rSlash - r/Antiwork How I Get Paid to Watch Netflix at Home All Day

Episode Date: February 9, 2022

r/Antiwork In today's episode, OP has landed the perfect job! It's a straightforward data entry position. OP realizes that the job is insanely simple, so OP hires a freelance coder to write a piece of software that will automatically enter all the data. All OP has to do is click a single button, then sit around and watch TV all day while the program automatically does their job. OP literally gets paid to do nothing! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to our slash anti-work where your request to quit has been denied. Our next Reddit posted from Introduction Honest. I'm a senior manager at a small firm with under 30 staff. During COVID, our revenue skyrocketed because we were all able to work from home in a high-demand industry. My boss, the business owner, asked for my input on how to reward the team. He was thinking of team activity or a Christmas bonus. This sub has really made me question why we spend so much of our life working just to

get by. So I've put together a proposal. Let's work less and give everyone more space in their personal life. My proposal was to provide a permanent pay increase of 10% to all staff. Give an extra 5 days off per year. I come from a country where 4 weeks is standard, so this increased to 5 weeks total. Make Monday an optional work day. Finish all your work from last week? Great, don't come in! The week officially begins on Tuesday, and that's when we meet together.

Feeling a little behind, then Monday you can catch up from home, and you don't have to meet or work with anyone else. The proposal was accepted four months ago, and all I can say is, wow, what a difference it made to the team's happiness with no decline in revenue. It's a fairly different story to what I've posted here usually, but I wanted to share it because without this sub, I never would have thought to suggest such a thing. It's so uplifting to hear posts like this, OP, because like, this is what people have been saying this whole time.

If you want employees to care more to actually give a sh** about the work they're doing, then it's really simple. You just pay them more. You treat them with respect like they're other human beings, like you care about their feelings and their happiness. And voila, you've got a happy worker, like it's not rocket science. Okay, I'm going to talk for a second about the guy who edits every single one of my videos. His name's Nathan, he does a great job, and he edits together the audio,

he does audio processing, he does all the editing for like the text scroll, and we have a great relationship working together. And I'm going to talk to you about how I work with him as a as like an employer. And I'm going to do this not to like to my own horn, but to reinforce what this person OP is saying that if you treat your employees better and you pay them more, you don't get worse results, you get better results. Ever since I started working with Nathan, I have given him yearly raises and yearly bonuses. And why do I do this? Why do I just throw money at him? Because it's really simple. So I've got a YouTube channel and I got to put out one video a day and a lot of editing

goes into it. So I need someone who's reliable who shows up and can like diligently put out videos. So it's like, hey Nathan, I will pay you and pay you well if you do this job really reliably and that's exactly what he does. And then it's more than that. Like the other day, Nathan said, hey, I'm gonna take the day off.

Is it okay if I like don't work on this Wednesday? And I'm like, dude, you don't even need to tell me when you're taking a day off. I don't even know which days you work. All I know is I send you a video file on Monday and then a couple of days later I get the finished product back and I can publish it. So I don't need to hand hold him and micromanaging because he knows what he's doing. And as a result of giving him so much freedom and by making him actually care about the job because I pay well, he innovates and he's like, hey, you can make this improvement

and this improvement and that's how my audio has improved. Go listen to the first video on this channel. Go listen to a video from like three years ago and how awful the audio was. So I mean, I'm not trying to say, oh, I'm done. I'm an amazing boss. I'm so generous and kind. That's not the point of this. I'm just trying to say that like, if you treat your employees well, then they'll treat your business well. It's not complicated. And my last my last job sucked hard before I became a YouTuber. And I always thought that if I started my own business, then I would try to, you know, I always thought that if I started my own business, then I would try to, you know, it's like that phrase, be the change you wanna see

in the world and, you know, now that I've got my own business being a YouTuber, I've gotta put my money where my mouth is and actually be the good employer that I think people should be. And like, after working with, I don't know how many editors I've worked with over the years, probably six different editors across three different YouTube channels. I can safely say that at the end of the day, you get what you pay for.

So this is just obviously this is something I'm really passionate about. And that's why I love this subreddit. Because work sucks sometimes. It just does. I love my job. And even then, sometimes work sucks. I'm my own boss. I can make as many videos as I want to.

