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Thursday’s Workwear Report: Ruffled Collar Blouse

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Our daily workwear reports suggest one piece of work-appropriate attire in a range of prices.

How pretty is this ruffled collar blouse from & Other Stories? It feels just the right amount of whimsical without looking childish. I would do a monochromatic look and wear this tucked into a navy pencil skirt, but it would also look great with a gray suit for a more formal setting.

The top is 100% cotton and machine washable, but I might veer towards professional pressing, because my ironing skills are never quite good enough for ruffles.

The blouse is $89 at & Other Stories and comes in sizes 0–12.

This ruffle-neck blouse from WAYF comes in sizes 1X–3X and is $68 at Nordstrom.

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Sales of note for 3/15/25:

  • Nordstrom – Spring sale, up to 50% off
  • Ann Taylor – 40% off everything + free shipping
  • Banana Republic Factory – 40% off everything + extra 20% off
  • Eloquii – 50% off select styles + extra 50% off sale
  • J.Crew – Extra 30% off women's styles + spring break styles on sale
  • J.Crew Factory – 40% off everything + extra 20% off 3 styles + 50% off clearance
  • M.M.LaFleur – Friends and family sale, 20% off with code; use code CORPORETTE15 for 15% off
  • Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
  • Talbots – 40% off 1 item + 30% off everything else (includes markdowns, already 25% off)

Sales of note for 3/15/25:

  • Nordstrom – Spring sale, up to 50% off
  • Ann Taylor – 40% off everything + free shipping
  • Banana Republic Factory – 40% off everything + extra 20% off
  • Eloquii – 50% off select styles + extra 50% off sale
  • J.Crew – Extra 30% off women's styles + spring break styles on sale
  • J.Crew Factory – 40% off everything + extra 20% off 3 styles + 50% off clearance
  • M.M.LaFleur – Friends and family sale, 20% off with code; use code CORPORETTE15 for 15% off
  • Spanx – Lots of workwear on sale, some up to 70% off
  • Talbots – 40% off 1 item + 30% off everything else (includes markdowns, already 25% off)

And some of our latest threadjacks here at Corporette (reader questions and commentary) — see more here!

Some of our latest threadjacks include:

332 Comments

  1. I would like to do a quick solo trip for 2 days or so before I start a new job and I would love some hotel recommendations. The goal of the trip is to relax and reset and basically have a “reading vacation”. As the name implies, I plan to do lots of reading, jacuzzi soaking, and eating of delicious foods.

    My only requirements for the hotel:
    – Must be within a 3 hour drive of the Bay Area
    – Must have a pool/hot tub

    A spa onsite or nearby would be a huge plus.

    Please share your recommendations!

    1. Indian Springs in Calistoga, Sonoma Mission Inn in Sonoma, Dr Wilkinsons in Calistoga for a less expensive spa weekend, are my go-tos.

      1. Ooh I stayed at the Sonoma Mission Inn as a young teen. I tagged along on my mom’s work retreat and thought it was the fanciest place ever.

    2. Monterey! I haven’t spa-ed there, but it HAS to have a nice one, plus beautiful nature. Treat yourself to the aquarium and go to all the feedings!

      1. We stayed at the Asilomar (no spa, probably more basic than OP was looking for) 5 years ago and it was idyllic. I just sat in a comfy chair under a tree and read my book. It’s my ideal holiday which I’ve found more difficult to replicate in the UK.

        1. My family stayed at Asilomar 38 years ago and I still remember it as my ideal vacation location. In fact, when my mother moved last year, one of the few items I took off her hands was an Asilomar poster she has had all this time.

      2. Sadly, there isn’t a great spa there. You’d think so, but the accommodations are generally sub par.

      3. I adore Asilomar, but it is rustic and has no spa (and the pool has been closed for ages due to Covid, but it’s not a glam pool to start with.) The vibe is definitely “State park lodge.” If you love cold beach walks and views, it’s your place. If you want a little more luxury, look elsewhere.

    3. There are some nice places on the Sonoma/Mendocino coast. I haven’t been, but have heard good things about Timber Cove and my parents used to stay at Benbow Inn or the Little River Inn (not sure how nice they are now).
      If you want to go pricey, Auberge du Soleil in Napa is lovely, there is Macarthur Place in Sonoma, and there is the new Montage in Healdsburg.

    4. The Claremont in Oakland has great pools and a great spa. And if you can bear to leave the hotel, Chez Panisse isn’t far.

      1. Agree that the Claremont spa is good. Unfortunately, Chez Panisse is only open for takeout until January.

    7. Pebble Beach? The Lodge at Pebble Beach and Inn at Spanish Bay are both beautiful. There is a spectacular spa.

    9. I like the recs for Calistoga. I have stayed at the Mount View hotel a couple of times and loved it. It has everything you’re looking for, and is right in downtown Calistoga so you can walk to cafes and shops etc. I went for the salt scrub last time I was there, and the mineral mud bath the previous time (it’s a watery bath with some minerals in it, not thick mud.)

      I’ve also stayed at Sonoma Mission Inn. It was on a corporate retreat thing and they ran out of regular rooms so I got a casita and wow!! The spa services were great, the pool is nice. Also a good option but more of a get in your car and drive to nearby stuff.

    11. The Sonoma Mission Inn is lovely. The Cottage Inn and Spa in the town of Sonoma is more affordable and charming. You can get a room with its own private patio, it’s about a block to Sonoma square, and they have bikes to rent if that interests you. As you can tell from the name, there is a spa on site. I don’t think there’s a swimming pool.

  2. Any Android experts here?

    I want to link a Google account to my phone only so I can forward Voice calls to the phone. I don’t want the contacts to import, just access to the Voice number. Everything I find on the web tells me to input the account and at the last second to enable Airplane mode, then quickly switch over to turn off syncing. It just plain does not work.

      1. Yes. The Google account with the Voice number has contacts I don’t want imported, I only want the Voice number itself to forward to the Android device. I can’t find a way to pick and choose, it seems to be all data or no data.

  3. Gah! I could not get dressed this morning. Am used to work = dress + tights + block heel low pumps. I opted into a mullet: sweater jacket, shell, elastic-waist pants, bad shoes. Good only in that it makes an on-camera zoom less awful but I need to do better or at least not waste half an hour to get to such a bad result. Had figured out summer clothes but now it is cold. Envious of guys who can wear a sweater fleece and now their summer outfit is a fall outfit.

    1. you could do the same – swap your pumps for flat knee-high boots and add a sweater or jacket.

      1. Good point. What is a current good offering in black with a low (<= 1 inch) block heel)? Prefer suede to leather. Narrow calves, so spendy brands work better (sadly, Aquatalia etc.). Any thoughts? This may solve a lot of my problems b/c I build outfits from the feet up if it's a high-walking or high-standing day.

          2. I am a 6 and now I am tempted. It’s been so long since I have worn winter work clothes that I have no idea what I own any more.

        2. If you’re willing to go lower than knee high, I love my Thursday Chelsea boots, and they have a number of other ankle high styles.

        3. Anon size 6, I have almost the same pair from about 3 years ago, and adore them – the elastic means I can wear them with black tights (and thin socks layered over), leggings, or skinnies :)

    2. My fall work uniform = dress + knee high boots + jacket. My winter work uniform swaps out a long wool coat for the jacket.

    3. You could wear a sweater and tights with your dresses if you already like your look.

    4. Winter weight dresses with winter weight jackets and the same shoes and tights, or with knee height boots?

    5. I think if you want to go for an upscale WFH look, go full Katherine Hepburn / Shiv Roy with some nice wool trousers and loafers on the bottom. The sweater jacket and shell on top sound nice, as would a silk button up shirt or a sleek turtleneck sweater.

      1. Ha! None of my wool trousers fit, hence the elastic-waist pants and the mullet look. But I could wear an elastic waist pleated skirt for a nicer look (with boots). I am about 5 pounds away from having my old clothes back, so close enough to not throw in the towel and yet far enough away to know that I need some fall options in the short run.

        #cheapbutwillbuygoodboots

  4. What are your best puppy biting deterrents for people and things? I have a five month old standard poodle puppy and I will try anything. He’s going to start obedience classes after the holidays (would start sooner but work travel/family commitments prevents) but we have to survive the holidays first. I’ve tried sprays, positive reinforcement, a million distractions, and yelping or growling when bit myself (sort of works). I know he’s teething and it hurts, but I’m at my wits end. I’ve also purchased a vibrating/static collar but after trying it on myself first, could NEVER use it on a helpless animal.

    1. Lots and lots of chew toys/ things. Swap one out anytime he gets mouthy. They need tons of chewing at this stage. Frozen bones are nice too on their sensitive gums.

      Yelping, and then turning my back on our very nippy spaniel helped a lot. Are you crate training? You can put him in there with some chews, trying to not make it punitive but as a time out. Ultimately you also have to wait it out. Ours was crazy with biting until she suddenly wasn’t.

      1. Do you worry about chews in the crate? I’ve heard conflicting advice that they should only have soft things in there.

        1. I am not the person you’re referring to but I have no issue leaving a Nylabone in my dog’s crate.

        2. I wouldn’t leave him in with them unsupervised. I’m just taking about brief time outs. I also agree that a reverse time out if you can leave the room can be effective.

          And a lot is variable. Our spaniel we brought home at 8 weeks, too early in my opinion, and she had not been socialized as much by the other dogs, plus she is very stubborn and head strong. But even she stopped biting around 9 months, like a switch had flipped.

    2. Make time for classes. It’s the only option and it is your responsibility. Guess you can’t make those family commitments because you made a commitment to a puppy.

      1. This plus exercise. Standard poodles are awesome dogs, but they are not a houseplant type breed. You bought yourself a working dog.

        1. Oh for sure. The lessons will come as soon as they can, as will more exercise. I’m super familiar with the breed (grew up with them) and we’re doing all the exercise with him! Unfortunately their joints have to be babied pretty heavily during puppyhood or they develop issues later. We’re limited to a maximum 1 mile walk or 30 min high cardio right now, but that will increase.

