That's in the Wall Street Journal. Subheadline: "Rather than lean in, young workers say they want jobs that can be done from home, come with a cool boss and end at 5 p.m. sharp."
Here's the Instapundit link. Quips: "Career goal of the moment" and "it’s unfair if women get paid less than men."
I was thinking about blogging that "Lazy-Girl Job" story yesterday. Quip: I was too lazy.
But looking at it this morning, I'm remembering that's exactly how I felt when I graduated from art school in 1973. I remember scanning the "help wanted" ads in The New York Times and seeing jobs described as "fun." I actually got a fun job too — reading magazines and hanging out with 2 other young women. We had to write code numbers on every article, but we had endless material to talk and joke about. In my extra time — which was ample — I read whatever books I wanted (and chose classic literature like "The Red and the Black"). We could wear whatever we wanted. I wore jeans and T-shirts. One of my co-workers, a fan of the "glitter rock" of the day, wore 9-inch platform shoes.Anyway, that WSJ is from July, so why was I reading it yesterday? I don't know, but Instapundit has me looking at it today. Some excerpts from the article:
The phenomenon, essentially the opposite of “leaning in,” has detractors, who say that aspiring to a lazy-girl job is the wrong attitude for building a meaningful career. Yet, many young women who have branded themselves “lazy girls” online insist they are anything but. After growing up hearing about the horrors of overwork, they say they’re happy in their jobs and celebrate striking work-life balance gold....
Like quiet quitting before it, the lazy-girl job is the latest iteration of 20- and 30-somethings of both genders redrawing the blurry line between life and work postpandemic....
Michael Durwin, a senior social-media strategist, says he isn’t antiwork, but does believe American hustle culture is toxic at times. He doesn’t understand why a woman would brand herself a “lazy girl,” though he gets the ethos behind the movement.
I think a truly lazy person doesn't openly use this term. Those who use it are probably getting their job done competently. I know I was in that market research position I described above. There was a specific job to be done, and we got it done efficiently, but we remained in touch with our freedom. I think someone today using the term "lazy girl" is displaying confidence that her work is valuable and deserving of a salary but also that affirming her entitlement to all of the freedom around the edges of the job — control over the time and place of her (or his) work.
Look around you in real life. Who are the people who declare "I'm lazy"? They're not the truly lazy ones, but the ones tempted into overwork and excessive scrupulousness or needless display of earnest industriousness. They ought to find a way to lighten up and throw off their imaginary overseer.
@gabrielle_judge Career advice for women who don’t know what remote job to apply to. You can bay your bills at not feel tired at the end of the day. Women are here to collect those pay checks and move on from the work day. We have so much more fun stuff happeneing in our 5-9 that is way more important than a boss that you hate. #corporatejobs #jobsearchhacks #remoteworking #antihustleculture #9to5 ♬ original sound - Anti Work Girlboss
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The ultimate Lazy Girl job is, of course, OnlyFans. Laying on your back, at home, in your own bed that you never get out of, endlessly masturbating for your admirers.
This scene should be the last one in the movie entitled "The Rise & Fall of the United States of America."
I think someone today using the term "lazy girl" is displaying confidence that her work is valuable and deserving of a salary but also that affirming her entitlement to all of the freedom around the edges of the job — control over the time and place of her (or his) work
1) No woman must be made to feel bad about, or responsible for, anything, ever.
2) You mean women make choices that cause them to make less money? Wait while I ask Hoyt to borrow her shocked face...
If we could stop the flow of helicopter money a modest recession would flush all this out. Just as are Yankee fans old enough to vote who don’t remember seeing them win a world series there are workers old enough to have a full time job but have never experienced a job loss recession. I don’t wish economic pain on anyone but at this point it could be constructive…
The people mocking this attitude are the same people who say young women don't need careers because they should be raising children.
Heinlein wrote a story called "The Man Who Was Too Lazy To Fail," about a smart but lazy guy who spends his life and career thinking up efficiencies and ends up very successful. Sure, I get that.
And as the mom of 3 GenZers, I certainly hope that we've imbued them with enough work ethic to want to get their work done well in order to be paid for it. I think we have, and one has been in the workforce for four years now and seems to be pleasing the right people. But dang, they do complain a lot. (Not just my kids - all the GenZs.)
