I hate working for money. I feel like slave. What are your views?

I know a lot of people say that, but I am seriously surrounded by very educated people who should know better.

If I told you where I work, you would imagine people with PhDs and lab coats. There's definitely a few PhDs, but every day I have to go fix a new problem generated by an incompetent person who makes 3x my salary.

For instance, they rented an overhead crane to move some heavy equipment. They decided to do some additional framing in that part of the building, and now the crane has to be bought from the rental company, cut apart with a torch, and sent to a scrap yard.

They bought a few trailers to use as office space, set them down in the parking lot, then realized that we don't have a good space to permanently install them. They will likely be sold at an auction at a huge loss.

In a different building, they put in a new custom built overhead crane, but they didn't measure it right and now we have to permanently lower safety railings so the crane will fit.

They installed a 40 ton air conditioner. For air conditioning, 1 ton means 12,000 BTUs per hour, not weight. The person who bought them didn't know that and engineered a concrete slab built for 40 tons of weight. It is huge, expensive, and makes me laugh whenever I see it.

Lastly, every single bathroom has a sign reminding people to not flush paper towels or t-shirts down the toilet.

I get now why people hate us engineers. The guy who graduated with the minimum GPA and can't figure out how a wrench works is still an engineer at the end of the day. And due to nepotism, he is in charge of the big decisions. Us engineers at the bottom spend all day fixing their mistakes until we get fed up and go work for some other idiot.

Hi all

I'm new here.

I've worked at this company for a few years now.

And it's becoming emotionally and mentally difficult. I've lost all confidence in myself and because of that I've been making mistakes I never had before.

I'm constantly scared that I'll be fired of demoted, so I overcompensate alot, It disgusts me.

Any advice.

I love what I do professionally. I work in a niche field in government, and while every job has its pros and cons, lately the cons are outweighing the pros in my current location. One of my problems is having golden handcuffs, it's the best pay I've ever had but its not worth putting up with these crazy fools. But due to the cost of housing everywhere in this and every neighboring state, if I want to move, I can't because the pay is less and the housing is more, which would put me in the hole. Because I have a niche job, openings are few and far between.

A new council was elected a couple of years ago and they seem to think that our municipality is overspending, which we aren't, we have had a budget surplus for years. The council eliminated the city manager, literally said that they are the elected officials and they will run the town. They also fired another employee after about 6 mo because they were the one saying 'no you can't do that. Policy say X or that's illegal.' So they got rid a her but it cost them a ton in a lawsuit because they didn't follow law or policy in how they fired her.

Now we have to jump through hoops, and tread on glass around them because they refuse to allow any decision that they weren't personally briefed. They are putting family members on local committees so they can have influence even after their term is up, they are making up new rules for employees without voting on it in a council meeting, literally just making things up and enforcing them like they are policy. For example, one department has 3 people. One councilor just made the rule that only one of them can be off or out of town for a training at a time. They had a professional conference that all of them usually attended, now each person can only go every three years. I used to be able to attend trainings out of town just by sending a request packet to the finance officer, now I have to send a councilor the packet for review, don't hear back for weeks, then get denied because the early bird registration date is passed.

They make public comments on social media how city employees are lazy and overpaid, but when HR got a pay study done, they keep knocking it off the docket for a meeting and say that its never been presented to them, even though it is a public record and has been shared all over the place. The report btw shows that most employees are underpaid compared to neighboring areas by 10-30%. They refused multiple request for raises for non union employees but the union staff get one every year. Some supervisors are paid less than their staff because the staff is union and supervisors aren't.

Nearly every department head that isn't an elected official is looking for new jobs because they keep making up stuff to tie our hands while not following rules themselves. The rules that they do present in council meeting make no sense, until the community and employees stand up for 30 min during public comment and point out everything wrong with the proposal, usually how no one was notified or talked to about these changes, and it really was just something that one of them wanted to do to have some power over the employees, example is some of the maintenance crews work 4 10 hour shifts so they can do repairs in buildings before or after business hours so citizens aren't disturbed. One councilor decided he didn't like it and had an agenda item to make them work 5 8 hour shift like everyone else. Never asked the maintenance director, or any staff, he just didn't like that they didn't have to work on Fridays. They tried the put in a very specific dress code, but every elected official besides them said that they wouldn't require their employees to follow it, the unions threw a fit, so it would have left maybe 3 departments left that they could enforce it on so they dropped it when they saw how upset the employees were. Again, no department head was saying that they had dress code or professionalism issues with staff over appearance, just someone wanted everyone to follow a dress code from the 80's.

So I’ll make this super quick. About two years ago I took a job that now confines me to a cubicle for about a 20k increase in salary. My previous job was never the same, each and everyday was different and spent alot of time outside.

