The 37-Year-Olds Are Afraid of the 23-Year-Olds Who Work for Them (nytimes.com) 498
Twenty-somethings rolling their eyes at the habits of their elders is a longstanding trend, but many employers said there's a new boldness in the way Gen Z dictates taste. From a report: At a retail business based in New York, managers were distressed to encounter young employees who wanted paid time off when coping with anxiety or period cramps. At a supplement company, a Gen Z worker questioned why she would be expected to clock in for a standard eight-hour day when she might get through her to-do list by the afternoon. At a biotech venture, entry-level staff members delegated tasks to the founder. And spanning sectors and start-ups, the youngest members of the work force have demanded what they see as a long overdue shift away from corporate neutrality toward a more open expression of values, whether through executives displaying their pronouns on Slack or putting out statements in support of the protests for Black Lives Matter. "These younger generations are cracking the code and they're like, 'Hey guys turns out we don't have to do it like these old people tell us we have to do it,'" said Colin Guinn, 41, co-founder of the robotics company Hangar Technology. "'We can actually do whatever we want and be just as successful.' And us old people are like, 'What is going on?'"
Twenty-somethings rolling their eyes at the habits of their elders is a trend as old as Xerox, Kodak and classic rock, but many employers said there's a new boldness in the way Gen Z dictates taste. And some members of Gen Z, defined as the 72 million people born between 1997 and 2012, or simply as anyone too young to remember Sept. 11, are quick to affirm this characterization. Ziad Ahmed, 22, founder and chief executive of the Gen Z marketing company JUV Consulting, which has lent its expertise to brands like JanSport, recalled speaking at a conference where a Gen Z woman, an entry-level employee, told him she didn't feel that her employer's marketing fully reflected her progressive values. "What is your advice for our company?" the young woman asked. "Make you a vice president," Mr. Ahmed told her. "Rather than an intern." Starting in the mid-aughts, the movement of millennials from college into the workplace prompted a flurry of advice columns about hiring members of the headstrong generation. "These young people tell you what time their yoga class is," warned a "60 Minutes" segment in 2007 called "The 'Millennials' Are Coming." Over time, those millennials became managers, and workplaces were reshaped in their image. There were #ThankGodIt'sMonday signs affixed to WeWork walls. There was the once-heralded rise of the SheEO.
Twenty-somethings rolling their eyes at the habits of their elders is a trend as old as Xerox, Kodak and classic rock, but many employers said there's a new boldness in the way Gen Z dictates taste. And some members of Gen Z, defined as the 72 million people born between 1997 and 2012, or simply as anyone too young to remember Sept. 11, are quick to affirm this characterization. Ziad Ahmed, 22, founder and chief executive of the Gen Z marketing company JUV Consulting, which has lent its expertise to brands like JanSport, recalled speaking at a conference where a Gen Z woman, an entry-level employee, told him she didn't feel that her employer's marketing fully reflected her progressive values. "What is your advice for our company?" the young woman asked. "Make you a vice president," Mr. Ahmed told her. "Rather than an intern." Starting in the mid-aughts, the movement of millennials from college into the workplace prompted a flurry of advice columns about hiring members of the headstrong generation. "These young people tell you what time their yoga class is," warned a "60 Minutes" segment in 2007 called "The 'Millennials' Are Coming." Over time, those millennials became managers, and workplaces were reshaped in their image. There were #ThankGodIt'sMonday signs affixed to WeWork walls. There was the once-heralded rise of the SheEO.
I can understand why (Score:5, Insightful)
I can understand why gen Z is not willing to accept things the previous generations tell them. They have seen how that ends up - climate change, financial disasters, unaffordable housing, and an exploitative employer-employee relationship.
Maybe they don't have all the answers, but right now there are plenty of jobs and this is a chance to change things for the better. Good luck to them and I'll help where I can.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:I can understand why (Score:4, Insightful)
Millennials are the first generation to do worse than their parents since WW2. Gen Z are even more screwed.
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This is the interesting contradiction here. If Millenials and now Z are so disenfranchised, how is it they seem to have so much leverage in dictating terms? Companies are clearly terrified to tell them to just turn in their badge and take a hike.
Re:I can understand why (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, with attitudes and work ethics being expressed like this article has described, what else do they expect?
That job is not there to stroke their egos, nor bend to their virtues...it's a fucking job.
If you choose to trade your labor for wages, then that's what you do. You don't own the place, therefor you get to make no calls on direction, etc.
If you don't like it....leave.
Bottom line, a job is there to earn money, nothing more.
And the world is not here to cater to your needs, wishes or to protect you from triggers.
If the US keeps caving to this bullshit, we will fall soon and we have nothing to blame but ourselves and how we spoiled and mis-raised our latest generations.
You can rest assured that the rest of the world isn't concerned with someones fucking feelings over pronouns, or diversity quotas in business or military.
And they will overtake and overrun us in the long run if we don't get back to understanding priorities in the same manner that brought us to the lead over the past couple hundred years.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Interesting)
Bottom line, a job is there to earn money, nothing more.
Nope. That's never been true. Your job is a part of your identity. When you meet someone new, what's the first question asked? "What do you do for a living?"
