Wouldn’t the ‘sage theory’ simply be that: this is a recession. Perhaps it’s just been too long since the last one (17ish years?) for people to recall recessions. Last time I got stuck in a very boring job too, for 4 painful years. Probably a good time to study, they say.
I'd rather be in a boring job than a stressful job.
I'm on a team that's talking about PIPing me and I have no opportunities to move to internal teams because there are so few open positions at my level. External job posting seem terrible right now in my area.
except the indicators do not show a recession.
I think it could be argued we're in a recession with the smells being buried.
As a whole the S&P is at pretty mediocre growth if you take out Nvidia and the 2 or 3 other tech outliers that are propping up the index.
https://fortune.com/2024/06/21/nvidia-microsoft-apple-meta-g...
Re:People are feeling stuck in their jobs
by Eddy_Viscosity2 on Sunday July 07, 2024 @07:44AM
(#40896914)
>there must be some sage economic/social/network theory that helps explain what's going on
"late stage capitalism"
Re:People are feeling stuck in their jobs
by 4RealFreedom on Sunday July 07, 2024 @08:30AM
(#40897157)
"Late stage capitalism" implies that capitalism is doomed to fail. In reality it is a system of constant change. Wealth inequality has always existed. Some problems like housing are newer problems that require solutions but don't point to an inevitable collapse. Are we also in "late stage democracy" and "late stage big government"? We won't know until after the collapse.
Re:People are feeling stuck in their jobs
by Eddy_Viscosity2 on Sunday July 07, 2024 @08:56AM
(#40897317)
Late stage capitalism refers to the stage where the field has become dominated by a relatively few big players and the focus shifts from providing value (which was required in the early stages with lots of smaller competing players) to extracting value. That's where we are now in many of the big economic areas - a few big players squeezing everyone by providing less and charging more for it because they can. It's the enshitification stage. It sucks for everyone but the owners of those companies.
Re:People are feeling stuck in their jobs
by 4RealFreedom on Sunday July 07, 2024 @09:23AM
(#40897536)
That could be viewed as a piece of "late stage capitalism" but that's only one part, right? The problem with the term is it's a catch-all for any perceived problem with capitalism. Maybe that issue is just a capitalism speed bump. As I said, we won't know we're in late stage until after the collapse.
Re:People are feeling stuck in their jobs
by Eddy_Viscosity2 on Sunday July 07, 2024 @09:53AM
(#40897739)
It's 'late' as in a stage that comes after the earlier stages. A collapse isn't guaranteed nor inevitable. There could just be a continual freezing out of competition until all that's left are entrenched classes of 'capital owners / rent extractors' living large, and everyone else struggling to get by. With modern computer-aided surveillance and monitoring and compliance capabilities, the capital owners could maintain the system pretty effectively. No collapse, just a a slow slide into well managed misery.
Re:People are feeling stuck in their jobs
by 4RealFreedom on Sunday July 07, 2024 @10:22AM
(#40897942)
There will always be "haves" and "have nots". That's been the case since forever. Standard Oil ruled the world. AT&T did, too. I agree that monopolies are bad. We should pressure our government to break them up. Will that help with people trying to find jobs in an inferior job market? That's where this conversation started. We need a strong job market. Competition can help that. We will always have bad job markets, though. It's part of the cycle. Nothing lasts forever.
It seems like such a crazy dynamic at the moment, there must be some sage economic/social/network theory that helps explain what's going on.
Perhaps it's just a case of 'social collusion' in finance; I'm sure it has a better name. Excuse my memory, but I recall with the dot-com bubble a particular financial analyst, I can't remember her name, called out the emperor's lack of clothes, and very shortly after the market crashed. This time, again forgive the memory lapse, a financier targeted Google and tech wages, even though I'm not sure wages can ever really be in a bubble, and seems, along with or just signalling, the fed's machinations, to have triggered this wave of layoffs, etc.