🗨 Urgent Warning About Radical Left

This is my third and possibly FINAL warning about the death of our economy. [LOGO OST]( At times, our affiliate partners reach out to the Editors at Open Source Trades with special opportunities for our readers. The message below is one we think you should take a close, serious look at.   As living costs rise amid inflation, some companies are helping squeezed workers out with wage hikes, bonuses or even free food. L Last month UK-based carmaker Rolls Royce announced it would give more than 14,000 lower-ranked workers a one-off payment of £2,000 ($2,430) to “help them through the current exceptional economic climate”. Other companies have taken similar steps: major UK banks, such as Barclays and Lloyds, are giving lower-paid staff out-of-season pay rises or cash bonuses, while there are also examples of small businesses giving workers bonuses to help them cope with the current surge in living costs. As of this writing, inflation sits at 9.4% in the UK, the highest level seen since 1982. In the US it’s 9.1%. Whether it's a coffee, food, housing or bills, the staples of our daily lives have all become more expensive in the past six months. Wages have also been rising, but not as fast – meaning workers’ take-home pay is buying them less, leaving many people struggling. In these circumstances, some employers are stepping up to help out workers, with cash injections or other subsidies that can help them shoulder these rising costs. But the move isn’t across the board, and experts say companies face a tricky balancing act. Firms want to save money in case a recession hits, and some organisations may not be in a position to act nimbly. But companies also need to retain workers in a tight labour market that favours jobseekers – because if firms don't do more to help workers, employees might go somewhere that will. Making moves to help At the moment, the basics of life are getting more expensive: groceries, clothing, petrol, childcare and utilities, as well as housing; rents are skyrocketing in cities, and many people can't afford homes as home prices have also gone up. Even going to work itself feels more expensive, as commuting costs, food and other incidentals all mount up. Many workers are struggling to handle these increased costs – which are linked to rising energy, fuel and food costs because of the war in Ukraine as well as shortages of goods and labour, plus supply-chain hurdles – and asking what their companies can do to help them out. Fuel, food, housing and more have all skyrocketed in the past several months, and many workers want employers to help more with the hikes (Credit: Getty Images) Fuel, food, housing and more have all skyrocketed in the past several months, and many workers want employers to help more with the hikes (Credit: Getty Images) Decades ago, says Perry Sadorsky, professor of sustainability and economics at York University, Canada, workers in many Western countries belonged to unions that would have bargained for cost-of-living adjustments. Those schemes "would kick in quickly to changes in inflation, helping to restore real wages". But these days, union membership in the UK and the US has plummeted, meaning that in the absence of collective pressure, it’s up to companies to decide for themselves if they should be helping. Many firms that have chosen to help are large private-sector organisations. Some are throwing money at the problem, like Microsoft, which reportedly doubled its budget worldwide for merit-based raises, and ExxonMobile, which gave US workers a one-time bonus of 3% of their salaries to weather price hikes. In the UK, bank Virgin Money offered staff a one-time bonus of £1,000, on top of pay rises in January of 5%. Other companies are taking a different tack; they’re not offering overt financial incentives, but they are trying to take some expenditure off employees’ shoulders. Some smaller companies in the US have started giving workers gift cards or weekly stipends of $50 to help pay for fuel, or offering free food for staff who come into the office. Others are allowing staff to work from home, which means savings on commuting and other work-related costs (and there’s certainly evidence workers want this; a recent survey of early 3,000 UK workers showed 45% were pushing for more remote working to save commuting costs). "More and more smart employers are saying, 'there's a two-fer here: you prefer remote work, so we're going to give you hybrid – but you're also going to save money'," says Johnny C Taylor Jr, CEO at the US-based Society for Human Resource Management (Shrm). Some companies can only do so much Workers want help, and many companies want to help. Yet it's not something every company can do. Right now, notes Taylor , employers are facing challenging times; they’re grappling with the need to attract and retain talent, while simultaneously not overspending in a way that means they might need dire cost-savings moves later on. Companies who fail to adjust for inflation are at risk of losing their top performers - Jean-Nicolas Reyt "The problem is companies can't make short-term decisions [to give workers