There is a massive societal shift going on. After decades of pretending work is just a means to earn money, we are realizing work is much more than that. People have a fundamental desire to take pride in their work. It's why people are leaving their menial jobs in droves, and SpaceX is overwhelmed with job applications.
Work is about more than money.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Insightful)
All true no doubt but everyone can't work at SpaceX. It's just not possible. Everyone does need to have an income however. Work is a means to earn money. That's not all it is but it's a big part of the equation.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Insightful)
That's a fucked up way of thinking then.
The ONLY reason I work, is to fund the lifestyle and things I like to do in life.
If I won the lottery tomorrow, I'd leave skid marks out the door.
My job is enjoyable enough, all of them have been, but I'd not cast a shadow on ANY of them with my presence if I had the means to live my life without working.
I have plenty of hobbies and interests in this world I'd rather be doing and I only work to fund those.
A job is not you. It is merely a means to an end.
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I almost never ask that question - ever.
Good for you! You are a statistical outlier.
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do you immediately race to categorize/rank someone by their job/title/employer?
Why do you assume that I'm asking because I want to ascertain if I'm better than you or not? I'm not asking what company you work for or how much money you make. It's a really good way to find common interests to further conversation. I love what I do, and will happily gab someone's ear off about it, if that's what they want to talk about. There is nothing wrong with the question "what kind of work do you do?" as long as you're not a pretentious asshole about it.
How sad.
Indeed.
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If you are trading your labor for wages, that's a negotiation. Sometimes negotiations break down and the relationship ends (someone quits or gets fired).
It's a job, not a feudal system. An employee should be free to tell their employer what they expect in exchange for their labor. The employer can either agree, negotiation, or deny those expectations. Th
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Interesting)
Millennials and especially Gen Z have been raised (ironically by boomers and gen x) to believe they have a moral obligation to only do work that is consistent with their moral values
That's fine and good. No one should violate their morals and should at some point draw the line but I know plenty of older people who have worked as telemarketers because the pay was too good. I think what we are seeing is that in many cases it's easier to cave to the Gen Z's relatively cheap demands of putting pronouns on their emails than it is to pay someone more to "violate their moral code". When the demands become not worth it for the company, these people will be out of a job.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Interesting)
corporations love "perks" which cost them nothing
One of the perks my employer offers is that you can pick any job title you like. It is surprising how much this means to people, and it costs the company nothing.
One of the packers in the warehouse has the title of "Supreme Commander" printed on her business cards.
It's just a matter of numbers. (Score:4, Insightful)
If enough people insist on these kinds of changes, employers will be forced to cave in order to hire any talent at all. If only a small number of vocal people make these demands, then employers will have no problem replacing them and keeping their businesses going.
It doesn't really matter what is reasonable or who is right. The trend either has momentum or it doesn't, and that is a simple matter of numbers.
Re:I can understand why (Score:4, Interesting)
What in the world do "morals" have to do with work and earning a living?
You work where you can make the most money to live a comfortable lifestyle for yourself and your family while at the same time, being able to put away enough money to retire in comfort as soon as possible.
Of course I'm not talking about criminal deeds or the likes of "snuff pr0n"....but regular legal jobs.
All I can say is, if Suzy is in a huff about company A having a contract with another legal company....I'll be happy to take that high paying job and live a nicer life and retire a decade ahead of her.
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Re:I can understand why (Score:4, Insightful)
There's no reason to work for a company/manager who doesn't treat you with respect when there are plenty of companies/managers that will treat you with respect.
Yes, employees should be treated courteously and professionally at work. Some of the more unfair or abusive practices we hear about from big employers in parts of the US would probably be prohibited by law in places with better work cultures.
That said, expecting an employee to work their agreed hours, actually do the work instead of trying to push it onto someone else, and keep politics (and particularly any form of identity politics) out of the workplace is not disrespecting anyone. It's just asking for decent and professional behaviour.
For now, we're in a strange economic and social situation and many sectors are currently employee's markets. People can get away with a lot because there is huge demand for labour.
However, when the pendulum swings back to more of an employer's market, some of Generation Entitled are in for a nasty shock. Those who have a poor work ethic may find themselves still competing for the same entry-level, low-paid jobs at 30 or even 40, assuming they even have a job at all after the next generation enter the workforce and want to start climbing their own career ladders.
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I dunno, my worst tech job was awful, but it was still light years better than when I worked a summer at McDonalds with a crew chief who thought he was a drill sergeant.
Re: I can understand why (Score:5, Interesting)
What you say will not happen. GenZ is willing to bully, tantrum, boycott, and harass until they get their way. Thats what happened in 2020 and its what happens in the workplace. They will quit your job, badmouth your company as a racist and sexist organization and encourage their friends to boycott you too. They will take it online and make it a mission because they are activists with a cause first after growing up with vapid lives. You have to find meaning somewhere even if it means tilting at windmills.
Re:I can understand why (Score:4, Insightful)
And there is little appetite for going back and doing it like the post-WW2 generation did it. Which, sadly is now not practical at all:
- The US is no longer the singular, preeminent industrial power on earth, We're perhaps not even competitive, though that will take time to reveal.
