I’ve always found the language in these cases to be severe so I get your reaction and agree in some ways, but it’s also not as simple as you’re making it out to be.
If I am your employer and I know you don’t really have any viable options/are economically insecure, I can put the squeeze on you because I know if I lay you off or you quit your life could be ruined. I know that the threat of you losing your job is going to drastically increase your tolerance for what I can ask of you. That is not a very tenable situation and it’s one a lot of people experience, whether their employer knowingly does it or not.
It’s not a fair power dynamic at the end of the day. In that case it’s true - my employer can force me to do a lot of things I would otherwise not agree to.
For an even less severe example, think of how many people have had to say the phrase “I can’t say no, I will lose my job.” In an ideal world you would be able to apply “the free market” to bad jobs, but in reality it’s nothing like that in the slightest except in very narrow cases and usually for a temporary duration, especially in the US where losing your job means you (and possibly your family) losing healthcare or otherwise being unable to pay your premiums. Many people simply can’t walk no matter how much pressure and abuse is applied to them. Hence “wage slave” as a term.
We were talking about a boss who made passive aggressive remarks. And that it was unfair that people could not stop working. I just pointed out that the responsibility of the social protection could not fall on the shoulders of individual employers.
We have created trade unions, works councils and labor laws to protect against the most egregious abuses of power. Many countries have a social safety net. All of these are good things.
I just don't see how one can argue in good faith that "not working" (the original point) should be a human right, guaranteed by society without any condition. On a macro-economic level how would that work?
If I am your employer and I know you don’t really have any viable options/are economically insecure, I can put the squeeze on you because I know if I lay you off or you quit your life could be ruined. I know that the threat of you losing your job is going to drastically increase your tolerance for what I can ask of you. That is not a very tenable situation and it’s one a lot of people experience, whether their employer knowingly does it or not.
It’s not a fair power dynamic at the end of the day. In that case it’s true - my employer can force me to do a lot of things I would otherwise not agree to.
For an even less severe example, think of how many people have had to say the phrase “I can’t say no, I will lose my job.” In an ideal world you would be able to apply “the free market” to bad jobs, but in reality it’s nothing like that in the slightest except in very narrow cases and usually for a temporary duration, especially in the US where losing your job means you (and possibly your family) losing healthcare or otherwise being unable to pay your premiums. Many people simply can’t walk no matter how much pressure and abuse is applied to them. Hence “wage slave” as a term.