          1. Are you doing any obedience training? You don’t need to take a class to do basic commands. Poodles are smart, and dogs want to understand what they’re supposed to do. Teaching sit, lie down, etc. now (immediately, start today if you haven’t already) will make your life and your dog’s life way better.

            Specifically for biting: pull your hand away and say “Ouch!” Frozen carrots are good. Mental stimulation (training, playing, etc.) should help too.

        1. + 1 – I also specifically recommend pulling your hand away and squealing with a high pitch yip noise, and then pretending like your hand is a limp noodle, while turning your back away from the puppy. It sounds like the puppy is teething. You should also put the puppy into a puppy socialization class ASAP.

    3. Teaching “touch” can help — that way they can turn the impulse to bite into the nose bump.

    4. I had a toy in my hands at all time and just shoved it in his mouth when he got bitey and if he couldn’t settle down he went in time out. The more you exercise them mentally and tire them out then put them in nap time the better it goes. I have a 10 month old german shepherd now and the 4-6 month period was the are we going to make it through the biting phase. I tried to do as much structured wear him out for 30 minutes (sniff walks, ball time, easy obedience, tricks), then put him in his playpen to sleep as I could. In addition to his crate I had one of those wire octagon structures (I call them puppy jail or playpens) that I would set up to put him in when he was being too much. Then he was still near me, but couldn’t be bitey and could play or nap.

      1. Thanks! Puppy realized he could just hop out of his playpen yesterday. Were you able to teach your dog barrier respect? The pen was our only “babysitter” besides the crate which he thankfully loves and accepts, but I feel bad giving him so little freedom during his frequent “cooling off” periods.

        1. as long as he could see me, yes, he was okay with it until about 6 months when he was honestly just too big for it (he is 90 lbs at 10 months). It definitely took some being consistent once he realized he could knock it over or hop over it with popping him back over the other side of it. I was also successful with gating off a room and removing all easily destructible items so he could hang out there. I agree – as much as they all push the crate them, I wanted him to have have more than one area that could be his safe space without having to enitrely rely on the crate.

          These smart breeds make such great dogs, but man puppyhood will challenge you!

    5. Reverse time outs worked for us. When puppy got bitey, I got up and quietly walked away. He got sad that playtime was over and quickly learned to control himself. The key is that he stays in a puppy safe spot (I would leave him in a puppy proofed room and step over a baby gate to separate us). I would leave for 30-45 seconds and then come back in cheerfully and grab a toy to reinitiate play. Then repeat as needed.

      Playing with older dogs helps a ton too. Dogs can communicate with each other very well and older dogs will correct younger dogs who play too roughly.

        1. Agree playing with other dogs helps. Even though I work from home, ours goes to doggy daycare 2X a week and to the dog park at least once a week. The older dogs corrected his behavior right away haha.

        2. He’s at doggy daycare today for the first time. I’m so nervous about it! He’s had playtime with older dogs before but not so many of them. I’m hoping he does well :)

          2. Our vet told us and she was 100% correct that doggy day care is the most effective way for them to learn not to be so mouthy. Other dogs will correct them in a way you can’t.

    6. I raised a herding breed puppy which are supposedly prone to nip because … they’re a herding breed. I got lucky/my breeder did a fabulous job with him, so my puppy was not particularly bitey. However, when he did get bitey, it was usually towards the end of the evening or after he’d been awake for a while. He was tired and cranky and overstimulated and lost his what little ability to self-regulate he did have. I tried all the stuff you have tried, and the most effective thing was to yelp, turn away, and stop playing. Fun/you– the two greatest things in the world–go away if he bites. If it got real bad, he got a time out in the bathroom (not crate so crate didn’t become associated with punishment). That strategy also worked when he would chase my ankles when I wore wool socks (lol instinct). I don’t know poodles, but they are smart like my breed, and knowledgable folks generally recommend aversive methods for sensitive, smart breeds. Seems to do little more than just raise the level of tension/arousal which is not conducive to self-regulation. You’re in the thick of it with teething. It’ll get better in a few months.

      1. Omg I love the part about your dog chasing your ankles when you wore wool socks. That’s amazing!

    7. ok, I am going to get a lot of push back on this, but think about a comfortable and soft muzzle for when you have people over. This will prevent nipping. I have friends who use one to keep their dog from eating everything on the beach, and another friend who uses one because the dog has bitten other dogs. It removes stress from the owner. There are a lot of varieties. I don’t know if one could work as a consequence of nipping–interesting idea. Mostly, I think this is a thing that goes away with time, though it does have to be taught that it is not ok. My golden “hugs” people on the wrist with her mouth-softly. Some people get it and don’t mind, and others freak out–I should have worked harder on this.

    8. Teach “easy.” Have a treat in your closed fist. Puppy will put teeth on trying to get it. Say “easy” and only when pup nudges your hand gently, open and immediately give treat. Our most recent pup (youngest of our 3), learned this very quickly, and “easy” became shorthand if he started playing too rough. It was immediately effective. Time with older dogs will also teach him when he’s crossed a line.

      Our “no” sound is a very loud, obnoxious, nasally “eh-eh.” At 3 it still works. If he doesn’t respond to easy, say “Eh-eh” loudly, turn your back, and make the fun end.

      Lots and lots of toys. Stuffed, frozen kongs. Stuffed bones. Nylabones and similar (my pup loooooved the wishbone). Bitter spray where you know he’s inclined to chew but shouldn’t. We have a toy bin and the dogs all know where they can find their chew toys. I would some times swap the item he was chewing on for an acceptable one. He was smart and started to figure it out. And, frankly, time! Our most relentless chewer has not destroyed anything since he was about 8 months old (maybe even younger).

      Good luck! It won’t last forever. Don’t buy anything nice until this phase is over.

    9. Congratulations on a lovely companion!

      More chew toys and things he can safely chew on and more activity to tire him out. They are so much work at that age. I found putting his mat/bed close to me worked, not sure if he felt comforted or knew I’d spot him getting into mischief.

      A stern “no” or “tsk” then ignoring him when he chews on you so he knows he did the wrong thing but won’t be rewarded with attention.

      My poodle is an old fellow now but still cracks me up because he finds the loudest noises possible to make with a gentle swipe of a paw and when I turn to see what the noise is, I find him staring at me and it’s always when he’s overdue for a walk, needs some biscuits or I’m eating seafood!

  5. Your best anti-SAD strategies? I’m feeling the winter blues creep in, not helped by a forecast of torrential rain for the foreseeable, and am trying to practice self-care from the beginning this year, instead of being miserable all winter. I live quite far north so it is DARK when I leave for work and when I come home.

    1. Same. Having plans to get out of the house helps. I also try to take walks during the day so I can soak up the light while it’s there. Also, last winter I started taking a vitamin D supplement, and I do think it helped some. So I started that regimen this week.

    2. Arriving and leaving for work in the dark is so depressing!

      Can you take walks at work during the day to get some fresh air and sunlight? Really good hot tea? Planning a trip somewhere warm?

      1. I need to get in the habit of a midday walk. I’m good at getting out when I’m WFH, but on office days, I don’t get out as much (20 minute walk home and back, but it’s typically dark). My office has windows but they face into a courtyard so I don’t get any natural light.

    3. Invest in great winter outdoor clothing. Proper down coat, snow pants, spikes for shoes. Go for a walk at lunch time at least once a week. Try to spend at least 2 hours outside on each weekend day. Snowshoeing is very easy and does not require a high fitness level. Consider signing up for winter sport lessons (cross country or downhill skiing or skating) to get you out of the house on the weekend.

      2. +1. Gear + hobby + weekend plans outside every weekend. That’s what you need to do.

    4. Philips sunrise alarm clock. I had one when I lived in the Netherlands (so similar latitude) and it was amazing. Husband just bought one but I believe it will help us in Seattle too. And then Vitamin D, lunch walks, a sunlight lamp, and antidepressants.

      1. Yes, I have the Phillips sunrise lamp, take vitamin D, antidepressant, and I try to get out at mid-day (though in Seattle, not sure how much mid-day helps, even.).

    6. Not completely responsive, but I am working on my own version of an advent calendar for my daughter who has SAD. For each day from the change daylight time/standard time through the winter solstice, there will be a little treat for her. Some are material things that she will like and use (a new tea to try, new sheepskin insoles to rejuvenate her worn slippers), some are coupons for experiences, like taking a hike together or going to her favorite ethnic grocery store. I have been having fun trying to be creative without spending much, and I think it will be a hit. And when she gets to the end, there’s that profound joy of knowing that the days will be a few minutes longer, and longer, and longer.

      1. That is so lovely and thoughtful!
        OP, there are definitely knittting and craft Advent calendars which are nice to have a little treat and the satisfaction of making something, even if Advent isn’t part of your faith.

      2. I LOVE this idea. I think I’m going to do it for myself! Maybe I’ll just write the ideas on slips of paper and grab one from a jar each day. Could be things like treating myself to my favorite takeout, allowing myself some online shopping that day, etc.

    7. Soft sweaters and scarves in beautiful colors I look forward to wearing. And SSRIs.

      1. Glad I’m not the only one to say meds are helpful. They make it so much easier to get through.

    8. Rainy dark Scotland is not fun this week! It’s amazing in the summer I can happily go a walk at 9pm, now I’m ready for bed at 6pm. I used an IKEA smartbulb in my bedside lamp as a cheap sunrise alarm in the morning which helps. Lunchtime walks even if it’s wet, I’ve just got a new giant brolly. I also think leaning into it too, having a pot of fancy tea and reading a book under a blanket for the evening is good. I also like to try plan my evening even if it’s just some indoor hobby time so I don’t get to the end of the work day and just do nothing.

    9. I use a verilux light lamp. Actually keep one in the office, too. The key, though, is that it needs to be within 18 inches directly in front of you. It’s a great time to read with coffee in the am. This has helped me immensely. My psychiatrist told me about the 18 inches. You only sit in front of it for up to 30 minutes.

    10. Some very good ideas here. What helped me is getting outside every single day (snowshoes are great for this), a sun lamp and listening to summer nature sounds while working. Ultimately I moved to a sunnier place, which helped the most.

