Business Business Insider double feature: Loyalty at work no longer pays — and it's employers who are to blame - Bonus: I'm a boomer who's about to retire at 59. I'm nervous about retirement because I'll have less income and too much free time.

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Sources: https://www.businessinsider.com/why-loyalty-between-employers-employees-2024-5 + https://www.businessinsider.com/boomer-retiring-early-nervous-about-money-2024-5
Archives: https://archive.is/oJ4iq + https://archive.is/JKj2x

Loyalty at work no longer pays — and it's employers who are to blame​

Steven Piluso - May 31, 2024, 6:41 AM PDT

As a marketing executive and a strategy, management, and operations consultant for two decades, I've heard and read a lot about employee loyalty. The blame seems to always fall on the (perceived) fickle and selfish nature of millennials and Gen Z, thought to be self-centered and loyal only to themselves.

And that's how it would appear — if you hadn't been in the corporate world for decades prior and saw firsthand how the initial social contract that created loyalty was broken by the employers, not employees.

I got an early impression of what company loyalty was supposed to be

After college graduation at age 22, I got my first job at an advertising agency. At the orientation, sitting with mostly entry- or low-level employees, an HR rep went over a lot of confusing information — stuff about common stock, benefits, and a pension plan.

I thought to myself, "Well, I'm going to work here forever and I'll just figure it out later and retire at 65, maybe before that!"

After all, this was what I'd been told by my grandfather right before I left for college. He'd retired after working at the same bank branch for 45 years, working his way from sweeping the floors to branch president.

I'll always remember his words that day at the kitchen table: "In my day, when you got a job, you did that job, whether it's what you wanted or not, until you retired. And you didn't worry about jumping around for money; if you took care of the company, they'd take care of you and your family."

He told me that his pension and healthcare were what kept him comfortable and allowed him to pay considerable medical bills for my grandmother.

Then I watched my company's loyalty perks dry up

About three years into my tenure at that job, a memo informed us that the company was discontinuing its pension program; we could either be paid out or migrate the balance into a 401(k), the new retirement provision for employees.

My colleagues were outraged. There was suddenly talk of "bailing out" by people older than me, but I didn't really get it at the time.
A year later, they announced an IPO and that all common stock would be liquidated and paid out at about $5 per share. The IPO price was $25.
"This used to be a great place to work," was all I kept hearing, though I don't ever recall anything significant that made that company such a great place to spend your career — except for the generous pension and common stock benefit, that is. These were the things that the company used to do to reward loyalty and make you want to stay, and they were gone.

I eventually left, as did many mid- and upper-level employees. I'd realized that since my former company wasn't going to take care of me, I had to do for myself what I could to work towards security and retirement in my future.

The older I get, the more I understand what's been broken

A few years later, I was working at a renowned global advertising agency and found myself in an all-hands client crisis meeting for a Fortune 500 company that was discontinuing its pension program.

My manager explained the magnitude of the situation: People had essentially sought employment at this tech company, perceived as a dinosaur among the dot.coms, specifically for the long-term security it offered.

Worse, many employees who had been there for many years were not "grandfathered" into keeping their pensions, forced to migrate to a 401(k). A unique benefit used as a powerful recruitment and retention tool had been erased.

It took me a while to see the gravity of that moment. Now, as I start to think toward retirement at age 52, I really get it. I have an uncle who'd worked for this same tech company who retired with his pension at a decent age and now spends his summers on his boat teaching sailing near Nantucket and his winters working ski patrol in Vermont.

He gave them 40+ years of his life, and in return they took great care of him. It seems like those days are gone now — or only reserved for the fabulously wealthy.

As I've gotten older, I'm sometimes jealous of friends who took jobs in public education or government. They haven't lived lavishly over the years, but with 30 years' experience can retire at full salary in perpetuity and sleep comfortably without the plague of questions like Will my 401(k) be enough to retire at 60? 70? Will the government move retirement from 65 to 70 and I'll have to work for nearly 20 more years?

I also wonder how much I may have missed along the way because I've had to be so focused on my future, instead of the present.

The broken loyalty contract between employers and workers can be repaired

Is loyalty a dated and dead concept? My answer, despite what I've seen, is an emphatic "No." In fact, the shift in values from Gen-X to millennials and Gen-Z creates a great opportunity to ignite loyalty.

It'll require companies to understand that there's a massive misalignment between what companies think will create loyalty versus what makes employees feel like they work for a great company and want to stay.

Though some startups and next-gen businesses are exceptions, most companies still focus on very linear, financially-based hooks for loyalty: salary, 401(k) match, stock options; maybe work-from-home flexibility.

