Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991) • Hacker News Board

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#391

Post by malthuswaswrong » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 2:32 PM UTC

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #371

malthuswaswrong wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you change your opinion if you were presented with hard data proving that 80% of wealthy people earned that wealth by delivering goods and services to people who voluntarily paid for it, and only 20% of the wealthy inherited it and that inherited wealth does not last more than 3 generations?

> 80% of wealthy people earned that wealth More likely they hired workers who created that wealth. And while in today's system we say that the person at the top "earned" that wealth, we could just as easily arrange firms differently so they are cooperatively owned. And in doing so they would not produce super wealthy people but instead a society with broader wealth distribution.

>More likely they hired workers who created that wealth.

More likely they hired workers and everyone created wealth together. A worker can't work until someone builds the assembly line, buys the materials, and sells the final product.

If it's so easy to do the whole process that anyone can do it, what's stopping you? Marxists claimed the capital class denied the funds to the working class to start their own companies. Well since the world went off the gold standard there is no lack of funding. It's the opposite now. Inflation is an attack on wealth. Wealthy people are ravenous to get their wealth out of currency and into "things" like property and businesses. Venture capitalists will fund the most ridiculous ideas in the desperate hope that one of them will "hit".

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#392

Post by malthuswaswrong » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 2:35 PM UTC

adrianN wrote: post #381

malthuswaswrong wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Take note of the goods and services we really need. Things like food, shelter, shoes, etc. I assume someone must be in charge of determining what products are essential and what products are frivolous consumerism. I assume you have someone in mind for the job. Yourself perhaps? I'm a big girl. I can make my own decisions on what is essential and what is frivolous in my own life.

You are conditioned from a young age by the ad industry to want a lot of things that are not essential in your life.

That's one theory. Another theory is that the ad industry is exploiting a human nature that has been there long before ads or industry.

How would we test that theory? How would we test if humans have always wanted things or if nobody wanted things until ads were invented?

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#393

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 2:55 PM UTC

hogFeast wrote: post #307

coldtea wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Two, I don't think you understand that incomes were so low back then that they could not afford even basic machinery. The furniture that most people had was a few chairs, tables, and things to eat with. Even basic household machinery (for example, a mangle) that was common in pre-20th century rural society, didn't exist (these machines also weren't produced in large volume) I don't need to "understand". I come from…

I studied this at university. I have done the research. I am telling you do not (your only evidence is that you think it was like the place you grew up...seriously?). Keith Wrightson is the basic textbook used on this subject (Omrod has written one about an earlier period). Pls, even for HN...this is wild, wild, wild levels of delusion.

[deleted]

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#394

Post by coldtea » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 3:07 PM UTC

hogFeast wrote: post #307

coldtea wrote: post #196

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Two, I don't think you understand that incomes were so low back then that they could not afford even basic machinery. The furniture that most people had was a few chairs, tables, and things to eat with. Even basic household machinery (for example, a mangle) that was common in pre-20th century rural society, didn't exist (these machines also weren't produced in large volume) I don't need to "understand". I come from…

I studied this at university. I have done the research. I am telling you do not (your only evidence is that you think it was like the place you grew up...seriously?). Keith Wrightson is the basic textbook used on this subject (Omrod has written one about an earlier period). Pls, even for HN...this is wild, wild, wild levels of delusion.

>I studied this at university. I have done the research.

A, that settles it then. "your only evidence is that you think it was like the place you grew up...seriously?" -- no, my evidence is having lived that life and knowing people who did well until 30 years ago (and even after then, slowly changing).

But sure, an English academic of the peasant classes on that island would know more. He read books about the matter (but probably not Sahlins or ethnology on the leisure times of even primitive tribes. Not much for other political environments and warmer climates, e.g. southern europe either. And probably has never cooked on a wood stove, grew plants and fed chicken animals).

