6 ms·

What If People Don’t Want 'A Career?'

61 points by anarbadalov 5y ago

bluefirebrand 5y ago
There's a lot of different problems in play here and they all stem from slightly different places. There's a lot of worker exploitation going on. People are paid less than they are worth and work more than they are paid for. What are the circumstances that allow this behaviour from companies? It's a more complicated question than just "Why are companies behaving this way", that's easy. Greed, mostly, and because they can get away with it. I'm more interested in why they can get away with it. Too few, or unenforceable regulations? Too many available workers? Too many qualified or overqualified people fighting for too few jobs? Honestly it's fine to not want a career, but you can't do nothing. We rely on people's work to get materials, build and heat homes, grow and distribute food. Society is built upon contribution. A UBI is not the answer because that's still just other people's labour. You cannot have both an opt-in working class and an opt-in nonworking class and have a healthy society.
- ngokevin 5y ago
  An argument for UBI is we are relying less on "people's work" and more on automation, globalization, and a winner-takes-all economy. If more and more contribution is being done by a select few through advanced technology, what is the shrinking working class to do, learn to code? What are the top winners of the current economy contributing as they disproportionately absorb more and more wealth? Especially as they dodge all tax. VAT the companies, use it to fund a UBI. That money is going to immediately flow back into the economy as 60 - 80% live paycheck-to-paycheck.
- nickthemagicman 5y ago
  Actually preliminary studies with UBI seem to show that only a small percentage actually quit working. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_pilots https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_pilots UBI is survival money. It's meant as a social safety net. It's not 'thrive' money. But people want to thrive. So the theory is that people will continue to want jobs to advance themselves and their families. Just with UBI the absence of a job is way less brutal. It's also shrinks the government and allows companies to do layoffs with less brutal consequences to the people being laid off, which allows companies to adjust to economic conditions a lot more easily. -------- Also, just like hunter gathering and farming ways of life were made obsolete by technology, this concept of a 'job' will potentially be made obsolete by technology in the future. As automation and globalization increases and the number of jobs declines exponentially in the US and also around the world...the same value is being generated but the gains are only going to a few people. Were going to have to figure out what to do with a ton of people who want to work but no jobs are available due to this legacy system.
- luffapi 5y ago
  I have no problem with people doing nothing and collecting UBI. There are tons of rich people doing nothing today and they're taking in a lot more money than UBI would provide.
  - zamadatix 5y ago
    The difference being you can't opt to be wealthy. I lean towards UBI myself but "a few rich in society can do it today" is a supporting argument against class division not for why UBI is a sustainable for society as a whole.
    - luffapi 5y ago
      The universal nature of UBI is what makes it appealing. That currently only a privileged few are free from a life of labor is a societal problem that UBI helps address. It doesn't make sense to worry about a fictional labor shortage when there is an excess of profit being captured by the wealthy. If a labor shortage actually existed that differential wouldn't exist, because it couldn't afford to.
      - zamadatix 5y ago
        Agree it's what UBI sets to solve and the reason UBI is appealing but neither of those were in question. You're referring to 2 different "labor shortages" at once there. The proposed labor shortage in the question "what if UBI were available at a life sustaining level" and the labor shortage caused by the current wealthy being able to opt out of labor. That the latter hasn't caused societal labor shortage issues is true but as you say it has been capturing a portion of the profit in a negatively impacting way and it's also on the order of 100x fewer participants than UBI would have. With that in mind it doesn't seem to be unreasonable to ponder what negative impact expanding such a concept 100 fold may have.
        luffapi 5y ago