My youngest, who's so far only had "summer job" kinds of jobs, complains about everything he has to do, work-, school-, or home-related ("That seems like a lot of work"), but then he gets down to it and does it, and does it well, so... crossed fingers.
Our neighbors, Argentinians who work incredibly hard at both their quite successful careers and their home life, express a lot of frustration at their three GenZ kids, who also seem to us to work constantly. We keep telling them that their kids are exemplary and lovely and they shouldn't be worried, but they still say this whole work-life balance thing drives them crazy, and why aren't their kids willing to work the way they did when they were starting out?
Is the threat to establishment "feminism" that these "lazy girl" job seekers will eventually transition into women who seek a male bread winner to achieve a higher combined standard of living and who will then have room for children in a nuclear family?
Put the gendered aspect of this off to the side. Start by asking yourself, whether you are a boy or a girl, who owns you? If you believe you own yourself, you have the right to make the decisions that will, in your judgment, build the best life for you.
Laziness seems to me, in general, a bad choice, but so is slavish subordination to worthless others.
Personal autonomy forces us to make decisions for ourselves based upon imperfect information, and the result will be the imperfect lives almost all of us are leading. Somehow, progress usually occurs, albeit fitfully, and then we die.
I've never read a convincing case for slavery.
Another term for Lazy Girl Job is Housewife. You set your own hours, determine your own work flow, and you work from home. It used to be a respectable profession. Now you have to whisper it behind your hand and hope no one overhears.
This young woman should have received a traditional Christian or Jewish indoctrination to prepare her properly to be a stay at home wife and mother.
Restore the patriarchy. Stop destroying our young women (and men) for the sake of the devil worship religion of feminism and gay worship.
The dude who invented the wheel was lazy.
These lazies are working. Good for them.
My career was in the oil patch, where operations run 24 / 7 and cost a lot - visualize operating costs of a $million per day, with lots of moving parts and a couple of years planning, leading up to it - so being on call all the time during a program was just a fact of life, as was working 7 days/week for long periods. So it's a little hard to wrap my head around people like this young woman, who isn't even an extreme example. It's become too easy to live a decent life. It sounds very Scrooge-ish to say that, but there's a real end-of-empire feel to the way these people are shaping their outlook in life. We are constantly harped at, about unsustainable environmental issues that are turning out to be mostly myths and misrepresentations, but these attitudes represent the true unsustainability of our culture, IMO. History is demanding a reversion-to-the-mean.
You know who works their ass of? Immigrants do. You can see this every day of the week, if you bother to look.
It's pretty obvious that young men are also lazy and low energy. They don’t take care of themselves or work out ("Dad bods" are for old men not men in their 20s, this is not debatable). They dress sloppy, don't cut their hair, have stupid, unkempt bears, etc. What kind of woman would be attracted to someone without personal ambition or self respect?
The United States is starting to feel like a fictional place. There's so much loose money sloshing around here that even lazy-girls can make $60K-$80K a year doing mostly nothing and playing with their kitties. No wonder everybody wants to come here, chasing the "Lazy-Girl Dream".
I just don't understand the mentality of not working your ass off. From my experience, one does not need to go to the best schools or be the smartest person in the room, but one does need to outwork everyone and be able to work with everyone - from the cool boss to the asshole boss. Yeah, sometimes you are going to sacrifice a Friday night out drinking or Saturday just doing nothing. You can't then complain when you are only willing to do the bare minimum that others are getting promoted and making more than you. Are you likely underpaid in the early part of your career? Sure. Do you then get overpaid in the back half of your career? Absolutely.
Always with the weirdo glasses.
She is obsessed with "safe" in her job choice decision. As if she were choosing between an office job and a skyscraper construction job. As if the massive majority of jobs weren't perfectly safe.
I've had a lot of jobs, a lot of hard jobs. I never gave the safety of the job a thought. Might have if I had been contemplating being a test pilot or a miner, I guess...
What's with the big glasses?
Needz moar hands and "like." If I'm an HR person evaluating her job application and finding this - she goes to the bottom of the applicant list just for those alone. Not because of her foolish online promulgating of the "Lazy Girl" moniker...meh, she's probably only lazyish...