extra compensation] that will impact the long-term viability of the company," says Taylor. He points out that some companies, especially big firms, have already found themselves cutting costs, rolling back spending, freezing hiring and even letting people go after zealous hiring and spending sprees over the last year. "Companies are trying to strike this balance," he says. An additional complication is that not all organisations can be equally agile around cost-of-living adjustments. For example, public-sector jobs have "a disadvantage in terms of flexibility of giving a pay raise, and a bonus – not to mention stock market options", all of which give workers more security, inflation or no, says Runjuan Liu, professor of business economics at University of Alberta, Canada. More government oversight makes it harder for such institutions to offer the bonuses and high compensation that private sector companies can, she explains. It can depend on company size, too, says Jean-Nicolas Reyt, associate professor of organisational behaviour at McGill University, Canada. Smaller or medium-sized companies may be faster to offer help, but might be in a weaker financial situation to do so in the long run. A recent Goldman Sachs survey of 10,000 small businesses in the US revealed 67% of them had increased wages to retain workers, even as 91% reported broader economic trends were negatively affecting their businesses. ‘A hard pill to swallow’ Because of all these factors, companies' best efforts to help workers through the cost-of-living spike will differ – and in some cases, they won’t be enough for workers. Some sectors are crying out for employees – but workers think they can do better elsewhere. T Throughout the past few years, workers have been resigning from jobs in record numbers. Some have been switching careers, some have been job-hopping for faster advancement and some have left the workforce altogether. In the US, for instance, the August 2022 data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics puts the labour force participation rate at 1.0 percentage point below its February 2020 level. In other words, people have been quitting and, in some sectors and jobs, they haven’t been coming back. Perhaps it’s unsurprising, given the poor conditions in many workplaces throughout the pandemic. The dearth of workers is most evident in hospitality and service-work industries, where positions for dishwashers, truck drivers, retail workers, food servers, airport agents, home health aides and similar roles have been open for literal years. This is not because people don’t want to work, say the experts. They just want better jobs; higher pay, improved conditions. The job market upheaval caused by the pandemic has enabled some workers to switch into better employment – and if hard-hit sectors want their workers back, they need to find ways of making their jobs more attractive. Why are these jobs open? Particularly in the US, data shows it’s been tough to be a service worker for a long time. In 2020, for instance, full-time American food counter workers made, on average, $23,960 (£20,796) a year – failing to clear the poverty line for a four-person household. Weekly hours have rarely been guaranteed, making it difficult for workers to be sure their income would cover their bills, or arrange things like transport and childcare. All of that, in part, accounts for the fact that the attrition rate – in other words, the rate at which people leave as a percentage of annual average employment – has been high in service industries for a long time. In 2017, it was 53.8% for retail workers, 72.4% for workers in accommodation and food service and 30.6% for people in manufacturing jobs. Food-service roles have been open for literal years, with employers scrambling to fill these positions (Credit: Getty Images) Food-service roles have been open for literal years, with employers scrambling to fill these positions (Credit: Getty Images) But if being a service worker was hard pre-pandemic, once it struck things became downright miserable for many. Retailers that stayed open faced supply-chain disruption, and spikes and drops in customer demand. Fewer employees had to work more hours, and increased overtime contributed to burnout. With schools closed and public transport reduced, some workers were negotiating a lack of childcare and a more difficult commute. Cases of worker abuse and reports of rude customers shot up, and though some companies offered one-time bonuses, few increased wages or offered hazard pay. And in many instances, the work was hazardous. Other forms of business moved online, but “in the hospitality industry, for instance, it's very hard to replace somebody who's at the reception desk of a hotel with somebody who's working virtually”, says Serge da Motta Veiga, professor of human resource management at EDHEC Business School in Paris. That meant frontline service workers, forced to interact with colleagues and customers while everyone else was sheltering at home, were among the most vulnerable to Covid-19. In the first year of the pandemic, 68% of working-age adults who died in the US were labour, retail