        I think it's a false assumption to make that there would be devastating, society stopping labor shortages with UBI. I will contend a lot of jobs today are useless (or worse, actually harmful). Many things can definitely be automated as well. I'm sure we can come up with janitorial robots, we just haven't because it's cheaper to exploit people. The goal of society should be to become post-scarcity. All of our technological progress has led in that direction. We currently just live in a period where the majority of the gains have been captured by very few people and that has allowed them to exploit human labor to enrich themselves vs. building a self-sustainable society. Engineered or not, I think that's the inevitable end game of continuing humanity.
- burnished 5y ago
  We already do. The children of the wealthy and influential can just choose not to work.
  - zamadatix 5y ago
    "The children of the wealthy and influential" is not an opt-in class though. Any healthy society should be resilient to 1% of its population being able to leave the workforce for their lifetime, the issue posed is what happens if 100% could.
    - burnished 5y ago
      I don't think its a concern. Most people want to work, when that work is a source of satisfaction or pride in their lives.
      - phil_e_delphian 5y ago
        In line with what you were saying above, I was raised to expect to have multiple career changes in my life. What satisfies us changes as we age, and we may not have the skillset for the dominant, high-earning fields as well
- about_help 5y ago
  People want to be useful, and people don't want to do the same thing for the rest of their lives. These are statistically true generalizations. UBI would allow people to expand their career paths since basic survival would not be on the line. Personally I've got minor health issues from being in front of a computer too much, would absolutely love switching it up with a more physicaly demanding job if I had UBI to make sure a drop in wages wasn't threatening my family's basic survival. This also assumes universal healthcare. "You cannot have both an opt-in working class and an opt-in nonworking class and have a healthy society." So I agree, but I do not think it would become a real problem. If it does become a problem we could implement a lottery system that swaps workers out every so often.
dolni 5y ago
That people reject taking on a career and being productive members of society is troubling. It also displays a ton of ignorance. Suppose we lived in a society where people didn't specialize and there were no careers. What would the day-to-day look like? Well, you probably wouldn't be able to get pharmaceuticals. The expertise required to conceive and produce those is massive. Ditto for healthcare. How about food? Without farmers, we are stuck growing our own or foraging. Too sick to forage or work the field? Then you don't eat. Somebody comes by your home with a weapon. Who do you call? Nobody, that's who. That's what society looks like if everyone opts out of a career. And if everyone can't do it, nobody should be able to. Fairness and all that. Extenuating circumstances notwithstanding, of course.
- luffapi 5y ago
  It's completely logical to not want a career when executives capture all of the profits. It's irrational to work when the execs at your company make 10-100X what you do and the non-working investors capture even more value than that. There is no labor shortage and there never will be. When exec pay equals worker pay, then all of the levers will have been pulled and we can maybe start to talk about a labor shortage. Much of which are jobs that shouldn't exist (ad sales), or things that can be automated.
  - dolni 5y ago
    Executives making too much is not a problem with people having careers and specializing. Executive pay will not, nor should it ever, equal worker pay. I am not going to pretend multiple millions in yearly compensation is reasonable. But there is a bit more responsibility at the executive level than there is at the bottom. Non-working investors are assuming risk. It is a different class of contribution than a worker. And don't forget, those "non-working investors" also include your average folk who are saving for retirement.
    - luffapi 5y ago
      You said: > That people reject taking on a career and being productive members of society is troubling. It also displays a ton of ignorance. I’m saying it’s not ignorant at all, opting out of a system stacked against you is highly logical. I would find it far more troubling if people just ignored the inequality in their own companies and blindly worked to make others rich. That is the real problem.
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
retinaros 5y ago
you know what will happen day one after UBI? all rent will increase to the extent where UBI will go into rich people pockets
jurschreuder 5y ago
I think it's good. Not everybody needs to work anymore, with current levels of automation. We need to normalize not working, instead of the opinion "if I have to work you also have to work".

