4 ms·

This is stupid, there is one thing I value which hasn't changed much between now and then - my time. If I owned my time I could spend it reading, talking to fri

This is stupid, there is one thing I value which hasn't changed much between now and then - my time. If I owned my time I could spend it reading, talking to friends, thinking. These things haven't changed much between now and then. From a UK perspective, a reasonable house in London costs 1 million. So broadly, until I have that level of assets, I don't own my time because I must work and don't have a choice about it. I work somewhere between 10 and 12 hours a day, 6 days a week on average, on a much higher than average salary and it will take me almost a lifetime to have the assets to own my time. This comparison is only relevant for those people who already own most of their time, so say $500,000 and above assets. Which is a lot of people but not most.

rectangletangle 9y ago
Although we may have far more creature comforts today. Land, housing, and other core assets are as expensive as ever.
- zimablue 9y ago
  Ironically, reading the comments it seems that this is written from some right wing perspective of "everyone should be happy with their lot". But counting wealth in terms of nice things you can eat and cosmetic surgery itself betrays a massively out of touch perspective. Almost everyone in the world spends almost all of their time working a job that they hate, because they have no choice about it. The people who view work less like this are mostly the upper classes, because for them work is much more likely to be vocational, fun or semi-optional. If you meet someone working in tech or trading in finance, there's a skew but they might have a rich or poor background. If you meet a journalist, or anyone with a "cool" or "fun" job, they're almost certainly very wealthy by background.
brucephillips 9y ago
So you would sacrifice antibiotics, advanced cancer treatment, air travel, the internet, telephones, etc. to have more free time to talk to your friends, read, and think? I wouldn't.
- zimablue 9y ago
  Those were just examples, in reality it's more free time to do absolutely anything. If you take the health side, I think Rockefeller would have had a higher life expectancy than me. I could be wrong but if you account for the higher life expectancy of the rich and the detrimental effects of stress, I think it would be close. But say he had a five year shorter expectancy, well if you say that time working a job is worth 50% of normal time (and also consider that most people would value 20-40 more than 60-80. Then he has an effective life expectancy decades longer. Screw the internet, phones and flights I'll trade for a grand tour, a private theatre, my own university, a private harem. If I'm lucky I'll get ten years to be completely free, in the other case I get 70 (?).
- smallnamespace 9y ago
  Not to be overly reductionist, but from an evolutionary perspective isn't one of the most important things the survival of your own genes? Seems especially in modern societies the actual cost, effort required, and difficulty of finding a mate and raising children responsibly (e.g. so that they might also be in a position to have children if they desire) is much higher than it was in the past (hence the sharply declining birthrates in all modern nations). You have outwardly modern, prosperous nations like Japan going through slow demographic implosions. If things are so great, why doesn't society want to, or manage to reproduce itself in the aggregate? Are modern conveniences, travel, time to read, travel, etc., the ends in and of themselves, or are they just supposed to be the means to the only goal that nature cares about in the long term, which the survival and propagation of parts of our ourselves? Not of the individual, since that will always perish, but our genes, our thoughts, our values and cultures?
  - djrogers 9y ago
    > Seems especially in modern societies the actual cost, effort required, and difficulty of finding a mate and raising children responsibly (e.g. so that they might also be in a position to have children if they desire) is much higher than it was in the past (hence the sharply declining birthrates in all modern nations). No, not at all. Sociologists do not at all believe that declining birth rates are because its harder to raise kids. It’s never been easier! Healthcare in most of the developed world is taken care of for the majority of people, basic education is free, and food is so cheap and abundant you’d have to actively try to raise a malnourished child today. The idea that delivering and raising a child was easier or cheaper 100,200, or 500 years ago is ludicrous.
jopsen 9y ago
Lots of people in Europe work 35-45 hours per week, have decent healthcare, dental, school systems and free time. In fact the EU mandates vacation time. Few jobs are physically hard and lots of people have the option to choose between free time and money. Sure being rich in 1916 offers some different benefits.. but I'm not sure I would swap.
- zimablue 9y ago
  40 hours a week plus a commute leaves you weekends and late evenings, which you won't enjoy because you're tired. And a lot of these people are trapped by a mortgage, and spent a lot of their energy and health worrying about bills. Maybe you or I wouldn't swap but the idea that most people in the town I grew up in wouldn't swap is actually absurd. Fear of insecurity is absolutely brutal.
  - jopsen 9y ago
    > Fear of insecurity is absolutely brutal This is probably the thing that would make people swap. I also feel like it's a thing that mostly affect poor Americans. GP was from UK and if you ask the same question in Northern/Western Europe I feel like risks of bankruptcy and homelessness is a lower.
- ido 9y ago
  40h/week doesn’t feel like it’s leaving me with a lot of time at all - I would much rather work 4 days a week for 80% of my salary or even 3 days for 60%.

