Education and Men without Work • Hacker News Board

Re: Education and Men without Work

#321

Post by belorn » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 3:18 PM UTC

gallamine wrote: post #105

tathougies wrote: post #5

The article is long on detail and short on suggestions (which is understandable). However, the suggestions it does make are not obviously going to work. The men illustrated in the article do not seem incapable of work, but rather disinterested. Vocational training isn't going to fix the fact that the government benefits the article cited allows the men to stay at home playing video games all day. Most people (but esp…

Also not discussed is the impact of unlimited access to pornography for sexual gratification on the reduction in male desire to do things that traditionally would attract women.

Is there a reason to claim that access to pornography is effecting employment rates for men?

Women did not exist the job market after internet access became widespread. It is thus hard to see any relation between access to pornography and employment rates outside of any gender stereotyping regarding both men and women.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#322

Post by alex_young » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 3:31 PM UTC

alex_young wrote: post #263

This is a wonderful example of how to lie with statistics. Look at the first graph [0]. Super scary up and to the right line that appears to show our labor force being destroyed over time with no link to economic conditions. But wait. Look at the scale. This data represents a 6% change over 50 years. Very weak sauce. Why trust a paper that starts off by deceiving people in such a base way? [0] https://www.nationalaff…

Why the downvotes? It would be great to hear why my observation is incorrect if you disagree.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#323

Post by lovich » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 4:48 PM UTC

r0pchainer wrote: post #210

lovich wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brah. Most jobs are hot garbage right now and video games at least give you tangible goals and rewards. You don't have to be some Uber man to be happy in life, and even if you are super masculine you still will choose the path that feels best. If for whatever reason you're stuck in a place where you have to put in years of effort for a small chance that you might have a better life vs taking a non ideal but still acc…

You're partly right. I work for myself, I fucking love my work, I'm a proper hacker, actually own investment property, two sports cars, and have a pretty nice house paid off for a single guy at 29, but I can't find a decent woman to start a family with. I tried, before I got to where I am, I got out of a 6 year relationship with a girl who was a software engineer. We were perfect together, honestly. But at the end of…

Man, have some self reflection

>In what fucking world is it difficult for a successful man to find a decent, loyal woman to marry?

You ask this question _after_ you said this

>But at the end of the day, she chose pursuing her career in one state, and at the time I pursued my career in a different state in the US, because I wouldn't marry her. Do you think a guy like me was going to follow her around? No. Do you think she's going to find a guy doing better than me now? Slim pickings.

You weren't going to marry her, and you wanted her to abandon her career goals to follow you? Why would someone hurt their career to stay with someone who won't commit to them? You want a servant not a partner, and most people aren't looking to downgrade themselves to servant

Re: Education and Men without Work

#324

Post by mac01021 » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 5:14 PM UTC

xyzzyz wrote: post #40

CptFribble wrote: post #30

I don't see why this is such a surprise, most people hate working. I thought it was almost a truism that people work for retirement, i.e. the point in their life when they have enough saved to stop working and just relax and travel or fish or whatever. If there's a way to skip 30 years of working at a job you hate and just start now, most people would take that option. This is the basic problem with basic income, alt…

we're going to have to undertake a huge cultural shift and accept a large XX% of the populace just sitting around, vaping and playing video games all day I don't think most people care too much about that. Unlike communist states which forced people to work, even if the job was bullshit, this is a free country, and if someone wants to sit around doing nothing useful all day, they are perfectly welcome to do so. What…

> This is blatant unfairness, being punished for working and rewarded for not working.

It's not (not always) blatantly unfair.

I can earn lots of money by working because I live in a society, governed by a body of laws, which has provided tremendous value to me in the form of educational opportunities and an extremely specialized labor force. Our shared civilization also constrains my behavior in myriad ways (I can't just go out and kill animals for food or harvest natural resources wherever I want, for example, and I have to share the limited space on our planet with a lot more people) but, for me, the benefits far outweigh the costs.

But if someone finds themselves in a position where the constraints imposed by civilization outweigh the benefits to them, then it's unfair for society not to help them out.

Ideally, we should all be reimbursed by our shared civilization for the loss of our natural inheritance (our right to live off the land, etc), with society providing the same reimbursement to each member. If people are unable (or just unwilling) to work for additional income beyond that, I won't feel exploited. It'll just be me paying my fair share for the benefit I get at their expense.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#325

Post by belorn » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 5:16 PM UTC

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…

A bit more reasonable expectation of teachers is that they should be able to motivate both boys and girls equally.