    1. Yup, this sounds like it tracks with the experience of people with long term Lyme, fibromyalgia, etc – hard to ‘prove’ via tests. There is hope among those advocacy groups that the increased attention for ‘long’ covid and the research into it will help lead to better treatments/breakthroughs for those with similar issues. I didn’t realize there is also ‘long ‘ flu/pneumonia/etc. It all seems to be related to an intense overreaction of the body and it is really hard to figure out what is going on/calm it down.

      1. Yep, definitely. I have Lupus (and have at times had a fibromyalgia diagnosis) and my labs look OK, even when I’m clearly struggling and in significant pain.

      2. Yup, agree. A friend had Lyme disease at one point but it persists. Meaning, it’s no longer in her system, per se, but it absolutely has affected her stamina and well-being for the long haul.

    2. Yes, this is completely normal for lots of conditions. I have chronic migraine and there is absolutely nothing that will ever show up on my labs or imaging, yet I’m in pain pretty much all the time and only manage to keep my job because I WFH and have a reasonable amount of flexibility in my working conditions. It’s very difficult to get disability benefits for migraine because of this, but nobody really doubts that this is a “real” condition (at least not anymore- interestingly this is a condition that has really benefited from the pharmaceutical industry finding some effective drug targets, which has validated migraine in the eyes of many doctors, if not necessarily the general public).

    3. Yep. I have had issues with my breathing for 11 months and finally gave up even talking to docs about it because all the tests and diagnostics looked fine and there was nothing they could do. Very frustrating!

    4. Yes, it is normal. I think a lot of labs and tests are geared towards more acute issues? Think of MS (until widespread MRIs, we didn’t have a test for it). Autoimmune disease can often be seronegative too.

    5. Yes, back pain is real but imaging only shows a limited set of causes for it, leaving the rest undocked.

      1. Sort of related… I just heard that they are looking at links between long COVID and Epstein-Barr Virus, which can cause Mono (and as you noted, Mono & long COVID share a lot of symptoms). The President of Moderna was on the In the Bubble podcast and talked about how future MRNA treatment may be able to target EPV, as it appears that COVID may potentially be activating the latent EPV.
        At least one study has shown that people who have had COVID and also are infected with EPV are much more likely to experience long COVID symptom than those who have not been infected with EPV. (not a scientist so any misstatements are my own).

    7. All my labs look normal though I have very real long-term effects. (I can certainly function on a day-to-day basis though.) It makes me feel like a fraud or a liar or like I am being dramatic. Sigh.

    8. Yes, extremely common. Post viral fatigue syndrome (Myalgic Encephalomyelitis) has been recognised by the World Health Organisation since the 1960s but unfortunately as it often affects women, due to our more complex immune systems as we host foreign bodies aka babies, we are written off as anxious.

      Psychiatrists McEvedy and Beard looked at an outbreak without examining or speaking to patients. They stated “there is little evidence of organic disease affecting the central nervous system…and epidemic hysteria is a much more likely explanation. The data which support this hypothesis are the high attack rate in females compared with males”. Seriously.

      As technology get better we can now see problems inside cells and (still expensive) scans but standard old tests look normal and unfortunately the entrenched medical opinion is that is psychological.

  7. Recommendations for: Relatively comfortable, pretty, bras with support/push-up? I’m done with nursing babies and want more support for my boobs than my bralettes, but don’t want to be in discomfort.

      1. Mine too. Bought it the first time after a fitting at Nordstrom. I also recommend a professional fitting.

    3. I’m on team “a well-fitting bra should be relatively comfy.” I’m a 36J and 16 hours in an underwire, sure, I’m glad to take it off, but a normal day? My Panache and Fantasie are not uncomfortable at all. Get fitted for your size and then start the search.

    4. Go to redd1t a bra that fits and do your five measurements. It made a world of difference for me. They will have so many recommendations for gin depending on your size and shape. I’ve found the ladies who run that sub so helpful.

      1. Don’t know where gin came from. Bras. They can recommend bras. Most are not ugly. Give it a try.

  8. Anyone have experience with custom made tall boots with minimal hardware/detail (not riding boots)? 5’11” with very thin calves/long legs; can’t find boots tall or snug enough. Live in NYC; local would be great but open to anything; budget up to $600, maybe a little more.

    1. I don’t have any experience with custom boots, but a skilled cobbler can take in tall boots to make them fit more tightly on your calves. There must be people somewhere in NYC that do this. You should be able to bring some boots in for a consult and they can tell you if it’ll work.

    3. I just ordered a pair from Adelante and was super impressed by the range of customization options for shoe size, foot width, and calf width–including an option to order two different sizes or to customize the design.

  9. Repost from yesterday: thoughts on the Ask a Manager post about juniors in investment banking quitting after 6-9 months? Consensus over there was “pay less, let people work fewer hours”.

    The OP is in the comments at AAM, Ctrl-F for “Vaca”. Link in following comment.

    2. I think Allison is correct that if people are leaving before the program is over, then it is no longer attractive enough to retain them and the program needs to change. It’s also not a compelling argument that “I suffered and others suffered, now new hires should suffer too.” It never is in any context. I think change needs to come from the top, starting with pushing back against the insane client culture that is made up of faux emergencies.

      1. cosign that that argument is never compelling. I feel that it’s often a protective stance to retroactively justify the suffering of the senior folks, who otherwise would need to confront that the suffering they did was pretty senseless. It’s easier to pass on the trauma, but that’s not how the cycle gets broken.

    3. I will say I understand the difficulty to change this type of culture, for the same reasons that we often advise people to be very wary of taking an 80% schedule in Biglaw. Kind of the old saying “cheap, fast, good quality – pick 2.” If you’re at a $$$ consulting or banking or Biglaw environment, the clients are expecting fast, excellent work for that price. So, you might be getting 80% pay but still not be sure you’ll be able to keep your evening plans.

      So… doubling your junior staff only to have them sign off at 5pm every day doesn’t support the business model.

      How to fix it? I could see an overall reduction in hours and pay as helping with long-term sustainability, but it wouldn’t mean juniors can shut the laptop at a reliable time every day. Going in with that mindset (every week might not be great but it won’t be months on end) perhaps would work?

      1. One point that commentators made is that you can push back (slightly) against client demands. If the client says “Can you send over that doc?” they don’t necessarily mean that night. It can probably be the next day. Which is when the client will read it because they’re not working late at night.

        I’ve found that when the partner or client leader starts off with “well of course these are our norms” it works out fine, no one is offended. I’m sure there are exceptions, but its still a matter of being a professional and figuring things out. When I’m in a position of power, I definitely make sure to do so. So when whoever is in charge does not look out for their team I frankly judge them for it.

        1. This is such a good point. I ask my clients when they want to review the next draft, and am often told the next day, except when it is a real emergency on their side (often because their execs waited too long before bringing legal up to speed).

        2. I had a boss who use to brag that she would take client calls anywhere at any time. The client actually thought she was nuts when they found out she was returning their call from a boat in the middle of a family scuba trip but the boss was oblivious and continued to use the anecdote to “motivate” associates to be more responsive. So even when you get reasonable clients, an unrealistic partner can undo it all.

    4. I thought it was interesting how insistent Vaca was that nothing could be changed. You wrote in to AskAManager with a question, clearly there is a problem and you have to address it somehow.
      It’s definitely not appealing to see your 40-something boss working hours like this.
      Investment Banking is not as attractive or hot as it once was. So that explains part of why people aren’t willing to deal with this. If you can get a job that pays decent (if not crazy) money and has normal hours, why not go to that?

      I also wondered if that firm was also treating the first years badly. Because as Vaca mentioned repeatedly the hours are common across the industry. So for people to quit they must be miserable day to day.

      I went to a business school and met plenty of people like Vaca who insisted that doing the 2 years ibanking was fine and the best way to set yourself up for life. I ultimately decided ibanking would be boring and am doing something completely different, and am much happier with my career now. So I think young people are just not buying what Vaca is selling anymore.

    5. People have figured out that the whole “work your way up from the bottom and get rich” thing doesn’t work for 90-99.999% of people (depending on the industry). And also that life is short, whatever time you get is luck, and there really is not an amount of money that can compensate you for not having a life that is meaningful and satisfying. The whole “work hard your whole life and you’ll be rewarded” has been exposed, time and time again, to be a base lie, and finally the worker population has caught on. The fundamental subterfuge of American capitalism has been exposed, and we aren’t going to turn back the clock and somehow convince people that everything they learned in the pandemic needs to be disregarded. And the core of what they learned is, companies and company owners do not give a sh-t about people. They will do what it takes to “preserve shareholder value” and keep hundreds of millions of dollars flowing to their CEOs, even if it means turning people out to starve in the middle of a pandemic. When the chips were down and people needed help, early in the pandemic, it was the government that stepped in to help people, and kept people off the streets and made sure they had food and money to pay the light bill. Not corporations. People have finally (FINALLY!) wised up to the idea that we do not owe the ownership class anything. Including our labor. Which the ownership class doesn’t want to appropriately compensate us for even in the best of times. And please don’t tell me “without business taxes the government can’t support itself” because we’ve all seen how laughable that idea is. People fund the government. The government helped the people. All the exploitative capitalists wringing their hands in their corporate boardrooms right now because “no one wants to work anymore” brought this on themselves.

      So. Companies can either accept this, and make changes (I felt like the repeated suggestion in the comments, of taking one 100-hour-a-week salary and splitting it between two employees who could work less and cover the same ground, was a sensible idea), or they can accept that they will be getting lower and lower quality of talent, and the talent they get won’t stay long. Adapt or die, like they probably tell their clients. These rich guys at the investment banks are not going to outsmart the worker class or somehow convince them that black is white, up is down, and the sky is green and not blue. I realize they *think* that they’ll be able to pull that off, but they can’t.

      Anyone interested in the current mood of the workforce should visit r/antiwork and see what end-stage capitalism has wrought upon itself. Fascinating reading.

      1. This is what I don’t get – the same people who espouse “adapt or die”now can’t deal with the fact that workers are demanding higher pay or that people don’t want to work 100 hrs / week?

