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Why do people waste so much time at work?

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Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#171

Post by tangent128 »

lsaferite wrote: post #113
douche wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I support the idea of a basic income, but only if it is a replacement for the system of piecemeal welfare programs and tax-breaks that we currently have. The entire system could get so much simpler than it currently is. You get your basic income check for X dollars a month. If you work a job, run a business, whatever, in addition to that, you get taxed Y% on your earnings, excluding the basic income amount. No deduct…

I'd suggest replacing an income tax with a sales tax though. One 'punishes' earning, the other 'punishes' spending. Additionally you simplify enforcement by narrowing the collection points considerably. Talk about simple, you don't ever files taxes as an individual. That mixed with basic income is a good plan from my non-economist POV. I've sure someone far smarter that I can explain why I'm amazingly naïve.

From what I've read on the subject:

Economically, you want to keep money flowing through the system as fast as possible. One dollar spent three times in a year contributes more to the economy than two dollars spent once. (I could imagine it even contributing more three dollars spent once due to participating in more transactions, but I don't know how you'd model that.)

If you tax spending, you incentivize hoarding cash, which decreases the "monetary velocity".

The psychology is different when income is taxed. People can choose to defer spending, but the only way to reduce income tax is to make less money- sure, some oddballs may do so out of spite, but most people prefer to maximize their income.

Furthermore, when combined with basic income, income tax does a better job of reducing the magnitude of inequality. While on its own that's a social argument, it becomes an economic argument very quickly: since it "takes money to make money", extreme inequality levels actually disincentivize productivity from the have-nots, since the expected return on effort becomes negligible.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#172

Post by GBond »

I'm surprised no one mentioned Holacracy yet.

As others have mentioned, doing "just enough" work is a by-product of a inefficiencies of the hierarchal approach of managing via command and control. Holacracy instead is network centric.

I don't know if I completely buy into the effectiveness of Holacracy but I can see how it it is better motivating to Producers. For example, I tend to write better code knowing that it will be peer-reviewed by another dev I respect.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#173

Post by Lawtonfogle »

mdpopescu wrote: post #80
Uberphallus wrote: post #13

In my case it's the lack of documentation about a huge system (ecosystem, I'd rather call it), in contrast to an overengineered methodology and process, which involves mandatory code reviews by people unfamiliar with the code and 6 test phases before production. If I crank 10 lines of code a week I consider myself lucky, and it won't take less than 3 weeks for them to hit production. The combination of that with long…

I sincerely hope this (10 lines of code a week) is hyperbole. I would be fine with 3 weeks to hit production - not everybody works on a SaaS, I've had six months release cycles - but... not writing code?

When the code base is bad enough, fixing a bug can take a small code tweak but days to discover and days more to test. Especially if refactoring bad code isn't an option at the time.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#174

Post by Lawtonfogle »

pinaceae wrote: post #131

because I pay you for 40h of productivity per week, not a fixed amount of output? for the latter, consulting/freelance exists. if you get paid for 40h per week, the expectation is to devote those hours to the benefit of the employer. do your tasks, if you have time to spare, think of other benefits - improvements, better ideas, learn, etc. people that finish a task and then wait to be given another are the bane of th…

Are you paying hourly or salary? If salary, you are paying for what should be able to be done in 40 hours a week, but if it takes 45, you expect it to still be done, no? So if one can get it done is 35, why do you expect 5 more hours to given free?

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#175

Post by juliangregorian »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #119
juliangregorian wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's well known that, once you acquire enough money, you can live off the proceeds of that money. If you inherited a million dollars and put it in bog-standard funds, you'd get ~$75,000 a year for doing absolutely nothing. How that factors into your theory, I'd love to know.

Not the OP but your assumption is that 1. That "investment" mechanism will hold up forever and 2. That you don't put that money in the system at the wrong time assuming it is a random walk.

Well, that's pretty much how ETFs work. I don't quite understand what you mean about a random walk, though.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#176

Post by jacalata »

floppydisk wrote: post #88
jacalata wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most people argue that technological advances made since Jamestown mean that we literally absolutely don't need everyone to work, because we are no longer an impoverished subsistence society.

