Well… it isn’t the same. That’s actually been true for your parents most likely and theirs and theirs… many millennial aged people would have great grandparents alive for part of their lives who were born in the early 1900’s or late 1800’s. Essentially being born into a world that had just gone through the industrial revolution and was seeing vast changes. Their great grandparents or grandparents may have come to working age in the Great Depression. The job market and working culture would be very different for someone coming along before and after such events, and many boomers born after the Second World War would have been coming to working age around the 1960’s or 1970’s where things would again be very different than for those in careers right after the war. We saw great shifts throughout these decades and huge lifestyle and culture changes in general. A rise or suburban living and increase in corporate and “white collar” work in major cities etc.
Those going to work in the 1980’s had a different experience as well, corporate America and economics and further globalization and international commerce and competition- deregulation and all manner of changes. Culture tended at large to become more liberal as well by leaps in the period from the 1960’s onwards. Computers started to be much more common in the workplace in the 1980’s but well into the 1990’s they weren’t quite ubiquitous yet. Outsourcing started to snowball in the 1970’s but in the 1980’s consumer markets began to really see an influx of foreign goods of high quality that sometimes cost more and often cost less than domestic goods but regularly offered better value or quality. By the 1990’s the rise of cheap outsourcing was changing things and the internet was changing the way business was done and causing disruption to profit models and long standing institutions. Many American companies had made questionable or outright foolish decisions in decades past and the…
.. consequences were really starting to impact the way they did business. The American auto industry for example had made poor investments and with record profits had invested the money to pay the pensions of aging workers who were retiring. This created a deficit which would change the way these companies structured employee pay and benefits plans to this day and led in part to massive outsourcing. The same auto giants had also stagnated on technology relying on “brand recognition” and were now losing market and brand reputation to foreign companies that had innovated and even sold at loss to establish their reputations. The Japanese “bubble economy” burst, and by this point Japan was a major trade partner and source of sought after consumer goods and technology products and components. This didn’t help.
These things had ripples too- US auto faltering harmed US steel, and when the economy sags, major construction often slows, which in turn tends to harm industries like steel. At the same time, the 1990’s brought about the 30 year anniversary of Earth Day. The 1960’s had been an era of social and ecological activism and many of the young people of that time and movement were now older and in positions of influence or power, the 1980’s saw some environmentalism and especially early attempts at “green washing” as it was an era of fads and trying to be modern. a renewed push for environmentalism was coming in the 90’s and television programs and school curriculums, films and books and more would be filled with all manner of “eco friendly” messaging to the generation growing up in the 90’s.
The push for environmentalism started to really see things start to move more into the business side of things. Laws about packaging and pollution and all sorts of things. Changes, or superficial veneers, to corporate culture concerning more progressive issues. The 1980’s had seen sudden and excessive wealth and sudden and excessive recession. There were big changes in the job market through this period. Those working through the first “dot com” era knew a very different workplace than those before and after generally. Those working the mid 2000’s saw yet another workplace. So it is a bit self evident that time marches on. It has been at least since the turn of the 1900’s that the job market and work culture tended to change for parent and child. That is nothing new. It is normal.
It also isn’t so unprecedented that a living wage not being a certainty. The modern sentiment seems to be that anyone who worked before 1990 or 1980 could have a home and all this awesome stuff by the age of 30 without much effort. That’s very far from the truth. What HAS changed is just how many people are struggling to get by. When the economy is “good” and we look at what people make and their buying power- those figures in a “GOOD” economy look like a recession of decades past. What has changed is the stability in most career paths. Well- “changed.” If you stop and think about it- compare things like benefits and wages and pensions and work hours and home ownership rates etc to periods long ago- and we are basically living in the bygone age of tycoons and robber barons. Through the industrial revolution, even in to the 1930’s etc- there were certain extremely wealthy persons or families that owned major industry. Workers didn’t generally get sick time or sometimes even time off.
There wasn’t a medical plan or a 401k or a pension. Many jobs, perhaps most, workers were “replaceable.” Can’t work? You’re fired. Can’t pay your rent? Evicted.
It was a dark time. Social services, laws to protect workers, taxes, and regulation of industry among other things were what ushered in the age of work with benefits. Before that unions were essentially the only protection or recourse possible for workers.
And behold- through the 80’s and even up to the previous presidency we saw massive deregulation and tax cuts. Cuts to social services. Stagnation on laws to protect workers or even regression.
Unions are still around but are hardly what they once were and the largest corporations that tend to be the ones most often on the “naughty list” are… perhaps not coincidentally… without universal or wide spread unionization….
And surprise? It turns out that if you remove all the things that basically ended the age of tyrannical abuse of workers by wealthy entrepreneurs… things slide back to a time where wealthy entrepreneurs abused workers and hoarded wealth while public infrastructure was minimal or non existent in places.
