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Antiwork

Can maybe some older workers explain why the early 2000s were so full of media that focused on the “misery” of office life when to most service workers those jobs seem like the easiest thing in the world?

For context I guess, I’m 29, and all I’ve ever done are service industry jobs for the most part. I’ve gotten tastes of office life but still for various reasons haven’t been able to make the switch. But I have friends who have been lucky enough to make that switch, mostly people from restaurants, and the way they talk about the jobs they have now vs before it’s like they don’t even consider what they’re doing now to be actual work, regardless too of whether they work from home or in the office. Reading accounts from people on Reddit too it kind of just confirms that for me. I know every job is different but most of the time from the outside looking in it seems like the average office worker only ever has to work 20% of the time or less. And for seemingly infinite more than any service…


For context I guess, I’m 29, and all I’ve ever done are service industry jobs for the most part. I’ve gotten tastes of office life but still for various reasons haven’t been able to make the switch.

But I have friends who have been lucky enough to make that switch, mostly people from restaurants, and the way they talk about the jobs they have now vs before it’s like they don’t even consider what they’re doing now to be actual work, regardless too of whether they work from home or in the office.

Reading accounts from people on Reddit too it kind of just confirms that for me. I know every job is different but most of the time from the outside looking in it seems like the average office worker only ever has to work 20% of the time or less. And for seemingly infinite more than any service industry worker could ever get(benefits like retirement plans, 401k, pto, sick time, higher pay, etc, all things that you rarely get to have in the service industry).

Like I’m genuinely asking not to be rude but because I’m confused, what is there really to complain about outside of things that could be wrong with basically any other work place or job? Cause the aforementioned entertainment that spent all its time highlighting the misery of office jobs in retrospect just looks really tone deaf and self absorbed in retrospect.

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