- We've rebuilt our WW2 adversaries, and indeed built up even our self-proclaimed post-WW2 enemies. Somehow it's not yet obvious that enriching your enemies has negative impacts on you...
- We've also strayed from a society that encouraged personal responsibility, and in so many ways. As an extreme example, if you choose the most useful cause, you can burn, loot, and murder, and be let go. Not even charged. That has predictable consequences.
But Gen Z doesn't want to burn, loot, or murder. They just want. And expect. Some do not quite accept that effort or even delayed gratification is the path to all they desire, and of course not. They were taught differently.
I'm obviously a full-fledged Boomer. I hope not to outlive my great blessings, but I may yet live to see all taken away, But one great ray of hope, I see at my work that the Gen Z interns and newly hired are energetic, capable, and eager to do better. Maybe we're lucky in hiring, but there are many great people out there in every generation. We need to encourage them to lead.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Insightful)
But Gen Z doesn't want to burn, loot, or murder. They just want. And expect. Some do not quite accept that effort or even delayed gratification is the path to all they desire.
My grandparents worked on a farm to literally put food on the table. My parents worked to earn a salary, then bought their food from a local grocery store. My child can make a few taps on his phone and have food delivered right to the door.
Our children are growing up in a world where, when they want, they order, and someone delivers. Literally, and usually within two days. Of course there is no delayed gratification.
But what will inevitably be our downfall is when my child, or my child's children, no longer know how to create and maintain the infrastructure that makes this lifestyle sustainable.
Re: I can understand why (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: I can understand why (Score:5, Funny)
We need a new designation: Anecdotal Coward
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Re: I can understand why (Score:4, Insightful)
For one, you never learned that the plural of anecdote is not data.
This entire story is nothing but anecdotes. How are they worse off?
Re: I can understand why (Score:4, Insightful)
Anecdotes stating that you were indeed able to pay off your college loans don't change the fact that the vast majority of people are still knee deep in college loans more than a decade after leaving college. I too was able to use my degree immediately and was able to pay off my loans in 6 years.
I had an apartment I shared with 2 others throughout college and lived on $600/month which had to pay for food, insurance, cell phone, my share of utilities and rent. The same apartment today is more rundown, as that was almost 20 years ago, and now goes for about 75% more money. Internet is almost twice as expensive now as well and we were excited sharing a one-way cable modem using a linux server as a router. The college I went too now has dorms so that probably helps but is probably still a fair bit more expensive. The reality though is that the younger ones do indeed have it harder in a lot of ways.
I grew with technology when it was very basic and have grown as the technology has. So containerization for me isn't some fancy new tech so much as evolution of existing tech I already knew. They have to learn it all from scratch which is quite a mountain to climb now.
I work with plenty of Gen Zers and I'm certainly not scared of them. Just like my fellow millenials there are some I trust because they have a strong work ethic and value integrity and then there are others that I don't waste my time on, not because of their age but because of their attitude. It has served me well, I try to do what I can to learn from anyone I can, when someone with less experience looks at a problem they view it through totally different eyes and that sometimes has value so its always worth hearing them out. The same goes for Zers or geezers.
I don't blame them for being disillusioned with the system the way it is, I am too. The difference is that years of having to navigate the system has shown me that there are some things I can change and some things I can't. As long as we live in a society with artificial scarcity we will continue to have the same problems generation after generation. I don't know how we fix it but the wealth disparity we have now is a very real problem and is comparable to the era of robber barons.
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"Internet is almost twice as expensive now"
WW2 folks didn't even have access to the internet for $100k/month. They also would have had to spend millions of dollars to have a computer that was a fraction as capable as what most teens carry in their pockets.
NASA would have wet themselves if they could have had access to a $35 Raspberry Pi when going to the moon.
So, internet is a little more expensive that it used to be but computers are 1/1,000,000 as expensive as they used to be.
Re: I can understand why (Score:4, Informative)
We're not talking 60 years ago, we're talking less than 20 years ago. It was the era of unlimited AOL for $20/month. I was building computers for $600 to $800 then that yeah, weren't anywhere near as powerful as computers today but that's not the point. While my Internet is quite a bit faster today, the cost of it has significantly outpaced other technological advances. Back in those days I would say that I would never spend more than $200 on a video card, that is far from the case today.
With cable and data caps increasing the cost of service today they are making it less accessible which is partly by design. If I want unlimited Internet these days I have to pay an extra $50/month. The entire bill used to be that with one-way cable which required all the same infrastructure in addition to POTS infrastructure.
The world is changing, dare I say a college kid could not survive on $600/month anywhere in Tempe, AZ. anymore
There isn't much we can do about that. I had the advantage of having access to VSAC loans which were less than 2% interest. Basically funds the service and subsidizes those that couldn't afford it. Very reasonable. Not all states have the same deal so people end up with private loans to the tune of 4% if you're lucky but often 6% to 8% or even higher since students have no credit history. Interest rates across the board are higher now and have been for quite some time.