rectangletangle 9y ago

Although we may have far more creature comforts today. Land, housing, and other core assets are as expensive as ever.

zimablue 9y ago
Ironically, reading the comments it seems that this is written from some right wing perspective of "everyone should be happy with their lot". But counting wealth in terms of nice things you can eat and cosmetic surgery itself betrays a massively out of touch perspective. Almost everyone in the world spends almost all of their time working a job that they hate, because they have no choice about it. The people who view work less like this are mostly the upper classes, because for them work is much more likely to be vocational, fun or semi-optional. If you meet someone working in tech or trading in finance, there's a skew but they might have a rich or poor background. If you meet a journalist, or anyone with a "cool" or "fun" job, they're almost certainly very wealthy by background.

brucephillips 9y ago

So you would sacrifice antibiotics, advanced cancer treatment, air travel, the internet, telephones, etc. to have more free time to talk to your friends, read, and think? I wouldn't.

zimablue 9y ago
Those were just examples, in reality it's more free time to do absolutely anything. If you take the health side, I think Rockefeller would have had a higher life expectancy than me. I could be wrong but if you account for the higher life expectancy of the rich and the detrimental effects of stress, I think it would be close. But say he had a five year shorter expectancy, well if you say that time working a job is worth 50% of normal time (and also consider that most people would value 20-40 more than 60-80. Then he has an effective life expectancy decades longer. Screw the internet, phones and flights I'll trade for a grand tour, a private theatre, my own university, a private harem. If I'm lucky I'll get ten years to be completely free, in the other case I get 70 (?).
smallnamespace 9y ago
Not to be overly reductionist, but from an evolutionary perspective isn't one of the most important things the survival of your own genes? Seems especially in modern societies the actual cost, effort required, and difficulty of finding a mate and raising children responsibly (e.g. so that they might also be in a position to have children if they desire) is much higher than it was in the past (hence the sharply declining birthrates in all modern nations). You have outwardly modern, prosperous nations like Japan going through slow demographic implosions. If things are so great, why doesn't society want to, or manage to reproduce itself in the aggregate? Are modern conveniences, travel, time to read, travel, etc., the ends in and of themselves, or are they just supposed to be the means to the only goal that nature cares about in the long term, which the survival and propagation of parts of our ourselves? Not of the individual, since that will always perish, but our genes, our thoughts, our values and cultures?
- djrogers 9y ago
  > Seems especially in modern societies the actual cost, effort required, and difficulty of finding a mate and raising children responsibly (e.g. so that they might also be in a position to have children if they desire) is much higher than it was in the past (hence the sharply declining birthrates in all modern nations). No, not at all. Sociologists do not at all believe that declining birth rates are because its harder to raise kids. It’s never been easier! Healthcare in most of the developed world is taken care of for the majority of people, basic education is free, and food is so cheap and abundant you’d have to actively try to raise a malnourished child today. The idea that delivering and raising a child was easier or cheaper 100,200, or 500 years ago is ludicrous.

jopsen 9y ago

Lots of people in Europe work 35-45 hours per week, have decent healthcare, dental, school systems and free time. In fact the EU mandates vacation time. Few jobs are physically hard and lots of people have the option to choose between free time and money. Sure being rich in 1916 offers some different benefits.. but I'm not sure I would swap.

zimablue 9y ago
40 hours a week plus a commute leaves you weekends and late evenings, which you won't enjoy because you're tired. And a lot of these people are trapped by a mortgage, and spent a lot of their energy and health worrying about bills. Maybe you or I wouldn't swap but the idea that most people in the town I grew up in wouldn't swap is actually absurd. Fear of insecurity is absolutely brutal.
- jopsen 9y ago
  > Fear of insecurity is absolutely brutal This is probably the thing that would make people swap. I also feel like it's a thing that mostly affect poor Americans. GP was from UK and if you ask the same question in Northern/Western Europe I feel like risks of bankruptcy and homelessness is a lower.
ido 9y ago
40h/week doesn’t feel like it’s leaving me with a lot of time at all - I would much rather work 4 days a week for 80% of my salary or even 3 days for 60%.