Nobody wants to work anymore? Gee, I wonder why?
A couple of years ago, I wrote an article titled “Working hard is overrated and pointless“. In the article I talked about how hard work often gets you nowhere, and loyalty to your employer is stupid.
Nothing’s changed, and I still stand by that article. Working hard when you don’t receive anything extra for it in return is stupid.
Since the so-called “labor shortage” started in 2020, I’ve been hearing the older generation complain a lot about how nobody wants to work anymore, the younger generations don’t have any drive, they’re lazy, etc. These bootlickers will do all kinds of mental gymnastics to justify spending your life slaving away for peanuts, and it’s both sickening and infuriating to watch. I’ve never been a big fan of my own generation or the younger generations, but in this case I think they’re absolutely right to not want to work.
First let’s look at that statement. “Nobody wants to work!” Who the fuck actually wants to work? I don’t know about you, but I only work because it’s required to make money. I don’t drag my ass out of bed every morning and sit in traffic for half an hour because I genuinely want to. If we lived in a perfect world where everything was magically provided and money didn’t exist I sure as hell wouldn’t do any of this shit, and anyone who would is a masochist. Don’t confuse necessity with desire. In the case of working, most people only “desire” to do it because it’s a necessity. Of course I don’t want to work, but I have to so I can pay my bills. I can think of a million different things I’d rather be doing with my time than acquiring paper with an imaginary arbitrary value.
I can’t blame anyone for not wanting to slave their life away, especially not with what employers pay now. There’s not a “labor shortage” as much as there is an epidemic of employers who don’t want to pay their employees properly. No sane and reasonable person wants to spend ten hours a day dealing with bullshit while still not making enough money to survive.
The argument against paying workers more is that unskilled laborers are easily replaceable, and thus not worth as much as a skilled worker. And this argument is true. Anyone can run the cash register at McDonald’s, anyone can slice lunchmeat at the deli, anyone can work the assembly line at the Ford plant. Why should we pay someone $20 an hour when it’s something any idiot can do?
Unfortunately, this argument falls flat on its ass in 2024, with these companies not only automating more aspects of their operations and majorly reducing their overhead, but also reporting record profits in the process. These companies have jacked their prices up astronomically since COVID, justifying it with bullshit about “supply chain disruptions” and “shortages”. The cost of goods and services continues to climb, but employee pay has basically remained the same. Meanwhile the CEOs and other executives continue to give themselves pay increases as company profits soar. But you can’t pay your employees more money? I call bullshit.
Most of these menial jobs were never meant to be careers. Nobody was supposed to spend their entire life running the cash register at Walmart or grilling burgers at Applebee’s. The problem is, things have changed. We’re not living in a world where someone can scrape by on $7.25/hour. We’re not even living in a world where they can get by on $15/hour. Should these people be expected to hold multiple jobs just to survive?
The counter-argument to this is that these people could go to college or trade school and learn a skill that’s in demand. Yes, someone in poverty has the resources to drop tens of thousands of dollars to pursue “higher education”. Do they go to class before or after their third job? Fucking idiot. Do you really think that someone who’s already struggling to make rent every month could afford to go to college or trade school?
Not that a college degree really matters anymore. The job market in virtually every industry is flooded with people holding degrees that can’t find work. This also has the nice little added perk of allowing employers to underpay college-educated employees. Master’s degree? You get $35,000 a year. Don’t like it? Too fucking bad, there’s a million other people with the same qualifications that we can replace you with. Everyone has become expendable, even the people with degrees. I’ve seen jobs requiring Master’s degrees that only pay $15/hour. And somehow people are wrong for not wanting to work these jobs?
Of course, that’s if you’re actually lucky enough to get past HR’s automated filter and score an interview. Then you earn the privilege of jumping through a hundred more pointless hoops and blowing smoke up the company’s ass. This SMBC comic sums up my thoughts on the interview process entirely:
I get that you don’t want to hire some lazy apathetic bum, but let’s drop the false pretense and be realistic. You need a service. I can perform that service. You offer me money in exchange for that service. Don’t waste my time with these bullshit group interviews or panels or thought exercises that have no standing on whether or not I can do the job. The worst part is, you’ll go through five interviews only to get ghosted in the end. Employers should be required to compensate interviewees for their time. I guarantee that if employers had to pay interviewees most of the time-wasting hiring games would stop really fucking quick. Speaking as someone who has handled hiring and interviewing candidates, if it takes you more than two interviews to figure out if someone is a viable fit for a position, you’re a fucking idiot and shouldn’t be doing interviews.
In the unlikely event that you do manage to get an offer, it’s always a low-ball offer with little to no room for negotiation. If you’re really lucky you’ll get a just-barely acceptable offer that will hold you over for a couple of years until you can job-hop and repeat the process all over again. Then they complain that nobody wants to work anymore.
The hiring process is a giant game of herp-a-derp being refereed by retards. We’ve made the entire process needlessly painful and tedious. What’s so hard about looking at a collection of resumes, selecting a few qualified candidates, then calling them in and asking them about their work experience? Nothing is hard about it, you’re just an idiot trying to justify your useless HR job by making the hiring process more complicated than it needs to be. This generation has wisened up to the bullshit games and doesn’t want to play them anymore. The hiring process has become the world’s biggest shit show, and I don’t blame anyone for not wanting to take part in it.
It’s time to update our standards and accept that we need to either pay our workers a livable wage or stop unreasonably jacking up the prices of things. I’m all for capitalism and a free market, but it’s not capitalism to treat your employees like slaves, and it’s not a free market when giant companies actively collude with each other to raise prices and keep employee wages low. We need to bring all these fuckers up on RICO charges ASAP. If employers aren’t going to do the responsible thing then maybe it’s time for the government to intervene and hold them responsible via salary caps and forced price regulation. The government mucking around in our economy is the last thing I want, but I don’t see a future with another real option. We’re reaching a point of no return. How do you plan on making any money when nobody has any money to spend because you got greedy and jacked the price up to unreasonable amounts?
So no, I don’t blame anyone for not wanting to slave away their entire lives at some shitty job just to exist. The days of a fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay are long gone, replaced by excessive expectations for meager wages. Nobody should be expected to burn themselves out while not making enough to survive, and I’m glad to see the current generation pushing back against this bullshit.
Something has to be done soon, or society is going to collapse. We’re not slaves, we’re not machines, we’re human beings. Very pissed off human beings who are tired of the cost of living rising while pay stays the same. Nobody wants to work anymore and I don’t blame them. Stop playing games with hiring, pay your employees a reasonable wage, and treat them like goddamn human beings. Enough with the bullshit.