The New York Times had an article today describing the macroeconomics of quiet quitting. It’s point: it may be a somewhat unstoppable train but that it will hurt our economy overall and the general tone was that quiet quitters were hurting all of us. However, somehow buried within this message was a simple fact: with industrialization, for the average US worker to achieve the same amount of output as in 1930, he or she would have to work 15 hours per week today. In context, the author also describes how globally, our workweek compares to other nations and at just 34.2 hours per week, Americans are generally working less. I work 24 hours a week and if I go anywhere on this workplace journey, it will be down.
Now, all of this isn’t to say that I don’t really love my firm, my colleagues and the work I do because I do. I’m in the unique position of genuinely being able to do work that I love so much that it sometimes doesn’t feel like work. So, why quietly quit? (Which, by description for me is working nearly half-time and being a little more strict about the boundaries I place around work.)
Mostly, it’s because my priorities have shifted dramatically. For most of my career, I was so engrossed in work that I didn’t mind the hours but also didn’t have a life outside of work to go home to. Then, I met my husband and his bicycling crash one year later showed me how fragile life was. Shortly after, my mom got sick and shortly after that, three family members were diagnosed with cancer. It’s not possible to understate the implications of all of that on my psyche. Suffice it to say that life’s purpose changed for me in those months and years surrounding all of those events.
Today, I am a profoundly different person than I was just five years ago when I first decided to pursue simple peace. The true “north star” of my life has shifted. Now, my life is focused on those I love, including my silly pets playing on the floor in front of me, and our collective lives together.
And I think sometimes that’s what is missing when we talk about The Great Resignation or quiet quitting. We fail to understand how we came – as individuals – into this space. Many people lost family members during Covid and others had family members need them in new and profound ways. Covid also put the world on pause and in doing so, gave us all a turn off of the hamster’s wheel to take a breath and do a reassessment. As we went through that reassessment, many of us pledged to live differently. Some of us had to, some of us wanted to and some of us finally and plainly saw the light of our own lives.
So, in counterpart to the article’s perspective on the macroeconomic impact of quiet quitting, let me offer my family-level microeconomic impact of quiet quitting.
First, my grocery bill has gone through the roof and it’s not just inflation. Instead, I cook healthier and better, using fresh ingredients and almost always from scratch. Both the time to cook and the output of that cooking is important to me. Food tastes better, my chronic inflammation has subsided and all of our bloodwork is mind-blowingly normal.
Then there is the general output for things like gas, work clothes and lunch money. The counterbalance to the higher grocery bill is that I’m not spending $50-60 a week for diner lunches, that were never really that good for me anyway. On top of that, my wardrobe has slowly turned over from suits and blouses to jeans, shorts, t-shirts and jeans. I don’t need to replace my work clothes as often, saving me hundreds of dollars a year. Then, there’s gas. A tank of gas now lasts me 2-3 weeks instead of a week. At about $40 to fill my tank, the savings of at least $1,000 a year hasn’t gone unnoticed, nor has the lack of wear and tear on my vehicle.
Then there is our own food production. Prior to the pandemic, we grew food but it ran out sometime mid-winter. Today? It’s the end of March and I haven’t bought a single potato, clove of garlic or onion. I have enough tomato squeezings to make ketchup, marinara, chili, and salsa if I want to. I have a fabulous recipe for stuffed poblano peppers that will blow your mind and enough peppers in the freezer to make it whenever I want. My point? My garden during the first full year of the pandemic produced over $2,000 of food. Not bad.
As far as living on less or reducing our standard of living, it just genuinely hasn’t happened. Now, part of that is that there are two of us supporting this household, so we are a double-income family. The other part, however, is just that it simply costs less when you can do things for yourself rather than purchase everything done. So, yes, we are planning that fabulous “honeymoon/anniversary” trip to Antigua next winter. It’s time for us to take time for ourselves. But still? Our costs are down.
Finally, I look at the cost of what I would have given up to maintain my constantly growing workload. Because I have Fridays off, I can do the majority of our cleaning that morning so that we can enjoy Saturday and Sunday as a couple. I am also able to go skiing or hiking with my sisters on Fridays afternoons giving us quality time to just be together and have fun. I can make the flower arrangements for both of my nieces’ weddings and take their wedding photographs, saving them each about $5,000 on their wedding costs. I can coach my oldest little kitty to reclaim her spaces in the face of more rambunctious brothers and help my timid big guy enjoy the outdoors with a little less fear. I can enjoy a glass of wine with my husband in the evenings and I’m not instead folding laundry in a mad dash to get things ready for the next day. I’m flexible for travel so that I can accommodate my husband’s much tighter schedule and I can run our household so that chaos doesn’t reign supreme.
My point: quiet quitting has an unfairly earned reputation as a bad thing for our economy. Quiet quitters are viewed as lazy, unproductive and unprofessional. But those observations – just like many observations in our general public discourse these days – are painfully myopic and short-sighted. Quiet quitting isn’t about doing shoddy work or being a disengaged employee. Quiet quitting can be the opposite: more engaged but at less intensity.
Further, quiet quitting has so much intrinsic value for our lives, our families and our communities. As quiet quitters, we can donate more to charitable causes and reduce our use of consumable resources. Further, there is significant benefit to our employers. Quiet quitters often have the balance in their lives to approach work more calmly and with more creativity and we are not at the same risk of burnout as our peers. But most of all, quiet quitting is a personal, family decision. It is not for government or captains of industry to control or bemoan. It is a highly complex and personal decision that one makes in considering the totality of their life and what it truly means for them and their family. To me, this is the height of personal choice. And for the CEOs out there? Well, tough luck, buttercup. I was one of you and I get the pressure you are under to produce and grow and gain in efficiency. But this is not your decision. It rests solely with the individual and their family.
And finally, I know that I am lucky to be here. It took a long time coming psychologically as well as an incredible employer who actually “gets it” around work/life fulfillment. It took a husband that saw the value of my time not just in terms of dollars but in our quality of life. It took painful events for me to learn that prioritization of family was more than lip service. And it took commitment to a lifestyle that involves growing food, hanging out clothes, taking care of a huge lawn and doing some of the other mundane tasks around here.
But quiet quitting got me here – long before it became a “thing” with a name. It was not a one-time decision but a slow evolution. And honestly, nothing has ever felt so right.
The Yuppie Homesteader 