Never ones to miss a chance to cry “hardship,” upper-middle-class, well-educated young Americans are getting in on the Chinese “lie flat” social protest movement, claiming they, too, are burned out and quitting their jobs to do nothing trib.al/e5rjiys
It started among Chinese factory workers burned out from grueling 12-hour, six-day work weeks, and the unrelenting pressure to climb the economic ladder.

So some Chinese millennials formed a movement to opt out of work and the pressures of society trib.al/e5rjiys
What this trend will mean for China is unclear, but Americans who choose to lay down in lieu of work may end up worse off than they think trib.al/e5rjiys
It’s hard to know exactly how many Americans are lying flat. The labor market is behaving strangely:

📈Unemployment is high
📉Many jobs are unfilled

Quit rates are at their highest level in more than 20 year, which could signal a less dynamic economy trib.al/e5rjiys
What’s even stranger are the many reports of burnout from people early in their career.

High-power-track jobs like banking and law are scrambling to keep their young workers from quitting trib.al/e5rjiys
In July, 2.3% of Americans under 45 are planning on leaving the labor force, compared to just 0.9% of Americans over 45.

There was a time when ambition was admired; now opting out of a career garners 400,000 likes on Twitter
Unlike Chinese factory workers, people in the developed world have never worked so little.

Between 1965 and 2003, American men gained an extra 6-8 hours of leisure time a week; women gained 4-8. And since 2003, leisure time has increased further trib.al/e5rjiys
In some ways it’s surprising to see Americans rising up against the cult of work. People may feel overwhelmed, but they’re not actually working harder than previous generations.

So why lie flat now? trib.al/e5rjiys
It could be that work is much less pleasant when you don’t get to socialize with colleagues. Or perhaps this past year made work feel inescapable.

Some realized hard work is not for them. But that choice is a luxury they may come to regret trib.al/e5rjiys
Many of the lie-flatters will probably return to work eventually; they will run out of money or get bored.

But their sabbatical will cost them. Historically, most of the pay increases you’ll experience in your career occur before age 45 trib.al/e5rjiys
The skill development and networking that happens in your 20s and 30s set up your career for life. Work is hard when you start out, but you reap the benefits for decades.

That makes your 20s and 30s a terrible time to have a midlife crisis trib.al/e5rjiys
At 4 p.m. ET, join us on @TwitterSpaces for a debate about American workers and the "lie flat" movement, featuring:

@roybahat
@AllisonSchrager
@s_m_i
@conorsen
@tghilarducci
twitter.com/i/spaces/1BdGY…

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with Bloomberg Opinion

Bloomberg Opinion Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @bopinion

15 Sep
On Labor Day, 7.5 million Americans lost their federal unemployment benefits, and another 3 million unemployed lost the $300 bonus that had been in place since March.

That’s a lot of people with no immediate way to support themselves and their families trib.al/pK04k9j
What would Franklin Roosevelt — who put America to work during the Great Depression — make of the way Washington has responded to this economic crisis? twitter.com/i/broadcasts/1…
The New Deal’s attack on the Great Depression had four main components:

💵Temporary direct relief for the impoverished
🔐A stronger social safety net
🇺🇸An expanded regulatory state
💼Jobs for the legions of unemployed
trib.al/pK04k9j
Read 15 tweets
14 Sep
18-year-old Emma Raducanu is taking the tennis world by storm.

Her victory in the U.S. Open turned her into one of those athletes who you can’t help but watch and want to know more, or even pick up a racquet trib.al/VKDcbjm
How big is this win? @ThereseRaphael1 asked Michel Masquelier, former chairman of IMG Media.

“It’s as good as it gets,” he says. “Tennis is an individual sport, so any individual who shines on that stage is instantly recognizable” trib.al/VKDcbjm Image
Alongside her championship title, Raducanu has other force multipliers for propelling celebrity and commercial success. There’s her international reputation:

🇨🇳Chinese mother
🇷🇴Romanian father
🇬🇧Raised in Britain
🇺🇸Shot to fame in the U.S.
trib.al/VKDcbjm Image
Read 13 tweets
13 Sep
Early in 2020, the world urgently needed to raise its sense of alarm around Covid-19.

But for the vaccinated parts of the planet, Covid is no longer a horseman of the apocalypse. Instead, it is gradually becoming “just a virus” trib.al/QvxD2SE
In Singapore, where 81% are fully immunized, the Ministry of Health has started prioritizing data on hospitalizations rather than infections.

Israel is riding out a surge in new Covid cases without returning to lockdowns for the vaccinated trib.al/jAnL73X Image
The calls from some quarters to stop publishing daily Covid case totals may be premature for a disease that’s still killing thousands of people a day trib.al/jAnL73X Image
Read 11 tweets
26 Aug
“We are deeply worried about Afghan women and girls, their rights to education, work and freedom of movement.”

That’s the statement on the situation for women and girls in Afghanistan, signed by 21 governing bodies. They are right to be worried trib.al/5lKzyVO
The Taliban has vowed to take a more moderate stance on women’s rights, but details are thin on what that means in practice.

The reality of their rule already looks troubling trib.al/keB25cW
The story for the last two decades has been a more positive one for women and girls in Afghanistan.

🏫 As of 2019, over 9 million children were enrolled in schools, 39% of them girls
📖 Literacy rates for females have soared trib.al/keB25cW
Read 9 tweets
25 Aug
When Americans began emerging from their homes after the first wave of Covid in spring 2020, many apparently headed straight to their local boat dealers.

Spending on pleasure boats shot up to 20% above the pre-pandemic pace in May 2020 trib.al/xHmYB8x
At a time when crowded indoor spaces can pose deadly risks, small boats are great places to be.

The remote-work arrangements also made it easier for affluent white-collar workers to locate themselves within convenient distance of a body of water trib.al/RiRZvDB
With so many other things that have boomed during the pandemic, one does have to wonder how long this elevated demand for boats will last.

Here’s spending on pleasure boats going back to 1959, adjusted for inflation: trib.al/RiRZvDB
Read 10 tweets
24 Aug
When we talk about workers going back to their offices, the goal for most is to return to the normal routines of life.

🍼 But for parents who had their first child during the past 18 months, the return is uncharted territory trib.al/a3jKClJ
New parents are figuring out for the first time how to manage:

🚍 Commuting
⏰ Long hours away from home
🍼 Parenting small children

All their experience thus far has been in a work-from-home pandemic world trib.al/Rnd0dVG
Data serves mostly to confirm that American work culture isn't particularly family-friendly, generally leaving mothers as the caretakers-of-last-resort in times of need trib.al/Rnd0dVG
Read 9 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!

:(