I make daily videos because I decide to make daily videos. I can do one a week if I feel like it. But like, man, why do bosses have to be such assholes all the time, man? Chill out, people. Why you gotta be such jerks about it? They think it's frequent pay raises and he can work at whatever schedule he wants. Zero micromanagement. And as a result, I have an amazing employee. On this next post, OP replied to a job ad that offered 28 bucks an hour. And then during the interview, he found out that it was actually only $11 per hour

plus commission. OP writes him an email, hello, I'm emailing today because I don't think the base wage of $454 a week, which comes out to $11 an hour, is a good fit for me. I'm aware there's a lot of incentives available at this position, but the base pay is much more important to me. My time is worth much more than $11 an hour, which is a lower wage than any previous job I've had. I deserve at least $16 an hour based on my past experience and success in these types of positions. 11 bucks an hour, even with incentives, is simply not enough to live off of.

During the interview, I stated that I wanted to find a job that I would have a future with. There's simply no future with 454 bucks a week base pay. I would gladly take this position if the base pay was at least 16 bucks an hour, but any less and I'm gonna have to look elsewhere. Thank you for your understanding. And then the employer replies, Hey there, I'm sorry to hear this, but I wanted to reach out to you to see if there's anything we can do to get you on the assignment.

It's a really good opportunity and has the potential to make good money. I understand the starting basic wages is lower than you want, but we base it off of your resume and experience. We put it in a chart that HR provides us with and it calculates what we're able to offer. We aren't able to adjust it after we get the results. There are certain things they consider as experience and some they do not. I would really love to get you on board, and there's great potential for growth within the company. I think this will be a great opportunity for you to start with the company if you could

accept the starting salary as of now. What a pathetic argument. Well, we want to pay you more, but we can't. We're not allowed to because of the chart. The chart says that we can't pay you too much money. Well, who made the chart. The chart says that we can't pay you too much money. Well, who made the chart? Uh, we did, but let's not think about that, okay? Our next Reddit post is from Legacy.

I work in a dental practice in a very wealthy area of California. Last Thursday, my office had a meeting and we were informed that we would only be approved for one day off per quarter. So that's one day off every three months. None of us in the office get any benefits. No paid time off, no medical, no holidays, nothing. We were also told that because we, the hygienists, were booked out so far that when we take our day off, we'll have to come in early or work late

to make up for the patients that we didn't see that day. Me and the other hygienists all put in our letters of resignation today. We all typed letters and laid them on his desk, so the owner got back from lunch and had to read through all the letters. My coworker told me that she saw him throw our stack of letters at the office manager while saying, look at this! Fortunately, Hygienists are in crazy demand in California right now, and all of us already have other job offers. Down in the comments, we have this story from Jimenty. We just had this happen for our kids daycare.

They closed, citing staff and concerns, and they gave us six weeks to find a new place for our kids, which is not possible. Four of us parents teamed up, met with the building owner, and our daycare will reopen as a co-op in four weeks and will retain all the staff minus the dip-s*** who was in charge. The staff are all getting $2 raises on top of the $2 raises they got last month.

Parents will pay the same, the daycare stays open, and the staff keep their jobs. This effing idiot didn't think to ask the parents if they were willing to pay more and was just going to close it. Now it's a win-win for the parents and the staff. Man, how is it possible so frequently, so insanely frequently that idiots are always the one who rise to power? Our next reddit post is from Environmental Kiwi. This was recent. I used to work for a very popular beauty supply in America. I worked there for two years without requesting time off because I

was mostly a student at university. Five months before I went in to take a vacation, I told my manager, hey, so my parents got me a present to go to Cancun in December and I'll need those days off. Don't worry about it. When time comes, I'll leave you off schedule. It seems exciting. I thought great. Then a month before the vacation, I remind her and she looked at me and told me, I don't know what you're talking about. I lost it silently in my head and walked away to talk to my other boss and she also said,

I know what she requested, but it's not up to me to decide, it's on her. Two weeks pass, and I give them my resignation and she denies it. I came to find out that my boss is pregnant and she's calling off the days that I planned on leaving. We're short staffed, but I warned them about this five months earlier. She scheduled me for a 40-hour work week when I was supposed to be off, and when I confronted her, she brushed me off like I was a servant. So, I just left. Come lunchtime, I'm bombarded with calls from district manager and other employees to come to my shift.

No thanks, but good luck. Okay, so this is the second story I've read today, where someone gives a resignation letter and they deny it as if they have a choice in the matter. Like is this a thing? I had no idea the bosses were like, no you can't quit, you must work here. Is this a thing the people experience nowadays? I know that there's a labor shortage right now, but is this really what it's come to?

