I haven't played video games in years but I think that's it not video games causing young men to drop out of the work force. Rather, there are other societal causes and young men without prospects for their future are going to fill their unused time with something.
Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
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Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
#32I think this is where UBI leads if it ever happens.
Even if that's the case, is that a bad thing? Should we not have the freedom to spend our own time as we please in a post-scarcity society?
Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
#33* Disappointing that the false meme about some gaming communities being hostile to women because they're women was promoted in this article. Some gaming communities are very hostile to newcomers: but it's not because you're a woman, it's because you're a noob or just suck. Welcome to one of the last remaining meritocracies. * The article makes a correct observation insofar as more men (not just an occasional sad soci…
You can't deny that the morepigs young are opting for are highly degenerate.
Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
#34I think this is where UBI leads if it ever happens.
That's what scares the shit of me regarding UBI. I don't mind paying for it even if it does keep young men immersed in a fantasy world. But I have a daughter. And she will be surrounded by men whose idea of women will be shaped by game characters that fail the Turing test but have big tits. I guess for her first birthday after puberty I'll have to get her a taser.
Are games really that relevant here? I'd suggest it might be more relevant that they haven't interacted with women enough. If that's the case, then that's the issue. To say something is a timesink is different from saying it warps wordviews strongly in and of itself.
Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's a real possibility, but consider thinking about it this way: Many jobs do not provide (marginal utility > income) to society, and many even produce negative marginal utility. Everything from utility companies to the financial sector to government to even academia has a heck of a lot of perverse incentives and corruption. Over half a century ago John Maynard Keynes--one of the most influential intellectuals to sh…
> provided we're able to keep the scarcity problem solved (which I'd bet we'd be able to pull off). I'm curious as to how we can pull that off given that an ever increasing percentage of young smart capable people are opting out of solving real world problems in favor of "toiling over their virtual realities"...
I really dislike the romanticizing of employment as "solving problems." The effect of employment is that somebody's problems get solved, but as the employee, they aren't my problems, and subjectively it feels like mostly solving a lot of meta-problems like how to follow somebody else's process and get along with all kinds of coworkers. If employment felt like object-level problem solving, I'd be employed.
Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
#36My friends were getting addicted to "Evercrack" 15 years ago, playing for days on end, affecting school, work, and social life. Other games had similar effects (usually mmorpgs). Nothing new here
It is when it spreads from the AV club to the mainstream and the numbers start having tangible impact on jobs numbers / workforce participation rates.
Good! Those metrics are important to some, but not to others.
Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's a real possibility, but consider thinking about it this way: Many jobs do not provide (marginal utility > income) to society, and many even produce negative marginal utility. Everything from utility companies to the financial sector to government to even academia has a heck of a lot of perverse incentives and corruption. Over half a century ago John Maynard Keynes--one of the most influential intellectuals to sh…
> provided we're able to keep the scarcity problem solved (which I'd bet we'd be able to pull off). I'm curious as to how we can pull that off given that an ever increasing percentage of young smart capable people are opting out of solving real world problems in favor of "toiling over their virtual realities"...
Because technology give us massive leverage. The economic opportunities aren't going away, and to the extent that we still need labor, compensation will adapt to what makes it worth an individual's time.
Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
#38I really like this read, something just smells off about blaming young people for "wasting years" on video games. We've got a horribly stacked real life "game" where the boomers and elites have horded everything and fucked future generations, blaming an individual for dropping out and not wanting to really participate in that trainwreck is being dishonest at best.
Spot on. I've got a good job and it has gotten me almost nowhere. Land prices have outrun wage gains. No point working. If I didn't have kids I'd drop out.
Landlords, banks and boomers are disgusting.
Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
#39I'm proud of you, bro.
Re: Young men dropping out of the job market to spend time in an alternate reality
#40>Game designers often deploy a technique called “dynamic difficulty adjustment”. In many games, the software assesses a player’s skill and rebalances various attributes of the game accordingly, to keep the game fun and manageable for those of less ability. Gamers early in their careers, or who are simply struggling to pick up the skills necessary to succeed, are given a helping hand; their world might be more generously strewn with useful power-ups, for instance. As players advance, these helping hands are withdrawn.
This sounds really silly, but I honestly consider being thrown into the deep-end when learning how to play Tribes 1 (I started playing in 1999) and DOTA (started 2004) as a child greatly benefited my overall mindset and attitude as I grew older.
I think I qualify as a videogame addict. I've probably spent more than 1/3 of my waking hours since I was nine years old gaming. I'm approaching 5000 hours on DOTA2 alone since 2011, though I've played significantly less games in general within the past three years due to finally being employed. Programming feels just as good, and I get paid on top of it.
I think my social development was stunted, but I feel like I'm mostly normal now as an adult. I really don't have any regrets, and I plan to give my kids completely unrestricted access to their own computer and the internet as soon as they want it, barring any laws or regulations that prevent me from doing so legally.