A lot of things were different when your grandfather were in school. Most teachers were male, and boys had better grades than girls. The teaching profession was high status profession, highly respected in communities, and well paid. The post world war 1 and 2 era put a lot of focus on practical skills with practical applications in both home and work. In addition the life path of men had very little free choice, in large part to male only military drafts.

From my own reading of education research and reports, making the teacher profession more gender equal and higher status would likely improve the situation for boys without putting higher expectations on the teachers themselves. Beyond that, the lack of male only military drafts means that both boys and girls have now equal freedom to choose what they want to do, and just as some women do not want to enter the work market so do now some men.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#326

Post by wayoutthere » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 5:38 PM UTC

at_a_remove wrote: post #226

wayoutthere wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure you really understand my point; "male socialization" is simply "the way we raise boys" -- which includes the ways we as a society neglect their needs. This isn't a "men versus women" thing, but rather a "we need to pay better attention to boys' emotional needs" thing. When you don't, you teach them that their emotions don't matter and aren't a thing they need to manage to have a healthy, happy life.

I'm not sure you understand my point: the way we raise boys has largely been ceded to women for a while now and heaping "toxic masculinity" (really, when was the last time you saw the second word without the first tugging it along?) shaming on men is just more of the same. We need less of it.

Thanks for proving my point that some men need to learn the skills to be less fragile and entitled. Playing the victim card based on 1950s stereotypes helps nobody and plenty of men are deeply invested in raising their children.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#327

Post by rpiguy » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 5:53 PM UTC

tathougies wrote: post #51

rpiguy wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Disability is a federal benefit (not state) and according to the article a whopping 2/3 of these men are on at least 1 federal disability benefit. Furthermore, 1/2 of the men take prescription pain medication daily. The government benefits certainly make it easier to not work, but the article does pain to say that correlation is not causation - it is a multi-factor phenomenon. Government benefits may enable the behav…

> What really had my brain going is why is this not the case in the Western Europe? Can you explain? Western Europe by and large suffers from the same problem. According to Brookings ( https://www.brookings.edu/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/ccf_201... ), while the US has a faster rate of male labor de-participation, the UK, Canada, and France are experiencing similar issues (Figure 2). No idea about the cause though.

The article says that in Western Europe the rate at which men drop out is much lower than in the US. I only had the article as a frame of reference for my question, I did not have the Brookings institution study for additional color. Interesting reading, thank you.

Re: Education and Men without Work

#328

Post by aratakareigen » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 6:27 PM UTC

cmdshiftf4 wrote: post #261

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…

>The unfortunate truth is that the majority of people live their lives according to the norms of their societies - even when such norms have negative overall outcomes. - People (men and women) are more stressed than ever - People are reporting less satisfaction with life than ever - People are increasingly anxious, isolated and suffering from depression - What once took one person going to work to provide now takes t…

Most of these claims I've never heard before, and I know at least one of them (the claim that inequality is lower than in the recent past) is definitely false, so I feel justified to ask: do you have any sources?

Re: Education and Men without Work

#329

Post by notfromhere » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 6:57 PM UTC

tathougies wrote: post #286

notfromhere wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The inability to understand what toxic masculinity actually is, is so very telling

What a vapid, empty response. I would be ashamed to write something so mindless in response to a well thought out comment. It would make me feel as if I'm resorting to cliche rather than engaging in an intelligent conversation. The commenter is absolutely right that the media is obsessed with articles on toxic masculinity. This is perhaps not a bad thing in and of itself, but media space is limited, and journalists o…

The vapid response is leaning on traditionalism as some kind of end-all-be-all of human relations.

As of women having equal standing is some kind of attack against men. Very pathetic

Re: Education and Men without Work

#330

Post by bumby » Tue, Jan 14, 2020, 7:59 PM UTC

state_less wrote: post #294

Mirioron wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think the two causes listed in the article are actually the causes. I think both are yet another symptom of an underlying problem. I would argue that men doing worse in schooling is likely another symptom of the same issue. I think that the heart of the issue is that more men nowadays feel that they just don't matter. Not to society nor to anyone else. This leads to a situation where they will simply sacrific…

What jobs still benefit from a man's physical strength anymore? Most things that need serious brawn use 'hydraulic muscles'? Soon women won't even ask us to twist the lid off jars anymore, there will be an iRobot for that. Where are men needed these days? We automated away manliness. It's worth less these days. The least valued men are now valued even less. Frankly, I think these disaffected men should go back to the…

It's interesting to me that you equate masculinity to physical strength but nothing else of value