“Nobody Wants To Work These Days”: Affectations of the Employed in a post-COVID economy

By  SHAYAAN  KASHIF ‘26

It’s been four years since 2020, but the world is still grappling with the effects of the pandemic. While the visible implications of Covid—masks, social distancing, and remote learning—are mostly a thing of the past, an unshakeable feeling that something is different remains. To many, the pre-Covid world is one that no longer exists. This sentiment seems to be reflected very heavily in the workspace. Polls conducted by Gallup found that over 56 percent of full-time employees in America, or about 70 million workers, believe that they can do their jobs remotely. Of those, 90 percent would prefer working from home to at least some extent. It seems that the vast majority of Americans who work office jobs have “tasted the forbidden fruit” of working from home, which has in turn impacted their work ethic. 

The idea of self-scheduling, or designing one’s own work schedule, seems to have eroded the concept of a universal workplace standard in the United States. As a result, a growing number of Americans have become dissatisfied with their jobs as workplaces transition back into offices. A combination of lengthy commutes, long hours, and lack of job security have left many Americans with little faith. Particularly, when comparing remote work with traditional office work, perception of many workplace norms has changed significantly. Americans no longer perceive working overtime as a sign of dedication and hard work—instead, they place far more value in work-life balance. Both my parents, who work in the tech industry, now work entirely from home. They cannot imagine going back into the office, especially considering the nature of their work. In addition, they place more emphasis on their personal wellbeing and no longer structure their day-to-day lives around their jobs.

Yet these upheavals extend beyond the workplace. In schools, the transition to remote learning had a tremendous impact on the education of millions of American youth. Students across the country have experienced a drop in motivation that is corroborated by a drop in GPAs and standardized test scores. At Exeter, teachers have said that classes pre-Covid worked at up to twice the intensity of classes post-Covid, and still performed better and were more consistent with deadlines. Exonians post-Covid have, allegedly, failed to keep up with workloads that would’ve been normal, or even light, before the pandemic. The problem goes beyond just students, though. Even something as simple as reaching out via email to admin can take frustratingly long due to slow or nonexistent replies. This combined with fatigues not working, a rocky transition to a new learning management system, and never-ending construction on a new dining hall has left many Exonians feeling as if they are in a perpetual state of limbo. For me, personally, everything feels a lot more like a drag—again, it’s just different.

So, what gives? Do people just not want to work anymore? Or is there some other reason? One theory is that the pandemic had a significant effect on our psyche. The idea that anything is possible with hard work, and by extension the very concept of an “American Dream” is deeply ingrained into culture. Yet the disaster of the pandemic, which left millions unemployed, obliterated many of our educational development, and overwhelmed the country has corroded this once zealous faith in the power of hard work. The notion that an American Dream even exists has come under attack as the wealth gap has further widened. Many Americans, rightfully so, have become increasingly distrustful of corporations, late-stage capitalism, and society as a whole, which they perceive to have further cemented the problems faced by the nation. As a result, work ethics have eroded, and self-respect and a work life balance have grown in their importance. The failure of corporate America to evaluate the lives of employees in their attempt to return to normalcy has therefore been detrimental to most companies.

That may explain workplaces, but what about schools? It could simply be youth adopting the attitudes of their parents, but there could be other reasons too. Perhaps remote learning, which presents far more opportunities for distraction, has made American teens complacent. In addition, the tremendous effect of self-isolation on the social development of teens has been linked to increased rates of depression, which is in turn linked with reduced motivation, lethargicness, and stress. Either way, the combination of all these factors means that the next decade may see a revolution in the American workplace. What exactly this will entail remains to be seen, but one thing is for sure: things probably aren’t going back to the way they were before.