August 31, 2007
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News flash: Most Americans are satisfied with their jobs?!
Happy Friday everybody!
A recent study found that most Americans (a whopping 86%) are actually happy with their jobs! When I read the article, I thought, what happened to that line from Office Space: “Peter, most people don’t like their jobs. But you go out there and try to find something that makes you happy.”
Most times I hear variations of … “I hate my boss”, “A job is a job”, “I’m not looking forward to going back to work tomorrow”, “It’s alright”, “OMG I’m soooo bored”, “I can’t stand my co-worker”, “It gets very stressful”, “I just need this for my next job”, etc etc. But very rarely do I hear “I love my job!”
Which leads me to conclude that either
1) 75% of all statistics are made up, this study included
2) people are “satisfied” with their jobs only because the average worker wastes 25% of their work day doing things like browsing the web
3) “I’m satisfied” is actually a euphemism for “I tolerate it.”
4) People..actually… do… love.. their… jobs.
Anyway, what about you guys? Do you love your jobs? Are you happy where you are? Do you think most people enjoy their work?
Click here to see what other readers have said.
Comments (22)
Agree with all four of your conclusions.
i actually enjoy my job. i love working with computers all day, sometimes not as much, but for the most part it’s great. and most of the day, you just stand around chatting it up with your coworkers (who are really cool btw) till something goes wrong. it’s like college hangouts all day long and you get paid pretty good for it, what is there not to like?
job is a job till you enjoy it, then it becomes more of a career.
No, most people do not enjoy their jobs.
I tolerate it because I get to slack off about 80% of the day.
I hate my job with a passion. But I love it and I wouldn’t want to do anything else…for the moment. So I’m satisfied, even though I get crappy pay, work crappy hours, get treated like crap, and usually feel like crap when I come home, I love it. Wouldn’t want it any other way….for the moment. Does that answer your question?
smileet147: so…. you’re a masochist?
i dont really like my job. a job is a job. hahaha. it pays the bills. plus it’s really boring.
have a great long weekend!! xD
if my job was to either 1) sit on my ass all day and tell other people what to do 2) have sex all day with beautiful women 3) take pictures of people pretending to get married in random european cities, all day, i would love my job. unfortunately, i don’t do any of those things.
i tolerate it. heh.
no, i really don’t mind my job, but that’s because, really, “it’s a job.” i work at a Goodwill handling donations. it sucks a lot of the time, but the people i work with are mostly cool, so it balances out. couldn’t say i “love” it, but i guess i am “satisfied.”
Could this explain it?
“Job satisfaction is greater among those who are still working after age 65 and lowest among workers under 29.”
or this…?
“…people living in the Western states are the least satisfied. “
lol. well, i know that i waste more than 25% of my time browsing the net, but i don’t mind my job.
people lied because they’re afraid their bosses are gonna google/myspace/facebook them to find out that they really DO hate their jobs….hahaha
answers are relative .. people can choose to love or hate anything based on where they set their baseline
I love my job
i HATE my work-mate. =D
anyway, i’d love to love my job and what i do, but I don’t. =]
i WANT a job. and once I get one, I’ll tell you whether I love it or not!
i liked my previous office job… the only thing that sucked was the pay… i was a product manager for office/engineering supplies
now i LOVE my job (wedding photographer)
Let me put it this way: I tolerate “work” so that I can do the things I love to do. Maybe I love shooting weddings, but there’s a ton of hard WORK behind each one, that’s for sure!
Ultimately the bottom line is that I ENJOY MY WORK and maybe you could say I love it, but I obviously don’t love my job as much as I LOVE my loved ones. Don’t bother asking me to “love my job” THAT much!
=Matt=
i think the survey is sketchy. after reading it i really question what population they surveyed. i’m skeptical about it being a very exhaustive sample. andddd, i think that maybe our california silicon valley whatever blah blah blah mentality is a lot different than the rest of the country..so it could be that americans really do like their jobs…just not really the circles of people we know haha. i dont know man. but i love my job!!! some days i dont wanna go cuz of weirdo random students i have, but when i step back to see the big picture, of course i love it.
Interesting question – I like my job, but that’s mostly because I get along with my coworkers and I see the work itself as a stepping stone to higher places. (I’m an illustrator for an educational company, so the work is fairly interesting but not as creative as I’d like it to be.) So I’d say I’m happy with my job now, but in 5 or 10 years, I very much doubt I would be.
I enjoy my job waiting tables, but I know that there are things that I would enjoy even more, including photography.
ryc: haha. hey, loving the clouds, skies and wind ain’t freaking! if it were to be, that’d make the 2 of us. olivia has certainly got a very sweet voice. my fave from her is her version of “sometimes when we touch”. prob you can consider using that in your upcoming slideshow. it’s really awesome. (:
p/s: thanks! my weekend was great. hope it was likewise for you!
Most people like their jobs? Wow, from what I hear most people hate theirs. Hmm…
I love B&W photos, too. Especially when it’s actual B&W film, which is what I take most pictures with. I’m not the best photographer in the world, haha. My ex boyfriend got me into photography about 10 months ago. Somewhere around there.
Don’t worry, you won’t dissapoint me. Especially not with the kind of photos you take.