I am absolutely miserable and have rose colored glasses for my old job. I can’t necessarily take the pay cut right now as my partner is out of work. How do people cope when you hate your job? it’s making me miserable with every aspect of my life. I have ADHD and I believe this is part of the reason I hate being in a cubicle 90 percent of my day.

I hate my job. Its dispatching at a call center. We're severely short staffed and have a few new trainees. It wouldn't particularly matter if I gave them a courteous 2 week notice because they wouldnt be ready.

This company is never proactive. Always reactive. Not to mention I pick up some of the slack which I know I should not. My boss is a snake who says pretty things but never follows through. We have micro managing supervisors and overall its a mess. I don't care about burning a bridge but do care about leaving people in the wind, for a lack of better words.

I'm starting to dread work and be resentful asf which is leading to irritability. I do have another job lined up in 3 weeks. I just want to leave like right now, on my lunch break 🤣

I have half a mind to leave my keys with HR and sending them an email at the end of my work day.

Id be an asshole and unprofessional huh?

Sorry it’s a long read but I’d really like some advice.

In 2012 my parents opened a business and I have worked there most of the 14 years we’ve been open.

I am about to turn 28 and I have two kids. I hate my job. I feel blessed to have it and I make more money than most people would especially despite my lack of education. Every day I think about quitting. When my parents opened this business years back they ran it together but unfortunately in 2018 my dad died of cancer and now he’s not there to manage it. My mom does her best but to be honest she’s not a very good business person I would say. she has ADHD and is a great “ideas” person but she also is completely incompetent and can’t send an email or scan a document or do anything tech related. Over the years I’ve taken more and more responsibilities and have learned the ins and outs of the industry and can pretty much handle all aspects of the job except I don’t enjoy it all. I don’t like management, I hate having to explain to people how to do things when at 16 I was working 12 hours a day and running things perfectly. I don’t necessarily like working with this particular clientele we deal with and find it exhausting. The clients are never happy nor willing to pay for the services they ask for and along with that there is a ton of paperwork involved that I have to keep up with along with the laundry list of requirements I have to keep up with for the employees. In the past I would work from 5:30am - 5:30pm but more recently I have adjusted my hours to 6:30am - 3:30pm (with no break) 5 days a week. I didn’t choose this job but have been here for a while and don’t know what to do or how to mentally think about doing anything else. Over the years there were periods of time when I lived in other states and did do other jobs like I was a cart girl in California for a golf course and I really enjoyed that and I also worked as a mail clerk at the same time in cali and that was fine as well. I also worked as at a call center when I was 19 and hated that but it was doable. So I have experienced other job industries but at the end of the day I never had enough support and always ended up back in my home town at my parents business.

I was previously married to my kids dad who was not a hard working man nor a financial provider at all so I had been used to working long days and multiple jobs just to keep the bills paid. Fast forward to today and I’m no longer with him (he went to jail for 14 years so…) and I’m engaged to a very sweet, hard working man who makes very good money from home and he watches me struggle daily. He wants me to step back and stay home or find something else I’d enjoy more but to be honest I don’t know how…. I currently am making 1200 a week and although we could still comfortably live on his income alone I feel scared to rely on someone else financially. I have always been the bread winner, I’ve done our taxes, I’ve paid for all vacations, paid for all meals but now I don’t have to do that and live like that anymore and I’m trying to adjust but mentally I can’t relax. I always feel like one day I’ll wake up and everything will be back on my plate financially and everything is already on my plate at work so I’m just so overwhelmed even though I know I don’t have to be.

I’m from a small town where the minimum wage is (legally still 7.25) mostly around 12$ an hour and I’m worried if I decide to leave my current situation I’d just fall back into working a lot but for less money (obviously). I just don’t know how to transition at all. I’d love a way to make money in a way that makes me happy and doesn’t suck my soul from my body but at the same time I mean my job is mainly just so freaking annoying but affords me a consistent comfortable life and I know that’s hard to come by and I don’t want to throw it away because i “boohoo my life is so hard” ya know. We’d like to move away from this town to somewhere better ( he moved here to be with me 😭 ) so my job opportunities are scarce. They mainly consist of food industry jobs, education type jobs or blue collar work along with healthcare work which I have no related college education for specialized work like that.
I just don’t know what to do or where to go from here.

Have you ever dealt with a similar situation and what did you do?

Hi!

It's time for me to vent a bit :)

I work as a software engineer in Austria (≠Australia). I've started this job 1,5 years ago and wanting to quit ever since.

I joined recovering from a burnout and damn did I pick wrong 😿

My boss is the most insecure man I have ever encountered, he does not belong to a leadership position at all. He compensates by being a micromanaging megalomaniac know-it-all and his only technique of handling anything is fear and critique.