and service workers. Understandably, throughout the last two years, attrition rates have shot up. In 2021, 64.6% of retail workers, a whopping 86.3% of accommodation and food service workers, and just under 40% of manufacturing workers quit their jobs. While safety – and overall misery – were leading factors, they weren’t the only reasons for the mass exodus. People also crave stability, which is difficult to come by in a low-wage job: one 2019 study found that minimum wage jobs have a turnover rate more than twice the US national average. “Those jobs are precarious,” says da Motta Veiga. “Job security has become the number one thing people want, above even all the other perks, like having a flexible work schedule, or working from wherever you want.” Job security has become the number one thing people want, above even all the other perks, like having a flexible work schedule, or working from wherever you want – Serge da Motta Veiga There’s yet another reason so many people quit: because they could. The staffing shortage has left many companies at the mercy of those who work – or don’t – for them. With the labour market leaning so far in favour of the worker, it’s been easier for workers to leave one job and get another, further lessening the incentive for people to return to jobs they find undesirable. The people who used to have those jobs have replaced them with gig work, or moved to new industries, says da Motta Veiga. “They're trying to transfer their skills into industries where actually they can be respected, well-paid and have more opportunity,” he says. Why aren’t people coming back to fill these jobs? The epidemic of quitting throughout 2021 and into this year, known as the Great Resignation, left job openings across industries. But David Dwertmann, associate professor of management at Rutgers University School of Business, Camden, US, says it’s been difficult to re-hire workers to fill low-wage jobs in particular, for the same reasons people left them in the first place. He points to a Pew Research Survey that asked people who quit their jobs about their reason for leaving. Low pay was first, followed by “no opportunities for advancement” and “feeling disrespected”. “If you're flipping burgers or something, it's not that easy to advance. Not everyone is going to be a manager. Many people are stuck in these jobs for years and years and years,” says Dwertmann. Plus, “the workers just don't feel like they're being valued enough, and don't feel like they're being treated well enough”. With a market awash in better opportunities, people feeling stagnant or mistreated in their jobs seized a golden opportunity to bail. Another factor, adds Dwertmann, is the wave of Baby Boomer retirements that left still more gaps in the workforce. “It's kind of the perfect storm,” he says. “I think Covid-19 probably for [Boomers considering retirement] was a great reason to say, ‘You know what? I'm done.’ Because these are the groups that were at the highest risk of Covid exposure, especially working in some face-to-face service jobs. I think if they could afford to do so, a large cohort of that particular population just chose to retire. I would assume that many of them will probably never come back into the labour force.” This Boomer exodus, notes Dwertmann, has been compounded by a lack of immigration during the past several years that has left gaps in industries which normally employ new arrivals. “In part due to the pandemic, in part due to changes in policy, immigration into the United States actually dropped by half,” he says. “And these are some of the people that used to fulfil or take some of those low-skill, low-education jobs.” Airport workers are among those who have quit and not returned to their positions (Credit: Getty Images) Airport workers are among those who have quit and not returned to their positions (Credit: Getty Images) What are companies doing to try to fill the ‘unfillable’? It’s not unusual, these days, to see signs outside fast-food restaurants, convenience stores and markets offering previously unheard-of starting hourly wages to new hires. Many employers instituted sign-on bonuses: in 2021, Amazon announced a hiring push and said it would pay $1,000 bonuses for warehouse and transport jobs. Hilton Hotels began offering sign-on bonuses of $500 and more for room attendants and other staff. Yet while financial incentives don’t hurt, they don’t do anything to address the other major things workers want that those “unfillable” jobs don’t often offer; flexibility, predictability and better conditions. “I do think employers need to react not just by increasing wages and providing sign-on bonuses, but also, for example, by scheduling employees in different ways,” says Dwertmann. “Making sure that there's some predictability for employees in terms of when they have to come in, and how many hours they get to work, so that they can, for example, manage childcare.” Focusing on the money alone, agrees da Motta Veiga, is short-sighted. While, yes, people want to be paid what they feel their time and energy is worth, companies should also “be asking people: ‘What do you want? What