      2. “When the chips were down and people needed help, early in the pandemic, it was the government that stepped in to help people, and kept people off the streets and made sure they had food and money to pay the light bill. Not corporations.”

        I can 100% guarantee you that the money came from corporations, because that (and income tax) is where the government gets its money. I can also guarantee you that corporations did a LOT during the pandemic. Around here, most distilleries converted operations to make hand sanitizer; for their efforts, the government slapped them with fines, penalties, and taxes.

      3. And yet I bet those same people expect for hospital ERs to be fully staffed (along with all support departments) 3 shifts a day, ditto ambulances to scrape you off the pavement, and to fly whenever they want to and stop at staffed gas stations and have hotels to check in to and restaurants . . .

        We are a greedy bunch when we expect others to serve us. And we want to not be subject to that ourselves.

        1. Shifts are fine, plenty of people replied to that AAM post saying that they should have morning and evening shifts if clients really need 24/7 work.

        2. I want people to have lives that are dignified; where people are fairly compensated for their work and where people don’t have to make a choice between buying food and keeping the lights on because some corporate CEO wants to keep labor at a minimum so they can get their annual multi-million-dollar bonus and buy a new vacation home. I want everyone to be able to walk into a hospital and not worry that getting critically-needed medical treatment will bankrupt them (like in every other first-world country except the United States). I want there to be some recognition that work has value, and for people to no longer be told “if you want more money, get a better job” and then be savagely criticized when they go get that better job and there’s no one around to flip the burgers.

          The worker’s revolution has started. So far it’s bloodless. Somewhere down along the line, if the workers aren’t heard, the guillotines will come out. People have been burdened and exploited for too long and they’re sick of it. It is too much to ask people, that they work for low wages and also somehow pay for their healthcare, education, retirement and elder care out of pocket. The middle class has been squeezed to bone-dry. It’s time for other people to feel the squeeze. Sorry, it’s going to be uncomfortable.

        3. i do not expect hotels, restaurants, etc., but i think medicine falls into a different category because in investment banking you are not saving anyone’s life, while at an ER it can be a matter of life and death. that being said – i think medical professionals and hospital employees are also humans who deserve good working conditions

        4. Yes, I want ERs to be fully staffed. I do my part by avoiding the ER unless absolutely necessary. Just like I will turn around a draft in a 24 hour basis, but only when it is absolutely necessary. Emergencies exist. Long days exist. What we’re asking for is that our employers use reasonable judgement when demanding all of our attention and energy. That’s not greedy!

        5. I am fully in favor of ERs being staffed with people who work 40 hours or less a week. I don’t want a doctor on her or his 100th hour of the week making life or death decisions about my care.

    6. I feel like AAM isn’t the best place to ask that question. The comment section is a bit of an echo chamber and it seems that most of the regulars have never worked in this type of intense industry.

      That said, I do agree with them that this working environment is absurd. One thing that struck me about the OP is that junior people are leaving for competitors. So they’re willing to work the hours, just not at OP’s company. If OP wants to retain them, I would focus on boosting team morale, weeding out jerks, and incorporating $ bonuses, like retention style bonuses ($X after 3 months, etc). OP’s company is withholding pay to encourage retention, and that is nuts.

      One more thought: my background is in biglaw and having represented some big banks, this mentality that you can’t just add another junior to divvy up the work is really common. If junior associates weren’t billing enough to a particular case, inhouse counsel would get upset because they felt it was better to have one person getting really deep into the case and working on it full-time rather than staffing a few associates to split the work. So really fixing these issues is going to require a mentality shift from the top down.

      1. It doesn’t matter for this question that they don’t have experience in this industry.

    7. Whatever the solution is, the commentariat is not offering it. It’s ridiculous to assume that a 22-year-old is worth $150k a year for working 40 hours a week; they are paid crazy money to be available around the clock. I’m rolling my eyes, but not entirely surprised, at the attitude that the OP should be the one to handle 3 am emergencies.

      I assume that investment banking has a lot in common with some lawyering: when the deal is coming to a close, you need people working on it who have had knowledge of what has been going on the entire time. You cannot have 10 associates understanding a case just so that they can all work sane hours in the days leading up to trial – not like that strategy really saves anyone any time because the redundancies are so expensive.

          1. I was responding to the comment above which referenced 150k. If 225k also isn’t enough, then you won’t be able to retain people.

      2. The thing is, the current strategy isn’t working for the person who wrote in to AAM. So something has to change. We’ve heard all the excuses above, but clearly they are having a problem retaining juniors regardless of what would need to be adjusted for that.
        Also, the commentariat wasn’t saying that OP should necessarily do it – there were all types of suggestions like have a shift or on-call schedule, pushing back on client expectations etc

      3. No one is suggesting that the juniors won’t ever have a heavy week when they are staffed on a deal that is coming to a close. Rather, they shouldn’t be staffed on every deal such that they are consistently working 100-hour weeks and being told they aren’t doing enough when they aren’t. Of course a lawyer has long hours in the weeks before and during trial. But they should have a break after that and if they don’t, the clients are not getting what they are paying for and it becomes unethical.

      5. If you hire more associates and pay them less, each associate has fewer cases and therefore fewer hearings/trials/emergencies. My current firm has a lower billable requirement and salaries, and my life is sane most of the time. Of course I am swamped before major hearings and trials, but there are not nearly as many of those times as my older, more demanding firms.

      6. I would not pay as much for the training period with a lump sum at the end of the apprenticeship or they pay the money back. This sounds ridiculous.

    8. yes, pay less, work less. they are losing out on a lot of super smart hard working people. even at start ups, silicon valley jobs people work long hours, but the culture is often nicer/better. not everyone, but a lot of the tone in those types of offices is not nice. managers don’t seem to care about their employees or treat them nicely. this is about 12 years back but I went to a type of college and grad school that is a feeder for investment banking/big law type of jobs. a classmate had trouble getting away to go to the doctor, had an untreated UTI and ended up with organs failing in the ICU. yes, she could have done a better job standing up for herself, but at 22 in your first job out of college that is hard to do. stop treating people like robots and treat them like people.

    9. I have an issue with people knowing what the requirements and rewards for the job are, and then opting out when it gets difficult. There are some careers that require a lot of work and hours at the beginning, with a pay-off financially and in experience. If you aren’t committed to doing what you’ve been told the job requires, don’t take the job.

      For some people, this type of immersion early in their career works out great. My advice to OP would be to really refine their interview process to weed out those who will quit when the going gets tough, and to see if it is feasible to slightly increase the number of juniors hired to account for attrition.

        1. Yes. Some people aren’t up for what the job requires, and the OP’s company needs to do better at weeding them out.

          1. I think what they will find is that super smart, talented people with options don’t want live this way. There’s been a sea change that you’re not seeing. And they need super smart, talented people to do the work. So the company is going to have to adapt or not recruit the best. I’m not sad about it.

      2. I’m not confident a robot didn’t type this. The AAM poster stated that 100 hour work weeks and working EVERY weekend is par for the course (not the high end, but the normal work hours).
        It is not only humanly impossible to work 100 hours every week without break – you barely get enough time to eat and poop or sleep more than six hours, let alone a single hour for recreation. But you also seem to think that people don’t change their minds or underestimate the toll that type of work will have on you.
        If you want to suffer abuse for money, go ahead, but it’s not normal nor should it be expected.

        1. +1 million.
          I also have to say, I would hope that people hiring 22- and 23-year-olds would understand that both because of neurological development, and because of lack of life experience, people that age likely have a hard time envisioning what working 100-hour weeks for two years will actually be like, and thus make a commitment without a full understanding of the consequences. It’s a combination of their frontal cortexes still not being fully developed (that happens at around age 25) and a lack of experience in what it’s work to work even a 40-hour week consistently for more than a few months. I’m surprised the LW is surprised that very young people in their first job would bite off more than they can chew, and not be able to handle it. Maybe, just spitballing, they should switch from hiring brand-new, wet-behind-the-ears college grads and instead find people with slightly more experience who fully understand what it means to take on what the company is offering.

          I also think there’s a factor here of – pre-social media, people would work these jobs and it would be awful and they would complain to their friends and families, but widespread knowledge of the real experience of working in these sweatshops wasn’t possible. Now someone working one of these sweatshop jobs can get on TikTok or YouTube and make a 3-minute video, and now millions of people know, don’t take a job like that. Same thing you see with employer reviews on Glassdoor and Indeed. You can’t fool all the people all the time. These companies have to change or they’re going to be stuck in a never-ending churn of new staffers that never even make it to the LW’s level.

          1. I think they’re hiring the 22/23 year olds because anyone older and more established would not put up with all this.

      3. A job is a contract between two parties, the employer and the employee. With at-will employment, either is free to break the contract at any time. Either party can also try and do things to ensure that won’t happen, and should. But its not “giving up on a commitment” not to do this.

        1. Yeah, let’s not pretend like an investment bank wouldn’t fire a junior staff person in a heartbeat if it would benefit the company.

      4. I’ve worked long hours before, though not regular 100 hour weeks. Before I actually did it, I did not know what it would be like for me. I didn’t know the effects it would have on my physical and mental health. I didn’t know that after a certain number of hours, each additional hour felt twice as hard as the one before it. I had colleagues that were absolutely fine with the hours, others who weren’t but were willing to stick it out until they reached a certain goal, etc. Everyone is different, and you just don’t know until you’re there.

        Good news for me–now I work fewer hours for less money, in an office with a very short commute. Once I left my previous job, I lost weight (which was healthy for me), stopped grinding my teeth, and was able to wean off my antidepressant.

    10. I’m in consulting not IB, but we have similar issues on a much smaller scale (lower comp, fewer hours, and less attrition), and generally I’m relatively unsympathetic to the complaints that the conditions are inhumane. It’s fine to not want this job/lifestyle, but those norms are well known and well compensated because of the tradeoffs. There’s also a really big learning curve and the more hours you put in, the faster the payoff for you, your own sustainability, and your team. Yes, we’ve had to increase our comp significantly over the past year and improve the perks given the strength of the labor market, if it’s still not attractive to an applicant, go ahead and move on.

