These comments clearly illustrate that there are lots of angry, embittered, likely white, likely male humans who find the arguments in this article insulting. And they should feel insulted. After all, they have spent the majority of the waking hours of their adult lives doing something they did not particularly want to do, and are irate at the thought that maybe, possibly, others may not want, and, GASP, eventually may not even NEED, to do the same as they. Because, perhaps, they look at the silver in their own hair, the lines around their eyes, growing deeper down their cheeks, feel a pain in their lower back that wasn't there the day before, and wonder, quietly, if they've been had.
We only get one of these life things. Nobody asks if they were productive enough, or a good enough employee, when they find they're on their deathbed. The only question that really matters is, "Did I enjoy that? Did I have a good time?"
What a waste, if the answer is no. I can think of few things more wasteful than that.
I feel like this article is missing an important point that maybe a lot of us are missing as well. We don't just work to make an "income" in order to participate in society. And our boss, ourself and shareholders aren't the only people that are benefiting from our work. Work, if done right, should be an act of service for the community in which we live. Our work is meaningful, not just because it helps you to pay the bills, but because it is a means in which we can make other peoples lives a little better. That is the essence of capitalism as I see it.
I am so sick of listening to employers complain about younger employees being non-invested or lacking work ethic. And while your article implies that a "career" is now considered by young employees to be less than appealing, because of the traditional demands of a "career" mentality, there is a solution for employers. There is a HUGE pool of people employers could hire who want to work, know what a commitment to a career requires, are used to the kinds of demands employers have historically imposed on employees, generally don't have family demands that interfere with job commitment, and in today's world are generally very healthy. That's right, retired workers who still want to work. So, until employers are willing to give up their outdated concepts about "older" workers and do away with the rampant ageism in HR they can shut the hell up about lacking a dependable workforce.
By way of explanation, I am 62 and retired. I started life in the corporate world (banking) and was doing well (promotions given, responsibilities added, people managed) and I bailed at 28. My last words to my boss were, "fuck you Betty, I quit". I realized the corporate life and all the ethical compromises I was being forced to make were just not for me. I have never been good at compartmentalizing my life.
I found various ways to participate in the economy that were not "careerist" and have lived quite a happy, comfortable existence.
I recognize the pressures are different now in the 2020's than they were in the 1980's but all the nonsense spewed in the article you referenced was being spewed back then too. Charley, I think the biggest question younger people should ask themselves when trying to think this through is how they will look back on the life they lived. I know that is a difficult thing to do in younger years but figuring out how to order your values and priorities matters.
As Bernaud Malamaud wrote in The Natural, “We have two lives... the life we learn with and the life we live after that."
It's almost as if capitalism is exploitative by design and consuming all of people's most productive years in order to enrich the bosses and shareholders while workers get screwed at every turn is the point. It's almost as if capitalism isn't really about lifting all boats with a rising tide, but is actually about extracting labor value from working people to make the rich richer. I feel like someone maybe wrote a book about this? Richard Marx or something?
So I am an adult at the end of my career, but I am watching my kids who are just starting out after finishing college. One they can't get a job out of college - they get offered contracts for a year - good pay but no benefits , no time off and when the year is over the job is over. Companies rarely hire directly anymore. Even when the kids apply to job directly to a company, it is a temp agency that contracts them and it is a contract job. Took 3 years and 3 contracts for my oldest to get hired as an employee - first time she has had sick days or any benefits, all their friends are the same.... Then there is my experience - 17 years at a job, and the entire department was mass outsourced to India. Getting on in age having to worry about my age making employment difficult, and looking at new jobs, even ones in my old pay range, a lot fewer benefits, expensive healthcare.... I think the layoffs allow employers out of grandfathered benefits, and start over the jobs at the same pay with no benefits. And yes I put in tons of overtime at no pay since I was salaried, lots of weekends and holiday work.... and still laided off... loved my job, thought it was a career - but it is a lie, young people listened to their elders and know it is a lie before they even start working.
Living in Europe as an expat, there are many things that frustrate me beyond measure. But one of the aspects I love is that you are not defined by your job. In many contexts, it's actually considered an egregious breach of etiquette to ask someone you don't know well what they do for a living. In the US, it's usually the first thing *everyone* asks in *every* context.