"Antiwork" is a trend anyway, especially among the un-launched and never-launched.
Plenty of foreigners ready to take their places.
I doubt this is gender specific anymore (if it ever was).
This is an almost rational choice people make in their 20s: work like mad trying to accomplish something or work to support enjoyable consumption. "Accomplish something" does not always mean make money, but it does mean devoting one's self to some work.
I don't see this as virtue vs laziness. But, ultimately from my economic point of view it is what divides our society between the capital "camp" and labor. Those who end up in charge are those who devoted themselves to something other than consumption.
Who ends up happier? That's personal. I'm pretty happy, retired comfortably, and can't stay away from the journals and writing. A good friend from high school, and former brother in law, seems happy and drinks and fishes everyday as he always has.
"Another term for Lazy Girl Job is Housewife. You set your own hours, determine your own work flow, and you work from home. It used to be a respectable profession."
To connect this to my point, to use the term "lazy girl" for this doesn't mean that it is lazy. It's more of a fun way to refer talk about what is actually a real and worthy job that takes skill, attention, and perseverance. It's just got a lot of flexibility and you're your own supervisor.
In that light, "lazy girl" is a humblebrag.
An addeendum: the only reason my friend is not miserable is a substantial inheritance. That's why laziness is not a rational choice for most people.
"I think a truly lazy person doesn't openly use this term."
Well, bless your heart, Althouse!
What's with the big glasses?
I dunno, but I think she rocks them.
My theory is that feminists actively encourage young women to take on Lazy-Girl jobs so that they can continue to bitch and moan about men making, on average, more money than women.
Prove me wrong
I’m trying to think of a lazy boy job.
In that light, "lazy girl" is a humblebrag.
You’re onto something here IMO.
A housewife is a not-for-profit vocation, which is a burden on state finances. That, and reduced diversity in the traditional nuclear family.
The "lazy girl" job described in that TikTok is actually not at all like being a stay at home parent.
It's specifically that it's a salaried job with benefits where you are not overworked and you retain a lot of flexibility and ease.
Being a stay at home parent is very demanding on your time and effort, often during the parts of the day when you'd like to rest or sleep. And the failure to do it correctly can get you in a lot of trouble or even in jail.
"She is obsessed with "safe" in her job choice decision. As if she were choosing between an office job and a skyscraper construction job. As if the massive majority of jobs weren't perfectly safe."
You have to try to figure out why safety played a role in the analysis. What kind of safety are women concerned about? It's not falling from scaffolding, but I think you do know what it is and you're either playing dumb or hiding your own knowledge from yourself.
Apparently, the Universal Basic Income is even closer than I feared.
Repeal the 19th.
These strike me as the jobs that Elon Musk got rid of at X (Twitter) to no poor effect on the operations. The "activist" and censorship jobs.
And remember, many of the tech companies had to make jobs for women to get their ratios up for ESG. So naturally, many of the non-tech tech jobs wouldn't have much to do. And it left a lot of free time for showing up at the protests and such.
And customer service has really declined in the last few years. Scott Adams has commented on his trails. Even though he can get executive action team response when he discusses online.
In any case, "lazy girl jobs" don't seem like the ones that will develop good work habits which are important when being a producer is important.
>Ann Althouse said...
"She is obsessed with "safe" in her job choice decision. As if she were choosing between an office job and a skyscraper construction job. As if the massive majority of jobs weren't perfectly safe."
You have to try to figure out why safety played a role in the analysis. What kind of safety are women concerned about? It's not falling from scaffolding, but I think you do know what it is and you're either playing dumb or hiding your own knowledge from yourself.<
Yeah, I already did that. It's because the "safety" business has been inculcated in these young twits for a decade or more by their schools and, I'm guessing from your comment, folks like you. They want their safe spaces. They don't want their kids to play in their front yards because the bogeyman is out there just waiting. They don't want their male co-workers - unless they're rich or handsome - to tell them they look nice. Or are you extrapolating some rape incidents and MeToo stories to the general work place environment? Yeah, I think it's probably the latter.
Focus on the "As if the massive majority of jobs weren't perfectly safe" part - the point of my comment. (And the skyscraper/test pilot thing was pretty obvious snark.)
And I'm playing dumb?
