> The goal of the future is full unemployment, so we can play. That's why we have to destroy the present politico-economic system.
- Arthur C. Clarke
Why do we assume everyone should be working?
11–20 of 121 posts
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#12Before that, a more important question is: why assume that buying or having "more stuff" leads to a better life?
Human life requires some consumables. Even with less stuff, you will always need some stuff.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#13How is this not the exact same stance that the far right has on immigrants and criminals?
Exclusion is a greedy short-term strategy. Are you also against public schools? I mean surely, the conclusion of your reasoning is that a lot of those students aren't going to participate in the labor market. Why bother?
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#14UBI is the inevitable future. We are now living in a time period in history when we wait for government bureaucrats to finally realise that UBI is a right and not a privilege.
At this moment more than half of employment can be classified as “bullshit jobs” - inconsequential that would make no difference if they disappeared one day, created to satisfy the requirements of the capitalist economy.
We have been productive to feed and shelter everyone for free for a while now, at least 20 years if not more, but the scarcity narrative gets reignited and pushed by politicians who want to distract and blame immigrants or lack of resources for their own incompetence.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#15How is this not the exact same stance that the far right has on immigrants and criminals? Exclusion is a greedy short-term strategy. Are you also against public schools? I mean surely, the conclusion of your reasoning is that a lot of those students aren't going to participate in the labor market. Why bother?
Godwin's new law!
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#16Because we got used to the idea that who is not working, is consuming resources made by those working and putting in effort. Then those putting in effort say "if I could get resources without putting in effort, why should I put the effort?". > ere is a very simple statement which may sound a bit mean: it is entirely feasible that giving a job to a “stupid” person, regardless of how much we try and train them, might c…
The dream society would be where we all just work less hours. Everyone can get a job but doesn't have to burn every workable hour of their life.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#17> I was talking to a friend of mine and I asked this. She said “of course everyone should be working, I mean, I’d like to be able to buy more stuff”
This sounds like the type of thing you hear from a person sipping a rare single-origin pour-over after their pilates class in Palo Alto.
In the real world, the average person would probably tell you something like "of course everyone should be working, I mean, I need to pay my rent, electricity bill, buy food, etc.".
Most people in this world work because they need to earn money to pay for basic necessities of life, not because they want to buy more stuff.
> Here is a very simple statement which may sound a bit mean: it is entirely feasible that giving a job to a “stupid” person, regardless of how much we try and train them, might cost the economy more than we benefit, in aggregate.
The economy is not society, though, and having a bunch of unhappy people who are poor and have nothing to do is probably not good for a country's well-being.
Until there's an alternative system that allows people to have their basic needs met without working, unemployment is a problem, and even if you had that system, we have no idea whether or not the masses will be content enough to stay sane and peaceful.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#18> utilizing a resource to it’s fullest at all times is not a given Typos like this (it's instead of possessive its) used to be bother me but now it's a hint that it might be human-authored, which is quaint, so it's stopped bothering me as much.
That won't be a good heuristic much longer. A few weeks back I saw Gemini write "Redundant Abstraciton Overhead" (-citon instead of -ction). It was the first time I saw a model make a "typo", so I made a note of it.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#19This ideas was last examined in Germany around 1930. They landed on a term for these "stupid" people, namely "useless eaters". Then they committed genocide.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#20UBI is the inevitable future. We are now living in a time period in history when we wait for government bureaucrats to finally realise that UBI is a right and not a privilege. At this moment more than half of employment can be classified as “bullshit jobs” - inconsequential that would make no difference if they disappeared one day, created to satisfy the requirements of the capitalist economy. We have been productive…
Indeed. As I see it (and I have lived in socialist and capitalist countries as well as developing countries) there are really only two problems. 1. People in power don't want the system to change because it's a threat to their position. 2. People with low education and no means to support their own kids keep having large families.
We can solve #1 by just vetoing the current government and replacing it. But #2 is difficult to solve because we should not be comfortable imposing reproductive control on humans from the government. So popular education may be a good thing to focus on: lower birth rate, lower problems, higher productivity.