The sad thing is that for a while he was actually improving based on my feedback, but then as soon as he'd have a bad day he'd take it out on his team. I was for a while a favourite of his, but since 2 months ago when the company decided to lay off 25% and handle it in the worst possible way, my motivation has dipped and so has my performance. With the lay offs of course came a higher workload. Fun!

Now I was on vacation for a week (Lisbon, Portugal, highly recommend) and I'm back and within 10 minutes of starting work I'm crying non-stop.

I have an employee review (2,5 months later than promised) and I know it's just going to be my asshole boss trying to guilt trip me based on my performance.

I'm quitting very very soon. Original plan was end of October so I get the end of year benefit, but I don't think I'll hold out. I'm feeling the first signs of burnout having been through it once already. I'll either quit this month or try to take a mental health sick leave and then quit.

It sucks financially, but it's not worth it to be belittled by this prick boss of mine.

Also the company will likely go bankrupt by the end of the year 🎉

Ps. I have a funny little anecdote:

On my last day before vacation 10 minutes before I sign off he sent out a request that we take a look at something instantly with my teammate. My teammate was already signing off and asked me to take a look. I did and fixed the problem, asked my teammate to handle it from now on as he was still working the next day. Then my boss sends me a message in teams on Monday like: so you left without even letting me know the status of this ticket.

Once he saw that my teammate was working on it he deleted it, I wasn't even supposed to see it but outlook still showed it in my messages summary. He's so fucking demeaning and instead of saying oh sorry my bad he tries to hide his mistakes.

🥔

I get emails all day that say move Sally to team A. They do not include last names or dates or reasons. then when you ask for more details you get Sally Jones and move her soon. Soon is not a date!!!

I also get i cant get logged in to email or Workday, ok what happens? then 3 days later after not responding they reply with no one has helped me.

we have to have an approval in outlook before they will approve things in Workday even though it go through the same approval process. no one like to make decision.

For some reason my operations team is responsible for reviewing payroll. I have to leave this place!! it is like using AOL in the 90s.

Hola! La verdad es que solo me quiero desahogar pero ya no aguanto mi trabajo, llevo como dos años en ese lugar pero ya no lo soporto, hay gente súper envidioso y mi jefa es una lacra. Ya me gradué de la u y estoy cursando una maestría pero siempre le dan los aumentos a la gente que tiene cuello o las que se meten con los jefes, pero no tengo un plan de respaldo, he estado buscando trabajo ya por unos meses pero ese trabajo en el que me encuentro me afecta tanto física como mentalmente, se me cae el pelo, no duermo bien, empiezo a enfermarme es como si mi cuerpo rechazara ese lugar pero al mismo tiempo
me siento como una fracasada que se está rindiendo y muchas veces me digo que tengo que aguantar pero hoy si siento que ya no puedo y no se si arriesgarme y tomar un salto de fé y esperar lo mejor pero al mismo tiempo está súper difícil conseguir trabajo. gracias por leer

Good afternoon reddit, want to get this out of my brain.
I work in Australia as a pharmacy retail manager. My boss is an independent owner and is an ass.
Basically over the years he’s become increasingly toxic and manipulative.
He smashed his phone once at work when a pharmacist called in sick because his child was unwell and had to take them to an appointment.
He threw a chair and slammed his hands down saying “fuck” over and over again.
He has constantly for almost the entire year, been talking about how I do a much worse job than another pharmacy he’s just bought, for reference that pharmacy has a heap more staff all on the floor. I have two overseas interns, had one part time girl and a brand new staff member. Mind you everyone is constantly working, but it still isn’t enough.

The interns don’t know enough to run the pharmacy and the new staff is great but still leaning. He constantly leaves tasks, scrutinises every little issue and won’t upskill staff. I received no training when I started and had to learn how to hire, counsel and develop staff with no guidance.

I keep hearing from the weekend staff that he just complains over and over. The worst part is that there isn’t a HR i can take this to, it’s just him.

I’m leaving in two weeks anyway to work for a company that treated me far better, but just wanted to vent.

I have some that go through my desk and trash my area. It makes me so mad. I don’t want to go to HR because I’ve only been here for a few months and I’m worried about rocking the boat and then not being able to transition out of the role that I hate so much.

I have one coworker that will follow me around and listen to my conversations.

Today, a different coworker asked me what there was to do in the town I went to college in because him and his wife were planning on going there this weekend. We laughed and talked about how it was such a small town and there was nothing really in it.

A few hours later she came up to me and asked “Do you live in X Town? I heard you talking to Coworker and I thought it was really weird that he was asking you about that town.” I said “No, I don’t live there.” She said again “I just find it really strange that he was asking you about that town.” I said “okay.” then turned my back on her and continued the work I was doing.