My first credit card was 7%, today you can rarely find one less than 12% with a 800 credit score. It's usually 18-26% which I can't stand as I feel its not even worth my time to open the envelope for a rate that bad, not that I would actually get a credit card from a mailer in the first place.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Insightful)
Hi millennial here. I make more money than my parents combined. My house is worth over twice my parents house. How am I worse off?
You do understand what an outlier is, right? Did you actually think AmiMoJO meant there are literally no millennials who did better than their parents? Or that everyone in previous generations did better than their parents?
To give you actual numbers, 90% of children born in 1940 out earned their parents (in real dollars). By 1980 that had dropped to 50%. Time will tell if AmiMoJo's prediction will hold true for millennials, but most predict she will be correct.
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It's also nonsense. Economic and medical issues have made life far more difficult for generations of entire nations. Being in the _midst_ of a genocidal war is horrific for many, if not all, the inhabitants of various nations.
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If the minimum wage had kept pace with productivity, it would be $24/hr today. https://cepr.net/this-is-what-... [cepr.net]
The standard of living has dropped You now have a generation that is doing worse than their parents.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Interesting)
I try to be careful about all these memes about what people in "generations" are like. There are 72 million millennials, for example, and the media writes about them like they all hatched out of the same cloning pod.
Here's the thing -- every last damn generation is dominated by mediocrity, because is defined by what is *about average*. The world has always got by on most people being more or less mediocre, and depended upon a small number of people in each generation outperforming that baseline. What would the world be like if every last person was like the *average* person *you* went to school with?
Now a societies do evolve and change, and the media explains those changes as the novel characteristics of a personified "generation" because personification is the lazy thinker's preferred explanation for everything. Sure you can find anecdotes of nightmare workers who insist that their work take back seat to their yoga classes, and no doubt that does happen if you are talking about a large enough sample of people. But it's about as sensible to think that people do that because of when they were born as to believe the Chinese zodiac year stuff printed on restaurant menus.
If someone doesn't want to work when yoga class is on, that's not because that person is the apotheosis of a generation, it's because they think their economic value to the boss is high enough that the boss has to put up with their bullshit. And if they don't get fired, they're *right*. That's the big, society wide change: putting up with bullshit is now a two-way street. Less BS is tolerated from the boss, more from the subordinate.
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Here's the thing -- every last damn generation is dominated by mediocrity, because is defined by what is *about average*. The world has always got by on most people being more or less mediocre, and depended upon a small number of people in each generation outperforming that baseline. What would the world be like if every last person was like the *average* person *you* went to school with?
New York City has decided to attempt to find out. They're eliminating their gifted program [seattletimes.com]. Now all students will enjoy equally pathetically bad teaching. Mediocrity will rule. Exceptional people will be left with their potential undeveloped, stunting generations of American innovation, growth, and the prosperity it might have brought. Unless they're rich enough to go to private school, of course.
All because some kinds of kids don't test well and come from a culture which explicitly does not want them
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Every generation thinks they will simply supplant the generation that came before. The truth of the matter is that by the time these people end up in any real position of power, they will be part of the machine they sought to change when they were new. They will then have a vested interest in the machine not changing, so they can hold onto their own power.
Welcome to the unending cycle. Very few disruptors change very much at all.
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Re:I can understand why (Score:4, Insightful)
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It is unfortunate that nobody has told these children what the results were the last every time anyone tried their preferred solutions: starvation, concentration camps, mass censorship, ubiquitous surveillance societies, and empire.
Re: I can understand why (Score:2)
Re: I can understand why (Score:4, Interesting)
There's lots of "someone do something" from both old guard and new guard.
They're generally the loudest bunch by far too...and equally the least effective.
But there's the equal problem of people feel the need to do/change/fix something (anything) to justify their existence. Politicians passing ridiculous, reactive, and largely misguided laws are a good example.
P.s. younger generations have LOTS of answers. We all did when we were young - then we grew up and realized some of them were really, really dumb. The others, assuming we grew our careers too, are stuff we should be implementing. Just like younger generations need a filter of experience, older generations need a seed of new ideas. They aren't mutually exclusive.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Insightful)
Those Stodgy Boomers, use to be Hippies who did not to trust anyone over 30 years old. When they got into their 30's they became ultra conservative yuppies. ...
Those Gen Xers who are the backbone of the Economy, use to be the Lazy Slacker Generation who never did any work. Until they needed to get work done.
It is like kids and young adults try to play by their own rules, only to have real life get in the way and make them play by the established rules.
This isn't to say that they are just going threw a phase and will get over it, the older generations should listen and learn from the younger ones too. As often our established methods and habits, make actually be out of date and counter productive.
The coding I did 20 years ago, assumed that the CPU was the speed bottleneck, So we often precalculated lookup tables and had the results available storage which was faster to read from storage than to do the calculations. Today with muli-core CPU's and GPU's Ill just have the computer do the real time calculation, as it is faster for the computer to do the math, than it takes for the Bus IO to find and send back the response. I had changed my tactics over time, because while I was a kid, I was challenging all the old timers who were thinking of storage in terms of Tape and magnetic media, and were making slow programs, because the CPU was jammed doing all the same calculations over and over again, where the Bus speed of Cached Hard Drives, and RAM Bus was often faster to look it up and calculate. Now today, the new kids will challenge me on why I am doing it that way, as the computer already has many idle cores, which you can take advantage of, and not slow down the Bus with calculations that take the same amount of time or less.
