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A world without work

theatlantic.com

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Re: A world without work

#41

Post by zzalpha »

waxymonkeyfrog wrote: post #34
zzalpha wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The article flat out assumes that "If John Russo is right, then saving work is more important than saving any particular job. Industriousness has served as America’s unofficial religion since its founding. The sanctity and preeminence of work lie at the heart of the country’s politics, economics, and social interactions.", and that "Most people want to work, and are miserable when they cannot." Put succinctly, the ar…

Unemployment clearly leads to degradation, both of cities (Youngstown) and of individuals. The question I think we're debating is whether the flow of causality goes unemployment->poverty->social degradation (this is your case, I think) or whether unemployment leads to social degradation more directly, even among people who don't currently need money (so, removing the variable of poverty) because it's a terrible blow…

I think there is a lot of evidence for this claim; see the section Paradox of Leisure.

I totally disagree.

The problem is that society, as it's structured today, does little to support the unemployed to provide the kind of social contact and meaningful activity that would offset depression and isolation.

In addition, there is a social expectation foisted upon the unemployed that they must become employed, and that expectation creates pressure, depression, and further isolation.

The fundamental issue is that we, as a society, have decided that unless you're working you're idle, and if you're idle you're useless.

Consider, there are many many retirees who manage just fine. Why? Because there's a social network put in place to support retirees... activity centers, social groups, travel clubs, etc. And a social expectation that retirees will specifically be idle!

Similar support mechanisms do not exist for the unemployed today because the unemployed are viewed as failures. Unemployment is not a valid life choice, and therefore society does nothing to support them.

This fundamentally comes down to the western idolization of work. Address that and I believe you'll address many of the psychological harms supposedly caused by a lack of employment.

Re: A world without work

#42

Post by __z »

falcolas wrote: post #15
benaiah wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

2. I know this is anecdotal, but when I was unemployed I often didn't socialize because I simply couldn't afford the luxury. Many social activities are fairly expensive, depending on your area, friends, and preferences.

Yeah, this came to mind as well. A night at the pub can easily run even a conservative drinker $20+, doing this every night (even when working) would be hard. And those costs appear in other activites as well - renting a field/equipment to play ball, renting a bowling lane, green fees for golf, tickets for events...

My biggest expense of a night at the pub is the cab ride to and from the pub since if I am going to drink I can't drive myself there. We don't have public transport.

Re: A world without work

#43

Post by mirimir »

While this is a very interesting and insightful article, it might be useful to add a broader historical/anthropological perspective. I'm not qualified to do that. But it's my understanding that development of agriculture and animal husbandry, and much later industrialization, drove huge increases in human population.

In part, of course, that was driven by the abundance of food and so on. But there was also the need for workers. So as machines displace workers, one might expect human population to gradually decrease, perhaps back to neolithic levels.

The challenge, then, would be to have that occur as humanely as possible.

Re: A world without work

#44

Post by VLM »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #6
rcarrigan87 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does capitalism have an ending? Maybe we can envision some kind of ending on earth. But what about when we start colonizing other planets? What new jobs begin to be created as we step outside earth.

A general purpose AI/Robot will just do what it does here, there, and much cheaper and better than some guy stuffed into a pressurized suit who can only work x amount of hours per day and is easily injured and in constant need of food/air/medical. If space migration happens it will be with an army or robots per person because of how hostile conditions are for delicate mammals outside of earth. I don't think the futur…

"hostile conditions ... for delicate mammals ... outside of earth"

Lets try a test of the general principle. Cross off the last three words and see if Canada, Australia, the western half of the USA, are all uninhabited. If they are, then no one will live in space. If people live in the desert in Nevada, then its highly likely people will (eventually) live in space.

Re: A world without work

#45

Post by stock_toaster »

zzalpha wrote: post #22
notahacker wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A world without work was a pretty common vision in the 1960s. And the 1860s But humanity has a remarkable capacity to invent new outlets to fill our waking hours as we redeploy resources used to make stuff to make other stuff or sell stuff. We didn't have (or foresee!) social media managers or video game designers in the 1960s. And software doesn't just make our production efforts scale, it makes our consumption scal…

Hell, modern theory has it that the pyramids were in essence a type of stimulus program to keep folks busy and fed (and no, they were not in fact slaves)!

I would love to see a return to investing in and updating some of the physical infrastructure that has degraded over time.

