Act Your Wage is the New Meme as Career Ambitions Plunge

 The willingness to do what it takes to get ahead has plunged, especially in generation Z, the zoomers.

Less Ambitious Workers and the New Work Order

For many workers the days of unpaid overtime and weekend work is gone. Work your wage has replaced quiet quitting as the new meme forcing employers to add more people to finish projects.

The Wall Street Journal reports Your Coworkers Are Less Ambitious; Bosses Adjust to the New Order

At law firm Nixon Peabody LLP, associates have started saying no to working weekends, prompting partners to ask more people to help complete time-sensitive work. TGS Insurance in Texas has struggled to fill promotions, and bosses often have to coax staffers to apply. And Maine-based marketing company Pulp+Wire plans to shut down for two weeks next year now that staffers are taking more vacation than they used to.

“The passion that we used to see in work is lower now, and you find it in fewer people—at least in the last two years,” says Sumithra Jagannath, president of ZED Digital, which makes digital ticket scanners. The company, based in Columbus, Ohio, recently moved about 20 remote engineering and marketing roles to Canada and India, where she said it’s easier to find talent who will go above and beyond.

In a November survey of more than 3,000 workers and managers by software firm Qualtrics, 36% said their overall career ambitions had waned over the past three years, compared with 22% who said their ambition had increased. Nearly 40% said work had become less important to them in the past three years, while 25% said it had grown more important, according to researchers at Qualtrics, which provides software to businesses to evaluate customer and employee experiences. 

In an American Bar Association survey of nearly 2,000 members this year, 44% of young lawyers said they would leave their jobs for a greater ability to work remotely elsewhere.

The Journal comments on Mary Waisanen, a 43-year-old structural engineering technician in Virginia Beach, Va. who after watching a Tik-Toc video wants a pay raise.

“Until then,” she says, “I will make more of an effort to ‘act my wage,’ ” referencing a phrase that’s gone viral on social media and encourages workers to do solely what they are compensated for. 

A Prudential survey also shows the same thing.

Prudential Attitudes Towards Work

Inflationary Attitude Shift

Every generation until now was happy or at least OK in doing whatever it takes to get the job done. 

Now, the older millennials and especially the zoomers seem to have had a sudden shift in attitudes.

The push for $15 is long gone. Now workers want $22 or more an hour. 

If we pay people enough to not work, this is what happens. 

Quiet Quitting, Are You Doing Only What's Necessary at Work and No More?

I discussed quiet quitting on August 18, in Quiet Quitting, Are You Doing Only What's Necessary at Work and No More? 

Wondering why productivity is down? Think about the new phenomenon called quiet quitting.

Great American Dream

People have decided that quality of life is more important than getting ahead.

Alternatively, they view the Great American Dream of home ownership is out of reach.

Blame the Fed and cheap interest rates for the latter.

My Number One Investment Idea for 2023

In retrospect, less works fits in with my Number One Investment Idea For 2023. 

Invest in yourself, your family, and your friends. Invest in life. If you need to lose weight, do it.

Spend more quality time with your friends, family, and loved ones. 

Attitude changes have implications for productivity and salaries. A mass resignation of aging boomers is accompanied by quiet quitting and threats of "working your wage."

Looking ahead, these trends are quite inflationary and very poor for productivity and corporate profits.  

https://mishtalk.com/economics/act-your-wage-is-the-new-meme-as-career-ambitions-plunge