Self-employment as a Response to the Great Resignation

A Great Resignation is going on. Workers are leaving their jobs at rates never seen before. They do it under economic circumstances never experienced by a whole generation of workers: the highest inflation rates in more than 40 years, in presence of the longest period of low interest rates and with apparently overvalued stocks and real estate markets. Not surprisingly, in such scenario political discontent arises, leading to an unprecedented success of populists’ proposals at political elections. To this date, mainstream theories at economic, business management and political levels appear unable to fix the multiple existing economic and social problems. In this paper, it is argued that the use of information and communication technologies provides with new perspectives for business management, in terms of relocation of workers at different geographic settings, but also establishing different contractual situations with their (former) employers and performing different functional-related tasks at the value chain level. That is, uncertain times bring new opportunities for younger workers, who may opt to live as digital nomads, locating their residence where less taxes need to be paid. Renouncing to work for a company, they can establish their selves as freelancers, self-employed or entrepreneurs, with the aim of offering their services to companies or individuals located anywhere, while developing a more nuanced knowledge of companies and industries. Developing these new business management perspectives requires, however, a deeper understanding of how entrepreneurial intentions relate to other factors, such as political positioning, human values or religious feelings.