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#395

Post by BurningFrog » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 3:15 PM UTC

bobthepanda wrote: post #329

didibus wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're right, I think I need to be more specific, assembly line work in some factory might count as physical labor, and that might not be any better, I can't say as I've never had that job. I'm thinking more in terms of the article, construction work, farming, and the more pre-industrial kind of physical labor. For me specifically, it was construction work, bus boy, landscaping, janitorial work and military training.…

While exercise is good, it's worth noting that in those lines of work your body wears its out after decades of doing it, and injury rates are fairly high.

Sitting in an office chair for decades doesn't cause great health outcomes either.

But it's the norm in our class, so we accept it as natural.

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#396

Post by Chris2048 » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 5:06 PM UTC

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #351

Chris2048 wrote: post #335

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And it’s totally voluntary Sure, while you are in charge. But when a more ambitious leader bashes your head in and takes over, maybe not so. How much of Lenin remained when Stalin took over?

There is no one in charge. I am not in charge. This is not a system based on any manner of authoritarian control.

Even a spiritual leader is in charge, if not in control. There still need to be laws, and those often follow from central sources/philosophies.

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#397

Post by [deleted] » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 5:19 PM UTC

legitster wrote: post #176

throwaway984393 wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> people developed almost no leisure activities! This is clearly not true. They didn't have modern leisure activities, but they had a vast array of activities to keep them from getting bored when they weren't working or doing the arduous, nearly continuous preparation of meals. > Common people had almost no sports, no games (beyond precursors to Bocce or backgammon), no literature! No literature, sure, because they w…

Point taken about sitting around drinking still being an activity of choice! But many of the listed activities were either only available for royals in the medieval period (fencing, racquet games, table games, a deck of cards in the 1300s was reportedly worth a small herd of sheep), or simply weren't recorded until that flurry of leisure innovations in the 1700s. Perhaps this is all due to that pronounced rise in lit…

[deleted]

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#398

Post by lindseymysse » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 5:52 PM UTC

malthuswaswrong wrote: post #354

lindseymysse wrote: post #283

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, we just watched the greatest military in the world™ scuttle out of Afghanistan with its tail between its legs, so we know that a primarily agrarian society CAN resist a militaristic society as long as its prepared. Pre-Colonial American societies were decimated by the biological warfare of the Europeans first. Now America turns its taste for biological warfare on itself. But, anyway, I digress.

False. We learned that an agrarian society can resist democracy and nation building. They were incapable of withstanding military destruction. They didn't even last 90 days. In fact they've already destroyed the military infrastructure we left them. "Soldiers" are literally parting out $20 million helicopters for $10,000 in scrap metal.

They didn't really resist, because they knew what the long game was. The people who planned the war didn't.

We should have bombed them for 90 days and declared victory and went home -- it would have been symbolic and pointless, but a lot cheaper in treasure and blood.

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#399

Post by bobthepanda » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 6:14 PM UTC

BurningFrog wrote: post #395

bobthepanda wrote: post #329

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While exercise is good, it's worth noting that in those lines of work your body wears its out after decades of doing it, and injury rates are fairly high.

Sitting in an office chair for decades doesn't cause great health outcomes either. But it's the norm in our class, so we accept it as natural.

health outcomes are relative, though.

office work will not cut your working life short with something fatal or totally unable to work.

Re: Pre-industrial workers had a shorter workweek than today's (1991)

#400

Post by TaylorAlexander » Sun, Oct 31, 2021, 6:15 PM UTC

malthuswaswrong wrote: post #391

TaylorAlexander wrote: post #371

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 80% of wealthy people earned that wealth More likely they hired workers who created that wealth. And while in today's system we say that the person at the top "earned" that wealth, we could just as easily arrange firms differently so they are cooperatively owned. And in doing so they would not produce super wealthy people but instead a society with broader wealth distribution.

>More likely they hired workers who created that wealth. More likely they hired workers and everyone created wealth together. A worker can't work until someone builds the assembly line, buys the materials, and sells the final product. If it's so easy to do the whole process that anyone can do it, what's stopping you? Marxists claimed the capital class denied the funds to the working class to start their own companies…

Nothing is stopping me and I am working on this.