What I mean is everyone wants both. And I’m not talking huge differences. I don’t mean go from 30k per year to 120k per year or going home sweating everyday to watching Netflix most days. What brought the question up was I was in hospital and the computer the scanned all the medication and machines into was on my right side of bed and Iv pole where all medications were on my left. Nurses also had to deal with wired scanners which they had to hold up above the bed to walk around. Not a huge problem but cover 30 rooms with 4-16 different medications to swap out per day was probably a major pain(nurses can chime in disagreeing).
Another thing I’ve seen is people in a warehouse with systems logging all locations a product could be in and saying yeah we have some of that in one of these and they have to walk around to check several locations to find which still has some.
So you want a 2k-6k raise… If your job was easier how much would that make you stay instead of just demanding a raise?
Edit: this is not a real situation but say I have 4 employees under me and an extra 25k in budget. Would you prefer a raise or to improve your job?
By trying to estimate how much other profitable work I could do with the time saved in the easier job
I think it depends a lot on the person? Where someone is career-wise (more established folks may care less about money per se), whether the desperately need more money, etc… Also depends on the proportion of the two, a 3% raise that requires 20% more effort probably won’t be worth it for most people
Myself, I don’t mind having a small but not insignificant raise over an easier job, but that’s largely because of my current life circumstances
Between more pay and fewer hours, I always want fewer hours.
In my experience, the more pay the easier the job
Can confirm. After trying out a lot of different jobs and careers, I’ve concluded that working harder for more pay only applies to jobs where your abilities aren’t much of a factor; You’re only renting out your muscles. These jobs can be hard as fuck, and often don’t pay very well.
Then there are jobs where the employee matters more. Some jobs because of what you’re allowed to do (certs, licenses, etc), and then there are the jobs that require niche skills - They don’t hire you to work hard, they’re hiring you for what you can do when needed. Think of a lawyer on a retainer.
I, for example, have a few certs and licenses, combined with very niche skills. My job is easy as fuck (for me), and there aren’t many others who can do it.
Yep same here. It also gets more abstract and takes longer to explain in one breath to a person. Eventually you’re justifying being baby sat by other fellow babies in the office whom all mutually babysit each other while the one autistic guy does the work of 11 people while being paid $40k/year and he barely gets to keep his job every review because corporations are retarded.
I want a job that pays my bills and gives me a bit of savings and spending money. Beyond that, I’m hesitant to take on more responsibility, difficulty, and headaches unless the pay bump is substantial. If my pay is below a comfortable level, I’d rather have a raise. If the pay is decent but the job is currently stressful, I’d rather have less difficulty for the same pay.
Granted, that assumes that the job doesn’t frequently experience scope creep. If the stress reduction is nominal before reverting back to pre-adjusted levels or higher, more money is better than temporary relief.
You get 4 more employees and your budget goes up? I don’t understand how that ties to your budget? If you are trying to say pay should scale linearly with direct reports then definitely no
That depends entirely on whether my current pay is adequate to sustain my desired lifestyle. If it isn’t, then reducing it further is out of the question.
I never said reducing it. I meant same pay for easier job.
All that matters is a good manager who has your back. I’ve only quit managers, never jobs. Also the most overworked I’ve ever been in my life was working minimum wage… I felt like an actual slave. The more money I make the more relaxed my job somehow is. I don’t want to doxx myself since I have a pretty niche job (this helps a lot btw. Especially trades or semi-engineering jobs) which can narrow me down a lot.
Find something you’re interested in, and try to line that up with demand that’s consistent for years or decades. Anything involving maintaining critical infrastructure, repair, fixing stuff, estimating, helping people do those things. That’s going to be pretty crucial as our society enters old age. Our infrastructure is at the end of its life and we’re out of debt capacity… That means we start prioritizing things that are critical and diverting funds away from “repair/replace all bridges” to “repair/replace only the bridges that would paralyze the nation if they were missing” which is cheaper.
My job is a mix of in the field wrench turning, fiddling, pulling cables .etc along with elective decision making, engineering, cross-domain collaboration, inventing my own tools to fix my unique problems that maybe 1 other guy in China also has? Maybe? That is extremely difficult for AI or robotics to replace. It can supplement certain aspects of this but it won’t be able to replace all of it by the time I’m retired (ha! I might die first but who knows) or if it can, everyone is out of a job.
I went from 150K to minimum wage.
So much happier. I need to figure out finances, of course, but I am a better person now.
Interesting, I want to know more of your story if you are willing to share.
Without giving too many details, worked at a place as a professional for a long time. Terminated because someone didn’t like me. Am still looking for a better job, fell back to a previous skillet at minimum wage in order to do something with myself, and it’s so much better.
I know this isn’t quite the situation you’re referring to, but the right work environment with the right management goes a long way to having fulfillment at work.