This is just obtuse:
"You're working so hard you haven't left space in your head for thinking about how life could be different. Do you think if someone employs you they thoroughly own you and you can't selfishly structure your life for your own benefit?"
First, no one in the US works so hard that there is no time to think about and plan a life- that first sentence is just ridiculous hyperbole. In the US, you are always free to change jobs, so the second sentence is a complete non sequitur. If one is happy working 9-5 40 hours/wk for $15/hr at a low stress/effort job, then one is free to selfishly structure their lives for that perceived benefit- I won't criticize it because I do understand it- it isn't a moral question to me. Just don't expect to get paid premium wages equal to those received by those willing to work when required and as hard as they can- those other people aren't slaves either.
What these young ladies appear to desire is to get pay that is equal to those who bust their asses every day doing twice the amount of work that is harder and more stressful- in short, they really are lazy. Believe them when they tell you this.
This is not a problem for working class workers of either sex. They have never worked harder or longer hours, or had to have multiple jobs, or faced dropping incomes and less chances to enter the middle class, since before WWII.
The entire problem for this class of people, -- who do very necessary work -- is illegal immigration. Illegal immigration has destroyed class mobility for even relatively well-trained manual and hourly workers. You can whine that the loss of unions has contributed to their plight, but show me one union that isn't utterly corrupt and ends up being just one more Boss Hogg around workers' necks.
Meanwhile, our Mandarin Class -- "nonprofit" six-figurers, college tenured and administrative types, K-12 teachers, and government employees -- are doing just fine. They bitch and moan about being overworked or making amazing sacrifices while none of them has ever carried more than a 2/2 class load after tenure, or faced the fact that they work far, far fewer hours than the people they constantly mouth off about (I'm looking at you, K-12 teachers).
Their politics are the lynchpin holding their lifestyles aloft: they refuse to consider academic and nonprofit reforms that would make their jobs and lives more constructive, less exploitative of others, and just less dishonest. The K-12 teachers love social problems and unparented children so they can play savior and rake in bigger bucks addressing the cultural decay they eagerly exacerbate in the polling booth. The tenured and educational administrators cannot imagine a university system where they actually have to do full-time work, rather than sloughing it off on their own little serf class, adjuncts paid pennies for the heavy lifting. So-called non-profits are anything but. They're either corrupt sinecures or very well-paid gigs that similarly need politics that create an ever-growing raft of social decay. Government workers make big bucks as they loaf around 9-5, even lawyers and other professionals. Hell, I've had plenty who tell me so.
We're going to deeply regret destroying the non-Mandarin, non-government, non-underclass working and middle classes in this country.
That's the only employment issue that matters, and it has little to do with gender or the "danger" of the job. I've met plenty of lazy losers on construction sites, too.
I saw the Instapundit post first and disregarded it because I think the focus on “girl” was off, because I could relate. I agree with Althouse notion of competent in your work and efficiency. I’m efficient at getting my work done. If you pay me salary and the salary is graded to my peers, and my peers are not as efficient, then I’ll do the work assigned, get it done early, and use my extra time my way. There is nothing lazy about it. I could do more, and typically willing to do more. But I’m not going to “work my ass off” for equivalent pay to someone not as efficient simply because the optics make them look more industrious.
When I was younger and working typical entry level jobs, I didn’t have a choice. I worked fast food, and my managers would put me on drive-thru because my through rate was faster and that was the highest demand. When I switched over to grocery, I had one of the fastest checkout lanes. Customers knew it and my line was sometimes longer because people knew I would get them out faster. But these were entry level positions, so I essentially got paid minimum wage. I couldn’t be “lazy”, but what do I call the coworkers making the same or more, but with less output due to being inefficient?
I do recommend discretion in doing what in this discussion is called “lazy girl” (It isn’t lazy or girl”). You first need to establish yourself with your employer and prove your competence and efficiency.
"Rather than lean in, young workers say they want ..."
Again, the article inflates itself by subtly blurring the difference between "some" and "all."
Obviously, the article is about "some" girls, not "all" girls. When you put "some" explicitly in, it deflates the whole article:
"Rather than lean in, some young workers say they want ..."
Then, the article just is a big duh. People are different. Some people want to lean in and some don't. Duh.
