Workers in the two largest economies—United States and China—are growing weary. In America, workplace trends, like the Great Resignation, quiet quitting, acting your wage, rage applying and others, indicate people are fed up and frustrated over being constantly worried about losing their jobs, being underpaid and treated poorly with no clear growth paths within their organizations.
The China Digital Times reported that a new term “humineral” (人矿 rén kuàng) went viral on the Chinese internet and is now subjected to censorship. It is a person who is “exploited by society until they are eventually discarded on the refuse pile.”
Huminerals are compared to objects found on earth. Workers are viewed as resources—not as human beings. Doing their job every day benefits the bosses and owners, at the expense of living out their dreams and ambitions. After receiving an education, a company extracts a humineral’s potential. When they no longer offer any further value, they are disposed of. The China Digital Times refers to this as the three stages: “extraction, exploitation and slag removal.”
Lying Flat
Another work trend aligned with the American concepts of quiet quitting and acting your wage is called lying flat. This is a response to the hustle-porn mentality in the Chinese business world.
Before he was shunned by Chinese leadership, multibillionaire founder of Alibaba Jack Ma was seen as a star. He championed the work culture known as “996.” This number refers to Ma’s belief that people should happily work from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m., six days a week. It’s equivalent to America’s rise-and-grind culture that resonated in the pre-pandemic time period.
The younger generation of Chinese workers was not fond of Ma’s work model. As reported by the South China Morning Post, Gen-Z workers are known to “slack off by refusing to work overtime, delivering medium-quality work, going to the toilet frequently and staying there for a long time, playing with their mobile phones or reading novels at work.”
This is their way of pushing back on the demands of long hours without pay that is commensurate with their efforts. Working at a slower pace is a form of protest. It’s their way of saying, “We don’t think that we’re being treated fairly.”
Like the complaints of both American Millennials and Gen-Zs, the young Chinese people contend that their meager earnings won’t afford them a house or a financially comfortable life. As opposed to prior generations, some Chinese youths are not buying into the hustle culture and putting a premium on having a well-rounded lifestyle.
They’ve adopted the mantra of lying flat. This term means “doing the bare minimum to get by and striving for nothing more than what is essential for one’s survival.”
The mindset is that lying down is a protest against participants in a workplace and economy that they don’t believe in or feel that they are getting a fair shot. Similar to many in the U.S., the Gen-Z and Millennials are forsaking purchasing homes and starting families.
The Chinese Government Isn’t Too Pleased About Lying Flat
President Xi Jinping is not too pleased with this trend, stating, “It is necessary to prevent the stagnation of the social class, unblock the channels for upward social mobility, create opportunities for more people to become rich, and form an environment for improvement in which everyone participates, avoiding involution and lying flat.” He is concerned that lying flat directly conflicts with the “Chinese Dream” or a “great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.”
Sadly, lying down and related trends show the discouragement and disconnection of young adults from the workplace and economy. This needs to be addressed. It’s unhealthy for young people and society when there is so much unhappiness. Conditions will only worsen if leaders continue to ignore this clear call for help and change.
Source: Forbes
