Lots Of People Say They'll Quit Over Vaccine Mandates, But Research Shows Few Do

[PatSeg]

Surveys have shown that as many as half of unvaccinated workers say they will leave their jobs if they're forced to get the COVID-19 shot, but in reality few of them actually quit. That's according to an article in The Conversation, a nonprofit news organization that covers academic research.

Researchers looked at companies that have vaccine mandates in place and saw that, so far, only a fraction of workers leave their jobs when it comes down to it.

"In other words, vaccine mandates are unlikely to result in a wave of resignations — but they are likely to lead to a boost in vaccination rates," they write.

"Houston Methodist Hospital, for example, required its 25,000 workers to get a vaccine by June 7. Before the mandate, about 15% of its employees were unvaccinated. By mid-June, that percentage had dropped to 3% and hit 2% by late July. A total of 153 workers were fired or resigned, while another 285 were granted medical or religious exemptions and 332 were allowed to defer it."

https://www.nhpr.org/2021-09-29/lots-of-people-say-theyll-quit-over-vaccine-mandates-but-research-shows-few-do

I kind of figured a lot of people would give in rather than lose their job.

[tanyev]

1. Heck, they get the vaccine AND they get to complain about it for years to come.

Win-win.

[PatSeg]

3. Yes, that's true

They'll be whining for a long time, portraying themselves as victims of the system.

[MANative]

2. We had one person quit rather than get vaxxed

It's a real shame because she was very skilled in a very niche job. It will be extremely difficult for her to find work elsewhere and because she quit, she likely won't be able to collect UI. All the other holdouts have now had at least first dose, so I have to consider our decision to mandate a success. Four new hires coming in over the next couple of weeks and all are fully vaccinated.

[PatSeg]

5. Yes, that is a shame

I wonder if she realizes the long term repercussions of her decision. I suppose she thinks she was acting out of principle, but she may think differently down the road. We all make choices that we later regret, but some mistakes cannot be undone.

[MANative]

14. I tried to help her see all sides of the issue and offered her three accommodation alternatives

Including WFH. She just couldn't see past the mandate. Had been reading (incessantly) Facebook posts about how "evil" the vaccine is. Very young, very naïve, very susceptible to negative influence.

[PatSeg]

19. And no one likes the word "mandate"

I know the ACA suffered because of that word. When it comes to employment, there are a lot of requirements for any job and many are government regulations that people just accept as part of life, even when they don't like them. Meanwhile, you have all this online propaganda feeding people's fears, I suppose it isn't surprising that some people are willing to risk being unemployed rather than take a shot.

Though I understand it to some degree, it still blows my mind. I just didn't think it was possible to brainwash so many people so thoroughly, especially in a free society where they have access to endless information. Sadly, it isn't just in our country.

At least you tried to get through to her. Maybe some day she will realize that you were trying to help her and she is young enough, she may recover. Older employees may not find other jobs.

[Mad_Machine76]

4. And someday they'll thank Biden for it.

[Hortensis]

8. Oh, no doubt! And tell everyone they voted for him.

Can't wait.

[Hortensis]

6. Biggest NON-surprise ever. Hot air hits hard reality.

[PatSeg]

7. Yes, it is pretty hard to hang on to your "principles"

when you have no paycheck and your bills come due. I think everyone has made compromises to keep their jobs. It is a matter of survival.

[Hortensis]

10. :) In this case, matter of survival in more ways than one for more than one.

[PatSeg]

17. Yes and many cannot see that at all

Sadly some of those who have lost their jobs, may lose a whole lot more if they or their family members get sick.

[Hortensis]

22. Umhm. The Republican pandemic is already shrinking due to vaccination,

but will continue among them. It seems likely that over time more localized flares will cause more employers and school districts involved to insist on vaccination, but the unnecessary tragedies!

[PatSeg]

27. Yes, I think that will happen

Sadly, so many lives would not have been lost if sanity and reason had been employed earlier. We had the tools available to get this pandemic under control sooner if only there hadn't been so much irrational resistance from the right-wingers.

I was always inclined to believe that Americans would come together during a major national or global emergency. We saw it during World War II, but now I wonder if it is even possible anymore. Can you imagine some of these fools response to rationing? Or mandatory blackouts?