I concur, we've made significant technological strides since then and it's nice that we've pushed our standard of living from swampy subsistence to one of the best in the world. However, that doesn't address the thrust of the argument which is if you create a society that rewards sky-gazing it creates the probability of a disincentive to work. Are there counter examples where this kind of society as worked in the pas…

I don't think you understood me. Let's say 80% of people won't work if they don't have to (I think thats not true, but to pick a number). Until today, that meant that allowing people not to work meant that society would collapse and everyone would starve because it wasn't possible to produce food and shelter for so many without their help. Today, it is possible due to technological advances that did not ever before exist. Thats why there is no example of it working before but people believe it could work today.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#177

Post by floppydisk »

juliangregorian wrote: post #130
Drakim wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I feel many people miss is that goods and money are not synonyms. If there was a huge influx of money into the world, that helps exactly nobody because the amount of food, shelter and other goods has not increased. I find that people "get" this a lot easier when you start talking about coupons and IOU instead of gold and dollars. Nobody believes that the guy who is moving coupons back and forth between various p…

Sure, and that reminds me of another great example for money's imaginary quality: The total amount of money in existence is many magnitudes more than it would theoretically take to end global poverty. However, no one dares attempt this, because it would knock the struts out that prop up the whole system (namely, debt).

The grandparent noted that while we can increase the amount of currency in people's pockets, that doesn't fundamentally change the number of goods and services available to the total population. If you define poverty as lack of money, then yes, we can fiat more than enough money into existence. However, if you define poverty as lack of access to goods and services, increasing the amount of money available won't work. Look at Germany in the wake of World War I. Money was flowing everywhere, but the amount of good and services available was minuscule in comparison causing rampant inflation to the point where it was more cost effective to burn the paper currency for heat rather than spend it.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#178

Post by icebraining »

jrs235 wrote: post #142
floppydisk wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's an incredibly frustrating response because it doesn't actually address anything substantive but simply attempts to cast dispersion on the arguments. I'll reiterate the request I made to a commentator below in the thread. Are there counter examples of a society working without incentive that allows people to work or not work and if so, why aren't they with us today / if they are, why aren't they more influentia…

First off, I mostly agree with your sentiments. This comment is not in opposition but made to extend the discussion even beyond just money. In order for a universal basic income system to work, we'll probably need to ditch democracy or put into writing some difficult to change protections. Seeing that the Constitution is being treated as either a) a living breathing document whose meaning changes with time or b) just…

Why doesn't that happen now, then? The current majority could, right now, decide to massively increase the taxes on, say, the 40% richest and redistribute that money to the rest of the 60%.

In fact, the current majority can, right now, decide to implement UBI, and then do all those things you describe.

Essentially, it's a slippery slope argument, with no great explanation of why UBI would change the conditions to start the "slip" that hasn't occurred until now.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#179

Post by sillygoose »

palmer_eldritch wrote: post #145
alextgordon wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's an anarchist viewpoint too, when you think about it.

Anarcho-capitalists maybe. The anarchist movement branched out from socialism and tends to be much more humanist than that.

It's interesting how you can recognize an Anarcho-Capitalist viewpoint when you see one, but can't recognize that being an AnCap basically just boils down to being moral, sane, rational and consistent.

Most self-proclaimed "Anarchists" I come across are actually something like Marxists, nonsensically railing against evil capitalist oppressors, without wanting to even discuss what capitalism means.

I went to one of their gatherings once, and out of around twenty people, only one seemed rational and open-minded.

The rest were intent on figuring out what kind of "activism" they'd engage in, and didn't want to discuss whether what they were doing actually made any fucking sense at all.

Re: Why do people waste so much time at work?

#180

Post by jfuhrman »

juliangregorian wrote: post #169
jfuhrman wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nobody believes that the guy who is moving coupons back and forth between various piles with specific timing has truly earned the load of goods he gains. Instead, they rightly feel like he is cheating the system and taking without giving back. If you're talking about grocery store coupons, then that guy has absolutely earned the gains. Coupons are a form of price discrimination, i.e sell at a higher margin to peopl…

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coupon_%28bond%29

Thanks. In that case, isn't someone taking on risk by moving coupons around?
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