I think someone today using the term "lazy girl" is displaying confidence that her work is valuable and deserving of a salary but also that affirming her entitlement to all of the freedom around the edges of the job — control over the time and place of her (or his) work
I suspect that many people using the term "lazy girl" online are trying to establish themselves as "lazy girl influencers" on which they can make profit, as opposed to merely looking for a work-from-home career working for someone else.
Figure 3 hrs a day, M-F works out to 750 hrs a year. Taking a figure of $75k as between $60k and $100k, that works out to maybe $100/hr. If you are working for someone else, figure 3x that for overhead and their profit, for a billing rate of $300/hr. That 3x overhead rate means that she really can’t work for anyone else, since most $300/hr work needs a lot of training or experience. It also means that she isn’t paying FICA and income taxes either. And of course, that means that she is probably leaching off of everyone else.
“Veterans of such jobs say roles such as “digital marketing associate,” “customer-success manager” and “office administrator” are good bets for achieving the lazy-girl lifestyle.”
Vicki is apparently a “freelance digital marketer”, whatever that means. My guess is that means she generates those obnoxious Google ads that show up in comment streams. They are all telling everyone that they are making ridiculous amounts of money for minimal work. Since you have to talk with them to get into this amazingly lucrative line of work, I detect a MLM (multi level marketing) scheme. That means that some else is always left holding the bag, when the pyramid scheme collapses. In a lot of the old style ones, that meant buying your inventory of makeup, or cleaning supplies, or whatever, up front, with the higher levels of the pyramid taking their profit from the inventory they force you to buy, to get in on the bottom.
The reality is that these are all fringe jobs. I am fine with that - they often provide the grease to keeping the economy moving, by reducing friction in the system that gums it up. But voting for Democrats to increase free stuff, by people not paying the taxes needed to pay for that free stuff, does bother me.
Michael Durwin, a senior social-media strategist, says he isn’t antiwork, but does believe American hustle culture is toxic at times.
I think it's cute Michael Durwin thinks "Hustle culture" is American. Maybe he realizes most successful countries have a hustle culture.
The problem I see with the Lazy Girl model is that eventually someone will come along and either prove they can do the job of two people, and the lazy girl will be fired. Or the company will ask you if you want a promotion, and if you don't, they'll notice it and start to look for your replacement.
The promotion culture at work will eventually push out the lazy girl for a cheaper lazy girl. I think.
I propose a lot of people over 50 would like the equivalent of the lazy girl job. I know so many men pushed out of their good careers because a)they aren't going to be CEO so b)they can bring in a cheaper person or people to do the job.
But what if the 50 year old would be happy at a starter level or mid level job? The could slay the job because they've already done it! But they won't get it.
Michael Durwin, a senior social-media strategist, says he isn’t antiwork, but does believe American hustle culture is toxic at times.
It is this and we are currently in one of those periods where it becomes toxic. This is based on a recent employment experience I had where I was put in the position of having to work 14 to 18 hours a day, 6 to 7 days a week for nearly 5 months. From what I'm seeing this is becoming common in the work world, so I'm inclined to cut Gen Z a bit of slack when they talk about work/life balance. For what it's worth, I turn 60 this year.
I'm sure the above will statement will cause a lot of huffing, puffing and off-gassing by the largely RETIRED Althouse commentariat, to that I say OK BOOMERS!
They don’t wanna grow up. No sir! Not them!
"The people mocking this attitude are the same people who say young women don't need careers because they should be raising children."
This kind of comment always fills me with wonder. Are Progs really able to live in a world where the grotesquely dated caricatures they themselves create take on the force of reality? It's so weird.
Housewife/mother is pretty fucking far from a lazy existence.
Drop the crack pipe.
Toxic femininity on display, with no ability to plan or see to one’s future or the well-being of those around you.
Both leaning in and leaving at 5pm are good work principles. Both can be accomplished, you work while at work, demanding equal treatment as coworkers, and stop at the end of the work day, because you aren't doing work without being paid for it.
It's sad to be afraid of life.
"overwork and excessive scrupulousness or needless display of earnest industriousness"
True story (paraphrase).
Talking with a co-worker about a supervisor.
