Jonathan Malesic

And, you know, coming out of the sort of idealism of the 60s, our expectations for work were pretty high.

People believe, well, we can do this.

So there was a greater expectation that our work could...

Number one, solve huge societal problems and fulfill us.

So the ideals had grown.

At the same time, in 1973, 74, the conditions of employment started getting worse.

terms like stagflation, where prices go up, wages don't.

That's right.

Good thing that's safely in the 1970s.

Safely in the past.

The conditions of work started to erode.

The power of unions had started to erode.

So there's the gap, culturally speaking, between our ideals and reality meant that, well, the conditions were ripe for high levels of burnout, for workers to start to name their situation.

Oh, definitely not.

No.

Dang.

Yeah, I mean, I, you know, it's at the end of that decade that President Jimmy Carter gave his so-called malaise speech.

of confidence.

Carter kind of diagnosed the country with an exhaustion, with a sense of ineffectiveness, a sense that we were no longer attaining our national ideals.

He kind of diagnosed the whole country with a collective case of burnout.