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Baby Boomers Don't Have a Stronger Work Ethic Than Later Generations, Says Study (sciencedaily.com)
A team of U.S. researchers from Wayne State University in Detroit have published research in Springer's Journal of Business and Psychology that dispels the popular belief that baby boomers have a greater work ethic than people born a decade or two later. Science Daily reports: The economic success of the United States and Europe around the turn of the 20th to the 21st century is often ascribed to the so-called Protestant work ethic of members of the baby boomer generation born between 1946 and 1964. They are said to place work central in their lives, to avoid wasting time and to be ethical in their dealings with others. Their work ethic is also associated with greater job satisfaction and performance, conscientiousness, greater commitment to the organization they belong to and little time for social loafing. The media and academia often suggest that baby boomers endorse higher levels of work ethic than the younger so-called Generation X (born between 1965 and 1980) and Millennials (born between 1981 and 1999). [Keith Zabel, the lead U.S. researcher, and his team] compiled a dataset of all published studies that have ever used a U.S. sample to measure and report on the Protestant work ethic. Studies included in the meta-analysis had to mention the average age of the people surveyed. In all, 77 studies and 105 different measures of work ethic were examined using an analysis method stretching over three phases, each phase offered more precise measurement of generational cohorts. The analysis found no differences in the work ethic of different generations. These findings support other studies that found no difference in the work ethics of different generations when considering different variables, such as the hours they work or their commitment to family and work. Zabel's team did however note a higher work ethic in studies that contained the response of employees working in industry rather than of students.
I came from a working family in a poor neighborhood in Chicago's Little Italy. My dad came home from WWII and worked his ass off. My mom parlayed a "Rosie the Riveter" gig into a great job. They both retired with terrific pensions.
Yet there are fungi that have greater work ethic than me. I made it through grad school on charm and bullshit and ended up university faculty (with a nice pension). My daughter takes after her Mom and is an incredibly hard worker (she's a PhD candidate in Math and teaches kick-boxing). I will bet that right now she's busting her ass trying to get numerical simulations of viral infections working in some arcane programming language and hasn't stopped since early this morning. She's working hard because she seems to genuinely love working hard. God bless her, but I don't feel that way.
Hard work has almost no correlation to success, I've found. The ability to convince people you work hard is more important than actually working hard.
The idea of a "work ethic" is nothing more than left-over propaganda from the Protestant assholes that first settled this country. We're supposed to see "hard work" as somehow morally superior to idleness. It's just a way that the people in the very top economic strata convince the rest of us to kill ourselves for their benefit. I'm glad I was able to see through that bullshit early on. My life was much nicer due to that revelation, and I was still able to accomplish a full and happy existence and even be able to leave something to my kid without really breaking a sweat. Luck, and the ability to know which corners to cut.
You are welcome on my lawn.
The US gave away its jobs to friendly nations. So the stability for many to find work and earn a living wage is gone in the USA.
What took a good educated 10% of the population is now a US brand as a front company with 1% needed. Even that is a global workforce invited in.
Designed in the USA, made anywhere cheap.
Everything of value that was good is gone. More new low wage jobs selling coffee, wine, beer, security every day and night?
Working for the gov/mil or been a mil contractor who enjoys no bid gov/mil work is not a long term solution given the private sector tax rates.
The US needs to rediscover good private sector jobs for its own citizens. Only the US private sector can create the kind of quality, reward and advancement that grows a nation.
Illegal workers have been allowed to flood the lower end of the jobs market to counter unions and be replaceable if any work place issues arise.
Student loans are based on every entry consideration but real merit and academic ability. Creating vast amounts of average graduates with safe, soft degrees in been "fun" years later is not what any advanced work force needs.
Good people still want to learn, study, work, better themselves, move up in society, do better than past generations when asked as always. But the option to do that has been reduced.
The few top university options based on years of hard work are been lost to very average students with no academic considerations.
Local jobs to even support a local college education are few and far between as older workers have to stay on and illegal workers are allowed to fill in.
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
This is purely anecdotal, but my experience is that there isn't so much a generational correlation to work ethic as there is an age-based one. Which is to say, a person's work ethic can vary significantly over the course of their adult life.