Couldn’t agree more. I’m 50 years old, a Gen-X’er, and have thought about many of the things the author says since my very first “professional” job. At a point I thought getting an MBA was the way out, it would allow me to find a job I really enjoyed. So, I went to a top 10 MBA program. Better career opportunities opened, and I chose to work for a nonprofit, which should be much more satisfying than working for a big corporation. I am now a VP at that nonprofit, so I have checked a lot of the “successful” career boxes… But I still don’t like my job enough to do it every weekday, using practically all my higher energy waking hours. And to think I have to do it for at least 15 more years in order to retire with a half-decent income is depressing. When I go to LinkedIn in (probably false) hopes to find greener pastures somewhere else, I sometimes find posts like “I love HR”, “I am so passionate about marketing”… really? Do people really love office jobs?
I'm not young anymore (43) and I've been in white collar work most of my career. I can't even count how many times I've been told "just put in more work now and you'll get that promotion soon" "show you're part of the team and the company will take care of you" etc. and other similar corporate talking points to make me stay later, produce more, or give up my weekends. As manager, I've even parroted some of those lines a couple times to my direct reports. I've realized that loyalty and commitment is not a two way street. Companies want you to give them everything all the time and be loyal to them, but they are only invested in you till the next downturn and would get rid of anyone who wasn't "exceeding" expectations. Which is crazy, because should we all be meeting the expectations they have for us, they definitely don't exceed my compensation expectations every year. So yes, I work hard and I am a team player, but I'm also looking for the next promotion outside the company and I'm ready to leave at a moments notice if a better opportunity came along. I no longer put any stock in the company taking care of me, I will take care of myself.
Another harmful effect of careerism is that it is used as a carrot to keep people in bad work environments with toxic supervisors or cultures. These environments perpetuate this myth that you have to stay in this particular job because it is a necessary step in your career, and to make a move would be detrimental and "set you back." You also see this come up with recruiters and hiring managers who look down on candidates for moving in and out of jobs every year or year and a half. I work with recruiters and this always comes up on panels, and they tend to have a bias that favors the manager and is skeptical of the worker. It's a really unhealthy power dynamic.
We live in a new Gilded Age. The gap between rich and poor is the widest it's ever been, and we should be treating Bezos and Musk not as capitalist paragons but as the robber barons they truly are.
This article opens up an interesting and somewhat predictable dialog, but suffers by using one single example as a bellwether for all of corporate life, uses unnecessary vulgarities, uses pigeon holing terms like white males, and incendiary comments like 'burn the system down'. A few thoughts from someone who has worked 45 years for companies big, small, and my own: 1. No one is ever promised a rose garden, and there are speed bumps in life. As a white male I have been passed over by females lesser qualified than myself because the company had to fix the optics about female employees, I have been fired by idiot owners, and corporate changes downgraded my current position, but each time I picked myself up and moved on. I did not complain about sexism or racism or whatever. Along the way my wife and I saved a lot, did not go on expensive trips or own fancy cars, and now we own a nice home in a rural area, have no debts, and can pay it forward by ensuring our grandsons' future education. 2. The only one who will help your career is you. Forget HR or the endless self-help industry. 3. Annual reviews are a total waste of time. I decided when it was time to move on, and I found the new job or new company. 4. Discover your passions, and find jobs/careers that play to that. If you don't like what you do it will show every day and color your daily existence which is not healthy. 5. If you decide to get into a 'soft' field that doesn't require a lot of skill like retail, food service, etc., don't expect that it will provide you security and a good salary. Get an education from a good school in a profession like medicine, science, engineering, accounting, teaching. You will have to work hard for the education, but you will have a life long demand for your skills. 6. Universal income, aka socialism, is a great idea that has never worked. In Russia the heads of the party all had dachas on the Red Sea, not exactly equal to others living in squalid drab small apartments in Moscow. In Cuba everyone remains poor and they drive cars from the 1950s. Yes they have universal medical care but where do people go for a tricky operation-Cuba or the US? The people with money that you want to tax even more to realize your universal income have complete mobility and will leave: witness the many leaving CA for TX and other states. 7. Yes there are many bad managers our there. Only maybe 3 or 4 managers in my 45 years actually understood how to do it right, despite endless books on the subject. In my view, the problem is ego and hubris once a person becomes a manager, or in some cases inability to lead the charge to a larger vision. 8. Finally, if you think business is easy, go start a business, take the risks, invest your own money, find out everything is not red and green, and experience the endless compromises you have to make. That is why entrepreneurs sometimes make a lot of money-they took the risks that you won't. 9. The biggest problem in the US today is economic. We ceded middle class jobs in manufacturing decades ago to China, and the result is mainly service jobs are left which don't pay well and are less secure. Meanwhile all of our $ go to Asia, with the result that they are buying up businesses, land, homes, and have control over our economy. No politician on either side understands this. Meanwhile federal and state governments keep spending money that they don't have. 10. Be a life long learner, not a life long whiner. And yes, listen to us senior citizens. We have learned more than you have about life. Never mind that you can download and fiddle with your latest phone app faster than us-what is important, as this article shows, is PEOPLE. Good luck in life.
