In times of severe economic downturn, as the U.S. experienced in the recent past, people who had full-time jobs with benefits couldn’t entertain the thought of leaving–no matter how unhappy they may have been. But in better times, when jobs are more plentiful and hiring is competitive, many workers still hold fast to a position that makes them miserable. What gives?
The reasons range from the seemingly practical–the salary, benefits and experience that accompany a given position–to the psychological, and this is where experts acknowledge the answer can be less clear. There’s the “devil they know is better than the devil they don’t know” theory. In other words, what if the next job is even worse?
Some mental-health professionals attribute the reluctance to quit a bad work situation to persistent negative thinking and a perhaps unconscious feeling that they don’t deserve any better than what they’ve got. At least one psychoanalyst interviewed for the article points to feelings of inadequacy instilled by poor parenting.
Along those lines comes the rationale (sometimes attributed to a certain type of parent) for not giving up a secure position with steady income, etc. One employee depicted in the article was afraid to quit her job soon after accepting it, even though she knew almost from the get-go that she was unhappy and had made a mistake. The reason: she feared not being able to get another offer for fear that a prospective employer would see her as a poor hiring risk.