Most of the world’s workers are ‘quiet quitters’

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Most workers are “quiet quitting”, according to a new survey released by Gallup. Quiet quitting describes employees who put in minimum effort and feel disconnected from their work.

Gallup estimates that lost productivity owing to low employee engagement could account for $8.8tn globally, or 9.9 per cent of global gross domestic product.

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But employees who feel apathetic are not a new phenomenon — in fact employee engagement has improved over the past decade.

Of those who were considered to be quiet quitting, 41 per cent said a change to company engagement or culture would improve their workplace. Another 28 per cent suggested that better pay and benefits would improve their engagement, and 16 per cent wanted improved wellness options, such as less overtime, more working from home, and access to a health clinic.

Joanna S Kao

Our other charts of the week

The Bank of England’s decision to raise interest rates by 50 basis points on Thursday will be devastating for many UK homeowners, who are far more likely than many of their European peers to be on short-term fixed-rate mortgages.

OECD data shows that more than nine in 10 people in the UK who took out a mortgage in 2021 fixed the rate for no more than five years. This means many will soon face higher repayments when their mortgages are renegotiated.

Other European countries have a larger share of people on fixed-rate periods over five years. In Belgium, for example, about four in five people who took out a mortgage in 2021 fixed the rate for over 10 years.

A few countries have a high share of variable-rate loans, which means homeowners are even more exposed to rate rises than those on short-term fixes.

Amy Borrett and Alan Smith

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In 2022, glaciers in the European Alps lost more ice than ever before. Last year, 3.2 cubic km of ice were lost, representing a decrease in volume of 6.2 per cent on 2021.

This was caused by low winter snowfall, summer heatwaves and deposits blown in of Saharan dust, which absorbs more heat and accelerates melting, reported Copernicus, the European earth observation programme.

According to a report by the Cryospheric Commission of the Swiss Academy of Sciences: “The ice melt in July and August alone would have provided enough water to fill all the reservoirs in the Swiss Alps from scratch.”

Steven Bernard

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A recent survey commissioned by the International Rescue Committee, a charity, reveals that 65 per cent of UK adults think it is important that the right to seek asylum is maintained in the UK.

Survey respondents were also asked to imagine how they would feel if they needed to flee the UK. Two-thirds said they would want to choose the country in which they sought asylum, with more than a third citing a government’s respect for human rights and the languages spoken as important factors in this decision.

Public opinion appears to be at odds with the UK government, whose illegal migration bill would allow for the detention and deportation of people arriving on small boats across the English Channel.

Half of those arriving via small boats in 2022 were from the following five countries: Afghanistan, Syria, Sudan, Eritrea and Iran. Asylum was granted in at least 80 per cent of cases from each of these countries, according to the Refugee Council.

Ella Hollowood

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More than 8.3mn jobs will be created in the US in the decade to 2031, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Of these, 924,000 will be as home-health and personal-care assistants, reflecting the growing healthcare burden of the country’s ageing population. There is expected to be only about half as many new roles for the occupation with the next highest forecast for job creation: restaurant cooks.

Positions for cashiers are expected to decline the most, falling by 336,000 to 3mn between 2021 and 2031, according to projections. Jobs for secretaries, administrations assistants and office clerks are also expected to decrease markedly over this period.

Amy Borrett

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