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Why workers just won’t stop quitting

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21–27 of 27 posts

Re: Why workers just won’t stop quitting

#21
This "great resignation" thing is a fake story, a forced trend mainly created by the media after so many people were made redundant during the early days of the pandemic. What happened across the U.S. is that millions of people were paid more money in unemployment than they would have from working. Bartenders refrained from taking more hours because they could get partial unemployment. Not in every state, mind you, but most of them. So, when I say this is a fake narrative, I mean that it's written to convey it from an angle of volition and choice, when the primary factor in the "great resignation" is that it was governments, states, and cities that haphazardly shut things down and disrupted work. And I suspect stories like these are a way to retroactively shuffle off the blame, considering the general public has lost so much trust in traditional media.

Re: Why workers just won’t stop quitting

#22
post #8

I would say they should try listening to workers about what's bothering them but in general there's not enough trust for that to happen honestly. Lots of companies have tried using anonymous surveys but very few trust that they're actually anonymous. They've tried using "independent third parties" but since those companies are paid by the employer, there's very little trust that identities will be protected, which co…

Unions are not the salve for this. The great resignation is in effect an existential crisis for the working person. People are questioning their life values and gut checking their work prospects against it and making a change when necessary. The pandemic was a watershed moment for everyone to kind of wake up and say, “is this right for me?”

Yes, sort of, mostly because people were offered more money in unemployment than to stay at their jobs, which probably reduced the value of work itself in many's eyes.

Re: Why workers just won’t stop quitting

#23

I would say they should try listening to workers about what's bothering them but in general there's not enough trust for that to happen honestly. Lots of companies have tried using anonymous surveys but very few trust that they're actually anonymous. They've tried using "independent third parties" but since those companies are paid by the employer, there's very little trust that identities will be protected, which co…

Are you saying unionized workers aren’t leaving their jobs?

No they go on strike and punish everyone else instead of just their boss.

Re: Why workers just won’t stop quitting

#24
post #8

I would say they should try listening to workers about what's bothering them but in general there's not enough trust for that to happen honestly. Lots of companies have tried using anonymous surveys but very few trust that they're actually anonymous. They've tried using "independent third parties" but since those companies are paid by the employer, there's very little trust that identities will be protected, which co…

Unions are not the salve for this. The great resignation is in effect an existential crisis for the working person. People are questioning their life values and gut checking their work prospects against it and making a change when necessary. The pandemic was a watershed moment for everyone to kind of wake up and say, “is this right for me?”

But can someone explain how these people can afford to quit?

I’d quit too if I was independently wealthy. What are all these kids doing to feed themselves and pay rent?

Re: Why workers just won’t stop quitting

#25
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unions are not the salve for this. The great resignation is in effect an existential crisis for the working person. People are questioning their life values and gut checking their work prospects against it and making a change when necessary. The pandemic was a watershed moment for everyone to kind of wake up and say, “is this right for me?”

But can someone explain how these people can afford to quit? I’d quit too if I was independently wealthy. What are all these kids doing to feed themselves and pay rent?

It’s not just quitting. It’s quitting after finding a better opportunity. And there are lots of opportunities right now.

Re: Why workers just won’t stop quitting

#26

With inflation running at circa 10% and most people only having received a circa 3% payrise this year, the easiest way to make sure your salary keeps up with inflation is to jump roles and take a decent uplift in pay.

That’s the situation I found myself in this year. Thankfully finding a new job was pretty easy.

Re: Why workers just won’t stop quitting

#27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It used to be common knowledge that home ownership was the bedrock of American civil society. There's nothing like a 30 year mortgage and a couple of kids to keep a person locked in. My editorial opinion is that rich people got greedy and stopped caring about the middle class and upward mobility. They saw houses as an investment opportunity they could sell as securitized tranches to overseas buyers. So it's grab as m…

I see it as being connected to the dynamics of empire, more generally. Property ownership - and its enforcement by the state - extends vassalage to the masses, tying them up in the system in a way that rent alone can't: too invested to skip town, too small to have a voice in the legal framework. If you "drop out" and live modestly, there's much less coercion to be had. That means that as the empire tightens up contro…

The ugly reality is that this new generation gets bullied by very rich tyrants who own homes. Wall Street is a mafia of warmongering tyrants who don't care about human rights and people's well-being. It's been economically proven that America has been having decreasing social mobility. America's middle class is not shrinking for no reason. Very rich tyrants have been causing this decreasing social mobility, so they can hoard money into their private banks while many people suffer and die of starvation from increasing wealth inequality. It's what causes American cilivization to collapse. Some countries' rulers are not allies to America anymore because of this. American society has become dystopian against future generations' well-being. There are many ways to prove America is no longer a great country for everyone. It's corporate oligarchy that influences mainstream media to gaslight working class Americans about how great America is. Sad to see America become a dystopian dumpster fire where working class Americans are treated like dehumanized serfs who don't have enough money to own homes.
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