The Great Resignation

What's been amazing to me about all of this is just how important momentum has proven to be in how people operate.

If you're working retail, service, food, hospitality, etc. This gave you a very long pause to stop, think, reevaluate and adjust.

Those sectors suck complete butt. Low pay. Long hours. Hard labor. Few benefits. And dealing with the public... During a pandemic. No thanks.

This could have been largely avoided if we had actually frozen people's wages/jobs in place.

It will take a long while to backfill the "lost" workforce. Probably 3 to 5 years. Maybe longer.

 

This is one reason why I've been thinking we should've been gradually decreasing benefits including expanded unemployment that were put in during the shutdowns. It's also an example of how the market is working to raise wages as demand for labor increases without the need for governments increasing the minimum wage.

 

I got a shiet raise so I'm looking as well. Not looking super aggressively, but at least am sending out some applications here and there. The only problem is that my current job is pretty easy-going, which is nice, so I basically want a 20% raise with the same easy-going workday! That might not be so easy to find but I'm trying.

 

Those benefits have been gone for months. That scapegoat is gone. It ain't the gubbermint checks responsible for this.

 

Maybe we could find a new creative way to reduce the average Americans' financial comfort to force them into jobs?

Foot on the neck always works noicely!

 

Fair enough.

 

That's not entirely true. What we've seen is that a ton of people made massively more money than they ever have before. And whether through financial responsibility or a lack of things to do during Covid, they saved much of that money and/or paid down massive amounts of debt. Covid funds along with suspensions of student debt payments/etc have basically been the biggest anti-poverty program in generations. As a result, many people are "wealthier" than they have been before and they are able to be pickier in choosing jobs or have the flexibility to wait a bit longer or try to change career paths. That explains the current weirdness of "lots of jobs" and "lots of unemployed people". Over time, however, that will revert - as Covid ends, people will start spending and build up debt as they always have. At that point, I suspect employment trends will revert as savings get drained, but right now, those government benefits are still having their effect because they went way beyond keeping people's incomes steady. Many low-wage workers made 2+ years of income in 1 year while also spending less, so they can afford to go a long while without employment for now.

 

I hope they don’t do blanket forgiveness. Some targeted forgiveness is fine. All the borrowers just got a massive benefit with two years no interest and the majority not effected economically by Covid at all. For many, that’s a large degree of forgiveness in of itself, paying down straight principal.

 

There's no doubt that student loan forgiveness would be a massive anti-poverty program in the short-term. But it doesn't solve the underlying college cost problem (and may heavily exacerbate it), and the big problem right now is we don't know what the effects of the Covid anti-poverty stuff is going to have longer term. Right now, we're having major economic disruptions - massive inflation, supply chain disruptions, the economics of a lot of small businesses are wrecked (though partially addressed through PPP loans depending on individual luck and circumstances), etc. But it's unclear if these are short or long term things, and it's unclear whether that's due to the Covid funds, the Covid disruptions, long-term structural changes from Covid, a perfect storm of lots of factors, etc. There's no doubt it's dramatically lowered poverty in the short term. But if it causes high inflation and a spike in interest rates for an extended period, it may be short-lived and it may end up reversing itself and/or causing new problems. Right now, I think the Covid funding gets an A for short-term effects but an Incomplete for long-term.

 

I was working remotely from March of 20 to August of 21.

I was able to quit pretending to work for 60% of my day which allowed to get a second full time job, which also only required about 40% of my time.

Net gain here was double my income, with 20% less time spent, all while saving money on commuting, food, getting more sleep, and seeing my young children more.

That all ended in August when we were forced back to work, for no reason whatsoever. Inevitably, I became discontent almost immediately and landed fulltime remote job starting Monday. I am also contracting back with old company because they cant replace my niche skillset when it comes to thier compliance reporting.

I dont know if I count as a great resignation person, but the pandemic sure did change everything for me.

 

Did you have the courtesy to tell each of the companies that you were working full time for, that you were spending half your work day time working for another company?

 

Probably just as much courtesy extended as the company reasons for not approving raises or subtly pressuring folks into working unwanted OT.

 

Nope.

I said, what do you need done and when do you need it by, as work should be.

 

For a lot of skills, companies should pay us for our talents and energy, with clear expectations, and not so much for hours in a certain chair.

 

Pure gold. Bragging working two jobs and doesnt understand why workers are being called back.

Our company tried to be edgy doing the work from home thing. It was very clear those who worked from home's productivity was much lower than those who showed up at the office. We knew who was working multiple jobs during work hours.

Personally, I find this practice unethical unless the employer gives their explicit blessing.

 

I agree. Its called consulting and contracting. Maximize the efforts and minimalize the BS. The best in industry often go this route.

 

Perhaps that was the case in your industry, it was not in ours.

Our revenue, productivity and morale were all up.

Our parent company, who frankly knows nothing about our people, customer, business, or processes, mandated the return from across the country. And now they have lost about 10% of their workforce, all star performers, and for what?

 

My wife is a business consultant for a global chemical company and said their productivity was up during work at home.

@Space Ghost lives in Florida though. Bath salts aren’t good for productivity.