4 ms·

Nothing is a guarantee of a good life. It seems like people think you should be able to just check a few boxes, then slot into a 9-5 and have everything taken

• francisofascii 6y ago
  To be fair, it used to work like that in America. Graduate high school, get a decent paying union job in your hometown with an okay house to raise a family. Drink beer and watch sports on the weekends with neighborhood buddies. Work 30-40 years and retire.
  • foobiekr 6y ago
    Even on the relatively short timeline of the history of the US, the period you’re referring to was quite short.
    • sokoloff 6y ago
      Which was launched and substantially overlapped with a period where the US was the largest export manufacturing base left standing and where massive rebuilding was needed on more than one continent. I hope to not experience a repeat of those initial conditions.
    • francisofascii 6y ago
      With the huge increases in productivity since the 1950's, people should be working less hours than in 1950. I don't have a good reason why this should be an anomaly in history.
      • geodel 6y ago
        Sure, if one is willing to stay at 50's living standard. Trouble is what used to be luxury then is now basic necessity and "everyone" must have it.
        • francisofascii 6y ago
          Exactly. We come back to our original problem. Our society turned "luxuries" like college, into basic necessities that one must do or have. Two cars, big homes, two parents able to work, phones, etc. are all great, but they cease to be luxuries when they become required.
  • mpfundstein 6y ago
    i'd also argue that this definition of a good life only applies to certain subset of people. i would die on the inside
    • francisofascii 6y ago
      Sure, but I would argue you are in the minority, and it is a large subset of people who can work hard and be dependable, but don't have the talent to be a highly skilled knowledge worker, or can't pivot to different skill sets, which is required to have dependable employment these days.
  • enkid 6y ago
    It may have worked like that for a portion of the population for a short period of time, but getting a union job was not a guarantee, and what your describing was not possible or very difficult for the majority of the population like women, non-white people, and recent immigrants.
  • refurb 6y ago
    That’s a cherry picked example. Good union jobs were more plentiful back then, but by no means readily available to everyone. Just like today, plenty of people struggled to make ends meet.
  • chasd00 6y ago
    to the current generation that is not a good life, that is a terrible life. If you're life isn't follow-worthy then you're failing.
• eli_gottlieb 6y ago
  >It seems like people think you should be able to just check a few boxes, then slot into a 9-5 and have everything taken care of for you for the rest of your life. If you're not particularly ambitious, yes. The whole system runs on ordinary people's labor, and it's an authoritarian system: when you go to work, you're following orders. It shouldn't be on you to take constant initiative and exercise your intelligence in finding new orders to follow, new ways to subordinate yourself to someone else's goals. If you want to treat people as subordinates, you have to take care of them, and yes, that means taking off the anxiety and cognitive load of potential unemployment. If you want people to do all this thinking for themselves, why shouldn't they recognize they're being exploited and get rid of you and your system?
  • imgabe 6y ago
    First, the system doesn't belong to any one person. Not even the owner of a company. They own one company. They don't own capitalism itself. And yes, you are always free to get rid of any one company's system and start your own system (i.e. company). What people find when they do this is that with freedom comes a lot of responsibility.