The younger generation needs to know why we do things the way we do, because often experience has overwritten our high minded ideas. But also we should listen the the younger generation as they have an outsider view of the problem and can propose a solution that is more in tune with the modern conditions.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Informative)
The vast majority of Boomers were not hippies.
Re:I can understand why (Score:5, Insightful)
I can understand why gen Z is not willing to accept things the previous generations tell them. They have seen how that ends up - climate change, financial disasters, unaffordable housing, and an exploitative employer-employee relationship.
I read the article a few days ago and working regular hours and being available to others in the office doesn't really factor into all that...
Mr. Kennedy interviewed a Gen Z candidate for a full-time position who asked if she could stop working for the day once she’d accomplished the tasks she’d set out to do. He responded that her role was expected to be a nine-to-five.
Ali Kriegsman, 30, co-founder of the retail technology business Bulletin, wasn’t sure, in the past, how to respond when her Gen Z employees insisted on taking days off for menstrual cramps or mental health: “Hey I woke up and I’m not in a good place mentally,” went the typical text message. “I’m not going to come in today.” Instinctively Ms. Kriegsman wanted to applaud their efforts to prioritize well being — but she also knew their paid time off could undercut business.
I can sympathize with that last bit but work is a job, not a frelling hobby. I'm sure we've all gone into work on days when we didn't want to or feel like it or stayed longer then we needed to, but we did because others were relying on us to be there or be available.
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Decline of the Empire (Score:5, Insightful)
With America's strength waning (and efforts to increase its strength only hurting us, e.g. the China "Trade War") and China and Russia's gaining influence, that dream began vanishing for many millenials. The "middle-classification" of America, which happened to combat communism, ebbed back in the direction of the Gilded Age -- where wealth even more disproprotionately concentrated at the very top.
Today a 35-year-old millenial couple with both partners working makes the same as a single-man earner in the 1970s when adjusted for inflation.
So, Millenials took to propaganda to get everyone to "hustle hard" and work even harder, as workers got squeezed.
Now Gen Z is seeing through that, at the same time they've been raised in a culture of several generations of privilege without WWI/WWII-era grandparents to tell them about how hard things could be. They don't want to be the next generation to get squeezed, which looks like 24/7 "availability" connected to phones getting pinged at all hours under the guise of "flexible work arrangements."
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2019: Millennials are a bunch of whiney twats who have an insane sense of entitlement and self importance. They don't know real work like the boomers did. Oh their music sucks too.
2021: Millennials are a bunch of hardarses squeezing every last drop of work out of all employees. Gen Z is seeing through that and all Millenial privileges.
Interesting. Gen Z looks like the first generation to get a free pass from being called whiney slackers and we're supposed to support them. As a matter of interest what do you
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Once Gen X r
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Who?
Re:Decline of the Empire (Score:5, Informative)
Source [epi.org]
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Today a 35-year-old millenial couple with both partners working makes the same as a single-man earner in the 1970s when adjusted for inflation.
That's not even close to true. Purchasing power is basically flat on an individual basis, and multi-income households have substantially increased purchasing power. Kids don't really realize how much more frugal people in the past were.
https://www.pewresearch.org/fa... [pewresearch.org]
People Who Bring Nothing to the Table (Score:5, Insightful)
No experience, just demands. The companies that entrust management to the Gen Z's who want to run things but haven't proven themselves or contributed as much as others; those companies will be 'agile': fail fast, fail often.
I must be getting old (Score:5, Insightful)
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Time Cube is REAL and this is PROOF!
Universal basic income the only way forward (Score:3)
Automate automate automate. Some humans operate as robots. I mean, bureaucrats, they are assigned a task and do it according to the rules. If your job does not entail acting like a human being, then of course a robot can replace it. With UBI, you may get the robotâ(TM)s paycheck or part of the r fruits of its labor but if you are doing something redundant and following a fixed set of instructions or rules .. then wtf are you but a robot? I am talking at places like the DMV or other agencies, banks, especially you can see that. If you merely follow a set of rules, then what is the point of being human? Be careful not to twist what I say, I am not saying we do not need rules, of course we need them. I am saying if YOU follow instructions and rules blindly, then the human element is missing from what you do. That makes you stealing the job of robot, and of course robots bring the most economic value at least in the short term.
Re: Universal basic income the only way forward (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah we've been hearing about the AI-pocolalypse for over a decade now, and here we are in 2021 where a relatively large number of people are quitting their jobs to get higher paying ones.
If everything you needed in life was automated, you wouldn't even need a job, let alone UBI.
Re: Universal basic income the only way forward (Score:2)
Society increases or decreases efficiency to match the labor pool. That's why pour over coffee is all the rage. We found something that a drip coffee maker can do with a push of a button, but now we add a professionally trained barista to pour the water from a kettle, thus making the whole process of getting a coffee massively less efficient.
Re: Universal basic income the only way forward (Score:5, Insightful)
If everything you needed in life was automated, you wouldn't even need a job, let alone UBI.
