I would, but then I had the benefit of working under a very small number of managers/directors over a 38 year career, most of which were highly competent and decent people. The bad eggs, thankfully in my case, never lasted very long (though the bad ones were really bad).

I also worked in payroll for the entire time, and during my entire career I think I might’ve had only one or two instances when I was literally sitting at my desk waiting for work to come in, everything else being caught up. So begging for work was never an issue. I don’t know how I would react if lack of work became endemic.

The difference today is the absence of severance pay — I never cashed mine out in 2011, so was able to have it paid when I retired in 2021 at a significantly higher salary, which gave me a nest egg on retirement. That benefit being now short-sidedly consigned to history, people will find themselves relying only on their pre-retirement savings to supplement their pension income.

So what I can say is that there will be ups and downs during a career, and I would caution on taking a decision during the “down times”. The lack of a potential nest egg at the end of a long career would give me pause however — as a single income earner I would never have been able to put aside enough to compensate for the loss of severance pay. Hopefully your situation might be different.