Doing the squeeze

Essayist Terrence Heath takes a look at those who still have a job and notes they increasingly have to deal with bad bosses. He notes that there are a lot of resources for dealing with bad bosses, but very little on the obvious of getting them to stop being abusive. Why are bosses bad? The answer is the same since humans developed the concept of the boss. Because they can.

And bosses can because, in this economy, the worker cannot say, "Take This Job and Shove It" as Johnny Paycheck sang in 1977. The worker is stuck because there is no other job to switch to, he or she is stuck. Take what the boss is dishing out or be unemployed.

We're in a "No Quit Economy" and bosses are taking advantage of that to squeeze their workers for everything they can. In just the first quarter of 2010 corporate profits jumped by $572 billion. Wage and salary payments went down by $122 billion.