It's always adorable when people think that automation is going to be doing work to benefit everyone, and not just a lucky few. Perhaps the tooth fairy will be delivering your free stuff you apparently thing automation will be producing for you.
Won't last (Score:5, Insightful)
It's all fine and good to push you personal agenda -- BUT if it affects the bottom line or put the company at a competitive disadvantage or out of business, then you might find yourself out of a job with less power & options than you think you have.
I don't think any business should feel compelled to make any political statements (unless it's part of their core business), as you can easily alienate a large customer base if you don't stay neutral. Of course they should and are required to support all laws regarding equal opportunity, labor laws, etc., but they don't have say they are pro-X or anti-Y.
And here's the thing a lot of 20 somethings don't get, lots of countries and foreign businesses don't give a rat's ass about this stuff -- they are out to compete in a global marketplace. I'm concerned that the US is going to hamstring itself globally with some of the shifts. To be clear, I do support fair pay, good work/llife balance and such -- but... people need to remember businesses, small or large, need revenue if you want a steady paycheck.
Re: (Score:2)
It's all fine and good to push you personal agenda -- BUT if it affects the bottom line or put the company at a competitive disadvantage or out of business, then you might find yourself out of a job with less power & options than you think you have.
Whether or not it lasts will mostly have to do with whether or not companies can ignore these requests without it affecting their bottom line. Companies aren't accommodating these employees because of the one or two vocal trouble makers, it is because they need to find new hires and new customers within this new generation. I assume this current labor shortage is giving workers a bit more power temporarily, but some change happens as any generation enters the workforce.
It will all come down to how important
Re: (Score:3)
Well, there's a couple other items you might have missed.
First, there is a constitutional entry right up top for gun rights.
There are a LOT of gun owners in the US, and after the past 2 years...there are even MORE of them, and those folks aren't going to want to give that up or have it taken away from them any time soon.
The 2A folks have to be vocal, in order to
Re:Won't last (Score:4, Insightful)
The Constitution literally spells out the right of the people to keep and bear arms. It's in laughable clear language. Before you try any more obfuscation let me ask you a question, and I'll assume English is your first language.
You walk in to a bodega and there's a sign "Due to thefts by teens, backpacks will no longer be allowed in this store."
Now, as a native English speaker, let me ask you. You're 40 years old, does this sign mean:
A: You can wear a backpack, you're not a teen.
B: Nobody can wear backpacks.
The answer, of course, is B, and you have your answer about the completely clear meaning of the second amendment.
Re:Won't last (Score:4, Insightful)
An amendment meant to allow for states to and other local authorities to form militias
No. This gross misunderstanding of what the word 'militia' meant in the 18th century is getting super freaking old. Reasonable minds can readily disagree whether or not individual possession of firearms is a good idea, but arguments over whether or not that is encompassed by "the right of the people to keep and bear arms" are infuriatingly intellectually dishonest. It certainly didn't encompass the open and concealed carry people want to shoehorn into it today, but claiming that the clause referencing the militia - at the time, a body consisting of all able-bodied men and not under the control of the state or any other government until and unless it is called up - somehow undoes the five words that follows it just willfully ignores all reasonable statutory construction.
Re:Won't last (Score:5, Insightful)
then you might find yourself out of a job with less power & options than you think you have.
Who is out of options? The Gen Z'er who's just sick of the shit, or the employers who can't find any employees because an entire generation is sick of their shit?
Reality is: You're a business decision. Companies weigh up the value you provide vs the cost incurred by employing you. But that business decision is predicated on the larger market too.
When a person is a self-entitled twat who thinks the world revolves around them, it's not going to go well for that person.
When a generation is full of self-entitled twats who think the world revolves around them, it's not going to go well for the company looking for employees.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
No they don't. There's nothing irrational about pandering to someone you have a vested interest in pandering to. The company makes a decision based on public image. All companies aren't Comcast, they can't just survive on their monopoly status while at the same time being hated by customers, staff, and governments all at once. Avoiding being the target of outrage is a very common very rational business decision for many companies.
You seem to think twitter outrage isn't reality. It is. Those people who read
Re: (Score:2)
And here's the thing a lot of 20 somethings don't get, lots of countries and foreign businesses don't give a rat's ass about this stuff -- they are out to compete in a global marketplace. I'm concerned that the US is going to hamstring itself globally with some of the shifts. To be clear, I do support fair pay, good work/llife balance and such -- but... people need to remember businesses, small or large, need revenue if you want a steady paycheck.
True dat. One can have all the research in the world showing the importance of rain forests / equality / whatever. It's hard to care about all that when your country's economy is underdeveloped and has problems supporting the people it already has.
Re:Won't last (Score:4, Interesting)
The other side of the coin is the effect of this on work ethics. Yes, it's great that you get a lot of say in how we do things, and you don't have to be here 9-5 just for a shitty paycheck for doing a lousy job, and that the work itself is what motivates you to stay. But the reality is that sometimes work is just going to plain suck, and decisions will be made that you do not agree with. And sometimes, your ideas are going to suck too. At some point you will have to accept that you're not god's given gift to the company and that you're wrong. And that ultimately the company exists to make money, even if it's not at any cost.