      What should be done (and is done by my firm): being more proactive at the mgmt level to push back on scope creep from clients, limiting slide output to highest impact content. What can’t be done: moving bid deadlines on acquisition opportunities, regulatory or financial announcement deadlines for public firms. As a result, there will always be times where you have a lot of work that just has to be done correctly and done fast.

      Also, we’re sitting in front of 1-2 year old high-end laptops doing intellectually stimulating work on our amazing monitor set-ups in high end offices, in safe neighborhoods, in attractive cities, where we can get up and go to the bathroom when we need. Lots of people work much harder than us, in way worse conditions, for significantly less pay, no benefits, and no job security. A little perspective goes a long way.

      1. Everything in your last paragraph is true. It’s also unfortunately not compelling for the young people your firm needs to hire and retain to churn out the work you bill clients for. So, now what?

        1. So don’t come work in IB or PE or Asset Mgmt or Consulting, etc. Obviously. But also don’t get upset that there are people who have made those tradeoff who are making 7 figures by the time they’re in their mid 30s. Everyone makes different decisions. It’s the combination of the societal “bankers get paid too much” attitude AND the “how could bankers ever expect such insane hours” attitude that is out of touch.

          1. You’re missing the point. Nothing you or anybody else defending this system are saying is going to solve the problem of not having enough junior employees. You can go on and on about trade offs until you’re blue in the face, but that won’t make people want to do these jobs any more.

      3. The argument that other people have it worse does not hold up ethically or even practically, as shown by the fact that these junior employees keep leaving.

        Let’s take an issue other than pay. You did mention safety. I work in health care and recently quit my job (with another one lined up) mainly due to persistent safety problems over my 4-year tenure at the hospital, which I brought to my management time and again, in multiple formats, with no action ever taken. Another terrible safety incident happened the night before my last day, and there still wasn’t any concrete plan to change our unsafe conditions. One of the things management told me was that other facilities don’t have the safety resources I was asking for (in other words, they also have no safety protocols whatsoever apparently). But I don’t care! Evaluating safety across different facilities, and figuring out how to pay for safe working conditions, is not my job. My job is to provide patient care, and I was unwilling to keep doing it without a safe work environment. My job has been posted for a month, with no applicants.

        Providing working conditions and pay that good employees will accept and keep is not a “but-what-about?” discussion.

    11. I thought the strategies OP’s company has used so far are awful. It’s so clearly not about the money, but they don’t seem to understand that. Also, withholding their compensation til the end of the year so they’ll have to stay is just abhorrent imo.

      1. If the whole concept of buying essentially children and holding them captive to a company wasn’t already giving me a “human trafficking” vibe, the withholding of money with the promise of a pile of cash and eventual freedom or a promotion to recruiter if you stay really did.

    12. Oh boy that was a trip, OOP just reads like a sociopath, but somehow thinks they’re the victim when really it’s the poor juniors they abuse.

  10. I know there is an easy answer but I’m coming up short. I want to book a hotel room with a jacuzzi type bathtub. How do I search for this / make sure I’m getting the kind of room I want?

    2. I would call them. I don’t trust an online reservation system for something special that I truly want.

    3. If you’ve settled on the property, I would call directly. Otherwise if you are still narrowing down, I have found the filtering on the booking apps to be pretty reliable, and then you could contact the property directly before you book to double check.

    4. All of the properties I’ve been to with an in-room jacuzzi allow you to book specific types of rooms, e.g., two queen beds, one king bed, executive suite. You pick the one that has the whirlpool tub.

  11. Please call your senators today to urge them to do whatever they can to convince that moron Joe Manchin to let paid family leave make it into Biden‘s bill and budget. The amount of paid leave was already slashed down from 12 weeks to four weeks and it’s on the chopping block now, once again throwing women under the bus to appease a deluded, self-important man.

    Frankly, Dems have already lost my vote, but if they blink on paid family leave, I’m 100% gone and leaving my next ballot blank or going third-party.

    1. I totally get the frustration, but voting third party or leaving your ballot blank = a likely Republican controlled congress and you won’t get any of the things you want that way.

      I’m willing to hear how voting like this at the federal level is strategic, but it seems that it gets you nothing and is basically wasting your vote/electing the opposite party. If we had a different political system it might work, but right now, we only have 2 viable parties so if you don’t vote for one of them, you’re essentially voting for the other.

      1. Seems like Democrats care more about the filibuster than my vote? A real opposition party would be great though!

    2. Never mind. It’s too late. I didn’t see in the headlines before I posted that it had already been slashed. I’m so tired of being used.

        1. No, there is funding for universal pre-K, and extension of the child tax credit. It’s not no loaf for working parents.

    5. If you are upset about losing paid family leave from a bill, why would you increase the likelihood of the Republicans winning elections by leaving the ballot blank or going third party? None of the elected Republicans that I’m aware of would ever vote for paid family leave under any circumstances. Seems like cutting off your nose to spite your face.

      Genuine question because I don’t understand this type of thinking.

      1. Because as a woman, I am no longer OK with needing to accept being a second-class citizen as the price of progress (the old “but at least we got some other provisions” line). I’m no longer OK with the Democrats being interested in me when my wallet is open, but then stabbing me in the back once they’re in office. You are free to do whatever you want to do, but between my feelings on this and my utter horror at what happened (and continues to happen) in Afghanistan, today’s Dems have lost me. I can’t do the “but they’re better than the alternative” anymore. I’ve done it enough and I feel worse off.

        1. Let’s be clear about what the problem is right now: it’s not all Democrats. It’s not most Democrats. It’s not most Democratic senators. It is a single Democratic senator from West Virginia. He’s the reason this is on the chopping block. Not the party.

          2. Nope — this is what life is like in a highly divided country. You don’t get all of what you want, but with all that spending you or someone is getting some of what they want. You want all of what you want, you need better than a 50-50 senate.

        2. I don’t belong to a party so the sense of betrayal is the mystery to me. If the choice is between some of what you want or none of what you want, some seems like the best choice. The Senate is 50-50 and that has consequences. If you want paid leave, you are much more likely to get through electing more Democrats than having more Republicans.

          This seems to be the major difference between my friends on the left and the right. I know any people who hate Trump, but voted for him in 2016 because they wanted conservative SCOTUS picks. Now they are going to achieve their goals through SCOTUS, and they voted for Biden in 2020. Meanwhile the progressives who refused to vote for Hilary get next to nothing.

          1. Yep. The political center of the Us population is much farther left than the center of our elected officials. Republicans win elections because they rally behind their candidate no matter what. Democrats demand perfection and won’t vote for anyone who we don’t love. This is why we’re in the bad place.

          2. Totally agree with Anon at 11:01. Democratic voters are less willing to compromise to give a candidate support, and that will always be their downfall.
            Third party voters cost Hillary Florida, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, which is the whole ballgame.

          3. In fairness its not only because republicans rally around their candidates no matter what. The system is also structurally set up to favor the rural over the urban. This is the major flaw and pretty unfixable because the people who would need to cede power have literally zero incentive to do so.

            But idealism definitely costs votes. Every single time people “sit out” or vote third party, the GOP picks up seats. Which in the end makes someone like the senator from W VA have all the power. If it wasn’t a 50/50 congress, what he wanted would not matter.

            Meanwhile – and please think about this, everyone who is so disgusted – if this plan goes through, however watered down it may be, there is a a much greater likelihood that things improve in all sorts of ways that people like, and democrats can pick up, rather than lose, seats and then push through things like Paid Parental Leave having a greater majority. Or you know, just take a look at the SC and how well that’s going.

        3. You are frustrated, but you are planning to cut your nose of to spite your face.

        4. I’m usually a fan of compromise and moving incrementally, but this is a multi-trillion dollar bill, right? This is a feeding trough for greedy little piggies to snuff their snouts into. The job of a reasonably decent politician is to NOT play the game wherein priority #1 is their pork and priority #2 is what people want, which forces people to empty their wallets to pay for what politicians want.

          Family leave needs to be higher up on the scale, and I say this as someone who is most definitely not liberal.

      3. 100%. I’m really sad about the paid leave being cut too but this is the definition of cutting off your nose to spite your face.

        1. To use your face analogy, here’s how I see it: elected Republicans get in office and punch me in the face. Elected Democrats get in office and also punch me in the face, perhaps with less force. The Republicans will gladly punch me in the face for free, but I’m done with paying (in volunteer time and donations) for Democrats to punch me in the face. I understand that you see it differently (I once did too).

          1. I completely understand not giving of your volunteer time and money anymore. But I can’t understand not voting or voting third party. An election is a binary choice. You only have two viable options. Picking anything other than the least worst option is totally illogical.

          3. As someone who has never donated time or money to a political campaign, I understand this completely.

          4. Not voting is voting. You don’t have to give money. You don’t have to volunteer time. But please vote.

          5. Sure, except they just punch you (wyt women–an assumption that may not be true for you) in the face, but the elected Republicans maim and kill minorities. It’s not a punch in the face for everyone.

    6. I’m so incredibly disappointed that paid family leave is on the chopping block. It is wild to me that we’re one of just a handful of nations that don’t have it. It’s so upsetting to me that 1/4 women have to go back to work after two weeks! It’s abundantly clear that we as a nation don’t care about maternal health.

      1. What do you do with the large chunk of working women who are independent contractors or run small businesses? That is an increasing % of women (and yet a way to true financial independence and setting hours that are life-friendly), and yet things like this drive employment to large corporate employers. Maybe just through one’s 30s? IDK what the answer is. It also makes it higher to hire employees if you are a small business b/c you can’t meaningfully compete on so many fronts.

        1. Canadian system – allow them to opt into the unemployment insurance system. They pay in for a certain period and can take partially paid maternity leave

        2. Businesses are clearly able to deal with sick employees, so why wouldn’t they deal with a few weeks of a maternity leave (which is easy to plan in advance, compared to almost any other medical procedure)? Firms in Europe, Canada and basically any other country in the world are doing fine despite a mandatory maternity leave (which are way longer than 4 or even 12 weeks).

          Women who come back to work two weeks after giving birth are not extremelly productive employees and most women try to avoid this situation anyways by accumulating other types of leave, etc.

