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Education and Men without Work

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Re: Education and Men without Work

#231

Post by invalidOrTaken »

mythrwy wrote: post #71
tmux314 wrote: post #42

There's a very weird "let them eat cake" attitude in this thread which I find distressing. The study reports on the millions of working age men in the US who are essentially too depressed and face too many obstacles to search for work. Instead, they're spending their days staying inside, getting high, and playing video games. They essentially have little to no chance to pursue romantic relationships. Many of them eve…

This may be an unpopular opinion but the real issue (biologically) is that we don't need all the men. We only need a tiny percentage of men. So how societies sometimes dealt with this excess of men was to send a good number of them off to war. Also occupations used to be much more hazardous so many more die working. The days of bundling laggers up in a red coat and sending them off with a musket to make the queens em…

>We only need a tiny percentage of men.

The question isn't how many we need, because need is relative. The question is how many we can employ profitably, and how profitably. (Hedonic adaptation will make us "need" them soon enough).

How many we can use profitably, and how profitably, is not fixed.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#232

Post by belorn »

There is a large double standard applied here that a man who don't work is checking out of society, but a woman who does the same is a productive citizen since she can produce babies.

We wanted and most of us still want equality in the work force with both women and men equality responsible to earn their place in society. The bread winner model is cultural obsolete, even through we still behave, and given many comments here on HN, still think in those terms. A mans role culturally remain to support his children and their mother. If he doesn't do this then we declare them as checking out from society, become hikikomori, an drug addict and hedonistically waster of time. Increased rates of depression and suicides only reinforce our belief that men must fulfill their role or they will only harm themselves and others.

So let me make a suggestion. Maybe it is time to change the culture.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#233

Post by JMTQp8lwXL »

HeroOfAges wrote: post #87
mythrwy wrote: post #71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This may be an unpopular opinion but the real issue (biologically) is that we don't need all the men. We only need a tiny percentage of men. So how societies sometimes dealt with this excess of men was to send a good number of them off to war. Also occupations used to be much more hazardous so many more die working. The days of bundling laggers up in a red coat and sending them off with a musket to make the queens em…

While I would agree that this is an unpopular opinion, it's one I've come to terms with myself as I've grown older. There's a book I read that's popular in men's rights advocate circles called "The Myth of Male Power" that explores the idea of males being the "disposable" sex. Unfortunately, we live in a time where you're branded a misogynist for even mentioning the possibility that men face some serious disadvantage…

Anyone with an ounce of empathy can see how men and women face unique challenges in society. The discussion to be avoided is "who has it worse". The more effective discussion is to see the problems for what they are, and come up with solutions.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#234

Post by jotakami »

TomMckenny wrote: post #212

Benefits are much more generous and much easier to get in countries with much higher worker participation. And they have the same video games in other countries too. And marriage does not cause entry in the workforce, participation in the workforce is what makes marriage partners more interested. Reduction in benefits has not and is no increasing work participation. There was not spike in worker participation in the…

> And marriage does not cause entry into the workforce

You going to cite some evidence of this, or is it just a hot take? My hot take is that after getting married and having a child, the thought of losing my income was terrifying. Obviously we can theorize about causation in both directions, but I would put forth the argument that being married and/or having a family is the single most powerful inducement to maintain gainful employment for anyone, male or female. It might not cause entry into the workforce, but it sure as hell reduces exit from the workforce, which would have the same effect on statistics.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#235

Post by chongli »

helen___keller wrote: post #145
allovernow wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The relationships between men and women have changed. The relationship of the economy to individuals has changed. >Well, if only women would return home, there would be more lucrative jobs for men, and more need for the women to be taken care of by a man". That ship has sailed Worth noting that the current changes are explicitly counter to traditional roles which have existed for thousands of years. Yes, appeal sole…

So... what do you want? A government program to promote the joys of being a housewife? Do you really think that will move the needle on a systemic socioeconomic issue? Or would you rather see an authoritarian solution? I'm sure that will go over well. Keep in mind regardless of what you want as a woman, there's very real economic risk to being dependent on a man. Wanting to live a happy life as a housewife doesn't pu…

Keep in mind regardless of what you want as a woman, there's very real economic risk to being dependent on a man.

Before we automated away most of the jobs for men (leading to the current crisis) we did it first for women, with household appliances like refrigerators, laundry machines, and dishwashers. Go back to the 18th century (or earlier) and you'll find that husband and wife are equally dependent on one another. Families lived on farms where it was "all hands on deck" just to keep everyone fed, clothed, and warm during the winter. This meant even the parents were dependent on their own children to help out, as there was always more work to do.

It really wasn't until the 20th century when men started working away from the home and women found their chores automated, leading to long periods of boredom and loneliness. The genie is out of the bottle on all of this, though, so going back to live on the farm like Agricola [1] is not going to be an option for most people.

