Why Aren't You Working?
I don’t know if this ever happens at your company, but from time to time, our boss here at the library will come into our office and pointedly ask: Why are people not working?
And now, armed with this recent report from the U.S. Census, I have an answer for her: retirement (38 percent) and school attendance (19 percent) are the most common reasons, along with chronic illness or disability (15 percent), and taking care of children or others (13 percent).
As it turns out, what my boss is really asking is why people who are employed here aren’t doing more work, and those answers are quite a bit different: here, the answers are playing minesweeper (50 percent), reading celebrity gossip on the Internet (20 percent), plotting ways to overthrow the boss (15 percent), writing posts for the blog is work (10 percent), and downloading old ZZ Top music videos from YouTube (Mike).
But back to the Census report, Reasons People Do Not Work. Using data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics and the nationwide Survey of Income and Program Participation, the report provides information on nonworkers, broken down by age, sex, race, education, marital status and other categories. The report includes information on duration of joblessness, health insurance coverage, and more.
Data and analysis included in the report can provide insight about the fluctuation and collective decisions of the labor force, and can inform HR programs and policies related to pay, benefits, work schedules, child-care arrangements, transportation and more.
We’ve got our own reasons, and maybe you do as well, but check out the official Reasons People Do Not Work here.
it may appear that I'm not working while I would call it incubation or mulling. You may appear to be working when doing a concrete task like
writing a memo or talking with a client. Thinking or reflecting on a problem doesn't always look like work, but it can be the most important
work I do. This is part of the reason why I run my own business. I wish there were a way that this type of thinking work could be more
accepted yet I do know that many people are just looking for an out to doing "real work."