The 'Great Resignation' is not about jobs

Economists are calling it ‘The Great Resignation’. In April 2021, 4 million people quit their jobs. Meanwhile, in June 2021, there was a series record 10.1 million job openings*.

It’s not about the jobs.

The numbers are impressive. But don’t focus on the jobs. People leaving their jobs is a symptom of a greater social shift that has been building over the past few decades. And don’t blame the pandemic. The pandemic accelerated the social shift, but it did not cause the shift.

The social contract has broken. The relationship between authorities (governmental, corporate, or spiritual) and the people has been fraying for some time. It has finally torn completely. It would be nearsighted to view the anti-mask, anti-vax, job quitting trends as pandemic driven. These are micro-trends in the macrocosm of the collapse of the social contract. And the effects will be larger and more far reaching than people leaving their jobs.

So what comes next?

While the current era is not as unprecedented as the media likes to (hyperbolically) claim, what comes next is difficult if not impossible to predict. What happens when trust in the system breaks down completely? When people no longer trust companies, governments, institutional religions?

*U.S. Labor Department reports