March 2020. Currently, the country has one of the lowest unemployment rates in Europe, hovering around 3-4%. Having one of the most diversified economies in the world, Germany offers jobs in almost any sector.
Salaries in Germany are also quite high for global standards. The average net salary in Frankfurt is 2700 EUR per month. In Berlin, the average net wage is 2500 EUR per month.
Some economic sectors in Germany have a greater demand for foreign workers than others. Notably, health care and tech are among the sectors with the highest demand for foreigners.
Classic factors of employee motivation continue to play an important role. A new study shows that every second employee attaches great importance to a secure job. However, only around a third of those surveyed are willing to make sacrifices for this.
Job security is an important motivating factor for every second employee: 52 percent of women and 58 percent of men attach great importance to it, according to the results of the study “The future of work: A journey to 2022”. For the study, the consulting company PWC asked around 2,000 employees in Germany about their ideas about the future of work, 46 percent of whom were male and 54 percent female.
According to the study, however, only around a third of those surveyed are willing to sacrifice their work-life balance for a secure job: 36 percent of the male and only 32 percent of the female respondents say they would be permanent for the prospect of a secure job available to your employer.
I decided to quit my job after I realized these 3 lessons. Although I heard of these 3 things before, they never clicked inside my head until these events happened in my life.
YouTube comments:
“If you don’t have a dream, someone will hire you to build their dreams.”
“I think the scariest thing for most people (myself included) is leaving the security of the job that you have. When you sent have another form of income already leaving that job can be terrifying.”
“I can relate to your experiences when you told the story about the interaction with your parents. I have a similar experience and I realized this has gotten worse when I put my well being: mentally and physically on the back burner for work. The biggest turning point for me is when I started to see my parents physical changes from old age; graying of hair, memory declining and just not recovering as quickly as they used to. That’s when I realized I f’d up. The excuses of I’m too busy to see them or the free time that is being sacrificed is for what? To out-compete your colleagues or hustle more than what is expected from the job description? We are expendable as you said. I took a seat back and started to see this toxic culture that it is “ok” to work off hours or be on call at a moment’s notice EVEN when you are on vacation; it’s not ok. It’s starting to crack and wake people up. The pandemic just accelerated it and you see stories of people wanting to take their lives back by pushing for WFH or do what is expected from you. Nothing more nothing less. My point to this story is that this isn’t unique. I feel there are many of us who are feeling this way and it’s not too late to change. Just need to make a commitment and walk that path.”
Tech jobs are known to have some of the most lavish benefits and perks, not to mention some of the highest salaries in the country. Still, that is not enough to keep some millennials from quitting. CNBC Make It spoke to several people who left their lucrative tech jobs to find out why they did it and what they are doing now.
YouTube comments:
“I am 50 years old working in the high tech industry, mentally tired and sick of the weekly 8 to 5 routine. Never got a proper day off even through the pandemic. Hats off to the millenials and GenZ that think differently and put more weight on LIVING rather than just WORKING.”
“As someone who used to work 80 hours a week, quitting my job to become a freelancer was the best thing I have ever done. Sure I still work a lot of hours and often close to 70-80 hrs a week, I feel like I am doing this for myself and not some corporation.”
“I worked a low paying tech job for six years and still felt the burn out. The problem is that tech is very fast paced and competition focused. You can barely keep up. Though I got promoted regularly, my higher ups told me the truth before they left, they said that I was severely underpaid based on my skills (essentially I branded myself a one stop shop for the marketing department as I am both technically knowledgeable, people oriented and strategic). I maxed out at $50K. So I decided to jump ship with little planned. Now I run a financial agency with my husband and we make $250K a year as entrepreneurs and we have the freedom to set our own lifestyle.”
“We don’t want perks. We want more money and we want autonomy. It’s simple.”
“I’m surprised that Google have such aggressive deadlines, considering them not having any noticeable new products the past few years, in addition to the closure of many of their products.”
“I disagree with this. My experience at Google was awesome. It was like working on a cruise ship and in my two years I can only remember having to stay late 2-3 times. I only left because once you work at Google other tech companies want you really bad and will pay more to get you.”
“As a current Software Engineer @ Google that started on 02/28/2022, I can see why Googlers quit! It’s hard to past the yearly perk review as a rookie, Junior SWE and if you don’t show steady progression within your role, you will continue to barely pass your yearly perk or even fail! The 5 reasons you mention on here are factual but I would add not passing the yearly perk review or getting a “meet expectations”, then you will most likely quit, because you will feel the pressure to perform at a much higher level. This takes a tole on your mental and emotional health big time! No amount of money is worth your mental and emotional health and feel like you’re going crazy!”
Poverty in America. It’s a concept that shouldn’t be a thing here. I mean we are the richest nation in the world, right? Well, look around today and you’ll see a lot of us are struggling. For many it’s their own fault – lots of us are broke because of decisions we made.
But plenty of Americans live in poverty because of things outside of their control. Perhaps it was a loss of jobs. Or in many cases, it’s the cost of living. Yes, poverty is a complicated issue here in the US. And no matter who is in office, it’s a problem without an end in sight.
A key issue for many workers is flexible working time in order to have a work-life balance. Negotiating a work/life balance can help enable parents (both men and women) to reconcile their work with their family lives and women in particular to participate in the labour market.
Finding the right work-life balance can allow workers to take leave from work so that they can participate in education or training or take up an interest, hobby or leisure pursuit. This may mean that employees can reorganise their working lives and hours around shorter days, weeks, months or years.
German families tend to be small with only one or two children. The men are still quite often considered to be the head of the household, even though both the wife and husband work.
It’s common to hear that Germans are great at switching off once their working hours are done, but according to a new survey, this may not be entirely true.
The survey commissioned by Novotel surveyed around 5,000 adults across Germany, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands and Poland to investigate their habits and working schedules. Surprisingly enough, it found that the Germans have the worst work-life balance of all four countries, with 58 percent work and only 42 percent leisure time.