The system worked when large corporations survived a long time and were perceived to be longer lasting than nation-states. By the 1990s, however, people started to realize that working as a company man was safe…provided the company stayed around. But the technological revolution that took place in Silicon valley put traditional companies under financial threat. For instance, after the rise of Microsoft and the personal computer, IBM, which was the main farm for company men, had to lay off a proportion of its “lifers,” who then realized that the low-risk profile of their position wasn’t so low
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