But as a marketer who has conducted years of research and cultural reconnaissance on Gen Z, millennials, Gen X, and baby boomers, I know that what seems to most drive young people today is the freedom to pursue their passions. They care less about money and are financially driven as a means to an end, pursuing things like side hustles, immersive travel to unusual places, music festivals, costly fitness classes, and mental health investments like therapy and life coaches.

That's why I've strongly encouraged the companies I work with to create sabbatical programs, such as five years of service matched with three months of paid leave to travel or pursue personal interests (with parameters that keep them from quitting on their first day back); to establish corporate partnerships that help employees pursue physical and mental wellness; and to create programs where employees are permitted and encouraged to dedicate a percentage of their paid time pursuing passions or work for non-profits.

A company that matches this demand with benefits, rather than just higher salary, can win loyalty.

Steven Piluso is a marketing operations and strategy consultant and a proud husband and father to two young children.




I'm a boomer who's about to retire at 59. I'm nervous about retirement because I'll have less income and too much free time.​

Essay by Laura Landsbaum - May 27, 2024, 4:14 AM PDT


For the last 20 years, I've had the same two alarms set every weekday — one at 5:15 a.m. and one at 9:17 a.m.

As a Texas high school teacher, the 5:15 alarm is really just a formality. After 20 years of early rising, I'm up before the sun with no prompting required. The 9:17 a.m. alarm is also deeply ingrained; it's the official attendance time when I'm required to pause my instruction and take attendance. It's Texas' official "time of record" by which schools are funded on daily attendance.

It's the schedule I've followed for two decades. But after this week, neither time will matter. I will walk away from teaching and into early retirement at 59, which makes me more than a little nervous.

My income will now be cut in half

I'm unnerved by several things. I'll be "living smaller" on less income. With my pension, my income will be less than half what it has been. My expenses will be lower but won't be cut by 50%.

I've been a remote adjunct instructor at a local community college for the past year, concurrent with my high school job, but the rules of my pension require me to sit out this Fall semester. It took me years of applying to secure that adjunct position. I worry that being forced to sit out the busiest semester of the academic calendar will push me to the back of the adjunct line once again. The pay isn't great, at about $50 per hour, but a few classes certainly can help close the gap in my income.

Since I won't be making nearly enough, I decided to accept a remote writing job, but it doesn't have benefits and won't have any structure or routine. While I'll be doing something I care deeply about, I will still be below the salary I earned this year.

I'm struggling to understand how I will fill my time

For 20 years, the more than 200 teachers in the building have been my daily interaction with adults. We lunch together, and I've shared the rollercoasters of their lives. They've been there to discuss and weigh in on my classroom dilemmas and personal predicaments. Where will the new voices of reason come from?

Wary of only my spouse for interaction, I have big plans. I've applied to join a committee for my community — one that meets monthly to review permits for home improvements, paint colors, and landscape design.

Two Mahjong sets have been growing dusty in my closet for decades. I've found a beginner's group that meets twice monthly that I have every intention of joining. I'm hopeful that Mahjong will keep the cobwebs from settling into the corners of my brain and give me a new group of peers.
Additionally, it's been easy to push off any amount of formal exercise with the "I don't have time" excuse. Now that I'll have the time in retirement, what will my new exercise regime look like? For 20 years, it's been steps in the school building that have been my only exercise. I've always known I need to stave off osteoporosis with weight resistance training, but now will be the time to pick up a dumbbell.

I'm not sure who I am without my job

Finally, for the last 20 years, I have proudly proclaimed that "I teach high school" to anyone who asks about my employment. What will the next answer be? I haven't found one that I'm comfortable with.

I'm not quite ready to say, "I'm retired." That phrase carries too many negative connotations for me. More than 30 years later, I finally understand why my former mother-in-law didn't embrace her new status as "grandmother" with any enthusiasm. Titles carry weight, and I'm not ready to shoulder "retiree."






 
I have no idea what welfare cliffs look like the UK.
Honestly, I’m not sure, because I didn’t have kids until I was hitched with a stable job, but when I was a young single worker (in a job that paid less than the median) after my rent and utilities and food I had about 40 quid a week to play with and wasn’t eligible for any kind of support at all. No expensive habits or subscriptions or anything like that and I lived frugally.
I suspect our system can be gamed like yours can and there’s a lot of disparity, with people working and struggling and getting less than those on benefits.
One advantage we do have is medical care being free at point of access for most stuff (although we pay NI national insurance which is main rate of ten percent of earnings on top of income tax so it’s not free free, but it’s not going to bankrupt you if you need to fix a broken leg.)
Just from observation, I do believe that what’s counted as working poverty in the USA is a higher income level than here. We also have entire cohorts of scroungers living off the dole but that’s a whole different game
 
This is what is so funny about giving employers notice to me. You're supposed to give them weeks of advance notice when you plan to leave, but if they want to fire or lay you off, they can just let you go this afternoon with no notice and it's up to you to figure it out.