is your priority? Is it that security? Is it that flexibility?’” They need to be creative, he says, in making these jobs more attractive. To fill an unfillable job, concludes Dwertmann, you have to make it not only financially worthwhile, but also provide some flexibility, some guarantee of safety and find a way to generate loyalty. “The pandemic comes around and the first thing people do is lay off big troves of workers,” he says. “They were thinking when it eased up everyone would just show up again, but really employees are like, ‘You know what? You didn’t stick with me. I’m not going back to you.’” Correction 21 Sept 2022: An earlier version of this article did not provide sufficient context around the statistic of the percentage of service workers who died during the pandemic. This has been updated for accuracy. The Great Resignation was triggered by the pandemic – so why aren’t resignations slowing down now as it wanes? W When people first began leaving their jobs en masse in early 2021, experts generally believed that the “Great Resignation” was a direct side effect of pandemic chaos and uncertainty. Many workers quit due to Covid-19 safety concerns or because their companies didn’t provide adequate remote-work support. Millions more left for more autonomy or meaning in their work; many of these shifts linked to lockdown reflection. And others quit for more money elsewhere, as the labour market tightened. But something unexpected is happening now. Even with Covid restrictions mostly lifted and the pandemic waning in many countries, the resignation letters are still piling up. Despite widespread predictions of a slowdown, data shows not only are people still leaving positions in spades, but many workers who haven’t resigned yet plan to do so in coming months. Experts suggest that two factors are fueling this trend. While the pandemic served as the trigger, the seeds of the Great Resignation were sown well before – and until the deep-rooted factors causing workers to quit are addressed, resignations are unlikely to subside. People are also now looking at work and the role they want it to play in their lives in a different way, and switching to jobs that better align with their new values. And, say the experts, the extent to which the looming slowdown will affect these quit rates remains to be seen. Pandemic powder keg Jobs numbers tell the story of a quitting epidemic that just hasn’t subsided. This is especially true in the US. Quit numbers were generally consistent throughout 2021, when an average of nearly 4 million people left their jobs each month. That’s more than half a million more than 2019’s monthly averages. In January 2019, there were roughly 7 million job openings in the US; a year later, the number of open positions grew to 11.26 million. The behaviour has spilled over into this year, too. At the end of March 2022, the Bureau of Labor and Statistics (BLS) showed a record high of 11.5 million job openings. And there’s good reason to believe attrition will continue, including outside the US: a PwC survey of more than 52,000 workers across 44 countries showed one-fifth plan to leave their job in the next year. Other studies turn up even bigger numbers, such as data from the Conference Board, which indicates this number may be 30% for US workers. In a separate survey of 1,000 UK workers, almost a third said they’re planning to quit soon. Some of these things have been bubbling over the past decade or more, and the pandemic really just put a magnifying glass over it all – Kristie McAlpine The pandemic has, of course, been the catalyst for the Great Resignation, says Kristie McAlpine, professor of management at Rutgers University School of Business – Camden, US. The global health crisis caused a shift in priorities, she explains, that kicked off the quitting wave. “We were going through a time where we lost millions of people,” she says. “It’s hard to imagine how that can all occur and not kind of force us to think about what’s important to us.” While some workers were re-evaluating their values, other factors led people to leave, too: frontline healthcare providers, service workers, teachers and others working in high-risk roles, sometimes for low pay or with little support, burnt out or walked out. People nearing retirement cut out of the workforce early to escape the pandemic. Huge numbers of parents, especially women, were forced to quit because of a sudden lack of childcare. Plus, a year or so into the pandemic, a shift in the labour market’s supply-and-demand equation in favour of workers made leaving a job and finding a new one less daunting than before. Yet while the pandemic may have provided the spark, explains McAlpine, the Great Resignation is a powder keg that had been building for some time. “Quit rates have been steadily increasing over the past 10 years,” she says. “That's not something that just started with the pandemic. It certainly exacerbated some trends.” Before the pandemic, Baby Boomers, a quarter of the US workforce in 2018, were already moving steadily into retirement. Low wages in service work and a minimum wage that had fallen behind the rate of