What I've seen in my own workplace is new entrants (whether at graduate or non-graduate level) entering the organisation but generally (and of course there are outliers) without making a full commitment to it and, particularly in the case of graduate entrants, trying to keep their student lifestyle running for a few more years. Over time, usually by the late 20s, this transitions into a much stronger work ethic; more time spent in the office and more "commitment" to the organisation. Eventually, somewhere usually in the 50s, this lapses into a degree of burnout. Now, all of the above is a huge generalisation and based on personal experiences only, but I've seen a couple of generations go through that cycle now.
Of course, there's a far bigger correlation between work ethic and social class. Behaviours liked to worth ethic, such as the ability to focus on deferred reward have a strong hereditary component, whether based on biology, culture or both. Again, there are exceptions, but this is where I've seen the strongest correlation. In the mid-2000s (at the height of the UK's New Labour touchy-feely period) I worked for an employer which took part in a Government-subsidised scheme to give placements to "disadvantaged" young people. This was actually a pretty cushy detail; the pay for those brought in through the scheme wasn't huge, but it was significantly above the minimum wage (almost £10/hour) and the work was white-collar administrative. Moreover, there was an expectation in place that if you did well, you would be able to turn it into a full-time job (this was in the land of silly-money before the big crash, when the UK economy appeared to be in full boom). Hell, there wasn't even much of a dress code beyond "use your common sense and don't wear anything that would actively harm our reputation".
I was involved with this scheme for three consecutive years, once as a mentor and twice as one of the "lucky" managers "given" one of the apprentices (yes, there was a degree of corporate arm-twisting). Across all three years, with an intake of 8-10 people per year, not a single one stuck with it for more than 2 months. The simple basics of being expected to get into the office at a sane time (we had a flexitime-within-reason system), to come into the office every working day and to follow the instructions of a manager once in the office were too much for the participants.
The "Greatest Generation". A bunch of over-indulgent assholes whose failings brought about the "greatest" depression.
The "Silent Generation". Raised post-depression. Extremely hard workers. Why? Because their aging parents left them no legacy except for care for them, pay for the welfare state, and fight in at least two wars. Nice.
The "Baby Boomer" generation. Another over-indulgent, entitiled, asshole generation. Why? Because their parents (the silent generation) swore that they'd never make their kids go through what they themselves had to go through. So they gave them everything.
The "X" generation. Another hard-working generation. Why? Because their parents (the baby boomers) are too busy indulging their self-entitles asses to actually care about raising their kids. Gen X-ers have had to bear low wages. Outsourced industries. And an income gap that is worse that it has ever been since ancient Egypt.
The "Millenial Generation". Another over-indulgent, self-entitled, bunch of lazy assholes. Why? Because their parents (the X generation) swore that they'd never make their kids go through what they themselves had to go through. Millennials have been doted over, helicoptered, and are living with their parents as adults at levels not seen since the Great Depression.
There's clearly a pattern. The "Greatest Generation" fucked the country. The "Silent Generation" brought it back. The "Baby Boomers" fucked the country. The "X" generation will bring it back. The "Millenial Generation" will fuck up the country. And their children will bring it back. And so on... and so forth...
Both my children are far more serious than I was at their age.
I dropped out of UC Berkeley in 1982 (was a Physics major) because I was too stupid to understand that while university wasn't what I had thought it was going to be, it was still the best way to discover the stuff that would interest you for the rest of your life. I stumbled through the first year there, barely matriculating due to an idiotic policy at the time (maybe still extant)- first come first served enrollment in courses - courses that were mandatory for my major. WTF is up with that ?, surely if they're mandatory, I am just automatically enrolled in them; why the fuck should I have to queue up for hours to enroll ?
Anyway, my kids are much more alert to this kind of thing than I was, they are somehow more used to negotiating these types of issues, and playing them to their advantage. They party less. They work with more enthusiasm for their jobs, which they have chosen because they are genuinely interested in them, rather than for the money.
I spent my youth in a cloudy, dream state - which wasn't bad, I'll admit - until I woke up at about age 20 and realized that I had better get my ass in gear and get something done with my life. Even then it took a 6 year stint in the US Navy to turn myself around and become anything like my children are at an earlier age.
Perhaps they have benefited from me explaining some more of the fundamentals of life to them better than my parents did me - although I don't think that's the case. None-the-less, they are certainly nowhere near as lazy as I was, and more conscientious about their place in society too.
Perhaps they're a bit special for their generation, but my experiences with their friends tells me they're not. I have high hopes that their generation will clean up a lot of the mess brought on by my parent's and my generation.