Personally if I worked at a large employer where I'm just a number I'd just quit without notice once I sign the offer for the new place. It's not like anybody will remember you in a year. Basically did that, actually, did absolutely zero work and just took PTO for the entire notice period. They said it was unlimited.

Weird how all those bosses who cared so much about my career and development stopped talking to me when I put in my notice, huh?
 
Personally if I worked at a large employer where I'm just a number I'd just quit without notice once I sign the offer for the new place.
It’s tempting but in any industry you’ll keep running across the same people again and again so it can be better to not burn bridges.
No big company will be loyal to you, but see it as maintaining your reputation, which benefits you.
 
Every time I might be starting to develop a twinge of sympathy for them boomers whine about $50/hr being poverty wages and I go back to wanting to strangle them all to death with my bare hands.
But it is a poverty wage for a boomer.

If you're 60, realistically you only have maybe 7 or 8 earning years left. If you're lucky. BIG IF. Then you're in your 70s and you're riddled with health problems. I'm friends with a few older blokes and one of them probably pays $4000 a month in out of pocket health expenses. Just health expenses. Every month. And it usually goes up geometrically each year you're alive past 75.

So it's either you, (a) worked your time in a government job and you've got a vested pension, (b) you properly stacked and managed your 401(k) and you've got a few million in funds that you can use to generate bond income that you can live off of before you have to eat down the principle to keep your moldy ass alive, or (c) you spent 40 years going fuck it yolo and now you're gonna be on the social security retirement plan - which usually is a 1 bedroom hovel while eating beans every night.

Complaining about not making 50 an hour in your 20s is pointless. You've got 4 decades of earning years left so the goal should be to git gud scrub so you can pull down the big money in your 40s and 50s and stack out your 401(k)s and your IRAs. But 50 an hour when you're at the ass end of the work ride? Yeah that's a dire situation that's gonna see you probably ending up being a sponge off of all your geographically closest relatives, before they get sick of you always reaching into their pockets, and they dump your ass in the retirement homes that are for people who didn't build assets.
 
As I've gotten older, I'm sometimes jealous of friends who took jobs in public education or government. They haven't lived lavishly over the years, but with 30 years' experience can retire at full salary in perpetuity and sleep comfortably without the plague of questions like Will my 401(k) be enough to retire at 60? 70? Will the government move retirement from 65 to 70 and I'll have to work for nearly 20 more years?
There's the pro-government job/anti-private sector propaganda.
 
five years of service matched with three months of paid leave to travel or pursue personal interests (with parameters that keep them from quitting on their first day back)
I'm fucking astounded that this dipshit thinks that this is a good offer. Why yes I would love to slave for 5 years for your fucking company to get 18 days of paid leave per year that I'm not even allowed to use until I've deposited enough of them into the good goy box, probably while being underpaid tremendously and overworked. If the modern job actually paid a salary that was in line with the cost of living and housing maybe this would be enticing, but it fucking doesn't, so everybody under 40 pretty much has to downsize their lives so that they can survive on unemployment anyway. With that being the case, why would I give the slightest fuck about this when I probably won't make it to 5 years at the company? Any time I see a policy like this I just assume that the interval of time specified is slightly higher than the maximum employee retention time for anybody who was not grandfathered in from the 70s. "Whoops, sorry Mr millennial, looks like our department is downsizing and we're going to have to lay you off at 4 years and 9 months. Oh, all that sabbatical time? Yeah it says here in your contract that we don't actually have to pay that out because it isn't counted per year but per 5 years and you never made it to 5 years."

These stupid, out of touch, spoiled old fucks need to start dying already. Complaining about $50 an hour, motherfucker I am a goddamn computer scientist and I have never even made $40 an hour. Rope yourself immediately you faggot boomer fuck.
 
I'm friends with a few older blokes and one of them probably pays $4000 a month in out of pocket health expenses. Just health expenses
That’s a huge amount. I just ran it through the calculator sites and that would need a pre tax wage of 65k here, simply for that expense alone. That 65k would put you at the 96th percentile of all wage earners in the uk. That’s only paying for that one expense in the wage of course, so any rent or food etc not counted. You would need to be top three or four percent in the uk to able to do that
 
Are we sure? Legitimately not trying to start shit. I'm just curious because it's all so complicated once you start factoring in things like welfare and per-state differences.
Like, if someone where in a state with no state income tax like Texas and their minimum wage is $7.25/hour; then that's different from someone in California who pays an additional 1-12.3% for state income tax vs federal. It's not just the taxes either, but the welfare available in each location, too.
View attachment 6050600
I have no idea what welfare cliffs look like the UK.
here's some interesting graphs and quotes if you're interested

