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maybe this is my tendency towards left-wing anti-establishmentarianism speaking, but I feel that this is somewhat blaming the workers for what is really - I thi
by permo-w 6y ago
maybe this is my tendency towards left-wing anti-establishmentarianism speaking, but I feel that this is somewhat blaming the workers for what is really - I think anyway - a result of the capital holders taking most of the profits from the advances in automation, and then using that money to successfully lobby governments to lower their taxes and not close the tax loopholes, resulting in wages staying the same, and people working the same hours
- thundergolfer 6y agoDavid Graeber absolutely would not blame the workers for the situation he describes above.
- lasagnaphil 6y agoHe isn't really just blaming the workers for this, he's blaming an ideological component of our everyday lives that have been engraved in the minds of both workers and capitalists. In his book Graeber goes onto length on how this dialetic of "compensatory consumerism" has been established throughout society, going all the way back to the Protestant work ethic, the labor theory of value, and then the scientific management of Taylorism. He doesn't just critique the phenomenon of bullshit jobs as simply "blame capitalism" or "blame the workers", it's far more subtle than that, and I would recommend reading the full book if you are curious about it.