Youth and the new culture of work: Considerations drawn from digital work

Abstract

This article discusses how the "new culture of work," which is characterized by the entrepreneurial discourse of flexible work and the demand that workers be mobile, adaptable, creative, innovative, autonomous and self-entrepreneurs, among other subjective attributes, holds "young people" as its ideal model. "Generation Y," as presented by business literature and media, embodies all the "qualities" that companies deem to be desirable in a worker whose flexibility is pushed to the limit. Based on research with Information Technology (IT) professionals in the state of São Paulo, we try to demonstrate that the construction of a positive ideal of creative and innovative youth obscures the intense nature of the work with these technologies, defined by "projectification" and instability.