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Businesses United States

In This Economy, Quitters Are Winning (wsj.com) 307

An anonymous reader shares a report: Workers are choosing to leave their jobs at the fastest rate since the internet boom 17 years ago and getting rewarded for it with bigger paychecks and/or more satisfying work. Labor Department data show that 3.4 million Americans quit their jobs in April, near a 2001 peak and twice the 1.7 million who were laid off from jobs in April. Job-hopping is happening across industries including retail, food service and construction, a sign of broad-based labor-market dynamism. Workers have been made more confident by a strong economy and historically low unemployment, at 3.8% in May, the lowest since 2000. Ms. Enoch started getting interview opportunities the same day she began sending out applications online. The trend could stoke broader wage growth and improve worker productivity, which have been sluggish in the past decade. Workers tend to get their biggest wage increases when they move from one job to another. Job-switchers saw roughly 30% larger annual pay increases in May than those who stayed put over the past 12 months, according to the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta.
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In This Economy, Quitters Are Winning

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  • Not really news... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by azrael29a ( 1349629 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @06:12PM (#56893826)
    Well, why is that surprising?
    American companies are known for exploiting their employees, treating them like shit, paying them as low as they can, and firing them as soon as they can. I, for a change, have job that I'm unlikely to leave any time soon. Why? Because they're paying me a very good salary, and they're treating me very well. They see the human part in their employees, unlike Americans who see their employees as disposable machines. I don't work in the USA, but I used to work for 2 American companies. Now I work for a Scandinavian company, and I love it.
    • by Kjella ( 173770 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @07:13PM (#56894022) Homepage

      Maybe you got lucky, but paying you very well is not the Scandinavian model. They pay everyone moderately well, try to make it a nice place to work and give you a good work-life balance and hope you don't throw it all away chasing a few more dollars. If you really want to maximize your salary you probably need to do some job hopping here too but it doesn't have nearly the same benefit, like the CEO is often paid 2-5x that of a regular employee and everyone else is somewhere in between.

      • by Krishnoid ( 984597 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @07:52PM (#56894140) Journal

        They pay everyone moderately well, try to make it a nice place to work and give you a good work-life balance and hope you don't throw it all away chasing a few more dollars.

        Maybe we should send over some troops to these shithole countries, to liberate what will most certainly be a grateful populace from this horrible socialist dystopia.

      • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

        I'm happy with enough money to be comfortable if the job is interesting and the working conditions are good. My goal is to be happy and fulfilled, not rich.

      • by tlhIngan ( 30335 )

        Maybe you got lucky, but paying you very well is not the Scandinavian model. They pay everyone moderately well, try to make it a nice place to work and give you a good work-life balance and hope you don't throw it all away chasing a few more dollars. If you really want to maximize your salary you probably need to do some job hopping here too but it doesn't have nearly the same benefit, like the CEO is often paid 2-5x that of a regular employee and everyone else is somewhere in between.

        Beyond a certain dolla

      • Maybe you got lucky, but paying you very well is not the Scandinavian model. They pay everyone moderately well, try to make it a nice place to work and give you a good work-life balance and hope you don't throw it all away chasing a few more dollars. If you really want to maximize your salary you probably need to do some job hopping here too but it doesn't have nearly the same benefit, like the CEO is often paid 2-5x that of a regular employee and everyone else is somewhere in between.

        I didn't write that it was a top salary in my profession. But it's above average. I could easily get 20% more somewhere else. But the work quality would be twice worse, so it's not worth it for me.

    • by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @07:24PM (#56894062)

      American companies are known for exploiting their employees, treating them like shit

      In Japan, many Japanese workers work to death.

      Same thing happens in Korea, Taiwan and China.

      In Bangladesh, workers are routinely locked inside the building they work in and many had been burned to death when fire broke out.

      In India, employers have been known to beat their workers to death.

      If you are thinking that only American companies treating their employees like shit, please wake the fuck up and smell the coffee.

      All companies are alike. To the bosses, their workers are slaves , to be worked to death, without pity.

    • As someone who ( living in the U.S.A) and having only worked for american companies. I'd say 'your mileage may very'. I' I've worked for some companies that are exactly as you described, and other that are not. However, I would say that if a company is large enough to have footprint overseas they are more likely to fit the category you describe. A lot of that has to do with the stock market. If a company is public, it is controlled by it's stockholder, many american companies are held primarily by fund

  • Locations with high levels of job hopping tend to be more productive and prosperous than locations with more stability. Job hoppers spread ideas. Freedom to quit and freedom to fire mean that unproductive and unhappy people are more likely to go where they are a better fit.

    Churn is good.

    • Locations with high levels of job hopping tend to be more productive and prosperous than locations with more stability.

      Because everyone having to learn how the company works is not at all a productivity drain. Also, training is free.

