Seems that some people are willing to do so – even without a replacement job lined up. Business Insider has a survey which indicates a willingness by people to bail out on a job without much thought to consequences. All of us know the rule – never quit you job until you have another one lined up. But that rule is fading, fast, it would seem.
It is, though, a rule I’m still following. I pretty much despise my employer and get the distinct sense, when I go to work, that I’m working for the enemy. Just another faceless, mindless corporate blob run by people who haven’t the foggiest notion of what they’re doing (and, of course, they think they do know what they’re doing…and that just makes it worse). The only thing I can imagine being worse than working for Big Corporation would be to work for Big Government. I’ve got an iron in the fire to get out of it and I hope that 2011 will be the last year in which I work for Big Corporation. But, won’t quit until I’ve got something fairly secure lined up as an alternative.
But the survey linked above indicates that attitudes about this are changing. Why? I figure its two reasons:
1. Often you can obtain an ok living just by getting yourself on the varied government programs available for unemployed people. $300 a week in unemployment plus $350 month from food stamps coupled with various programs to subsidize your utilities and you can skate along for quite a while without having to lift a finger. I’m not saying it is wealthy, care free life…but for some people, it does beat the 9-5 grind.
2. Its hard to drive yourself to perform for idiots doing work which has no real point to it. A lot of work in modern America is just that – it might be financially rewarding, but you don’t produce anything and you don’t feel like at the end of the day you accomplished something. If you worked in mining you could measure how much ore you extracted; in manufacturing, how many items made; in farming, how many acres plowed…but working as a financial analyst churning out financial stats that no one will ever really read? Where’s the job satisfaction in that? Couple that with the knowledge that the people on top, who do no real work, are reaping vast sums while you might be lucky to get a 3% raise, and its easy to head for the door.
We live in a very sick society. Only part of us are well – those who do produce useful goods and services, day by day. Those who serve in our armed forces. Police and firefighters – the better part of the teachers, too. But probably a majority of us are infected by the sterile, pointless and ultimately soul-destroying modern way of living. We really need to change – back to a society which does useful work; back to a society which honors hard work, thrift and sobriety. We need, to put it in a nutshell, a revival of a human civilization.
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