(This is a warehouse job I’m referring to where quotas are expected to be met.)
To be clear, the only two co-workers of mine who have complained about this to me both have interests more aligned with the company than everyone else, and have literally threw other co-workers under the bus. They will defend the company almost all the time.
That said, they don’t understand why I don’t want to put 100% of my effort into the job. My reason is that, even though I technically would be paid a few dollars more if I hit certain targets, it isn’t going to improve my situation at all. I live in one of the cheapest studios in town. The bosses I’m sure live in expensive homes. A single page of a customer’s order exceeds my wage in cost by far. Plus, work is dreadful and uninspiring and we have no say in the process at all. I don’t want work to dominate my life. Nothing about making someone else’s profits makes me want to grind.
They didn’t buy my explanation. They said by me not meeting expectations I am not screwing over the company at all, I’m only screwing over the rest of the team because they have to do all the work that I don’t finish myself, and they end up having to work later. I argued they should hire more people, and I was told they’ve already hired as many as they can afford at the moment.
So am I really to blame? I still can’t understand why I should give work my all given the worker’s situation under capitalism. I might be more inspired if we were worker owned or unionized. What do you think?