I'm 67 years old and I've been retired since 2014. These past few years have been the best ones of my life. Like the younger people mentioned in this story, I too, have struggled with the meaning of work and to have some sort of work-life balance throughout my "career." I lived in a different time, when housing was less expensive and I came out of graduate school without debt, so I was able to eek out a living by trying to work part-time and taking time off between jobs to get a break. The Gen X and Gen Zers have my sympathy. I hope that one silver lining of the pandemic is a true grass-roots labor movement of people who refuse to sell their souls to corporate America. I will leave you with this quote by Lily Tomlin that has inspired me throughout the years, "The problem with the rat race is that, even if you win, you're still a rat."
This is why we are becoming the softest country in the world and a laughing stock. This much complaint over the possibility of working in an air-conditioned office every day? across the world people are dealing with real problems; fleeing for their life's. Now us, facing no true adversity, are creating issues, acting entitled to everything and working for none of it. You know how big corporations are built? Through an amount of work that is unfathomable to you. The amount of work that it takes to build a successful company cannot be quantified. That's why you aren't successful. Instead of being motivated and working harder to change your station in life, you are stamping your feet and throwing a tantrum. It is mind boggling the amount of backwards thinking and the ability to victimize yourself on this thread. Grow up and make something of yourself, you aren't entitled to anything deadbeat.
These comments clearly illustrate that there are lots of angry, embittered, likely white, likely male humans who find the arguments in this article insulting. And they should feel insulted. After all, they have spent the majority of the waking hours of their adult lives doing something they did not particularly want to do, and are irate at the thought that maybe, possibly, others may not want, and, GASP, eventually may not even NEED, to do the same as they. Because, perhaps, they look at the silver in their own hair, the lines around their eyes, growing deeper down their cheeks, feel a pain in their lower back that wasn't there the day before, and wonder, quietly, if they've been had.
We only get one of these life things. Nobody asks if they were productive enough, or a good enough employee, when they find they're on their deathbed. The only question that really matters is, "Did I enjoy that? Did I have a good time?"
What a waste, if the answer is no. I can think of few things more wasteful than that.
I feel like this article is missing an important point that maybe a lot of us are missing as well. We don't just work to make an "income" in order to participate in society. And our boss, ourself and shareholders aren't the only people that are benefiting from our work. Work, if done right, should be an act of service for the community in which we live. Our work is meaningful, not just because it helps you to pay the bills, but because it is a means in which we can make other peoples lives a little better. That is the essence of capitalism as I see it.
I am so sick of listening to employers complain about younger employees being non-invested or lacking work ethic. And while your article implies that a "career" is now considered by young employees to be less than appealing, because of the traditional demands of a "career" mentality, there is a solution for employers. There is a HUGE pool of people employers could hire who want to work, know what a commitment to a career requires, are used to the kinds of demands employers have historically imposed on employees, generally don't have family demands that interfere with job commitment, and in today's world are generally very healthy. That's right, retired workers who still want to work. So, until employers are willing to give up their outdated concepts about "older" workers and do away with the rampant ageism in HR they can shut the hell up about lacking a dependable workforce.
So much in this post....
By way of explanation, I am 62 and retired. I started life in the corporate world (banking) and was doing well (promotions given, responsibilities added, people managed) and I bailed at 28. My last words to my boss were, "fuck you Betty, I quit". I realized the corporate life and all the ethical compromises I was being forced to make were just not for me. I have never been good at compartmentalizing my life.
I found various ways to participate in the economy that were not "careerist" and have lived quite a happy, comfortable existence.
