The Social and Cultural Consequences of New Attitudes Toward Quality of Life. When the Need for Individual Identity Exceeds that of Material Needs

Entrepreneurs are inclined to abolish many protections and rights so laboriously won by the second half of the last century forward, returning to a situation that would like to take the business model back a hundred years. On the other hand, workers (and younger generations in particular) are developing an unprecedented and unusual attention to the quality of life, even to the detriment of its work dimension. On the basis of what has been argued so far, we can assert that growing shares of individuals in Italy, Europe, and beyond, have grasped the fact that there are more important and satisficing things than paid work, and, in order to achieve them, they are willing to accept serious risks, including the decision to leave the given job. Quitting does not mean leaving the job market, rather it means having a plan B in mind, often vague and approximate, which reacts to the request for freedom – a request that appears with a certain audacity here and there in today’s society, to affirm that identity needs do not come after material ones.