There are still some people who live the old way, though. They're called the Amish and they have much tighter family bonds than the rest of us. Even they have a real challenge maintaining their way of life, given that their children are allowed the opportunity of living among "the English" (that's us) for a while before they decide to commit to the community or strike out on their own. It's hard because modern technology is so very addictive.

[1] https://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/31260/agricola

Re: Education and Men without Work

#236

Post by JMTQp8lwXL »

supernova87a wrote: post #10

As unpopular it may be to say such a politically incorrect thing (admitting this is a generalization, and all the caveats that come with it) -- Men generally have the biological need to go do and wander and discover things. I don't know whether it's hormones or what. Debate all you like elsewhere (I'm not trying to debate that point here). My point is that when they don't get an outlet to do this, they cause trouble.…

I think it's unfair of you to introduce a premise, make a series of conclusions based off of it, and then say "don't challenge the premise", especially when the premise itself isn't an obvious or easily verifiable fact.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#237

Post by dlp211 »

chongli wrote: post #221
indigochill wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The difference now is that automation is rendering the hill insurmountable. I would say "the difference now is that the failing educational system is rendering the hill insurmountable." Automation is just tools. Reasonably able people can learn to use tools. But they need the means to do so affordably and effectively. Our system of education, however, is largely stuck two generations back and not up to the task of p…

the difference now is that the failing educational system is rendering the hill insurmountable. As an aspiring educator, it's becoming increasingly obvious to me that society expects teachers to be miracle-workers, to motivate children so they study really hard and get into a good college. Yet we don't expect the same from parents. Parents are spending less and less time with their kids, while the demands for educati…

> Parents are spending less and less time with their kids

This is not true, in fact, parents are spending 2x more time with their kids.

https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2017/11/27/parents-...

Re: Education and Men without Work

#238

Post by remarkEon »

rocqua wrote: post #159
supernova87a wrote: post #10

As unpopular it may be to say such a politically incorrect thing (admitting this is a generalization, and all the caveats that come with it) -- Men generally have the biological need to go do and wander and discover things. I don't know whether it's hormones or what. Debate all you like elsewhere (I'm not trying to debate that point here). My point is that when they don't get an outlet to do this, they cause trouble.…

> Men generally have the biological need to go do and wander and discover things. I don't know whether it's hormones or what. Debate all you like elsewhere (I'm not trying to debate that point here). I'd drop biological here. Because it might just as well be a cultural or social cause. The important observation is that men have the need to have adventures and women don't. The rest of your argument stands without need…

That the trend exists across cultures suggests that culture might only be part of it. Not 100% due to biology, to be sure, but intuitively it makes sense that it's a significant drive simply based on how humans evolved and what gender roles existed because of our biology (men hunting and gathering, women raising children).

Re: Education and Men without Work

#239

Post by exhilaration »

Mirioron wrote: post #72
tmux314 wrote: post #42

There's a very weird "let them eat cake" attitude in this thread which I find distressing. The study reports on the millions of working age men in the US who are essentially too depressed and face too many obstacles to search for work. Instead, they're spending their days staying inside, getting high, and playing video games. They essentially have little to no chance to pursue romantic relationships. Many of them eve…

I don't think people will care until the issue has become large enough that it will start impacting others in society indirectly. Eg not enough tax revenue being generated or not enough men willing to fight in a war.

In a few decades we'll have robots to fight our wars.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#240

Post by elfexec »

> Unfortunately, the two causes the article cites (dissolution of family structure and rise of single male households) are unaddressed.

It's unaddressed because it's the journalist class and their kind that has waged a war against family, gender roles, gender itself and males. At least since the 90s as far as I remember, the predominant message in media is fathers are bad, males are bad and family is bad. Media has discouraged men and women from getting married, having children, encouraged divorce, abortion, etc. When a nation's media pushes nonsense like "toxic masculinity", isn't it about time to declare the media the enemy of the nation? But what's interesting is that the media are just propaganda of the elites. The elites decide the media campaigns and trends which transform and socially engineer society. The question is why? After all most of these elites and many of these journalists are males themselves.

One solution is the diversification of the elites, media and society in general. Not in superficial aspects like race, gender, etc, but ideology, thought and values. Seems like there is a lot of incest within the elite/media class. They all seem to think alike and that's not a good thing.

Also, these attacks on men are also ultimately attacks on women as well. Ignoring the fact that half of a woman's genetic history comes from a man ( their father ), the attacks on men ultimately harm their future prospects of a husband, family and kids. And their future hopes of happiness.

Men's suicide is increasing and women's happiness has been plummeting.

https://www.nber.org/papers/w14969

Add to that the below replacement birth rate of american born women, you'd think there was a crisis in america. But we can't really discuss the real issues here because it's verboten.

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