inflation meant discontent was growing among blue-collar workers. And presenteeism and a culture that equated long hours with hard work was pushing knowledge workers to burnout. “Some of these things have been bubbling over the past decade or more, and the pandemic really just put a magnifying glass over it all,” says McAlpine. Given that the pandemic served as the accelerant for mass resignations, rather than the original cause, says McAlpine, it’s unrealistic to think getting past the pandemic means the quitting will simply cease. The nuanced issues that precipitated the Great Resignation took a long time to build, and they may take a long time to resolve. In the wake of the pandemic, experts believe many people are looking for a career change or work they find more meaningful (Credit: Getty) In the wake of the pandemic, experts believe many people are looking for a career change or work they find more meaningful (Credit: Getty) Post-pandemic factors At the moment, says Anthony C Klotz, a professor of management at University College London's School of Management who coined the term “Great Resignation”, quit rates have more or less plateaued, but he doesn’t expect them to drop in any meaningful way in the immediate future. In addition to the original push factors, he says that the reasons people are resigning have diversified. For instance, some workers are now swapping jobs that require them to be present in the workplace for remote positions; other workers, he says, are leaving remote jobs for ones that have a larger in-person component. Some of the moves are getting even bigger, as people leave not just their jobs, but their professions entirely. “It’s not just about what's happening in an industry,” he says. “And that kind of supports the notion that people are looking for a change coming out of the pandemic or they're not afraid to completely switch to a new chapter of their career.” McAlpine concurs, saying the role a job plays in someone’s life has shifted, which could permanently change the way people select positions and whether they stay or go. “Of course, people want to be compensated fairly, but they're also looking for some connection and meaning in what they do,” she says. Workers may be looking for ways to restore wellbeing, adds Klotz, noting that moving to a new job is often an attempt to reclaim wellness. Klotz also believes that resignations have become somewhat self-perpetuating, potentially prolonging the period of quitting. “Turnover contagion is real,” he says. “When you have colleagues who leave first, it's almost always a bummer, because usually it's a little bit more work for you. At the same time, though, it puts the idea in your head that it's doable to make that leap. It’s hard to stop that cycle of resignations for organisations, because with each one, it's like it logically puts the idea in other people's minds about the possibility of it.” A lasting shift? While Klotz believes these quit numbers are poised to stay high in the short-term, the impending economic downturn and general uncertainty around the future of the labour market could change things down the line. It’s reasonable to think a major recession would, at the very least, slow down the quit rate. “It would stand to reason that if a recession comes in, the job market gets worse. So, there's fewer options for employees to switch from one company to another. Because there just aren't as many jobs, resignations should absolutely go down,” says Klotz. “Maybe not as much as they would have before the pandemic, but they'll definitely drop.” Already there are some signs high living costs and inflation are influencing worker behaviour; in the UK, data points to a “Great Unretirement” as older people return to the workforce to make ends meet. Other data, meanwhile, suggests more ‘boomerang employees’ are returning to previous roles in the wake of pandemic moves. But it’s unclear, says McAlpine, whether even a global financial crisis would be enough to stem the tide of the Great Resignation and keep people in jobs they want to leave. “We’ll see what happens if we do indeed head into a recession,” she says. “But I think that as long as workers have an understanding of what they're looking for, employers are going to have to make some changes in order to accommodate that. And it seems like people will be willing to leave if they don't get it.” Walking out of a job in anger can seem extreme – but there are often powerful motivations for doing it. A As we head into 2022, Worklife is running our best, most insightful and most essential stories from 2021. When you’re done with this article, check out our full list of the year’s top stories. It was sweltering inside the nightclub where Alexander was DJing, in the US state of Virginia. Though it was more than 40°C outside, the club’s air conditioning was broken. It felt extra sticky and humid because the club was hosting a special event: a Pokemon-themed foam party, where upwards of 400 clubbers were frolicking in suds. “I literally had ice packs on my neck in order to not pass out,” remembers Alexander, now 35, of the 2016 event. The heat was also damaging his