          1. Disagree that businesses are able to deal with sick employees. Pre-COVID, sick employees worked all the time. And since I could WFH, I never got a sick day, I just muddled through from bed and a subpar printer/scanner/using my phone as a second monitor. I get a day off if I am in a coma. Maybe.

        3. The solution is for paid maternity leave to be run through unemployment. Plenty of people are unemployed through no fault of their own; others are “laid off” because they weren’t great workers. If we are going to throw money at people in that situation, and throw money at people who are disabled (via SSDI), I see no reason to not do some limited maternity leave. I would prefer it to be done on the state level, as costs of living and local markets vary so dramatically. However, there’s little reason to not have a per-capita tax that goes into a central pile of money, from which maternity leave benefits are paid.

          2. Worth mentioning: the population of Sweden is almost identical to the population of North Carolina; Denmark, to Colorado; Finland and Norway, to Minnesota. Their systems cannot really scale up by a factor of 30 to 60, which leans towards doing this on the state level.

      2. I’m frustrated too, but at least they tried to get it passed (it wasn’t even on the table for other Dem administrations). While I’m not pleased and definitely have an Arya-like list of politicians that richly deserve a terrible fate, my GenX self feels like so many decisions are really between a not-so-great solution and a truly crappy solution. I want the people who will get to the not-so-great solution as oppose to nothing at all.

      1. Know what’s disgusting? That Zero Republicans will support the bill. This kind of legislation would help small business owners who can’t independently fund paid leave for their employees – I thought small businesses were ‘the backbone of (Red) America’?.

        Sure, I’m disappointed the democrats can’t get every single person in their caucus on board with a broader expansion of the safety net, but that disappointment is dwarfed by my disgust that not a single republican in either house will support even a stripped down investment in climate change legislation, universal pre-k for 3 and 4 year-olds, and a tax system that supports middle class families. I’m infuriated and disgusted that Republicans seem singularly focused on keeping our kids from being exposed to black history, refusing basic public health measures, and supporting armed treason. That, to me, is far more worthy of anger and disgust.

        2. Maybe if every bill stopped covering 50 different topics, we could get some bipartisan support.

          1. The reason they are trying to get all the topics covered in this bill is precisely because there is no bipartisan support for single-issue bills and in fact Republicans will filibuster them into oblivion. So budget reconciliation is the only way out.

          2. This is also a mystery to me! If your policy is popular, why not a single issue bill about that popular thing? You get the votes, and make the other party be on the record voting against that narrow issue.

            The giant, trillion dollar bills are difficult because it is hard to even know what is in them!

          3. Among voters, if not politicians, there is certainly bipartisan support for shorter, more narrowly focused bills!

    8. I don’t agree with Biden’s bill and am pleased it’s getting cut back. The administration is doing a lackluster job, and can’t craft, explain, or sell a bill. The Democrats have been promising lower prescription costs for years, and can’t even deliver that. I voted for Biden because former President Trump is a dangerous incompetent idiot, not because I believe the Biden administration has the ability to lead or govern.

      1. I voted for Biden to get Trump out. I had low expectations, and thus far have not been disappointed.

    9. I find it extremely ironic that the only paid leave that passed in this country has been the paid leave for federal workers that Trump passed.

      2. On a similar note, I’m amazed that more states have not funded preschool. I was blown away when I moved to Seattle and realized that public preschool programs were $$$. I had previously been in a school district where preschool was provided in the public schools.

        1. I don’t understand why CA can’t get its sh*t together and get universal preK in place before 2025! As a CA resident, I feel like we are a state full of $$$$ people who put out a bunch of preachy “in this house we believe science is real…” signs on their lawn in their fancy neighborhood but act like you are taking bread directly out of their children’s mouths if you talk about raising taxes even a tiny bit. I’m sure there are lots of things I’d hate about living in OK, the state where my grandmother and her sisters taught in one-room schoolhouses through the Great Depression, but they have universal preK!

          1. I’m so with you. Honestly, my tax burden is stupid low in Washington compared to my previous home in a flaming red midwest state. Put a freaking tax levy on the ballot for any of these issues and I will happily vote yes.

  12. Any litigators who made the jump to become a product counsel? Curious whether you like it so far, and what you find challenging?

    1. I have seen client in house litigation counsel make this shift. It’s a big change that requires really investing in knowing the client’s products and business space. I would not do it unless you are genuinely interested in the business.

  13. Hi wise hive, I am considering a move to Austin, Texas for a new job (slightly higher pay) and really struggling re where to start. I have no friends or family there and I am coming from a bigger East Coast city which has long winters. What do you think I should be considering/keeping in mind? Any anecdotes? Words of advice? Where to live? How to make friends? Is it CRAZY to leave my lovely city for this, I think objectively not but I seem to be very nervous about this.

    1. This is very personal, but I would be seriously looking at whether this is trading up. Liking where you live and having friends and family nearby would be worth more to me than a job.

      1. +100%

        I think living near family and friends is PRICELESS and I never plan to move away from my community.

        1. On the flip side, I just moved away from friends and family because weather, access to nature, etc is not changeable and you can make new friends locally. So YMMV. I love Austin but it is unique in a lot of ways so you should definitely spend a good amount of time there if you’re considering it, and I agree I wouldn’t move anywhere just for a job unless it’s a dream job. Agree with Audreycat’s comments below.

      2. +1

        If you like your current city and have a good network of family or friends there, I would think very hard before moving elsewhere. The only exception might be if your career opportunities are significantly limited in your current location. But it sounds like you’re in a large East Coast city, so I assume you have options available locally too.

    2. I’m a Dallas person and I haven’t lived in Austin in years but it is a city I like a lot. However, IMO, it is a city that was not built to be as large as it has grown and the traffic and the congestion and everything is really not great right now. I think it will be much nicer in a decade once Austin figures out how to deal with the people and everything.

      1. +1 This is spot on. It’s grown much faster than it was supposed to. It is a friendly city with great outdoors activities and good restaurants, lots of young people and families. It still has some ‘small city’ components – like you will need to go to Houston or Dallas for professional sports, some of the bigger concerts, etc. You will learn to tolerate the heat after your first full summer. I don’t think it’s *that* humid…certainly could be worse.

        The city is growing south. South Congress and Rainey Street have recently become more trendy, if you want to live in Austin proper. Plenty of suburbs if you prefer.

        If you are coming from the east coast, it will not seem expensive! Yes housing has gone up but it will be manageable.

    3. I would encourage you to visit, if you haven’t already. Do you like food? Do you like music? Are you mildly outdoorsy? Do you mind traffic? Do you mind super humidity? How do you feel about homelessness? These are some things I would think about before moving there. I used to live in Austin and it will always hold a special place in my heart. I will say we found it pretty easy to make friends there. But I would think long and hard about moving back. Austin has some existential problems that I think are going to get much worse in the next decade.

      1. Like how bad is the homelessness?

        And what do you see as existential problems?

        DH is a UT grad and would love to move back. It’s big enough to have jobs and people b/w 25 and 65 (even if skewing younger than us). I went to college in a small college town that I could retire to but doesn’t have enough jobs or people b/w 25 and 65 to make sense now. Both are humid car-driving areas.

    4. I’m an Austin native and will say that this city is amazing but totally unrecognizable from where I was born and grew up. It has a lot going for it but it’s become unaffordable for many middle class families, and I’m damn lucky I got on the property ladder in 2009. If I hadn’t, I’d have been priced out. If your combined annual household income is less than 200k, or you’re looking for a newer, single family home under 500k, you may be in for sticker shock. People are friendly here, skew young, fit, attractive, left-leaning, and highly educated. You may not fit in if you don’t conform to that profile, and dating here is highly competitive. The public schools are terrible unless you can live in a wealthy area (west or north west). There is no real public transportation so expect to drive a lot. The scars of Jim Crow are fresh and I35 is still the boundary of black and white. The police are pretty horrible and violent/racist, and the local government is corrupt. The weather here is amazing and it’s a heck of a lot cheaper than San Francisco which seems to send us about two hundred people a day but it’s beginning to have all the issues of a big city- terrible traffic, massive income inequality, homelessness, air pollution, frequent property crime etc. BUT, you should move here because it’s still, in my opinion, the home of the best breakfast tacos and barbecue in the world.

      1. “Dating is highly competitive” — yikes! I feel like this is my warning to stay away no matter now many people tell me I will looooove it there.

        1. 100% and I was surprised to find this comment buried so deep.

          My sister lives in Austin. She has just this year lost her bodily autonomy, lost water and power during the coldest weather ever and has now been billed heftily for it, and fully half of her wealthy white neighborhood didn’t/doesn’t take COVIS seriously, and that is how she got COVID herself.

      2. +2.
        Sorry, but I can’t look at what’s going on politically in Texas – not just women’s rights but the whole sum of everything – and feel like I want to be part of that, on any level. Governor Abbott is being primaried by other Republicans who don’t think he’s conservative enough. That should tell you everything you need to know right there. Ultimately, I hope Texas follows through on its many years of threats and exits the United States, and takes a number of Southern states with it when it goes. It would not be worth it for me to move there for any amount of pay increase, much less a “slightly higher” raise.

      3. +3 I’ve visited Austin and think the city is great, but I would not move to a state that has effectively banned abortion even if I myself had the means to leave the state if I needed one. The Covid response would also be a concern for me. While many red state (and arguably some blue state) governors haven’t handled this crisis well, DeSantis and Abbott really stand out as the two worst and most callous. Banning individual school districts from implementing mask requirements particularly infuriates me.

      4. I’ve never lived anywhere else so I guess I don’t get the extreme backlash. The abortion ban sucks, but the Supreme Court is about to make Texas the tip of the iceberg. Y’all can say goodbye to Roe nationwide. I don’t see this as a reason not to move to Texas. It might be a good reason not to move to the US.

