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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.
[...] The resurgence of job-hopping is particularly helpful for younger workers looking for footholds to launch their careers, said Erika McEntarfer, an economist at the Census Bureau. About 6.5% of workers under age 35 changed jobs in the first quarter of last year, versus 3.1% of those ages 35 to 54, according to census data.
"The people who are changing jobs, they skew young and they skew being placed in what you might call bad jobs, where the average pay is quite low relative to other jobs in the economy," Ms. McEntarfer said. Job-hopping could lead them into higher-paying industries, she said.
Source: https://www.wsj.com/articles/in-this-economy-quitters-are-winning-1530702001
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday July 06 2018, @02:10PM (9 children)
I think it's all luck and timing. My first real job out of grad school ran for 12 years, my next 6 jobs averaged about 2 years each. By some measures, I'm in year 5 on this one now... I only left 2 of those by choice, the rest were a function of a crappy economy either shutting the whole place down, or jerking people around in ways I wouldn't put up with (relocation to a shitty climate, for one.)
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday July 06 2018, @05:02PM (8 children)
Luck requires randomness and there is very little of that in the world, ask any crypto guy. That doesn't mean there aren't things outside your control but if you consider their possibility ahead of time you can plan for them.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday July 06 2018, @10:46PM (7 children)
I'm sorry, but going in to job 1, year 1, should I have been planning for the eventual collapse of the place which was not to actually happen for another 11+ years? And, yes, for the last 6 years we did plan and prepare as we could for the coming collapse, but how extensive should such planning be? Uproot and relocate on the chance that something bad might happen?
The thing that tanked job 1 was 9-11, it caused a global shift in investment away from medical devices - and it took over 2 years for that particular train wreck to finally grind to a halt. During those two years I was doing an extensive job search to be ready for the day the backsplatter started coming up from the fan, but, you know what? When the economy is in TILT mode, good job offers aren't all that plentiful - I still had a good deal going for the next 2 years, and when it really did end, I spent 4 months confirming, full-time, what my half-assed job search told me: there ain't shit out there unless you move cross-country.
Same thing happened in mini-scale on job 4, the writing was on the wall, the feelers were out, the planning was in full planning mode for almost a year, but the day Mr. can't raise enough funds to tear a wet paper bag came into my office to give me "the news" that he had utterly, completely, and desperately struck out this time, phrased as: "you're being let go," it came back around to the same old story of: yeah, you thought the job market around here looked crappy while you had a job, now that you get to pursue employment full-time you can rack up a whole lot of first-hand stories about just how crappy it is (interviewed with a guy who needed my skills, but he, highest paid software guy in the place, wasn't making 1/2 of my previous salary...)
One solution over the years would appear to be: work for about 1/2 the pay that I've been making since somewhere around year 6... but that seems like a really poor strategy for the long term, since all this painful unemployment really only amounts to less than 3% of potential earning time over the years, and even lower paid people are being laid off at the same time that I am.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday July 07 2018, @06:55AM (6 children)
Then it was a choice not luck. If you really want a solid demonstration of the difference between the two, get caught counting cards in Vegas. Large men in suits will be happy to explain the difference to you in a dark, secluded area.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday July 07 2018, @01:29PM (5 children)
Here's the thing, during those 6 years, "the collapse" was imminent at least 4 times, and when "the collapse" really did hit, that was just another chance event - any one of a dozen potential sources of (low odds) funding could have come through in time to prevent it for another 2 or more years. So, play the odds: keep riding the good job instead of making a painful lateral to one that might, or might not, be more secure.
The second time I moved town for a job (only 100 miles that time), I ended up in a real shithole of a job - but it only lasted 6 months because an unbelievable work 95% from home opportunity landed in my lap 6 months later. Planning: move to a bigger town where the job market sucks less and take a good looking job with what appears to be a stable-ish company who needs you. Reality: stable-ish company is run by a Mercurial tyrant with a Napoleon complex and an offer for better pay, better benefits and infinitely better working conditions falls from the sky 6 months later with no location requirements attached. Plan for that? Sure.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Saturday July 07 2018, @07:54PM (4 children)
Yeah, I woulda told you that if you'd asked. You'll pretty much always get treated better and shown a lot more loyalty at a SMB. If you want to be miserable but make more money that you then have to spend on cost of living differences, by all means move to a major urban center and work for a large corporation. If you want the same standard of living minus a few of the city frills and a much more pleasant work environment, hit one of the non-major urban centers and sign on with a small or medium sized business.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Saturday July 07 2018, @09:20PM (3 children)
My experience/advice is to stay away from college / University dominated towns, too many asshole "business-children" there who think they can just pay shit to students and get great workers. Yeah, it happens, but not nearly often enough to base a business on. Still, they muddle through with a staff of many incompetent children and blunder around repeating rookie mistakes, missing opportunities and barely scraping by or worse, when they could hire fewer people with actual experience and do better for less cost.
Small/Medium businesses have been a mixed bag for me, the first one was a great ride - compensation was always competitive with my contemporaries working for larger firms, and much more of a total business operations experience than being in a "not my job" silo farm, it was like a 12 year MBA program. Others have had a lot of insecurity in their leadership, childish personalities to deal with in positions of power, etc.
As for cost-of-living, I also find that to be a mixed bag - Miami was high, Houston was low-ish, but there are many smaller towns with costs as high or higher than the larger nearby more metro areas. Along with the sometimes lower cost of living in the smaller towns also comes a very real lower level of services, particularly in the schools, but really all around from police to medical to fixing the damn potholes in the road. Again, varies by location.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 08 2018, @03:10AM (2 children)
In the schools? Man, have you ever gone to public school in a major urban area? I have and it's complete shit compared to the more personal style of education you get in smaller towns. Mind you, some of the teachers in smaller towns aren't exactly the sharpest bowling ball in the shed but most of them are quite passable.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 08 2018, @03:28AM
The public schools in the "good" counties that are suburbs of Washington DC are some of the tops in the nation.
True, they're not in the city itself, but they are next to it. Good luck getting that level of academics and extracurriculars in some second tier city.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Sunday July 08 2018, @01:29PM
I don't think there's a solid size-quality correlation for schools. Houston had a confederation of independent public school districts, some were great, some were complete shit, and it had everything to do with their property tax funding. The small town school district I know the most about in central Florida definitely qualifies as having a whole stable full of non-sharp bowling ball teachers: their high school graduates who wait tables downtown don't know how to pronounce croissant, even after working in a restaurant with them on the menu for months. They also have a real problem with keeping the kids off drugs - there's a rodeo community there and the kids that are into horses do pretty well, but the ones that aren't mostly end up circulating with the drug using crowd because those are the only two choices for social circles there. At one time (before the drug thing was so bad in town) I thought about moving there and teaching math/science in the high school, but life had other plans.
Україна досі не є частиною Росії Слава Україні🌻 https://news.stanford.edu/2023/02/17/will-russia-ukraine-war-end