Conviction and confidence are traits found in young people of any generation, but Gen Z it seems to be particularly incapable of accepting a disagreeabe situation, whether they actually have a point or not. That might be because they have been listened to too much, without telling them when they are wrong. The bottom line (in my somewhat limited experience in working with Gen Z) is: if you can put your own ego aside and keep an open mind, they are brilliant to work with, as long as they are intrinsically motivated. But when they are not, they are terrible.
Fear or Respect? (Score:2)
I don't see much fear in these examples. I see respect for these employees as people. These are extreme examples, but sure I would assume the workplace is going to continue to change as new generations start entering the workplace. Has that ever not been the case? Greater levels of communication over social media has probably led to each generation starting at the millennials to have a more defined identity (at a younger age) than previous generations. This may make things more noticeable but I don't think
I did the same (Score:2, Insightful)
I was helping my boss when I was 19, and was making my bosses serious money at 20. I was even asked how to go about doing things properly when I was 23 and was enlightening CEO at 24. Bought a bmw for my 25th with cash.
So I salute all those visionaries before me who understood and appreciated new generations and the new perspective they bring to the table.
But the majority of the Z people are just rude because they've had the modern "nothing off limits" upbringing. Someone needs to put a stop to that too.
So
Reasonable because business is war. (Score:2)
Business exist to exploit workers and workers exist to exploit their employers. Attrition on any side does not matter as workers can find other employment and failed businesses are instantly replaced by competitors.
The market is a perfect ruthless judge. I see no problem here. Oldsters can adapt and elevate problems about their liability/decisionmaking level. They don't have to like it. We're paid to work because work sucks.
Zero-sum game (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3)
People think I'm progressive because I favor gay people when hiring.
All I really care about is that they're less likely to take time off to take care of kids.
"Young people suck" is a tale as old as time. (Score:5, Insightful)
Youth is impatient as we all were at that age. These folks talk a big game and have all the answers when they aren't the ones in charge. But heavy is the burden of leadership. They'll understand that soon enough.
One thing though that no one is teaching these kids is "no one cares." Like literally, no one cares. Yoga. Your dog. Your life. The nonsense that happened over the weekend. It's all personal trajedies and no one cares.
In the meantime get to work. Do your job. Learn your craft. If you're not willing to do that, then quit. Or in the alternative I'll fire your ass and pay more to a Gen Xer who will. It's all good, no on is indispensable and you won't be missed. I'm far enough in my career that I don't have to give a shit what a 23 year old fresh out of their mother's vag thinks or values. I'm retired and on my boat in under 10 years.
The world continues to spin and the sun will rise from it's customary eastern location tomorrow.
Re: (Score:2)
"Youth is impatient as we all were at that age"
Impatient but also thinks it has discovered solutions that the oldies haven't**. Invariably we all find out as we age that the "solutions" we came up with had already been discussed and thrown out for being unworkable long before we joined the company.
** Ok, there are obviously cases where this is true or no progress would ever be made but in general its not.
Re: (Score:2)
"'no one cares.' Like literally, no one cares.... In the meantime get to work. Do your job. Learn your craft."
Would mod you up if I could.
Might be too easy to blame social media, but many peoples' obsession with likes/followers/etc seems to have gotten confused with the importance of actually DOING or PRODUCING something of actual value. There's a level of narcissism in the US these days that terrify me -- that one's opinions/values/rights are SO much better/more importance/etc than everyone else's. That's
Woke won. Tokens won. Hard work and integrity lost (Score:3, Insightful)
A crying - a possibly existential - shame that the divisive woke warriors are pulling the world apart just when it needs us to pull together.
Easy way to save money (Score:5, Insightful)
No problem. You complete your work by the afternoon you can clock out. You won't get paid for any of your remaining time, but you can clock out.
Oh, that's not what you meant? You wanted to get paid for a full shift but only work part of that shift? That's not how it works.
Apparently the idea more work might come in throughout the day never entered their mind.
Re:Easy way to save money (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Informative)
Neither are acceptable. You come in at your start time, you leave at your leave time. That is what you agreed to in exchange for your salary. You don't get to pick and choose.
This is what I told my millenail underling about leaving early (we're in IT). Imagine leaving five minutes early one day, and right afte
Re:Easy way to save money (Score:4, Insightful)
If you pay me for time, you get time. If you pay me for results, you get results.
Make up your mind.
Re: (Score:2)
If you consistently finish early, the way this is handled is as follows:
o Lower your salary to match hours worked
o Increase workload (with maybe a bump in salary). Note if work/per hour/per FTE can be outclassed by a single employee then this can reflects bad on management, as they'll need to better gage what an employee is expected to do over time.
o slow your pace so you dont get laid off and your work is split and given to two others who were retained.
I've seen all of these attempted at all levels. Plus
Re:Easy way to save money (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Easy way to save money (Score:2)
Perhaps. It depends on how her to-do list is created. If she was hired to a full time position and there's simply not enough work to fill one, then find her more work or let her not waste her time. If she is setting her own daily goals and is finishing by noon, then of course she needs to provide her time.