    6. How tolerant are you of our idiot republican representatives effectively banning abortion in TX, and doing everything they can to pander to their voting base as the expense of the quality of life of the residents of the state? How do you feel about rolling blackouts for electricity in Winter or possibly Summer in the future (you’ve heard about the Texas grid issues from back in February? The grid hasn’t been fixed yet….). How do you feel about sky high property taxes on whatever house you buy? Depending on where you are from, moving to Texas isn’t a move up at this time. I have a friend who grew up West Coast, schooled in East coast and she’s really struggled with all the things I mentioned above. I live in Texas and I’m struggling with all these things as well.
      I live in Texas, lived in Austin for College and have a family member who lives in round-rock (north of Austin) now. According to family member traffic is atrocious from round rock all the way down to south of Austin. As someone else mentioned the city growth has rapidly outpaced its infrastructure and traffic is miserable everywhere. With students moving in for School in fall, expect to see delays in services around start of school time if you live near the center of Austin.
      I know I’m only giving you negatives, but these items will affect your life if you move to Texas, so along with looking at the extensive list of fun things to do Austin, look at the issues as well.

    7. Austin can be fun, but at the end of the day, you are still in Texas, with the Governor and State Legislature doing their best to keep Austin in line with the rest of the state. So, if you want to live somewhere where the Governor overrules local mask mandates, and the Legislature as many liberal social policies as possible, move. I would stay put in my comfy likely Blue north eastern state.

    8. I have a friend who moved to Austin and said you basically can’t spend time outside in the summer because its so hot and humid. Maybe native Texans are fine with it, but it was worse than she expected (coming from a northern city). At least with east coast winters you can bundle up and still go outside.

  14. I have never hired movers for anything other than an in town move before and am looking for a gut check on what is normal. I am looking at a 250 mile move of a two bedroom house. Not a ton of stuff/furniture, but both houses involve two stories plus a basement and most of the heavy furniture is in the bedroom on the top floor in both houses so I know it is an annoying move. I am in Michigan, so not a HCOL market. Just looking for what others have paid.

    My family and friends are all the we move ourselves type but this would be annoying to drag everyone out for, plus we are all grown and I make good money it seems weird to not just pay for movers. I’m just not sure what’s normal and what’s being taken advantage of.

      1. I should add, I recently moved two blocks away (on the same street!) and I still hired movers. It is normal to get movers.

      2. +1. I couldn’t help but shake my head when my 30-year-old friend dragged her aging father up to help her move. She’s also still on his cell phone plan, though.

      3. I think she’s planning on paying for movers but is trying to get a sense of a normal cost, since she hasn’t done it before.

    3. I would expect to pay around $500-$600 for an in-town move of that size, so would expect to at least double that for the mileage.

    4. I’m not sure whether this qualifies as long distance (it probably does) but in any case, get quotes from at least three companies. You’re probably looking at a couple thousand dollars. I’m moving one room’s worth of furniture about 400 miles and it’s going to cost almost $3k. All of the quotes I got were within a few hundred dollars of each other.

    6. Keep in mind that moving companies have had to raise their starting wages to $15/hour just like everyone else and still seem to struggle to find workers right now. I wouldn’t expect to find a company quoting less than $100/hour for a two man crew and you will probably need more movers than that for a SFH. Also, some companies calculate based on the square foot of your residence, so your basement may be adding a lot in this case.

      I would be shocked to be asked to help move someone’s entire household at this point in my life, but I have friends that still try to do it themselves. They usually end up literally crying in the truck by the end of it.

    7. I wouldn’t even care if I was being taken advantage of if it meant I didn’t have to do a 250-mile move.

    9. If you are older than 25 you should not ever be asking your friends to help you move. Hire movers.

    10. I COMPLETELY understand the using friends/family for moving. When I first used movers it was for a new job 900+ miles away and I am never going back. I’m guessing you are from a blue collarish type family who didn’t have a lot of extra money. That’s where I come from too. for that 900+ mile move (done twice now), I think I paid around $3K. I did not have them pack much up and I got rid of a lot of stuff. This was for a 1 BR and no dining table, coffee/side tables, bureau etc. The last move was in 2019.

      Get 3 quotes. Atlas is a good one – that’s who I’ve used for both now. You can choose how much you have them pack vs you packing. I did all of my own packing except for mirrors and last minute stuff I didn’t get to. Home Depot has GREAT moving boxes and kits for things like TVs and dishes/glasses. Do a little every night. Label each box with the room.

      I’d think that yours is probably going to be around $1200-1500 based on fuel and labor costs increasing.

      Then, enjoy the blessing of not having to move big furniture, put your bed together (they do that!!), and having boxes in the right rooms. This was so great when I moved into my current place, also a townhome.

  15. This is going to sound crazy, but I feel like my voice has suddenly become much hoarser, with limited ability to speak for an extended period (like giving an hour presentation). I’m a woman, early thirties, and don’t do anything known to be tough on your voice (smoke, sing, etc.) I haven’t been sick lately, don’t have allergies, etc.

    I swear I can barely make it through an hour of speaking without my throat going all wobbly and croaky, and then it takes me 4+ hours to recover back to a semi-normal speaking voice. To my knowledge, I haven’t changed the way I speak, but maybe I have? But how could it change so rapidly?

    Has anyone had this experience or have ideas to offer? I’ve googled around and am not seeming to find this elsewhere. I’m not concerned enough to see a doctor but it does bother me from a professional standpoint.

    2. I would guess that your best and worst are:

      Worst-case scenario: cancer of the
      larynx? Best-case scenario: benign virus infection?

    3. What’s the mold count where you are? Ours is sky high and I’ve been a mouth-breather off and on each day for weeks. Candies and perpetually drinking helps.

    4. When this happens to me, it’s because my throat is dry (I take nasal sprays that irritate my throat a bit and I suspect that makes it worse). If I drink during my presentations, it’s fine, but that’s obviously hard to masked.

    5. It is possible you developed allergies that you didn’t have before. I never had allergies before, and now my allergies are terrible! I used to sing in choirs and now I can barely sing at all.

    8. I would see a doctor. It’s likely nothing – there are a lot of benign causes for this. But I know 3 people (myself included) who were diagnosed with cancer and one of the symptoms was a hoarse voice. And it was 3 different forms of cancer – lung, stomach cancer, and lymphoma. It’s worth checking out.

    9. You didn’t say if you are in the office or still home, but on virtual calls, people tend to talk louder. I can always tell when my boyfriend has been on calls because he’s very hoarse in the evening.

      Singers around here will know that there is a proper way to project, and a bad way, and the bad way can mess up your vocal cords. I don’t know enough about it to say what those techniques are.

    10. See a doctor. Silent reflux is a possibility – do you ever have indigestion or a dry cough?

    11. OP here: It has been very very damp here for the last few weeks, and I continue to work from my 1950’s home which has an older furnace and filter. We’ve also recently had the first floor painted, so windows were open a lot. I haven’t felt like I have allergies, but it seems those things could be “silently” affecting me.

      I also am doing my presentations/talking virtually, and potentially speaking up as a result. The drinking thing is interesting – I don’t like to sip water on calls because I wear a headset and know it will pick up the sound too much.

      But the strange thing is, this has been my life for the last 18 months, including during a lengthy kitchen reno that produced a lot of dust/nonsense. This all seems so recent…

      1. Go to a doctor and get a better headset if you really can’t take a sip of water while on a call.

      2. I mean, use the mute button to take a sip of water. This is a problem you’ve made up for yourself.

      3. Go see a doctor. It’s probably nothing serious, but as people have mentioned, hoarseness can be a sign of various cancers.

    12. How dry is your house? If it’s just a recent change it mignt have to do with seasonal changes and increased dryness. You could get a humidifier and see if it helps

    13. Nodules on vocal cords would be my first guess! No harm in getting it checked out.

      1. 100% this. My husband is a doctor so speaks regularly at work. He developed hoarseness that didn’t go away. Eventually he went to an ENT and was diagnosed with a node. Removal was a short and straightforward surgery. After it healed he was prescribed vocal therapy to learn better ways of talking without aggravating the vocal cords, and he’s fine now.
        I mean, who knows, this could be anything from allergies to cancer, but I just wanted to point out this is one possibility and it won’t go away without intervention.

  16. Thoughts on smart TVs? Specific recs under $1k (I love the look of the frame TV but it’s not in the budget). We’re upgrading our TV for the first time in about a decade and the idea of being able to watch streaming services from our TV is very appealing. We have a preschooler so anything that’s easier for a kid to operate is a plus. We’re fairly paranoid about privacy and don’t have Alexa or Siri but apparently you can turn off the listening aspect of the TV and we would do that. Is it worth waiting for Black Friday sales?

    1. You don’t need a real “smart TV” to watch streaming services. We have an old TV (10 years old, not smart) and Roku, which allows us to watch all streaming services. We are also privacy-oriented and this is the best compromise. I would not get an Alexa or anything else at this point.

      1. My quick research indicated the Roku spies on you just as much as the smart TVs. Is that not accurate?

        1. It doesn’t have a camera or a microphone. It monitors traffic to some extent, but the camera and microphone on smart TVs are worse IMO.

        1. You can buy a smart TV and disconnect it from the internet so it’s effectively dumb. That’s what my friends in IT do. But then of course you can’t use it to stream Netflix.

    3. I love our smart TV. I can’t imagine having a “normal” TV nowadays and I’m old enough to remember when I used the VCR to record shows. It’s easy to have all streaming apps in one place. I do workout videos on YouTube and play them on the TV. We’ve had luck with Samsung TVs. You can probably find some good deals on Black Friday. We got ours from Best Buy.

    4. If you DO want the Frame I saw that they are running 33% off sales at the moment, so maybe check? I think Samsung’s have some of the best current reviews. We bought two over Labor Day and have been very pleased so far.

      1. +1. If you want the Frame, get the Frame. You can stalk sales (we got ours for under $1k) or save for a few months to increase your budget. We also had our previous tv for 10 years and the Frame felt like a huge splurge but omg I love it so much.

      2. Dang it, we just bought an entertainment center that wouldn’t really work with the frame TV. Wish I had known about the sales! Oh well.

