I am so tired of people taking the erosion of stability for granted, or, worse, framing it as an unambiguously good thing.
I just finished Aiming Higher by George Williams, and there was a statement in there which got my attention:
“Today’s and tomorrow’s graduates won’t work the same job over a lifetime.”1
This is not just in Williams’s book; I am only mentioning it because it was what got me thinking about this. This is everywhere, and it’s more than just an attitude; it’s true.
This narrative ignores the fact that so many jobs require a degree, or some form of certificate or training. Employers, in my experience, refuse to recognise transferable skills, so you need to apply for work that is below your current pay grade — and capability — in order to find a job somewhere else. You cannot jump careers at the drop of a hat or without some kind of penalty. There is so much investment in careers, now, in the form of degrees, certificates or specialised training, and we’re also expected to change them multiple times throughout our lifetimes.
Make it make sense.
I will!
Tools of Capital
Mass redundancies and forcing people to change careers so often are tools of capital to keep workers down. Being surrounded by layoffs scares people into staying in the garbage job they already have, as they are too scared of starving to leave. I know a few people in this position. I personally am looking for work I don’t want, but have experience in, because of the need for money.
It’s all infuriating to me. Why do so many people take instability for granted and don’t question why it is the case?
Commentators often talk about how younger workers are all to happy to jump ship, of not giving their all to a workplace, of not committing to their employer. But when employers treat their workers like a trinket to be discarded when we’re no longer useful, it’s business as usual. They only sound the alarm when we do the same to them.
For me, personally, I am an autistic person who has a prominent trait of rigidity2; of not dealing well with change. I particularly detest any alteration to my material circumstances or physical reality, especially when it is not of my own volition.
I do not want to move workplaces every few years. I want to work in a single place for 30 years and then retire. I want to build relationships with other people in my field and become an expert in my domain that others can turn to. I want to spend most of my work time getting to know this field, exploring how it interacts with the world and other sectors. I want to build relationships with experts in different areas and explore interactions between our domains. I want to go out to conferences and industry events and make friends with people who could use my expertise to do good, and whose expertise I could use. The flipside of my autistic rigidity is that in an environment like this, where I can focus, where I am in control, and life remains stable, I thrive and can get stuck into a deep focus.
I know that’s not for everyone. And that’s fine. Everyone’s brain is different and has different needs and preferences. I know there are people out there who would prefer to move around regularly. There are people out there who would not like to work at all. I’m just not one of them.
Even in an ideal world where no one was required to work to survive, there would still be things that needed doing. People get sick and need treatment, and food, clothes, housing and other necessities will have to come from somewhere. For recreation, we’ll still need community centres, crafting clubs, publishers, sporting infrastructure and more — all of which will need people to run them.
I would love to work in something like that; something fulfilling, helping people around me. Ideally, I’d be working about 15-20 hours a week, maybe up to 30 if it was something I particularly liked. The time I work would be flexible, the labour and conditions wouldn’t be exploitative, and I’d be building connections with my colleagues and community.
And it would be stable, god damn it.
Even for people who like to move jobs or careers regularly, the current environment doesn’t work, because it is so rarely on their own terms. Choosing to jump from one employer to another on a regular basis is great. But so many don’t choose; they get laid off, they get forced out by discriminatory bosses or colleagues, they don’t get a pay rise or promotion for years and need to leave in order to attain that.
And the media uncritically follows the corporate line, as it so often does. You see it in the propagation of terms like “quiet quitting”, where employees are castigated for refusing to do more than the minimum required of them. These narratives never ask why more than half of the workforce doesn’t care about what they do. With so many people adopting this attitude, it would be a prudent question to ask. But they don’t, because doing so would mean unravelling the exploitation at the heart of a capitalist society they benefit from, so instead, they choose to turn a blind eye.
I’m not sure what the best way to achieve something like this would be. It would definitely start with joining your union and building solidarity with people at work and in your personal life, in a way that cuts across lines of race, (trans)gender, class, disability, sexuality, nationality, and more. A co-operative would be ideal.
What do you think, reader? What would you want in the world of work? Stability? Genuine flexibility? No work whatsoever? All are valid. Let me know in the comments.
Musings From a Queer Environmentalist 