By John Pickard

Reddit is a social media platform that is much more popular among Generation Z and millennials than Facebook is. It has separate strands, ‘subreddits’, some of which are interesting reading.

At the moment, one of the most popular subreddits is “r/antiwork”, which has no fewer than 1.2m members, mostly in the USA and twice the number it had three weeks ago. It describes itself as being “for those who want to end work, are curious about ending work, want to get the most out of a work-free life, want more information on anti-work ideas and want personal help with their own jobs/work-related struggles”.

Reading the posts on r/antiwork, there are the usual contradictory and (deliberately) provocative comments that you will get on any social media platform, but it is also clear that the strand is an outlet for thousands of mainly young workers complaining about their working conditions. As it is with Facebook and other social media, a lot of the participants make a point by a poster with a short comment on it, or by reposting from other social media. The following are all extracts from the r/antiwork sub-reddit:

*I used to work at a heavy equipment rental place with minimum 11 hour shifts M-F. They called us in an hour early the next day to be there at 6am instead of 7am. I had just run a boomlift from Miami to Cocoa Beach, and didn’t get home until 12:30 am the night before (fluctuating workweek means not one cent of overtime btw). I had just pulled a nearly 17 hour day, and they made me come in 5 hours after my shift ended at 6am in the fucking morning, so they could talk to us about the dangers of sleep deprivation…You can’t make this shit up

*Just a rant, but goddamn. Left an hour and a half early one time because my kid was stranded. My manager told me that it was “an unacceptable use of company time” and that “it will be a documented offense.” Ok. Document me. I told them our family owned and family forward business seemed to mean “if you work at the home office.” I’m so done with retail. If for even one moment they believe that any job is ever EVER going to be more important than my kid, my personal life, even my fucking cat they can shove their family first bullshit up their collective asses.

*Why are so many people so willing to add their colleagues and managers on social media? It’s asking for trouble. I’ve repeatedly turned down requests to the point now I got pulled up on it today by my line manager. Apparently I’m not being a team member! She can fuck off. My life is NOT work.

*During our talk, my boss told me that I was “organizing my work around my personal life” and it should be the other way around. Fuck that, I will start thinking of business ideas because I HATE 9-5 jobs. That’s all, just wanted to vent.

*”I know we SAID we were offering $18 an hour on the job listing, but you’ll actually be making $11.”

FOUR JOB INTERVIEWS IN A ROW have been like this. This one in particular, for a management position, was especially heinous. Is this shit illegal? If not, it should be. All my interviews are, at this point, me trying to suss out if they lied on the listing (they all do).

*One of my previous employers required us to promote the business through social media. Had to make twitter, Facebook, and twitch accounts and post daily. When I was fired, one of the reasons listed was “spends work time on Facebook”. You motherfucker, here’s the list of emails you sent me giving me specific directions to do something on social media, Facebook included.

His lawyer did not like reading those emails.

*People have been leaving here in droves lately. I work in the engineering department, and we’re down to just two of us doing the work of five. The lead engineer position has been vacant since May and they can’t fill it. Nothing confusing about it, either – we’ve had people apply, but they always turn down the offer because the salary is laughably low for a PE.

… Every department is struggling. So what do they do?

“Retention Bonus!”

Not raising wages. Not improving benefits. Not anything concrete and permanent to retain employees, much less attract new ones to fill all the vacancies we desperately need filled. Just a one-time payment of $1,000 (before taxes).

Okay, fine, giving people a $1,000 bonus is still something, right? Yeah, it’s a fucking punishment.

See, here’s the fine text. You get a $1,000 pre-tax, meaning you walk away with about $650. But if you leave next year, you have to pay the gross “bonus” back.

So I get $650 now, but if I quit next year, I have to pay them $1,000, which puts me out $350, net. Effectively, they’re charging me $350 to quit.

That’s their retention strategy. Pay-to-quit. Quitting is behind a fucking paywall now…The “bonus” is actually due back if you “separate voluntarily or involuntarily.” So getting fired will also cost you $350

And so on, and so forth.

Like all social media, unfortunately, reddit is shallow and superficial. As it is on Facebook, most posts are short and even the longer ones lack depth and perspective. There is little opportunity for putting forward a developed and rounded-out argument, except where the platform is used as a signpost to longer articles and more developed arguments.

However, as a window into the consciousness of hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of young people, it is very revealing. It carries the authentic voice of frustrated, angry and embittered young workers. There are few posts that offer explicit solutions to the problems outlined, but there are a lot that point the finger at ‘capitalism’ and the billionaire class who own and manage the system.

It is one thing to vent your frustration through a social media post and it is another thing entirely doing something about it. Currently just over 10% of US workers are in trade unions, half the figure of forty years ago, but that is still nearly 15 million workers. Among young workers in the retail and fast-food sector, the proportion is much less that this. The nearly 15 million in unions are dwarfed by the 55 million in various gig jobs, mostly without adequate pay and conditions of employment.

We shouldn’t exaggerate what subreddits like r/antiwork is telling us. Many of the posts are simply ‘venting’, all sound and fury signifying nothing. But reading the posts, you get the distinct impression of a mountain of dry tinder that will only take a small spark for it all to go up.

You can find the subreddit here, and it’s worth opening a reddit account, if you haven’t already got one.