On this next post, OP got this email from management. Dear team, I'm sorry to inform those that haven't heard already that our dear friend and coworker, Blank, has recently passed away. To mourn the death of someone so dedicated is only natural. So, if you need a moment to grieve, please feel free to clock out and spend some time in the break room. While it may sound insensitive, I think it's important that we don't let our productivity slide. I think it's fair to say that Blank would have wanted that. And also, please don't clock out while the store is busy, as this will add undue stress on the team.

If there are any issues with this, please contact me directly and do not discuss these issues with coworkers as it may cause undue stress. Disgusting this may result in immediate dismissal. Unable are the love to die for love is immortality, signed management. Wow, imagine dying, and the legacy you leave is your manager using your death to keep your co-workers working. So just keep that in mind. Make sure that you write in your will that you don't want productivity to slide. That way your co-workers will keep marching on in your absence and keep making the company money. Our next reddit posted from Cynic Usme. I got a night shift job doing Data Entry back in 2015.

I quit and I needed something fast and I, while I looked for something better during the day. It was a data entry position, meaning I would get an email containing the details of an order and I would proceed to input the information into our system. Right after my training, I knew this is something that AutoHotkey could do. I don't know how to code that well, so I went to a freelancer website to hire a guy to develop the code. It cost me two months of my salary. I just had to input how many orders I went a process per hour. Since on day one, I was working from home because the company didn't want to pay for transportation

or cleaning during the graveyard shift. For the first two years, I would check if there was ever something that the code couldn't do, which usually took me less than five minutes, and then I would let the computer run and watch movies go to bed, sometimes I'd even go out. Then I added those functions to the code as well. I was doing such a great job that I was offered promotions a few times. I was offered positions during daytime, which I would reject stating that I'm a very introverted person that enjoys this type of position. Eventually, I got another better paying job, but there was no reason for me to quit where I was already working.

For my data entry job, I could spend months without having anybody reach out to me. Sometimes, my co-workers would try to match my order entry quota, which would make me open the code and change a number from 8 to 9 to increase my production and keep myself on top. I changed a number regularly just in case, but nobody even noticed. I even got two salary raises for never missing a day and being the top producer in my 3 person department, to which I responded by changing the 9 to an 11 or a 10 on some days. But eventually, it came to an end. It took them 4 years to develop new software that would replace my data entry position. A few weeks ago I got my severance check.

I was told that I could keep the laptop and office equipment and that I'm welcome to apply for any position I want. I've never talked about that with anybody in real life, not even my family. Even my wife wasn't sure what my job was with that other company. Now that it's over, there you go. This is my darkest work secrets. I did try to schedule a demonstration of my code back in 2017. The regional manager told me that they're very busy dealing with the important stuff,

so just keep doing the good work that I was doing. Which I did until the date that I was finally let go. OP Genius. Absolutely genius. Hats off to you, good sir. Honestly, it sounds like you had a dream job. The only thing I'm wondering about is it seems to me that you were doing two jobs simultaneously. You kept doing the automated data entry job even though you didn't quit the other job.

And I don't know if this is the case, but I think that if you report two full-time incomes on your tax forms, the IRS might audit you. But I don't know, maybe I'm wrong here. Our next way it posts is from historical reception. After several months of having my vacation time off request denied, my staff being fired and not replaced, and my work hours increased without my consent, I walked into my boss's office and handed her my resignation letter. I was giving a four week notice, which I thought was nice.

She looked at me and said, no, I can't deal with this today. Pact or stuff, and left for a day of shopping on company time. I went to my office, cleaned it out, finished off a day's work, and put my keys in our mailbox. The next day, I got a call from HR saying they were giving me the day off without paid to think about what I did, and that I was expected to be at work the next day. No thanks. Two years later, I'm living my dream life.

Suck it, Joan. Uh, I don't know if you're aware of this, manager, but employment. Employment in America is optional. People don't have to come into work. They can't make you work. That's called slavery and that's been a legal in America for quite some time now. What fantasy land is this lady living in? Oh well she didn't process my resignation letter so I guess I'm not resigning.

Oh shucks. That was our slash anti-work and if you like this content be sure to follow my podcast because I put out new Reddit podcast episodes every single day. podcast episodes every single day.