Not the only time she has done this. She is so fucking weird. She is constantly trying to get into my business. She will insert herself into the tasks I’m doing and tries to control what I’m doing. WE WORK IN SEPARATE DEPARTMENTS TF ARE YOU DOING HERE?!

My dumb fuck coworkers are sending me over the edge. I hate my dumb ass job but the people here make it worse.

I should start by saying I do not hate all jobs! There are past jobs I loved! They just didn't pay enough. Well, I was at my last job for 4 years and it got to the point where I absolutely hated waking up in the morning. I was applying to 5 jobs a day, even applying for jobs I was overqualified for just so I could get out faster. Well, I ended up landing a decent job that has actually helped set me up for better jobs in the future. The only thing is.. it's only been 5 months and I hate this one too. I hate that this job was such a relief at first, but now that the honeymoon phase is over I'm right back where I was.

Management is so bad here, I have two managers telling me two different things and moving the goalpost constantly. Nothing I ever do is good enough. They're always changing things and I just can't do it.

I just wanted to vent and say that I hate being in this position- knowing that this job saved me from my last, but now I need saving again..

I don’t want to go in tomorrow at all. This job makes me question everything about myself. I’m 26 years old and I make $16 an hour…this sucks. I used to make $19 but my position got eliminated due corporate rules so I had to transfer to a smaller store. I love the company I work for but the job itself is so boring. I tried to apply for the corporate office of this store and they rejected me even though I have a bachelors degree and 5 years experience. It’s so draining. I used to work at a busier store and transferred to a smaller branch because it’s close to my house (6 minutes away) and honestly I hate how boring it is. They say busy jobs lead to burnout but nah for me boring jobs lead to burn out. I love the beauty industry and really could make a career out of it if I wanted to. But honestly right now with the job market it feels impossible. I feel like Gen Z is going through the biggest struggle right now. Even my dad said to me “I’m so glad I was not 25-26 in 2026 because wow it’s hard” YUP.

I work remotely in member services for a major health insurance company. I've only been here about three months, and I actually liked the job while I was in training. Then I got out of training and started taking calls.

MY GOODNESS!

I've worked in customer service for over 18 years, so dealing with angry people isn't new to me. But this is different. Almost EVERY call is miserable. I'm not even in retention or collections. I'm literally supposed to be helping people with their health insurance, yet it feels like I'm constantly explaining why something isn't covered, why something costs so much, or why we can't do what they're asking us to do.

There are days where it feels like there isn't a single genuinely good call.

Then you add the metrics.

Hold time. Wrap time. Quality. Phone etiquette. Survey offers. RTMs. And on top of actually solving the person's problem, we're expected to work these almost "sales-like" things into conversations whether they fit the call or not.

I've been doing customer service long enough to read the room. Sometimes a person DOES NOT WANT TO HEAR ANY MORE CRAP FROM YOU.

If someone just spent the last 20 minutes frustrated about their healthcare, the last thing they're thinking about is helping my company's metrics.

The moment that really got me was having to tell someone who was already struggling that their cancer treatment wasn't going to be covered.

And after delivering news like that, I'm supposed to worry about whether I offered them a post-call survey so I don't get dinged on my metrics?

Are you serious?

"Sorry, I know I just gave you devastating news about your cancer treatment. Would you mind staying on the line to complete a brief survey about your experience today?"

How disconnected from reality can we possibly get?

And I'm starting to realize something else that's making the job harder: the insurance itself barely seems to cover anything for some of these people. I'm the person on the other end of the phone who has to explain it to them, so naturally I'm the person who gets all of their anger.

Management isn't helping either. There's a lack of professionalism and accountability that I'm already noticing, and the workload is ridiculous. Ironically, they aren't overly harsh when someone screws up, which sounds like a positive, but sometimes it feels less like grace and more like nobody actually has control over what's going on.

The only time I don't completely hate my workday is when they put me on messaging instead of phones.

And it's starting to follow me outside of work. I'm exhausted. I'm frustrated. I dread doing it. I'm losing motivation, and I don't feel like I'm being paid anywhere near enough for the amount of crap we're expected to juggle. For what this job actually requires, I genuinely think the pay should be at least $4–$5 more an hour.

So why haven't I left?

Money. Benefits. Working remotely. Responsibilities at home. And the fact that the job market right now is absolutely horrific.

I've been applying elsewhere, but finding another decent job feels like a job itself.

I know every job has metrics. I know customer service means dealing with angry people. I've done this for 18+ years. I'm not expecting every caller to be happy or every day to be easy.

But this feels different.

I'm three months in and already wondering how long I can realistically keep doing this.

Am I overreacting? Has anyone else worked member services for a health insurance company and felt like this? How do you survive this kind of job without completely checking out mentally while you're trying to find something better?

Because right now, I want the hell out.