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Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

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Re: Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

#291

Post by Dumblydorr »

dividefuel wrote: post #93
ericmay wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a general comment, I'd like to say that getting out of the house is a hell of a lot easier when you don't have to drive everywhere to participate in daily life. So and so family member sits at home and watches TV all day is a phenomenon caused primarily by our car-centric culture which, for the elderly, is a barrier to staying healthy both mentally and physically.

I do think that once an elderly person loses the ability to drive, it's often a big tipping point towards their decline. I would suspect that losing the ability to drive usually (but not necessarily) comes before losing the ability to navigate public transit. But I don't immediately believe the link that 'car culture' -> 'earlier cognitive decline'. Car culture, for example, is usually associated with living on large…

Heavy confounding there. If they’re declined enough to not drive, they’re declined in a ton of other ADLs too

Re: Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

#292

Post by 6510 »

Aurornis wrote: post #181
spartanatreyu wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no sudden outbreak of productive activity because people have more free time. I can't recall which studies they were, but I was under the impression that with a sudden expansion of free time, the earliest productivity gains don't occur until months later at the earliest. I think the effect came up in long-term UBI trial participants, and those that acquired sudden wealth from inheritance / lottery / stocks…

> I think the effect came up in long-term UBI trial participants, The failure of UBI trials to show these effects has been one of the noteworthy developments in the UBI topic in recent years. There were several studies that tried really hard to demonstrate that UBI would increase the rate of business creation and similar metrics. The last one I remember reading was trying to show that the long-term cash recipients re…

It's such an unimaginative metric. First, we lump all jobs together into one bag. Depending on who you are some jobs are an actual joy whole others are absurdly demanding. We have zero dialog about the correct number of hours for each.

Lots of jobs (both physically and mentally) require slacking off half the shift. I've seen quite a few that on paper require 8 hours of top tier athletic performance. It might be possible to train a person to accomplish that. The work schedule looks nothing like a training program.

To grow, mental and physical challenges have to push people to their limit for X hours over Y days where X and Y depend a lot on what it is one does and their point of exhaustion. If you are not exhausted you aren't growing. When you are exhausted you should be resting. Rest should be exactly the right duration.

If people are never challenged physically, mentally (and perhaps socially) they will decline and eventually the lack of physical fitness will eat away their mental performance just like a lack of mental challenge will ruin physical performance.

There is no discussion about the duration or frequency of shifts.

If you look at it strictly from a greed and exploitation perspective it is a dumb idea to pay someone for 8 hours if it isn't possible to do more than 5 hours of work. It is dumb to have people work 5 days if they are used up after 3. It is dumb to have 2 days of weekend if the employee is not recharged. The collective goal was to exploit them until retirement. If they cant even be allowed to grow stronger it is a truly dumb schedule.

I had a job once that involved a weekly truck full of 75 kg bags of flour. About 10 employees were unable to do a single bag, about 10 could do 1-5. Then there was one guy who did the other 150 bags. Not a coincidence it was the same guy who put them in the mixer. Say 10 000 kg. The world record most weight lifted in a day is half a million kg or say 6500 bags.

They calculated top memory sports people are on average 5000 times better at remembering things than untrained people. They weren't born like that nor did it just happen suddenly.

Lots of people want to start their own business but they are terrified by the amount of work and level of uncertainty. It doesn't seem like we want people to start their own business. We need them to but it looks more like we've made it intentionally complicated. Complicated enough that you probably shouldn't invest in them.

There is also the angle of people able to support you. If everyone has 4 day weekends you really should ask them to help you. If it is only 2 days you'd best not bother.

Re: Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

#293

Post by reverius42 »

somenameforme wrote: post #261
globalnode wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i think people trying to argue that we would be more productive is a symptom of the productivity disease. where all we value is productivity and thats the only way we can justify more non-work time. i personally just think we should all have more time to do what we want, whether that is being productive on personal projects, talking to people, playing games, or doing nothing. happier people right? why should 10% of t…

I was all with you right up until the class conflict stuff. Nobody's enslaving anybody. Well that's not true, we're mostly enslaving ourselves. There are endless easy opportunities in life. For instance go teach English in Saudi Arabia and you'll earn around $60k a year which doesn't sound like much until you account for the fact you pay 0% in taxes and have a cost of living well under $1k a month. Just live frugally…

> Nobody's enslaving anybody.

> Saudi Arabia

I have some news for you.

Re: Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

#294

Post by WJW »

chownie wrote: post #276
henrikschroder wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Giving employees 1 week of free time? That's nothing, and nothing will change too as a result. Give them a whole month of free time? I bet they will make some small, short term projects, even doing hobbies like gaming, fishing, cooking or golfing where it wasn't available before. *confused in European, again* Hey, if only there was an entire continent of hundreds of millions of people who typically have 5 weeks of…

You have confused 5 weeks (across a year) for 5 weeks (contiguous), this isn't speciality european confusion it's the regular garden variety.

There's tons of people over here taking 3 or 4 weeks contiguous, especially if they have children. That is in addition to other vacations around christmas etc. It's definitely not 5 separate weeks.

I don't think there's a lot of things that one could do in 5 weeks, but where 4 weeks would be too short.