I recognize the pressures are different now in the 2020's than they were in the 1980's but all the nonsense spewed in the article you referenced was being spewed back then too. Charley, I think the biggest question younger people should ask themselves when trying to think this through is how they will look back on the life they lived. I know that is a difficult thing to do in younger years but figuring out how to order your values and priorities matters.
As Bernaud Malamaud wrote in The Natural, “We have two lives... the life we learn with and the life we live after that."
It's almost as if capitalism is exploitative by design and consuming all of people's most productive years in order to enrich the bosses and shareholders while workers get screwed at every turn is the point. It's almost as if capitalism isn't really about lifting all boats with a rising tide, but is actually about extracting labor value from working people to make the rich richer. I feel like someone maybe wrote a book about this? Richard Marx or something?
So I am an adult at the end of my career, but I am watching my kids who are just starting out after finishing college. One they can't get a job out of college - they get offered contracts for a year - good pay but no benefits , no time off and when the year is over the job is over. Companies rarely hire directly anymore. Even when the kids apply to job directly to a company, it is a temp agency that contracts them and it is a contract job. Took 3 years and 3 contracts for my oldest to get hired as an employee - first time she has had sick days or any benefits, all their friends are the same.... Then there is my experience - 17 years at a job, and the entire department was mass outsourced to India. Getting on in age having to worry about my age making employment difficult, and looking at new jobs, even ones in my old pay range, a lot fewer benefits, expensive healthcare.... I think the layoffs allow employers out of grandfathered benefits, and start over the jobs at the same pay with no benefits. And yes I put in tons of overtime at no pay since I was salaried, lots of weekends and holiday work.... and still laided off... loved my job, thought it was a career - but it is a lie, young people listened to their elders and know it is a lie before they even start working.
Living in Europe as an expat, there are many things that frustrate me beyond measure. But one of the aspects I love is that you are not defined by your job. In many contexts, it's actually considered an egregious breach of etiquette to ask someone you don't know well what they do for a living. In the US, it's usually the first thing *everyone* asks in *every* context.
Couldn’t agree more. I’m 50 years old, a Gen-X’er, and have thought about many of the things the author says since my very first “professional” job. At a point I thought getting an MBA was the way out, it would allow me to find a job I really enjoyed. So, I went to a top 10 MBA program. Better career opportunities opened, and I chose to work for a nonprofit, which should be much more satisfying than working for a big corporation. I am now a VP at that nonprofit, so I have checked a lot of the “successful” career boxes… But I still don’t like my job enough to do it every weekday, using practically all my higher energy waking hours. And to think I have to do it for at least 15 more years in order to retire with a half-decent income is depressing. When I go to LinkedIn in (probably false) hopes to find greener pastures somewhere else, I sometimes find posts like “I love HR”, “I am so passionate about marketing”… really? Do people really love office jobs?
I'm not young anymore (43) and I've been in white collar work most of my career. I can't even count how many times I've been told "just put in more work now and you'll get that promotion soon" "show you're part of the team and the company will take care of you" etc. and other similar corporate talking points to make me stay later, produce more, or give up my weekends. As manager, I've even parroted some of those lines a couple times to my direct reports. I've realized that loyalty and commitment is not a two way street. Companies want you to give them everything all the time and be loyal to them, but they are only invested in you till the next downturn and would get rid of anyone who wasn't "exceeding" expectations. Which is crazy, because should we all be meeting the expectations they have for us, they definitely don't exceed my compensation expectations every year. So yes, I work hard and I am a team player, but I'm also looking for the next promotion outside the company and I'm ready to leave at a moments notice if a better opportunity came along. I no longer put any stock in the company taking care of me, I will take care of myself.
Some of us just don't feel like working 24/7 to make rich white men even richer.
Another harmful effect of careerism is that it is used as a carrot to keep people in bad work environments with toxic supervisors or cultures. These environments perpetuate this myth that you have to stay in this particular job because it is a necessary step in your career, and to make a move would be detrimental and "set you back." You also see this come up with recruiters and hiring managers who look down on candidates for moving in and out of jobs every year or year and a half. I work with recruiters and this always comes up on panels, and they tend to have a bias that favors the manager and is skeptical of the worker. It's a really unhealthy power dynamic.
We live in a new Gilded Age. The gap between rich and poor is the widest it's ever been, and we should be treating Bezos and Musk not as capitalist paragons but as the robber barons they truly are.
