The members of the platform have already influenced stock prices together, and now they want to change the world of work.
(Photo: mauritius images / SOPA Images Limited / Alamy)
Dusseldorf A botched interview by a Reddit moderator and ensuing angry responses have brought the anti-labour movement’s main online platform to a standstill. On Wednesday, the Reddit forum “r/antiwork”, which most recently had around 1.7 million users, mainly from the USA, was closed.
Doreen Ford, one of the forum’s moderators, had previously given the US broadcaster Fox News an unsuccessful interview. Ford was “not even able to summarize the main goals of the subreddit” and, with her seemingly unprepared appearance, harmed the movement as a whole, criticized angry users in sometimes abusive language.
This verdict spread rapidly in the online community. Ford and other moderators then began deleting posts that questioned Reddit’s moderation policy or called for Ford’s resignation. The temporary closure followed on Wednesday.
Although “r/antiwork” has been around since 2013, the number of members skyrocketed in autumn 2021 and has doubled in the past three months alone. The reason for this is dissatisfaction with the state of the US job market during the corona pandemic.
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The users discussed in the forum under the slogan “Unemployment for everyone, not just for the rich”. They were no longer willing to accept normal working conditions and wages, and some of them declared that they wanted to abolish the capitalist economic system.
Supporters of the movement encouraged each other to quit their jobs and no longer work in traditional salaried positions, but to become self-employed. The goal is usually to have more free time. Anti-work pioneer Ford, for example, worked in retail for 10 years before turning to dog sitting.
Reddit activists caused a sensation on the stock exchange
After the ban, it is unclear how the important mouthpiece of the movement will continue. Members of another Reddit group caused a stir on the stock exchange at the beginning of last year. Retail investors, following discussions on r/wallstreetbets, rallied the prices of “meme stocks” like struggling video game retailer Gamestop and movie theater chain AMC in a coordinated action to punish hedge funds that had shorted the stocks.
>> Read here: A year after the Gamestop rally: What’s left of Reddit traders
Since the Reddit activists have already issued strike impulses in terms of the labor market, they should not be underestimated, especially as their number is growing. The ideology of the anti-labor movement goes back to Marxist theories. But the trend is also fueled by technological development, which means that many people find their work pointless.
In the past year, many Americans have quit their jobs. There were around 4.5 million in November alone – according to the Financial Times, that was the highest rate of layoffs since the Department of Labor began keeping records in 2001.
The data shows that many workers were likely to leave their jobs after receiving a better offer. Overall, however, the employment rate has fallen below pre-pandemic levels.
At least some workers, like Ford, appear to have turned away from conventional forms of employment during the pandemic. Meanwhile, investment bank Goldman Sachs has warned that the anti-labour movement poses a “long-term risk” to US labor market participation.
Wage levels and job security in Germany are higher
In Germany, labor market experts do not fear such a development. Yvonne Lott from the employee-friendly Hans Böckler Foundation considers mass layoffs and a departure from traditional employment relationships to be unlikely.
“For one thing, there is generally greater job security here than in the United States, where the ‘hire and fire’ principle applies,” says Lott. On the other hand, the wage level in Germany is significantly higher overall, so fewer people are forced to do two or even three jobs.
Oliver Stettes from IW Köln also refers to independent studies on employee satisfaction, for example from the EU. “In the last three decades, Germany has consistently had around 90 percent satisfied employees.”
Nevertheless, Cawa Younosi, Head of Human Resources at SAP Germany and spokesman for the Federal Association of Personnel Managers, points out that the desire for meaningful work and for more self-determination and personal freedom can also be observed in this country. “All employers have to react to this – not just in sectors where there is already an acute shortage of skilled workers.”
More: 24,000 jobs to be filled: who the DAX companies are currently looking for.