Survey Finds Ambivalence on Workers’ Satisfaction
Nearly 90% of working adults express some degree of satisfaction with their jobs but barely one in four feel completely satisfied and 40% work strictly for the money, according to a new Gallup survey.
The poll of 797 workers, conducted from July 18 to 21 among a random sampling of adults in the continental United States, indicated that members of the post-World War II generations who entered the work force since the 1960s are significantly less satisfied with their jobs than are older Americans.
Only 24% of workers between the ages of 18 and 49 are completely satisfied with their jobs. Among older workers, the rate is nearly double--43%.
Past surveys found that workers became less likely to complain about their jobs as they entered their 30s and 40s, but today a surprising number of workers in those age groups retain their youthful dissatisfaction, the poll said.
Only 28% of those surveyed overall are completely satisfied with their general working life. Thirty percent are completely satisfied with their company, 40% are completely satisfied with their boss and 41% are completely satisfied with the kind of work they do.
Yet when asked whether they could find any satisfaction at all in their job, 89% of those surveyed answered affirmatively. Experts familiar with research on worker attitudes said the high level of general satisfaction underscores a longstanding dichotomy between day-to-day job frustrations and the human need to feel some fulfillment in one’s job.
Sar Levitan, director of the Center for Social Policy at George Washington University and the author of “Second Thoughts on Work,” said polls on job satisfaction have traditionally drawn superficial responses.
Every poll since the late 1950s has found job-satisfaction levels between 81% and 92% despite simultaneous responses indicating that only about one-third of all workers are satisfied with issues like job autonomy or the assistance they receive from supervisors.
“The most important factor is that people don’t want to feel badly about themselves,” Levitan said. “It’s the general psychology of people. . . . We do what we do and then we are satisfied with it, because what else can we do?”
“You have to rationalize your life,” explained Andrew Kohut, a Gallup staff member who worked on the poll.
Richard Belous, a senior economist and human-resource specialist with the National Planning Assn., a research group sponsored by business, labor and agriculture, said he believes that high levels of uncertainty in today’s workplace make workers less reluctant to complain.
While unemployment remains low, many companies--even those that are financially healthy--are laying off workers through restructuring plans. That trend is expected to continue as a hedge against a potential economic downturn. In addition, salaries are being held in check by low inflation and employers are increasingly requiring workers to pay for a greater share of their health benefits.
“We have been in a long economic expansion, but the benefits of this expansion have not hit a lot of people,” Belous said. “For a lot of people in the work force, if they still have that core job with a good company, they’re not going to complain. They know those jobs are much harder to come by now.
“It’s really in good times when people start complaining, when you hear people talking about things like job enrichment.”
Karen Nussbaum, executive director of 9-to-5, a national organization of working women that focuses on clerical employees, said, “What we usually find is that people like their jobs but they don’t like their treatment. Either they don’t like the people they work for or the place they hold in the system or they’re not compensated or not given an opportunity to really invest themselves in the job. That’s the reality for the most part for the people we’re working with.
“The structure of most jobs prevents you from getting what you go to work for, and then you’re left saying, ‘I only do it for the money,’ ” Nussbaum said.
The Gallup Poll found that while few workers say they are completely satisfied, 56% are happy with most or all aspects of their jobs.
Between 87% and 95% like the security of their jobs, the importance of the work they do and the amount of contact they have with other people.
75% Like Their Salary
Seventy-one percent like their chances for promotion. Seventy-five percent like their salary. (Only 16% are completely satisfied with their pay.) And 67% like their health insurance and benefits.
Other findings of the Gallup survey:
* The poll found no significant difference in job satisfaction between men and women, although it did find that women put in shorter workweeks than men, travel less often and tend to have jobs located closer to home.
* Asked if they would continue to work even if they did not need the money, 70% of those surveyed said yes, but more than half said the work would not be their current job.
* Long hours are common. About 39% of all workers log 45 hours or more in a typical week. One in seven say they work 60 hours or more.
* Thirty-eight percent are regularly scheduled to work evenings or weekends or report they have no set work schedule.