        1. The Frame comes with legs so it can sit in an entertainment center like a traditional TV. Just saying.

          1. Yeah but I think the added cost is only worth it to me if it would be wall mounted so it would actually look like framed art when it was off. Honestly, as much as I love the look of it in other people’s houses, this TV is for our basement and no one goes down there except us so it really doesn’t need to be aesthetically pleasing. If we were putting a TV in our living room I would get the Frame no question.

    5. It doesn’t have to have ‘listening’ features to be a smart TV. I have a Samsung one (a fairly standard TV, I think it was less than £200 two years ago) and I have all the Netflix/ Amazon/ etc apps on it and the interface is just via the standard tv remote.
      (Assuming this isn’t one of those things that turns out to be surprisingly different in different countries!)

    7. I have one smart tv and my parents have one and both of us prefer using an external device for streaming. A friend had a smart tv that stopped being supported by a couple streaming services after only two years. So I’d recommend a firestick/Roku as opposed to a smart tv, which will probably be cheaper overall.

    8. Personally not a fan of smart TVs since they have planned obsolescence and aren’t all that well designed. I think you’re much better off with a dumb tv and Chromecast since google has much better software support and updates than any tv ever would.

    9. OMG I didn’t know about the Frame until today and now I want one so bad!!

      1. I convinced my husband to buy one because we have opposing taste and cannot agree on what kind of art to buy for our family room and the Frame will let us try out a bunch of images until we find one we can both live with.

  17. Does anyone else’s skin on their hands crack in cold weather? For some reason, it’s the tip of my right thumb that cracks the worst. Followed by my knuckles.

    What are your favorite hand creams? Any other advice?

    1. You need O’Keefes Working Hands. It will actually heal the cracks and prevents more developing.

    2. In addition to the creams, there is a skin sealing thing that you can buy and brush on to ‘seal’ them (like skin safe clear nail polish) that my husband will put on at night in the winter time as he also gets a nasty crack on my thumb too that does not ever heal well on its own.

      1. Yes! Liquid bandage. It’s the only thing that reverses the eczema on my hands, too, when it gets out of control.

    4. Try sleeping gloves once you have the hand cream on. Even if you take them off in your sleep, they’ll help for the time that you leave them on. And you can wear them while you watch tv.

    5. Lucas Paw Paw Ointment—affordable compared to other creams. I have never tried okeefe’s so can’t compare (but now am tempted to).

  18. I’m starting a new job in a few weeks and have no idea what to wear the first time I go into the office. Big law in my NEUSA city is getting increasingly casual and it sounds like most employees are wearing jeans (and only going to the office 2x per week). When I had my interviews, every one of my interviewers was wearing a t-shirt/athleisure on camera. I feel like a suit would look extremely out of touch. Do I go with jeans + blazer? It’ll probably be pretty cold but not yet snowing.

    1. When I’m not sure of dress code I usually go for a dress, because it avoids ‘committing’ to trouser/Jeans fabric (if that makes sense). For this situation I’d probably wear a medium-nice work dress with a ponte blazer that I could put in my bag.

    2. If I were you, I’d split the difference between a suit and jeans. Go for top+pants+blazer. You can always ditch the blazer if its too much. Also, wouldn’t stress too much about your first day being too formal – you can always scale back once you see the vibe of the office. No one will ding you for that.

      3. Yep. People will only side-eye you if you keep wearing things that are significantly more formal than your office. You get a pass for being too formal your first day FOR SURE.

  19. Public service employees: how do you hang in?

    I love the work I do, I’m passionate about the mission of my agency, and I work with truly wonderful people. However- everything else about my job is becoming untenable. I’ve been at this job for four years and haven’t gotten a COLA, let alone a raise so I’m effectively poorer than I was when I started (this plus inflation means I can no longer afford to contribute to savings, another coworker admitted that she’s just balancing her debt- not getting out of debt). The workload has probably doubled over those four years. The building I work in is in terrible shape (like we don’t have hot water for washing hands, paint is peeling off the walls, HVAC barely works).

    I’m struggling because most of my friends in other sectors make 2x what I make, they work in nice buildings with cool perks (free snacks, on site gym, etc), and have better work life balance.

    I’m job searching, but need to find a way to be less resentful in the interim.

    1. I gave up on “making the world better” though sacrificing my own quality of life. It’s unsustainable. You can’t set yourself on fire to make everyone else warm. I can be a better contributor to the public good when I have food in my belly, a non-leaky roof over my head, and enough financial breathing room to make better long-term decisions.

    5. Speaking as a public servant… just leave. If you’re passionate about the mission, find a way to volunteer for that cause in your free time once you’re out. As much as I have loved working for the government, I am fed up with the bureaucracy, lack of COLA or meaningful performance raises, and delay/inability to get appropriate equipment and technology to allow staff to do their jobs. I’m also looking to leave.

      1. +1. I was a longtime public servant (10+ years in fed and state gov’t) and at some point I just got fed up with all of the bureaucracy, lack of perks, limited advancement opportunities, and of course, low salary (I was maxed out and was never going to increase my salary other than modest COLAs going forward). I decided to pull the trigger and leave for private sector more than a year ago, and I only wish I had done it sooner. I wouldn’t rule out going back to gov’t someday, but for now, it just didn’t fit my needs anymore. I do miss the mission and camaraderie some days, but besides that, no regrets at all.

    6. I didn’t realize the American public service was so bad. In Canada we are paid at market rate and get yearly COL adjustments automatically.

      1. In government specifically, a lot of it is theater aimed at reducing the appearance of “waste.” So no raises, no food at conferences, no coffee or water, poorly maintained facilities, etc.

    7. You have done something great for your community, for your country. But its not tenable anymore. Personally, I found that working at your friends jobs was not as fulfilling, but at some point thats acceptable. You are completely right to find a new job, but in the meanwhile hopefully knowing that you made a difference might help.

    8. I am so with you. Workload is incredibly unreasonable, we don’t get COLA increases, and also no hot water. Our office just started providing napkins in the breakroom and I was thrilled!!
      For me, personally, I am quite senior so my pay is pretty good. I am fortunate to have a SO that makes great money. I resent the martyr culture in my particular sector of public service (education). However, I am in a (privileged) position where I can absorb some of the downsides, so I want to stay as long as I can because I think I am making meaningful contributions.
      I think public service is lacking emotional boundaries, so I am intentional about that and modeling it for my staff. “This is a job. This is a thing that I do for 8 hours a day. It is not more than that.”

    9. I hear this! I feel stuck for another few years because I’ve been relying on PSLF. I could make double in the private sector in my industry, though, which might compensate for my years of investment in PSLF. The biggest hurdle is the identity shift; I’m passionate about the mission but realizing it’s insufficient to make me happy.

    10. Honestly it’s hard. I have it better than you modest raises every year or two, hot water, and not only is the paint not peeling but also I can request to have my office repainted and it will be done within 6-9 months. But the insane workload is unreal. I’ve started just ending my day at a reasonable time, only working later if it’s a true emergency, and letting the chips fall where they may. After 10+ years it’s the best I can do.

    11. I am a very long term (decades) public sector employee. I have made the opposite decision of many who responded to OP upstream, and I stuck with governmental employment as my post-BigLaw career. Like others have said, I work very, very hard, and I am not paid nearly what these kinds of hours would bring in the private sector. I also get to be involved in a truly dizzying array of issues at a high level. I deal with novel issues all the time. I never know what surprises will hit me on a given day. I am often in the room where decisions are being made about the “right” thing to do, rather than what is the minimum required by law. As I said, my earnings are not high, but my salary means that my family is in the top 20% in the US, based on my income alone. I work longer hours than others in my group because my kids are grown, and I want to make this as easy as I can for those who have young children. I guess I am saying that why I stay—and there were bleak years with salary reductions and many years with no raises—is that my life satisfaction is high.

  20. I started watching the Enron smartest guy in the room documentary and just . . . how do people drink the corporate kool aid so much? Theranos made me think of this too. Yes money is important but if you’re at these places you’re qualified and could find a new job, you don’t have to stick around when there is sketchy stuff going on.

    1. Theranos was sketchy from the start. No reputable venture capital groups with knowledge of biotech would invest. They knew a 20 something person with no training in medicine/biomedical research with a wildly unattainable product idea chatting in biz-speak with “changing the world blah blah blah….” lingo was a bad investment. Holmes/Theranos had no publications in peer reviewed and respected scientific journals, and no one ever saw the “device” actually work as marketed. But yeah…. 90 year old George Schultz will throw in some $$….. so many ??naive/ignorant (?blinded by the blonde?) rich men did not do their due diligence.

      It sounds like many folks who worked at Theranos knew things were fishy and left over time. Remember, most folks are small time cogs at a low level an don’t know all the results/stuff behind the scenes. But the whole marketing/biz side was a bunch of 20 something frat boys from her brother’s preppy college who knew nothing about science. And the lead scientist left over the bad management and bad results, so they filled the job with a Dermatologist figurehead that knew nothing. It is staggering how Holmes was so willing to keep marketing a product with known problems that could effect the health of patients.

      1. I don’t actually blame the ops/marketing people that much. As they’ve said, they’re not scientists, they’re not responsible for knowing how it works in detail. But when you’re clearly testing in commercial labs and tricking investors that should set off warning bells.

      2. It’s not an accident that her board and many of her investors, and the people she signed deals with at Walgreens and Safeway, were all older white guys. I’m sure none of them would admit that her attention was flattering to them, and they likely at least sat and heard the pitch because a pretty young lady was laughing at their jokes and staring meaningfully into their eyes (unblinking – she was famous for that).

    2. Could write a novel about this but – many malignant leaders intentionally create a strong team dynamic that creates a feeling of “it’s us against them” that entraps people emotionally, and makes it hard to leave. Wanting to belong to a group is a fundamental human need, and sociopathic leaders are generally very good at figuring out how to exploit that need for their own gain. Conspiracy of Fools by Kurt Eichenwald is a dense book but it goes into fascinating detail about how Andrew Fastow, in particular, created a culture of fear and an army of fiercely loyal dudebros around him that basically made it impossible for anyone to figure out exactly what he was doing, much less realize how damaging it was. When leaders tolerate toxic behavior in organizations, they risk creating someone like Fastow, who can bring down the entire company.

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