Me: Man, that dude must work 70hrs+ a week. He oughta take some time off.
Co-worker: Did you ever meet his wife?
Housewife/mother is pretty fucking far from a lazy existence.
Not so much as it used to be, what with Roomba vacuums, automatic washers and dryers, UberEats and the like...
Ms. Althouse, it is not an either/or. I work my ass off and still make time for life outside of work for family etc.
I choose to work hard because I wanted to get to the C-suite level. I wasn't a slave. I could have relaxed, been content with a middling career (which is fine for those who want that), but I had goals. I like what I do and I'm good at.
The problem I see with the Lazy Girl model is that eventually someone will come along and either prove they can do the job of two people, and the lazy girl will be fired. Or the company will ask you if you want a promotion, and if you don't, they'll notice it and start to look for your replacement.
One other problem is when the business you are in shrinks. You can survive this first round of layoffs, but if you don't pick up the slack of those let go, then you won't survive the next round. You really do need to be competent and efficient. If you are not, then you are playing with fire. And truly, your point about someone else coming along; yeah, you better not think you are the best and only fish in the sea. The goal is balance, not arrogance.
and "it’s unfair if women get paid less than men."
it's SO Unfair!!
men get Paid MORE than women, just because they Happen to work longer hours..
men get Paid MORE than women, just because they Happen to work harder at their jobs..
men get Paid MORE than women, even though THEY Aren't sucking the bosses dick!..
SO Unfair!!!
Summing up discussion with friends across a fairly wide range of "industries" (higher ed, defense, hospitality, contract software, mortgage and housing), a general picture emerges:
The upper management is crazy, possibly from too much social-media induced groupthink. Whatever the origin of the problem, there is a massive disconnect between when it coming out of upper management / corporate and the actual problems facing organizations.
Middle management has been told--seemingly universally--that they are being evaluated on whether or not they can keep the lower management from quitting / switching to another company (particularly the lower management that was promoted or hired for demographic reasons since 2020). They therefore are letting / encouraging their lower management to work from home, to schedule themselves for the least onerous shifts, to ignore deadlines, etc., etc.
Lower management has realized this, REALLY likes "shirking from home," and knows that they aren't being fired because doing so would hurt the metrics for their managers.
The front-line workers--the people who have to be in person: teachers, doctors, nurses, engineers in factories, etc., etc. are carrying the organizations right now, but they are getting burned out badly. What has held everything together is that those front-line people haven't internalized that idea that there's nothing wrong with just sitting home and collecting a check, but how long they will continue to be played for suckers is a real question.
The "lazy girl" phenomenon is being driven by this dynamic--middle management won't fire them so they spend all day on their phones, don't actually know what they're "managing," etc.
Eventually things are going to start collapsing. I don't know if you've noticed a couple of major stories about fake and/or defective parts ending up in the engines of commercial aircraft, but apparently those are 100% the result of "remote management" being done in inappropriate circumstances. There will just be more of that until the management / administrative class managed to go un-insane.
I'm not holding my breath.
and "it’s unfair if women get paid less than men."
I'm surprised this tired old myth is still around. If it was true, somebody who recognized the economics of the situation would start a business and only employ women.
What kind of safety are women concerned about?
Well, I think they'd do well to consider that question themselves.
I worked in heavily male-dominated fields during my early career. I was the only employee of a mining company working in Alpine County, CA, working 10 on, 4 off, in the field, with no one checking up on me and no way to call for help if I fell down the mountain or encountered a bear or or was struck by lightning or was attacked by some rando in my little shack behind the local biker bar in Markleeville. Then I was the only woman mudlogger working in the Sacramento Valley. The dangers I faced there were real and physical and based on the safety record of the particular toolpusher of whatever rig I was working on, plus the subtler risks of working 12-hour days or nights surrounded by roughnecks (one guy was arrested for murder at the rig one morning).
Later in my career, I worked in mixed-sex offices and my primary danger was my commute. Still later I worked in an all-female setting and, besides my commute, my primary danger was the deaths of a thousand cuts that my female coworkers could inflict on my psyche. In recent years I've been at home and face dangers of my own making like doing yard work where venomous snakes hang out and going up on ladders while alone in the house.
So, what kinds of safety are these Lazy Girls concerned about?
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