[Hortensis]

34. We know now these "fools" are tools of their leaders in any era.

I just couldn't imagine so many of our people, good people, could be so bad. Reading about it happening in Germany and other places didn't prepare me.

I know a lot of people don't say it, but I believe spread of this pandemic diseased was encouraged by their leaders, and not just tRump either. It's documented fact that they refused and blocked all normal government actions to stop it. And that tRump actively encouraged his oyal followers to behave as spreaders. And that's why they did it. He could have told them to ration eggs and throw the rest at us and they would have.

I assumed early on the decision to not stop it was an opportunistic continuation of their pre-tRump slow-rolling coup, and it may be they were fine with the initial information that it killed retired and chronically ill people on entitlement programs. But now we also know their megadonors made out like megabandits from this national disaster as well.

So much for my conspiracy venting. But Maddow and Brian Williams both, separately, once said their official behaviors were completely documented and would have to be investigated after the emergency. So many investigations, so little time. Literally.

[PatSeg]

35. Well, the same people who would profit off of the death

and destruction of wars would probably not hesitate to profit off of a pandemic. Greed seems to blind these people to everything around them and the victims of their greed are just collateral damage. The same with healthcare and medical insurance, its always about the money.

No, nothing prepared me for this either. I've always known that there were impressionable gullible people, but I seriously had no idea that there were so many.

As for the leaders who refused to what was necessary to stop the pandemic, I think they are so political and basically sociopathic that they really don't care what happens to people, as long as they can maintain power. Yes, I think some saw opportunities and took advantage of them, but others just had no motivation to try and be helpful. It's not in their political playbook.

I agree, there is "so little time".

[Hortensis]

36. Yes.

I feel sure most just went along and that accusing even today's sociopathic GOP of carrying out a well thought out, competent genocide would be giving people incapable of governing well way too much credit.

We have a big job to do.

For now, I want popcorn.

[PatSeg]

39. Yes, the whole what a "tangled web we weave" scenario

So many have gotten in so far, they apparently cannot see their way back out. I guess that sort of thing, where a person has an epiphany and changes course only happens in the movies. I suppose there have been a few, but sadly, not nearly as many as I would have expected.

I still cannot believe how many well educated, worldly people have chosen to blindly follow a carnival-barker grifter, even though they know it is wrong, compromising every value they claimed to believe. That is so very sad and for many it is too late to redeem themselves.

Yep, popcorn sounds marvelous!

[Hortensis]

42. It may be that some will be able to sprinkle some denial

over that period and then close a door on it. That way, those at least could skip a perhaps impossible admission of what they did and just re-don their discarded values and old identities.

Whatever might work, I'd support it in order to move society back toward normal. I've always seen us all as people of parts, the good to be appreciated. It's become impossible to discuss any of this anyway. But no matter, I'll never be able to forget or meet new people without wondering, and that's sad to look forward to.

The popcorn was good.

[PatSeg]

43. Perhaps, being people in general have very short attention spans

We've seen politicians do it before, just change course as if nothing had happened and many voters conveniently forgot. The problem I see with that is most of this hardcore republican base probably isn't going back to mainstream again, so our reformed republican politicians might not have enough voters to get them over the finish line. I think many of the disillusioned MAGA types will just give up on politics entirely. I don't know if there would be enough moderate conservative republicans left to elect anyone.

I'm not sure we will ever move back to "normal". I believe there will be a new normal and hopefully it will be better than the old one that invariably led us to this point.

[Hortensis]

37. Huh? Duplicate deleted. :(

Last edited Thu Sep 30, 2021, 04:43 PM - Edit history (1)

[Mad_Machine76]

9. It's crazy

that it had to come down to any kind of mandate- in the midst of a pandemic- but it got politicized by TFG and, well, here we are........

[PatSeg]

21. Yes, ever since Trump,

it is like we are living in an alternate reality. Every day is "Opposite Day" in Trump world.

[Mad_Machine76]

23. And us sane people

are just being drug along for the ride with their delusions against our will.

[PatSeg]

25. Yes and I really had no idea how sane

I actually was until I was surrounded by all this bizarre craziness. Sadly if this keeps up, our sanity could be at risk as well. Nothing really prepared us for this level of nuttery.

[Mad_Machine76]

28. I know

and I thought we had it bad with GOPAC Zombies of the 1990's or the "Tea Party" of the 2010's. Every iteration of the Republican Party just gets worse and worse and their crazy keeps infecting more and more people.