gear, and he’d had enough. Over the microphone, so everyone could hear, he berated the club owner for lying about fixing the air conditioning and for the equipment-frying conditions. “I’m done,” he said, then stormed out. Many of us have fantasised about leaving a bad job in a similarly dramatic fashion. Yet far from throwing a temper tantrum, 'rage quitting' is a sign of serious flaws in a workplace: from lax health and safety standards to exploitative working conditions and abusive managers. The Covid-19 pandemic has only intensified the stressors that can lead employees to quit on the spot. But as rage quitting tends to be the culmination of a series of work issues, employers can avoid being left in the lurch by paying attention to the warning signs – before an employee drops the mic on their way out the door. What a ‘rage quit’ looks like The idea of angrily walking out of a job has been around since long before the phenomenon became celebrated in pop culture, like the 1970s country music anthem Take This Job and Shove It; and before video gamers started using the term ‘rage quitting’ in the 1980s to refer to angrily exiting a frustrating game. Though rage quitting can look and feel impulsive, dissatisfaction with a job tends to build up over time, until an incident triggers the actual resignation. And having a safe space to land – such as an abundance of job options, another source of income (like unemployment insurance) or an upcoming opportunity (like graduate school) – can make it easier to pull that trigger. Angry departures are generally the culmination of a series of tensions, rather than just one bust-up (Credit: Getty) Angry departures are generally the culmination of a series of tensions, rather than just one bust-up (Credit: Getty) These patterns exist in some form across job roles and industries, but will take different shape in different contexts. There’s a lack of statistics about rage quitting, but Peter Hom, a turnover expert at Arizona State University in the US, points out that in Germany, for instance, employees of large companies get penalised for quitting without notice. The US has more at-will employment, so it would make sense for rage quitting to be more common there. Sajeet Pradhan, who researches organisational behaviour at the Indian Institute of Management Tiruchirappalli, says compared to the US and Europe, India “is more culturally tolerant (unfortunately) towards abuse at work”, due to “power distance or the upbringing which has conditioned us to respect people in authoritative positions”. In India, according to Pradhan, “rage quitting is generally witnessed among highly-skilled jobs and the millennials”. In general, says Nita Chhinzer, who researches strategic human-resource management at the University of Guelph in Canada, “higher-educated people are more likely to quit, because they think that their skills are highly transferrable and generalisable”. Yet those in lower-skilled, precarious employment can often quit with little notice. Peter Hom refers to people working for export-driven factories in China and Mexico: “It’s like musical chairs – they jump from job to job.” And although young workers are sometimes perceived as flaky, “the truth is that before they have a sunk cost, for a sunk investment in the organisation, they’re making a decision about what’s best for them”, adds Chhinzer. It makes sense that they would quit an ill-fitting job more spontaneously. This doesn’t mean that leaving in the heat of the moment is always logical. Chhinzer says that with “rage quitting, they’re not really stopping to make those rational decisions about something and just thinking about what are their options”. Fed-up employees might overestimate their ability to secure another job. What lies beneath a rage quit Though there are many reasons to leave an unsatisfying job, there are certain recurrent patterns that lead to spontaneous resignations. One of the most common reasons is poor management. Abusive supervision can lead to emotional exhaustion. When managers fail to address employees’ repeated concerns, the explosive result may be those employees quitting in outrage. Bad management is often linked to other reasons people rage quit, like scope creep, harsh schedules, overwork and dismissal of safety concerns. Feeling unsafe in the workplace – for whatever reason – is a powerful motivator for an impromptu resignation (Credit: Getty) Feeling unsafe in the workplace – for whatever reason – is a powerful motivator for an impromptu resignation (Credit: Getty) Sarah experienced all of these in a recent three-month stint as a cashier at a small grocery store in Michigan, US. The 24-year-old had moved in with her parents for the summer. She’d intended to work only part time as she prepared to leave for graduate school in Toronto, but the short staffing and intense manager demands soon had her working full time. It was also clear that employee safety wasn’t a priority. The only young woman on staff, Sarah felt unsafe in multiple ways: drunk customers were sometimes belligerent, most people refused to wear masks and she was usually the sole employee in the shop. The final straw was when a customer began to stalk her. Sarah asked her manager to move the employee rota from its public position in the shop, where any customer could see when she would be working, to a private space. Not only did the manager refuse, but she also shouted at Sarah for mentioning the stalker. “My boss just immediately went for the gut. She was just like, ‘You need to be an adult. Why aren’t you being an adult about this?’ She repeated that so many times,” says Sarah. She quit in that phone call, a month before the job would have come to an end. “I felt so bad because I really wanted to put two weeks [notice] in … But then the more I thought about it, and how little they had helped me and worked on the situation, I was just like, this is not worth my time or my safety.” Sarah had seen the role as a temporary job and, while she was shaken up after rage quitting, she wasn’t in dire financial need. “I definitely think if it had been my dream job, I would have taken different steps,” reflects Sarah. She says that she would have been less likely to quit spontaneously “if it was a job that was already valuing me… if it was a job that was actually like a career”. With rage quitters, ill treatment on one side breeds ill treatment on the other. After her manager failed to consider her safety, Sarah decided against serving out a notice period. Chhinzer refers to social exchange theory: “The way you treat me dictates the way I treat you.” If a manager is switching schedules at the last minute, insisting that employees work extra hours or refusing to allow time off for bereavement, then employees are more apt to reciprocate with limited communication and little notice as well. The Covid intensifier Some of these employee pressures have been magnified during the Covid-19 pandemic. Chhinzer says that in 2020, quit rates generally went down as people held onto jobs. But resignations have surged in 2021, so that “managers and organisations and HR departments are really worried about retaining talent”. Yet as Sarah’s experience shows, that worry doesn’t always translate into better safeguarding of employees, particularly in low-paid roles. Safety has been a common catalyst for client-facing employees to quit in a rage Indeed, safety has been a common catalyst for client-facing employees to quit in a rage. A nurse whose colleagues spread misinformation about vaccines; a restaurant worker whose managers hide the fact that Covid has been spreading among staff; or a retail worker worried about transmitting the virus to a vulnerable relative – all have left jobs semi-impetuously during the pandemic. Business researchers were already exploring ‘death awareness at work’ before the pandemic. But Covid-19 has brought another dimension to this workplace anxiety. For those who rage quit, especially those with high ‘death anxiety’, the ‘rage’ component “may be more likely to be triggered by the fact that employers fail to provide enough safety measures to protect their employees’ health”, notes Rui (Hammer) Zhong, a PhD student at the University of British Columbia in Canada, who researches the dark side of workplaces. (This impassioned rage response is in contrast to another form of death awareness that Zhong and his colleagues have researched – death reflection, or ‘calm quitting’ on realising how short life is.) As Chihinzer comments, “People are exiting not just based on poor treatment at work from managers and co-workers; they’re also exiting based on the situation at work,” such as a requirement to return to the workplace. “Those weren’t considerations before.” Alternatives to rage quitting For someone tempted to rage quit, it can be useful to gain perspective on what lies beneath the anger, beyond the immediate gratification of socking it to a bad boss. It’s also useful to consider why more people don’t rage quit. Stories of overworked employees thumbing their noses at poor bosses are satisfying and sometimes inspiring. But of course it’s distressing to quit without a back-up plan. Dear Fellow American, Joe Biden and the radical left are taking us down a path of no return. This is my third and possibly FINAL warning about the death of our economy. [Ignore this message at your own risk.]( Sincerely, Jim Rickards P.S. What you saw happen on Election night was nothing compared to what I fear is next. [The time to prepare is now.]( [divider] From time to time, we send special emails or offers to readers who chose to opt-in. We hope you find them useful. Email sent by Finance and Investing Traffic, LLC, owner, and operator of Open Source Trades To ensure you keep receiving our emails, be sure to [whitelist us.]( This ad is sent on behalf of Paradigm Press, LLC, at 808 St. Paul Street, Baltimore MD 21202. If you're not interested in this opportunity from Paradigm Press, LLC, please [click here]( to remove your email from these offers. This offer is brought to you by Open Source Trades. 221 W 9th St # Wilmington, DE 19801. If you would like to unsubscribe from receiving offers brought to you by Open Source Trades [click here](. © 2023 Open Source Trades. 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