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purchasingpower.png

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There is another reason why hourly rates often look more favourable. In 2022, the average British worker did 1,532 hours, but US workers completed 1,811 — a whole 18 per cent more. Hypothetically, if US workers worked UK hours but at the same hourly wage — while adjusting for purchasing power – the mean US wage would fall to around £48,000.
The data also suggests British workers are fundamentally less productive. This is nothing new: in the 1950s, American aid administrators visiting British factores were shocked by the working practices here. They concluded that US workers had more individualism, a greater desire for success and a willingness to try new ideas.

not only do european countries tax their workers more, pay them less, and demand more time off for them, skilled occupations barely earn more than unskilled positions. and, like mentioned, the productivity difference. i always know when i'm working with someone from europe because they'll be slow as shit to respond to me and then i'll randomly get automated replies from email saying they're "on holiday" for the next three weeks

tl;dr: europeans are LAZY
 
That’s a huge amount. I just ran it through the calculator sites and that would need a pre tax wage of 65k here, simply for that expense alone. That 65k would put you at the 96th percentile of all wage earners in the uk. That’s only paying for that one expense in the wage of course, so any rent or food etc not counted. You would need to be top three or four percent in the uk to able to do that
Being sick and old is expensive, and people seem to think they'll stay healthy forever, because they've been healthy up until now, so why would anything change in the future, right?

One guy said to me "My retirement sucks. All I do now is go from one doctor's appointment to another doctor's appointment, every week, and hoping that I can still finish taking a piss in less than 10 minutes."
 
It’s tempting but in any industry you’ll keep running across the same people again and again so it can be better to not burn bridges.
No big company will be loyal to you, but see it as maintaining your reputation, which benefits you.

I've abandoned two jobs, nothing happened. You're just promoting the fearmongering from these companies. I'd already seen so many people fuck up in jobs, fired for all kinds of dodgy shit and still carry on getting work and progressing their careers.
 
I've abandoned two jobs, nothing happened. You're just promoting the fearmongering from these companies. I'd already seen so many people fuck up in jobs, fired for all kinds of dodgy shit and still carry on getting work and progressing their careers.
My own industry (or my bit of it, the whole thing is huge) is pretty small, so for me it has been useful. Mileage varies. I have a pretty long notice period written into my contract as well (which goes both ways.)
 
It actually pays in certain places to have a child out of wedlock. I knew a kinda-useless Asian guy making six figures a year in a cushy job. He had two kids.

His baby mother lived with him, but was not actually married to him. So she got various benefits for those kids.
It’s by design. The feminists pushed for this because they wanted to liberate black women from the patriarchy. They succeeded and we can see the results.

Also most jobs don’t give a fuck. They’ll throw you under the bus for an ass Pat or to save .0000001% on their overhead. Loyalty requires a two way street. Most companies have 0 loyalty. Look out for yourself first.
 
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It amuses me greately to see americans bitch about worker's rights out of all things.

After you fought tooth and nail to have less obligations, lower taxes, no unions, gee I wonder if those things finally come biting you in the ass.

Same people that were like "MUH COMMUNISM! MUH FREEDUUHM!" 10, 20, 50 years ago are now "MUH CORPORASHUNS! MUH EXPLOITASHUN! WHERE MUH RIGHTS?!"
 
It actually pays in certain places to have a child out of wedlock. I knew a kinda-useless Asian guy making six figures a year in a cushy job. He had two kids.

His baby mother lived with him, but was not actually married to him. So she got various benefits for those kids.
Honestly this. Become a nigger to a system and get as many benefits that are given to niggers for free. The only way those niggers lose is if everyone else does what they do.
 
They're doing all of those things because they've correctly deduced that their future has been completely skullfucked by, in large part, boomers.
Boomers literally fell into massive wealth blindfolded and ass first. Then they pulled up the ladders behind them and now act suprised while every successive generation coming after has eaten shit.
 
Has loyalty at work ever worked?
just switch every 3-5 years looking for the highest bidder. learn and keep going.

It's true, internal promotions pay less than you would get if you job hopped and if they hire someone from the outside they will pay them more that you would have got for a promotion. Generally.

Not only that but in many cases breaking away from your previous roll can be hard because so many people are used to going to you for what they want and they didn't get round to hiring a replacement for you. So you'll be pulling double duty.
 
Not only that but in many cases breaking away from your previous roll can be hard because so many people are used to going to you for what they want and they didn't get round to hiring a replacement for you. So you'll be pulling double duty.
Plus depending on how far up you are they have to move multiple people.
If manager gets promoted, then you need a new manager, so you promote the assistant manager, well now you need a new assistant manager, etc. etc.
 
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