The idea of privatization and manifest destiny are all well and good but they ignore the fact that in a world where people survive on strength and luck…. A lot of people will not survive. That’s why we have safety nets. To catch the people who fall or can’t stand. So it is a very different workplace than your parents- just like it was for theirs and so on- but it’s also eerily the same as the workplace at what is basically the darkest period of modern history to be a worker.
I’m double posting this one. My other comments cover the How’s and whys and such about differences in the workplace. This one is more just an opinion.
I agree 100% that the modern working world is largely structured in a way that if employees don’t do what is best for them, don’t keep mobile and don’t concentrate on their own careers and well being- they’ll generally end up screwed for it. Loyalty is generally not rewarded anymore and companies generally act more as meat grinders, using what they can of an employee and giving as little as possible. That said- the attitude about it gets me. Like- why even bother saying this? The company is acting in its self interest as are you right? How can I be mad at a company for trying to use me to better its position without loyalty or care to me when I’m trying to do the same? If that’s what it is- we are talking about prostitutes and Johns. Nothing wrong with those things inherently- but it’s a transaction. A hooker doesn’t get to be upset…
That you didn’t kiss them goodbye or take them to breakfast after, and a John can’t be upset a hooker doesn’t want to show up to the family reunion and meet their parents. That’s my how that relationship works. The way it works, and everyone knows it- someone’s getting fucked and someone’s getting paid. So there we have it. You know that this company probably just wants to grab a profit nut and pay you and would drop you in a heartbeat if they felt like it or someone more attractive or cheaper came along. You know this. You’re selling your time. The question is wether we want to be a street hooker or a classy escort about it. So yeah- demand what you think you’re worth. Set the rules or how much it costs to break the rules. Protect yourself and make your money. You don’t own your John anything asides what you agree to take money for up front. But like… people get so salty or belligerent and it’s like… why? It is what it is. The person interviewing you didn’t create the system and…
.. almost certainly can’t change it. Your John doesn’t want to hear your problems or probably doesn’t care anymore than you care or want to hear about theirs. Come to an agreement on what services rendered are to be and what that costs, do the job, go home and take a shower. The rest is all just play acting. Very few people want someone who doesn’t seem to want to be there. So we smile, we make inoffensive jokes and play nice because it doesn’t have to be any more unpleasant for anyone than the services agreed upon require.
And that’s the thing- that recruiter or hiring manager etc- what are the odds they are so different from you? They do that job because they want to? They love the company in their truest heart? Or like you- do they have a bunch of bills and a powerful need to eat and this is where they ended up? That interviewer is you sitting in front of you. That interviewer has to sit there and tow the company line wether they want to or not. They have to play the part and…
.. dance because if you stop dancing, the company stops throwing dollar bills. You can be petulant and defiant and maybe that helps swallow the feelings of indignity or shame or whatever that while you sit there hating this company and or this system- you have your hand out asking them to pretty please take you in and give you money- but at the end of the day… you’re selling yourself. The most precious and personal thing you have- your time. Something you never get back and can’t get more of. So do you, kick and scream if that makes things easier to go home at the end of the day, but why? Of the millions of ways and places to try and make some stand or some difference- is that the best one or even a good one…? I question that.
It was a dark time. Social services, laws to protect workers, taxes, and regulation of industry among other things were what ushered in the age of work with benefits. Before that unions were essentially the only protection or recourse possible for workers.
Unions are still around but are hardly what they once were and the largest corporations that tend to be the ones most often on the “naughty list” are… perhaps not coincidentally… without universal or wide spread unionization….
And surprise? It turns out that if you remove all the things that basically ended the age of tyrannical abuse of workers by wealthy entrepreneurs… things slide back to a time where wealthy entrepreneurs abused workers and hoarded wealth while public infrastructure was minimal or non existent in places.
I agree 100% that the modern working world is largely structured in a way that if employees don’t do what is best for them, don’t keep mobile and don’t concentrate on their own careers and well being- they’ll generally end up screwed for it. Loyalty is generally not rewarded anymore and companies generally act more as meat grinders, using what they can of an employee and giving as little as possible. That said- the attitude about it gets me. Like- why even bother saying this? The company is acting in its self interest as are you right? How can I be mad at a company for trying to use me to better its position without loyalty or care to me when I’m trying to do the same? If that’s what it is- we are talking about prostitutes and Johns. Nothing wrong with those things inherently- but it’s a transaction. A hooker doesn’t get to be upset…
And that’s the thing- that recruiter or hiring manager etc- what are the odds they are so different from you? They do that job because they want to? They love the company in their truest heart? Or like you- do they have a bunch of bills and a powerful need to eat and this is where they ended up? That interviewer is you sitting in front of you. That interviewer has to sit there and tow the company line wether they want to or not. They have to play the part and…
What you did here is double post twice.