Re: Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

#295

Post by Tade0 »

bcrosby95 wrote: post #28
nate wrote: post #14

We probably all have anecdotal evidence here, but my father is a perfect example of being no longer employed and a ton of stuff declining. Yes, cognitively, but a lot of health. We're talking not just your "career". He was a commercial real estate agent. But in his 80s he was working at Menards as a greeter and stocker. And it kept him busy. Getting out of the house. Figuring things out. Meeting and talking to people…

It's hard to really say from anecdotes. My uncle retired early and was sharp as a whip until 86 or so. Then decline hit him hard. There was no change in life circumstances, he just got old. Also, I think you'll find that taking care of someone who can't take care of themselves is a lot of work. I had to do it for my mom for 6 months and its a ton of stuff. Talking to doctors. Arranging appointments. Etc.

From my pool of anecdotes I can only say that moving around - not necessarily doing sports or anything - affects things tremendously.

My maternal grandmother lived to 97, while my grandfather is still with us at 99. Interestingly, their next door neighbours are also alive and in their late 90s.

The one thing they had in common was living four floors up without an elevator. Curiously, in that block, people started dying starting from the lower floors.

Realistically I think they were born in an unique moment in history, which allowed them to have a childhood of running around barefoot, barely ever seeing a motor vehicle[0] and an adulthood with modern sanitation and post-war healthcare.

[0] Grandpa recalls how bewildered everyone was by the arrival of the nazis, with their tanks, motorcycles and, closer to the end of the war, bicycles(that part he found hilarious). They've never seen such a huge motorcade in their lives.

Re: Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

#296

Post by bsenftner »

wiseowise wrote: post #289
bregma wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Did I just described rich kids? You just described Lord Of The Flies. Be mindful of fundamental human nature and how it shapes everything we do, including all our social constructs. Few people are, which make mindlessness the dominant modus operandi.

> Be mindful of fundamental human nature and how it shapes everything we do, including all our social constructs. Few people are, which make mindlessness the dominant modus operandi. What is the fundamental human nature in your opinion?

Adapation

Re: Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

#297

Post by card_zero »

wiseowise wrote: post #270
jandrewrogers wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they would be making projects, business ventures, or volunteering This is not what actually happens in practice. There is no sudden outbreak of productive activity because people have more free time. If this was going to occur there would be mountains of empirical evidence for it by now because this situation isn't rare. I know many people with a lot of free time. In the vast majority of cases, people spend their f…

> I know many people with a lot of free time. In the vast majority of cases, people spend their free time in almost exactly the same way they spent their free time when they had less of it. Binging on social media, television, or games? Now they just do more of it for longer. The people that volunteer more were already doing it, and they are in the small minority. You lock people for decades in the madhouse which lea…

Cease this wild extrapolation, which starts at dementia, passes through a casual myth called "brain rot", and ends at games. I like games and I like being idle. I don't like the judgmental concept of "productive activity" and I don't think that arbitrarily occupying yourself, even if you produce something, is inherently worthy and good. I produce certain things with my ass, gimme a medal.

Re: Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

#299

Post by throwthrowuknow »

bregma wrote: post #284
wiseowise wrote: post #270

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I know many people with a lot of free time. In the vast majority of cases, people spend their free time in almost exactly the same way they spent their free time when they had less of it. Binging on social media, television, or games? Now they just do more of it for longer. The people that volunteer more were already doing it, and they are in the small minority. You lock people for decades in the madhouse which lea…

> Did I just described rich kids? You just described Lord Of The Flies. Be mindful of fundamental human nature and how it shapes everything we do, including all our social constructs. Few people are, which make mindlessness the dominant modus operandi.

Lord of the Flies was a fictional novel, it never happened, it’s not real and shouldn’t be used to inform your thinking.

Especially when real life instances of groups of young children being stranded without adult help exist and play out in ways directly opposite of the novel’s central thesis.

Re: Does Employment Slow Cognitive Decline? Evidence from Labor Market Shocks

#300

Post by TheOtherHobbes »

Aurornis wrote: post #181
spartanatreyu wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There is no sudden outbreak of productive activity because people have more free time. I can't recall which studies they were, but I was under the impression that with a sudden expansion of free time, the earliest productivity gains don't occur until months later at the earliest. I think the effect came up in long-term UBI trial participants, and those that acquired sudden wealth from inheritance / lottery / stocks…

> I think the effect came up in long-term UBI trial participants, The failure of UBI trials to show these effects has been one of the noteworthy developments in the UBI topic in recent years. There were several studies that tried really hard to demonstrate that UBI would increase the rate of business creation and similar metrics. The last one I remember reading was trying to show that the long-term cash recipients re…

Starting a business can be horrifically expensive, complicated, and risky. You have to spend a good few months researching all the things you need to do before you actually do it. And most people don't even know what questions to ask.

Some people will grow up in households where their parents understand basic law, finance, and business bureaucracy. They may already be part of a network with similar individuals in their cohort.

There's also the informal culture - knowing when you can push and maybe exploit vs knowing when to fold and play by the rules.

Other people come to it completely cold. They don't know the basics, don't understand the requirements, have no experience of the culture, don't even know what the words mean.

This is another reason why UBI isn't enough. If you want people to be more entrepreneurial you need a practical culture that supports that. Investing in them financially is a good first step, but it's not a complete solution.

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