In the USA there are a huge amounts of bridges that need updating/repairing, dams needing repair (or removal), roads needing repair, dilapidated school buildings needing updating (as well as energy efficiency updates), etc. There seems like TONS of work to be done to refresh our aging physical infrastructure.

Re: A world without work

#46

Post by eli_gottlieb »

waxymonkeyfrog wrote: post #21
zzalpha wrote: post #17

I find it presumptuous that the authors lay depression and so forth at the feet of unemployment and not the obvious: poverty. If folks could live, unemployed, receiving mincome that supported a reasonable quality of life, is there a reason to believe these various effects would still be a major issue?

Sorry I didn't mean to suggest that at all. When I wrote "the ills of unemployment go well beyond the loss of income" that was my way of saying loss of income is the first-order outcome of losing a job, but there are more complicated effects to consider. The reason I focus on the other effects is that, in deciding how government/culture might rearrange itself to replace work, I think it's critical to see that work is…

>The reason I focus on the other effects is that, in deciding how government/culture might rearrange itself to replace work, I think it's critical to see that work is about more than money--and the benefit of work is about more than a paycheck. It is about esteem, purpose, community, a sense of meaningfulness in life, and it's not clear to me that all of those things comes with a monthly government check; so it's useful to think of ways we could replace these values in the future.

It is also about actually accomplishing something that needed doing. This is precisely why we want it to disappear: unfilled needs are bad.

Re: A world without work

#47

Post by notNow »

mirimir wrote: post #43

While this is a very interesting and insightful article, it might be useful to add a broader historical/anthropological perspective. I'm not qualified to do that. But it's my understanding that development of agriculture and animal husbandry, and much later industrialization, drove huge increases in human population. In part, of course, that was driven by the abundance of food and so on. But there was also the need f…

Are you a eugenicist and human depopulation advocate?

Re: A world without work

#48

Post by waxymonkeyfrog »

zzalpha wrote: post #41
waxymonkeyfrog wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unemployment clearly leads to degradation, both of cities (Youngstown) and of individuals. The question I think we're debating is whether the flow of causality goes unemployment->poverty->social degradation (this is your case, I think) or whether unemployment leads to social degradation more directly, even among people who don't currently need money (so, removing the variable of poverty) because it's a terrible blow…

I think there is a lot of evidence for this claim; see the section Paradox of Leisure. I totally disagree. The problem is that society, as it's structured today, does little to support the unemployed to provide the kind of social contact and meaningful activity that would offset depression and isolation. In addition, there is a social expectation foisted upon the unemployed that they must become employed, and that ex…

If you think we should provide support mechanisms like activity centers for the unemployed, I think you'll love the fifth section of the piece where I say we should provide support mechanisms like activity centers for the unemployed!

I'm okay with disagreeing over the centrality of work. Some very smart people think that maintaining structured busy-ness is very important psychologically. Some people disagree. But it seems to me that we agree on many of the solutions, including a basic income and activity centers.

Re: A world without work

#49

Post by agumonkey »

mirimir wrote: post #43

While this is a very interesting and insightful article, it might be useful to add a broader historical/anthropological perspective. I'm not qualified to do that. But it's my understanding that development of agriculture and animal husbandry, and much later industrialization, drove huge increases in human population. In part, of course, that was driven by the abundance of food and so on. But there was also the need f…

Also increase in comfort and development is correlated with smaller children number, so an hyper modern world may have smaller population "momentum". There's a statistician with a TED talk about that. Maybe that one http://www.ted.com/talks/hans_rosling_shows_the_best_stats_y... I cant recall.

Re: A world without work

#50

Post by kmnc »

zzalpha wrote: post #17

I find it presumptuous that the authors lay depression and so forth at the feet of unemployment and not the obvious: poverty. If folks could live, unemployed, receiving mincome that supported a reasonable quality of life, is there a reason to believe these various effects would still be a major issue?

Does having a mincome stop you from stressing over the guy across the street who has a bigger one and a better looking wife? Maybe it does, but I don't think the mincome or quality of life is the biggest driver for that. The biggest driver is freedom (Do I truly believe I have every opportunity to become what/WHO I want to be?)

Can we really achieve that freedom for everyone in the real world? Is getting close good enough? Will virtual worlds and simulation provide us that freedom?

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