[PatSeg]

30. I know, I thought the Tea Party

was as bad as it could get, but they were pretty harmless compared to these nutjobs. You're right, it has been a gradual progression and it terrifies me that it might even get worse. There could even be a president more dangerous than Trump.

I listen to some old school republicans on television (well ex-republicans) and they are absolute horrified. Many honestly believe this could be the end of our democracy and they are not inclined to be hyperbolic.

[spooky3]

11. Holding their breath until they turn blue isn't a great

career move.

[fescuerescue]

12. When it comes down to it. People want to eat and live inside

Hopefully the ones they are fired are denied unemployment payments.

This really is an effective form of persuasion.

[Thomas Hurt]

13. Most christofascist are paper revolutionaries...

the remainder are one step away blowing or shooting something up.

[MissB]

15. One coworker is quitting

They actually work in a different section now but used to work in the same group that i do. They’re quitting before the deadline. Foolish to give up a good job with great oay, great benefits and a good retirement. But whatever.

[Raftergirl]

16. Most people live paycheck to paycheck

and have little savings and cannot afford to lose their jobs.

It’s not surprising that many say they will quit, but don’t.

[Aristus]

18. I'm guessing this lot can't afford to quit whatever jobs they may have:

[PatSeg]

20. Oh my god

If they lose their current job over the vaccine, it may be the last job they ever have.

[lindysalsagal]

24. Not surprising.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

26. It takes a special kind of person to quit over getting a vaccine.

But, it's nice to have that choice. I don't remember that option when I got drafted and they gave me a dozen or so vaccines on day 1.

I get every vaccine that comes along, maybe an attitude formed when polio was rampant.

[PatSeg]

29. Yes and I am amazed that there are members of the military

who are resisting getting vaccinated. It was my impression that that is not an option when you join the military. I'm sure no one ASKED you if you want those vaccines.

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

31. I have to admit, we were much dumber way back then.

We had no internet full of facts and wonder, we had no Fox News (since there was no cable).

[PatSeg]

33. Who knew so much available information

could be a detriment. Apparently no amount knowledge can wipe out willful ignorance.

[Caliman73]

32. Because the premise is stupid in the first place.

People quit when their job becomes unbearable. I went back to school in order to make my escape from a job that I actually love doing, but that the management in the agency had made unbearable for me. A couple of personnel changes and a manager who was really, not well mentally, were making my life extremely difficult. Fortunately, the top brass changed and the entire culture of our workplace changed. One of the supervisors who I could not take, actually turned out to be a decent person, who had just been under the thumb and kind of tortured by the "unwell" manager and was on the verge of quitting too. My plan is still to move on to other things, but at my own pace, eventually, when things in my family life settle a bit. Could be years.

Anyway, people quit when they are fed up to the point where they are willing to be unemployed for awhile, or if they can find something comparable to what they are doing now. Serious breaches of ethics or law can cause someone to quit. I left a job once because the executive director of the agency I worked for was literally a convicted crook and I found out there was a lot of shady business going on. I could not stay there so I found the best job I could, and got out.

Having to have a vaccine, that is as safe as a vaccine can be, is not a deal breaker for most people. The problem is that it has been turned into such a political football, that people work themselves up and scream about it like it is being ordered to perform a ritual sacrifice on a toddler or something. It is manufactured outrage that really has extremely little chance of any negative impact in your life. You are not being asked to commit Medicaid or Medicare Fraud, to fake equipment damage to get insurance payments (literally things that were "expected" of me that made me quit a job). You are being told to take a vaccine to limit your exposure and the exposure of others to an easily spread virus that has killed over 600,000 fellow Americans and 4 million people worldwide in the span of less than 2 years.

[Hekate]

38. This is why Pres Biden's mandate for military & federal workers was absolutely vital...

… in getting the ball rolling with all other employers. For one thing it showed it was legal and possible, and for another thing it gave them cover.

The vast majority of workers are not going to quit their jobs in a snit.

[PatSeg]

40. And the military and federal workers

have always had certain mandates, usually far more than most jobs. It wasn't until now and the pandemic that it became such a huge issue.

[Johonny]

41. in some ways it's too bad too

The people holding out tend to be the worst people on the workforce. People that make the work space hard.