Women are Leaving the U.S. Workforce and Flipping Tables on the Way Out

The U.S. workforce is facing a seismic shift within the next decade with four major trends are headed our way. To start, 40 percent of Americans will be leaving the workforce as Baby Boomers retire, the old minority is becoming the new majority, and temporary workers are predicted to make up 40 percent of the U.S. workforce by 2020.

The final of the four major workforce trends is that women are leaving the U.S. workforce in droves. Why? Because they’ve gotten tired of ducking under so many glass ceilings and feel they can achieve more starting their own businesses. After all, women are higher educated than men, and their financial responsibilities are equal to men, yet when they go to spend a hard-earned dollar, all they’ve got is an average of 75 cents.

Last week, this trend was made very clear by virtue of a nearly 450 word manifesto (and it’s subsequent hashtag #tableflip2015) specifically about women leaving the tech sector rather than working to change or adopt to the tech sector. flipthetable.club, in addition to being an inspired URL, is a call for women to bring activist methods into the business landscape. Their argument: we don’t need to lean in, we need to stop participating in a flawed system. It’s time for women to flip the tables out of the way and take their potential elsewhere.

They write:

For years, we thought it was us. That we were failures. We thought that if we just did twice as well as the pasty hoodie-wearers around us we’d move up through the ranks too. Instead you got twice as much work out of us than you did out of our male peers, and tossed us a few scraps of “women’s networks” and “Lean In Circles” instead of promotions and raises.

It turns out that others are listening. The Guardian wrote about the manifesto in, “Screw leaning in. It’s time to slam the door in Silicon Valley’s face,” and so did Motherboard in, “Why Women in Tech Need to Start Flipping Tables.” Within days the manifesto had 28.5K page views. And if you follow the hashtag #tableflip2015 on Twitter, you’ll find compelling stories, comparisons across industries, and a community growing in strength and support.

Take a look at the manifesto below. Compelling stuff; what do you think? Share your reactions with us in the comment section below, send me an email or find me on Twitter.
Photo Credit for image on left: Ninja
Photo Credit for photo on right: meme.tn