That said, none of that costs any money. We’re talking about policy, procedure, and culture change. I’ve been able to manage mentally as a wage slave by becoming more socialist This does not always align with what the company thinks it wants, but for minimum wage, I don’t care. I am doing what’s right by me, and that’s a good feeling.
I’m on 52k (which in the UK is a good salary). I don’t want for money, can generally buy whatever I want/need but still need to be careful not to go overboard.
But I’m stressed out. All the fucking time, I’m seriously considering leaving for a job with slightly worse pay but significantly less responsibility.
So if you offered me more money to stay in a stress-free iob, I’d pick that
Those are only two variables of many.
At one point, I had job offers from four places at the same time, offering me different salaries, benefits packages, work culture, work effort and work mobility.
I ended up taking the job that was the most intellectually stimulating, had the best benefits package, and had a good cultural fit. Sometimes I had to work weekends, but got paid double for doing that; usually that was one weekend shift a month. Overall pay was on the low side of competitive.
I never regretted the choice.
Ok that makes sense. I wasn’t saying those are those only variables just the ones I could theoretically control.
Not sure I’m following your point. If someone doesn’t give me a raise, doesn’t cut hours but I get my job simplified- what’s the problem with that? The only caveat I could see is if you have a job that you liked because of the challenge, and having it easier now equals it is unfulfilling. Similarly if you see an easier job as future reduced opportunities. But, if you just have a job to survive or that you are ambivalent about, I don’t see where the problem is.
It’s the question of raise vs simplified. Not no raise but you you want a simpler job. But if you had to choose, which and why?
Easy, do I get a sense of achievement with this job? Is it part of my identity in a healthy way? Then, raise
Do I just do the job because I need a way to pay the bills? Then, simplify. Less stress has a massive health impact
Am I desperate to pay bills and debts? Probably raise and side hustles and overtime I don’t know
It would be more straightforward to answer if it was less hours vs more pay, rather than easier.
Easier is too subjective, and I dont trust a boss to fairly judge what’s easier for the worker. Also any time throughout history when things got “easier” for the worker, more work in other areas or aspects just got piled on.
If my boss gave me the option of either working 4 days instead of 5, or get a 20% raise, id pick the former.
Ok that’s true and valid. But either way that ends up more dollars per hour. If it was an easy question I wouldn’t of asked it.
Define “easier” because that’s not a well defined term. Also, people do in fact aspire to do more with their life than watch Netflix in their down time, but Netflix never has scheduling conflicts or other responsibilities. The 24/7/365 work culture we all seem to be building towards, isn’t conducive to things like community organizing and routine social interaction outside our cloistered bubbles of employment. Also, define “more pay.” Are we talking imaginary “line-go-up” math, or are we actually talking about increasing people’s purchasing power relative to cost of living? Please, try to remember, we’re living in a shell game where actual value of goods and services relative to effort is so deeply obfuscated actually requires a Ph.D in Bullshit… I’m sorry “Economics” to grasp half of it.
Ok, Netflix example was poor. I meant I was not talking about making your job basically just hanging out. You will still need to do some work. I’m not saying making you work 365/24/7. Easier basically meant removing the parts which cause you extra effort or extra pain. Like I saw a grocery story had little lifts for stuff so if you were putting stuff on the third shelf the lift would be at same height, no need to bend down and lift, just kind of pick up rotate and place on shelf. That will reduce a lot of backpain in people who work those jobs, the job is still required but is easier.
I defined more pay in my original post as 2k-6k usd. As in your gross pay to be exact. So take the even at 4k and you get an extra $77 per week.
Basically it’s like this, we can give you a say 4k raise today or we’ll remove the parts of your job that are a pain. Not saying globally, I’m saying you or maybe a team and that’s it.
Honestly, better training would help more with the back pain. The physical exertion is not the problem, it’s the lifting form. A job that saves you time and money at the gym is not a bad thing. I don’t understand why employers think people want a frictionless work environment. Friction builds capacity and competence.
If it’s a matter of time and efficiency, sure do that, but don’t kid yourself that’s for your productivity metrics, not the employee’s. If it’s a matter of safety, then absolutely address that, but you’re doing it as much for the sake of the company in terms of lost man hours and legal liability.
If you’re trying to raise morale, then people need compensation. That’s the whole deal, I give you my time, effort, and experience and you give me something of equivalent value, monetary or otherwise. You can give them pay, you can give them insurance, you can offer professional development or financial planning services I don’t know, but give them something.
Yes, people tend to prefer to work for a well run company that is taking care of its side of the deal, and providing the tools to do the job you’re paying for. It suggests the company has some future and foresight, but business competence is table stakes, it’s the baseline they should be able to expect.
Here is the thing. jobs very often are bs and its impossible to actualy know what the job will be like till your working it. So in general you go for more pay. Leaving a job that is definately bs for one that seems like it won’t be as much bs but pays less makes sense though. You have a known quantity at that point even if the unknown is a bit of a gamble.
