Why do we assume everyone should be working?
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Why do we assume everyone should be working?
1–10 of 118 posts
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#2Before that, a more important question is: why assume that buying or having "more stuff" leads to a better life?
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#3Worth reading rather than reacting to the title. The author is basically arguing that "some people are too stupid to be worth the effort to employee them", not the more familiar way this phrase is used.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#4Before that, a more important question is: why assume that buying or having "more stuff" leads to a better life?
Also true but that's not something I can easily show with economics.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#5> utilizing a resource to it’s fullest at all times is not a given
Typos like this (it's instead of possessive its) used to be bother me but now it's a hint that it might be human-authored, which is quaint, so it's stopped bothering me as much.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#6> utilizing a resource to it’s fullest at all times is not a given Typos like this (it's instead of possessive its) used to be bother me but now it's a hint that it might be human-authored, which is quaint, so it's stopped bothering me as much.
<3 you know what, I'm keeping it now.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#7Worth reading rather than reacting to the title. The author is basically arguing that "some people are too stupid to be worth the effort to employee them", not the more familiar way this phrase is used.
So by "working", the author really means "working for a wage"?
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#8I appreciate this reflection. I'm not sure if we assume we need everyone participating in the labor market, that we need their active contribution. I think it might be more about "well, if they're not, they're lazy and we're supporting them, they're getting a free ride."
So I think often there is this kinda contempt at someone not having a job.
But what I've often said, and may rephrase after I say it, is that people don't need a job, they need money and something to do.
And while it may not be those exact two things, perhaps it's different ones or more, I think a job is a compressed object that we assume needs to exist. And when we decompress it, we can see what people might actually need from it and provide those things in different ways.
So I'm excited to see you questioning the "job" object and curious to see how we might pull it apart and how that might actually solve some of the underlying problems that we can't seem to address.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#9Because we got used to the idea that who is not working, is consuming resources made by those working and putting in effort. Then those putting in effort say "if I could get resources without putting in effort, why should I put the effort?".
> ere is a very simple statement which may sound a bit mean: it is entirely feasible that giving a job to a “stupid” person, regardless of how much we try and train them, might cost the economy more than we benefit, in aggregate.
Well, if they don't put in effort, however small, and get resources, others will try to be stupid too. Or, they would not get enough resources, starve and those with empathy will be very vocal and use shame.
Re: Why do we assume everyone should be working?
#10It might be a net loss to the economy, true.
But to me it’s about you trying to contribute.
I don’t want to give my hard earned tax money to some lazy dude not working and smoking weed all day.
But if said guy worked as many hours as I did, just not profitably but through a sponsored job, I’d be fine with sponsoring him with my money.
Because he’s still contributing. He is still adding value, even if not as much as somebody else could.