Re: (Score:3)
Apparently the idea more work might come in throughout the day never entered their mind.
Or you could be proactive and find more work to do...
I do not know where.. (Score:2)
I feel very sure that I’m uncool
I do not know where these people work, but sounds like they are all working as marketers. /. readers, at least in the past, never cared about "being cool". So just another fluff article.
So Wait (Score:5, Insightful)
So the younger generation thinks that they have all the answers and know better than the older generation? Stop the presses! This is the first time in history this has ever happened. Surely they are correct this time and won't fall into the same trap that their grandparents did.
This is spot on! (Score:5, Interesting)
Just wait... (Score:2)
Until these 23yo junior employees start becoming 30-something managers. All of sudden their "I can do whatever I want" attitude will disappear.
Hell is managing other people. And the younger the people you manage are, the more hellish it is.
I miss the days of "Just do your fucking job" as a motivational phrase.
This bullshit is isolated to a few cities mostly (Score:3)
I work on the East Coast in a major tech hub. The guy would have been laughed out of the room.
This sort of thinking only thrives in consequence-free zones like Silicon Valley where companies like Lyft and Uber are taken seriously rather than criminally investigated as amazingly elegant ponzi schemes utilizing securities law.
That's probably why I have never personally met a Zoomer who acts like this where I live. They'd never make it into a corporate office where the management isn't allergic to money.
In the late 90s I had a young boss (Score:5, Insightful)
I was approaching 30 in the late 90s. I had a boss who was 19. He wasn't my direct report, but he was up there and definitely a "boss". This guy earned it though--knew all our systems in and out, I think he started when he was 16 so had more experience than a lot of us, etc. Nobody should be afraid of a young person who's *capable*.
Arbitrarily endowing just any young person with responsibility beyond their experience seems just silly though. It's ageist, and a great way to destroy morale. Have at it. Smart people will be putting their resumes out, and it's not too hard to jump these days.
Fire them (Score:4, Insightful)
If your employees are a pain in your ass, fire them. It's a lesson many need to learn. I don't care what time your yoga class is, I'm paying you for you time. Don't like it here? Ok, leave.
Re: (Score:3)
then when you have fired your employees and find you can't hire replacements, bitch to the government and insist they import more captive workers for your failing business.
Because bullshit jobs? (Score:4, Interesting)
I was pretty proud of my role in a large bureaucracy, I thought my work had direct positive impact, because part of the job was to prove it, show the improved state of infrastructure for the replacement/maintenance money spent.
I was very taken by the book about "bullshit jobs" and how something like a third of jobs are not even needed - in the opinion of the guy doing it, because during my career, the bureaucracy I worked in also grew really fast, and it seemed like it now took multiple people to do the work expected of one, a decade earlier. (The work had certainly added a number of steps and checks.)
More than that, the management seemed to have developed an obsession with re-organization; there was always a re-org in progress, most of them needing years of work from several dedicated workers, and endless meetings with the people being re-organized. I could never detect any improvements from these exercises.
So the question arises: do these workers feel they can get away with any demands because they are NOT bullshit jobs, they're the ones really needed to keep the place running? Or is it because they are true bullshit jobs, needed only to make their managers look more impressive, which of course means the managers have to have somebody in the role, and their job is to appear to be necessary. Maybe they're good at THAT.
It's always the same (Score:4, Interesting)
1) we're young, we can change the world!!!
2) Look, we're changing the world!
3) wait...is anything really changing?
4) Hmm, that problem wasn't as simple as we thought...
5)The world is what it is.
6) Why do those silly young people think they can change the world?
This movie seems appropriate... (Score:3)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?... [youtube.com]
Method Matters (Score:5, Insightful)
It's absolutely 100% good to come in and expect that your culture (or a new culture) be recognized as valid. However, we need to make sure that veterans of industry aren't just stepping out of the way because the new values are better values. There's still a lot to be said about operational experience and wisdom.
I work at a major public university. Every single year, we get new students who have been told they need to go out there an change the world for the better. They've been told that they know better than those older than them (more so recently). And they're bringing a lot of updated and improved principles. But they're bringing zero competency on operationalizing change. Their input is shallow:
- You should make it so...
- Why don't you... ?
- Why haven't you...?
- We shouldn't have to...
They've been taught how to create pressure from Karens and activists, but not told how to integrate into the system and make change themselves. Once they actually ask "Why?" and "How?", they find out that a LOT of the things we do are for VERY GOOD REASONS.
- Expense
- Privacy
- Risk
- Fair Wages
- Work-Life Balance
- Sustainability
- Legal Requirements
Let's just not mistake little Karens with good causes for people who have developed genuinely good ideas and competencies who just happen to be a little more abrasive than anticipated.
They are too entitled... (Score:3)
Re: (Score:3)
The pennies I pay to welfare give them something to lose.
You don't want to deal with a person who got nothing to lose.
Hourly? (Score:3)
Rules may vary, but salaried workers can often be more task focused and can take off early once "everything is done". Sure, not every place will allow that, but just means people are just going to surf the Internet (or whatever) for the rest of the day.