  • by AnthonywC ( 4415891 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @06:33PM (#56893892)
    Seriously 'Quitter'? These are just people changing jobs; never mind the ones that were laid off or fired. I guess it's too much in the eyes of WSJ to let the peons change their allegiance. I guess they'd prefer the slave workers to keep working until the same place until they die; without raise. Since this is 4th of July, I give a big FU to WSJ and hooray for some independence and dignity for the average worker.
  • by Rip!ey ( 599235 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @06:51PM (#56893954)
    A job is something you stay at. Long term benefits traded for long term benefits on both sides, including protection.

    A gig is short term. A stepping stone. You don't stand for long on any individual stepping stone. Great upside in a rising economy, with a potential downside when the economy falters. There's still a trade of benefits. That part doesn't change.

    Both can be called careers. That's the personal development side. Beware however, employees and employers both. You reap what you sow.
  • In any economy, winners are able to quit.
  • Healthcare (Score:5, Insightful)

    by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Wednesday July 04, 2018 @07:13PM (#56894024)
    I know dozens of people stuck at dead end jobs because they can't go 90-180 days w/o health care. Only the top tier stuff has day 1 health care. This is one of the big reasons I want single payer in America (besides that it saves $17 trillion over the next 10 years. Seriously, we could pay off the National Debt in my lifetime). Wanna see wages go up across the board? Give everyone healthcare so they can demand higher wages. Rising tide/all boats and all that.
    • Yeah, but a rising tide does not help if the boats are not seaworthy.
    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Having it experienced Single Payer in Japan for 14 years, I would completely agree. It makes people not tied to their employers and provides more incentives to people starting their own ventures.

      • Japan is the country that did it best, though - government insurance with private providers. I don't think the US is capable of pulling it off Japan-style because that would require looking at how someone else did it, and doing it the exact same way with no modifications. That means no handouts to existing insurance companies, no handouts to unions looking to run new government hospitals. Our government is incapable of solving a problem without scratching some backs, and that back scratching is why we ha

    • I know dozens of people stuck at dead end jobs because they can't go 90-180 days w/o health care.

      Pro-tip: find the next job before quitting your current one.

      • I know dozens of people stuck at dead end jobs because they can't go 90-180 days w/o health care.

        Pro-tip: find the next job before quitting your current one.

        But wouldn't it better it you didn't have to? We're talking higher quality of life here, and one of those scenarios definitely sounds more preferable to the other.

      • by art123 ( 309756 )

        Super pro-tip: Many employers have a 90+ day waiting period for new employees before they are eligible for medical benefits.

    • by King_TJ ( 85913 )

      I've got to step in and make a comment here.... One of my best friends is a divorced mom with 3 kids who has struggled to make ends meet by working full-time and stretching the little bit of child support she gets. Occasionally, she still winds up having to beg her mom for a loan. A while ago, she took a job doing health and life insurance sales. After dealing with all of the people on medicare/medicaid, folks on Obamacare plans, and everything else? She's concluded that Americans' biggest problem with h

      • Your taxes already pay for roads for everyone despite bad drivers. Your taxes already pay for police and the rest of the criminal justice system for safety and enforcement for everyone despite all the criminals. Your taxes already pay for fire departments to put out fires for everyone despite many who carelessly set fires. Why is health care different?
      • We're already paying for coverage of the people you describe.

        Your insurance company isn't taking your premiums and putting them in an account just for you. Instead, those premiums get paid out to sick people on all plans offered by that insurance company.

  • by physburn ( 1095481 ) on Thursday July 05, 2018 @05:05AM (#56895156) Homepage Journal
    Today is my last day at my current job. Starting monday a new one, with 10% more salary, 9 to 5 hours instead of 9 to 6, and 4 stop commute instead of 17 on the underground. Shop around for jobs every couple of years, it can be very profitable and improve you life greatly.
  • You really need to look a bit beyond just the pay because, if you don't, you'll be job hopping again soon enough.

    How long has the company been operating ?
    Are they established and stable, or a startup ?
    How much turnover does the company have ? Why ?
    Benefits ? Insurance ? Retirement ?
    Does it require travel ?
    What's the cost of living where the company wants you to move ?
    Telecommute a possibility ?
    Starting at bottom seniority means getting stuck with hours you hate ?
    How much personal / vacation / sick time th

  • ... the ones who know stuff have the upper hand. The ones simply juggling money are very close to being replaced by robots. Closer than the cleaning lady and the burger flipper actually.

  • I really don't like farting smoke.
    All things considered, it's still an employers' economy.
    They set the wages, and there are still an excess of potential employees for each job. When the actual demand for employees exceeds the available pool of personnel, only then will you see a truly dynamic increase in wages and employer effort in employee retention.

    Until then, it's smoke and mirrors.

The 11 is for people with the pride of a 10 and the pocketbook of an 8. -- R.B. Greenberg [referring to PDPs?]

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