Read this yesterday, and there were very few comments. Upon my return, I see the corporatist status quo bootlicker boomers have logged on.
This article opens up an interesting and somewhat predictable dialog, but suffers by using one single example as a bellwether for all of corporate life, uses unnecessary vulgarities, uses pigeon holing terms like white males, and incendiary comments like 'burn the system down'. A few thoughts from someone who has worked 45 years for companies big, small, and my own: 1. No one is ever promised a rose garden, and there are speed bumps in life. As a white male I have been passed over by females lesser qualified than myself because the company had to fix the optics about female employees, I have been fired by idiot owners, and corporate changes downgraded my current position, but each time I picked myself up and moved on. I did not complain about sexism or racism or whatever. Along the way my wife and I saved a lot, did not go on expensive trips or own fancy cars, and now we own a nice home in a rural area, have no debts, and can pay it forward by ensuring our grandsons' future education. 2. The only one who will help your career is you. Forget HR or the endless self-help industry. 3. Annual reviews are a total waste of time. I decided when it was time to move on, and I found the new job or new company. 4. Discover your passions, and find jobs/careers that play to that. If you don't like what you do it will show every day and color your daily existence which is not healthy. 5. If you decide to get into a 'soft' field that doesn't require a lot of skill like retail, food service, etc., don't expect that it will provide you security and a good salary. Get an education from a good school in a profession like medicine, science, engineering, accounting, teaching. You will have to work hard for the education, but you will have a life long demand for your skills. 6. Universal income, aka socialism, is a great idea that has never worked. In Russia the heads of the party all had dachas on the Red Sea, not exactly equal to others living in squalid drab small apartments in Moscow. In Cuba everyone remains poor and they drive cars from the 1950s. Yes they have universal medical care but where do people go for a tricky operation-Cuba or the US? The people with money that you want to tax even more to realize your universal income have complete mobility and will leave: witness the many leaving CA for TX and other states. 7. Yes there are many bad managers our there. Only maybe 3 or 4 managers in my 45 years actually understood how to do it right, despite endless books on the subject. In my view, the problem is ego and hubris once a person becomes a manager, or in some cases inability to lead the charge to a larger vision. 8. Finally, if you think business is easy, go start a business, take the risks, invest your own money, find out everything is not red and green, and experience the endless compromises you have to make. That is why entrepreneurs sometimes make a lot of money-they took the risks that you won't. 9. The biggest problem in the US today is economic. We ceded middle class jobs in manufacturing decades ago to China, and the result is mainly service jobs are left which don't pay well and are less secure. Meanwhile all of our $ go to Asia, with the result that they are buying up businesses, land, homes, and have control over our economy. No politician on either side understands this. Meanwhile federal and state governments keep spending money that they don't have. 10. Be a life long learner, not a life long whiner. And yes, listen to us senior citizens. We have learned more than you have about life. Never mind that you can download and fiddle with your latest phone app faster than us-what is important, as this article shows, is PEOPLE. Good luck in life.
I'm 67 years old and I've been retired since 2014. These past few years have been the best ones of my life. Like the younger people mentioned in this story, I too, have struggled with the meaning of work and to have some sort of work-life balance throughout my "career." I lived in a different time, when housing was less expensive and I came out of graduate school without debt, so I was able to eek out a living by trying to work part-time and taking time off between jobs to get a break. The Gen X and Gen Zers have my sympathy. I hope that one silver lining of the pandemic is a true grass-roots labor movement of people who refuse to sell their souls to corporate America. I will leave you with this quote by Lily Tomlin that has inspired me throughout the years, "The problem with the rat race is that, even if you win, you're still a rat."
This is why we are becoming the softest country in the world and a laughing stock. This much complaint over the possibility of working in an air-conditioned office every day? across the world people are dealing with real problems; fleeing for their life's. Now us, facing no true adversity, are creating issues, acting entitled to everything and working for none of it. You know how big corporations are built? Through an amount of work that is unfathomable to you. The amount of work that it takes to build a successful company cannot be quantified. That's why you aren't successful. Instead of being motivated and working harder to change your station in life, you are stamping your feet and throwing a tantrum. It is mind boggling the amount of backwards thinking and the ability to victimize yourself on this thread. Grow up and make something of yourself, you aren't entitled to anything deadbeat.