61 points by anarbadalov 5y ago

There's a lot of different problems in play here and they all stem from slightly different places. There's a lot of worker exploitation going on. People are paid less than they are worth and work more than they are paid for. What are the circumstances that allow this behaviour from companies? It's a more complicated question than just "Why are companies behaving this way", that's easy. Greed, mostly, and because they can get away with it. I'm more interested in why they can get away with it. Too few, or unenforceable regulations? Too many available workers? Too many qualified or overqualified people fighting for too few jobs? Honestly it's fine to not want a career, but you can't do nothing. We rely on people's work to get materials, build and heat homes, grow and distribute food. Society is built upon contribution. A UBI is not the answer because that's still just other people's labour. You cannot have both an opt-in working class and an opt-in nonworking class and have a healthy society.

ngokevin 5y ago
An argument for UBI is we are relying less on "people's work" and more on automation, globalization, and a winner-takes-all economy. If more and more contribution is being done by a select few through advanced technology, what is the shrinking working class to do, learn to code? What are the top winners of the current economy contributing as they disproportionately absorb more and more wealth? Especially as they dodge all tax. VAT the companies, use it to fund a UBI. That money is going to immediately flow back into the economy as 60 - 80% live paycheck-to-paycheck.
nickthemagicman 5y ago
Actually preliminary studies with UBI seem to show that only a small percentage actually quit working. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_pilots https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_pilots UBI is survival money. It's meant as a social safety net. It's not 'thrive' money. But people want to thrive. So the theory is that people will continue to want jobs to advance themselves and their families. Just with UBI the absence of a job is way less brutal. It's also shrinks the government and allows companies to do layoffs with less brutal consequences to the people being laid off, which allows companies to adjust to economic conditions a lot more easily. -------- Also, just like hunter gathering and farming ways of life were made obsolete by technology, this concept of a 'job' will potentially be made obsolete by technology in the future. As automation and globalization increases and the number of jobs declines exponentially in the US and also around the world...the same value is being generated but the gains are only going to a few people. Were going to have to figure out what to do with a ton of people who want to work but no jobs are available due to this legacy system.
luffapi 5y ago
I have no problem with people doing nothing and collecting UBI. There are tons of rich people doing nothing today and they're taking in a lot more money than UBI would provide.
- zamadatix 5y ago
  The difference being you can't opt to be wealthy. I lean towards UBI myself but "a few rich in society can do it today" is a supporting argument against class division not for why UBI is a sustainable for society as a whole.
  - luffapi 5y ago
    The universal nature of UBI is what makes it appealing. That currently only a privileged few are free from a life of labor is a societal problem that UBI helps address. It doesn't make sense to worry about a fictional labor shortage when there is an excess of profit being captured by the wealthy. If a labor shortage actually existed that differential wouldn't exist, because it couldn't afford to.
    - zamadatix 5y ago
      Agree it's what UBI sets to solve and the reason UBI is appealing but neither of those were in question. You're referring to 2 different "labor shortages" at once there. The proposed labor shortage in the question "what if UBI were available at a life sustaining level" and the labor shortage caused by the current wealthy being able to opt out of labor. That the latter hasn't caused societal labor shortage issues is true but as you say it has been capturing a portion of the profit in a negatively impacting way and it's also on the order of 100x fewer participants than UBI would have. With that in mind it doesn't seem to be unreasonable to ponder what negative impact expanding such a concept 100 fold may have.
      - luffapi 5y ago
        I think it's a false assumption to make that there would be devastating, society stopping labor shortages with UBI. I will contend a lot of jobs today are useless (or worse, actually harmful). Many things can definitely be automated as well. I'm sure we can come up with janitorial robots, we just haven't because it's cheaper to exploit people. The goal of society should be to become post-scarcity. All of our technological progress has led in that direction. We currently just live in a period where the majority of the gains have been captured by very few people and that has allowed them to exploit human labor to enrich themselves vs. building a self-sustainable society. Engineered or not, I think that's the inevitable end game of continuing humanity.
burnished 5y ago
We already do. The children of the wealthy and influential can just choose not to work.
- zamadatix 5y ago
  "The children of the wealthy and influential" is not an opt-in class though. Any healthy society should be resilient to 1% of its population being able to leave the workforce for their lifetime, the issue posed is what happens if 100% could.
  - burnished 5y ago
    I don't think its a concern. Most people want to work, when that work is a source of satisfaction or pride in their lives.
    - phil_e_delphian 5y ago
      In line with what you were saying above, I was raised to expect to have multiple career changes in my life. What satisfies us changes as we age, and we may not have the skillset for the dominant, high-earning fields as well
about_help 5y ago
People want to be useful, and people don't want to do the same thing for the rest of their lives. These are statistically true generalizations. UBI would allow people to expand their career paths since basic survival would not be on the line. Personally I've got minor health issues from being in front of a computer too much, would absolutely love switching it up with a more physicaly demanding job if I had UBI to make sure a drop in wages wasn't threatening my family's basic survival. This also assumes universal healthcare. "You cannot have both an opt-in working class and an opt-in nonworking class and have a healthy society." So I agree, but I do not think it would become a real problem. If it does become a problem we could implement a lottery system that swaps workers out every so often.

dolni 5y ago

That people reject taking on a career and being productive members of society is troubling. It also displays a ton of ignorance. Suppose we lived in a society where people didn't specialize and there were no careers. What would the day-to-day look like? Well, you probably wouldn't be able to get pharmaceuticals. The expertise required to conceive and produce those is massive. Ditto for healthcare. How about food? Without farmers, we are stuck growing our own or foraging. Too sick to forage or work the field? Then you don't eat. Somebody comes by your home with a weapon. Who do you call? Nobody, that's who. That's what society looks like if everyone opts out of a career. And if everyone can't do it, nobody should be able to. Fairness and all that. Extenuating circumstances notwithstanding, of course.

luffapi 5y ago
It's completely logical to not want a career when executives capture all of the profits. It's irrational to work when the execs at your company make 10-100X what you do and the non-working investors capture even more value than that. There is no labor shortage and there never will be. When exec pay equals worker pay, then all of the levers will have been pulled and we can maybe start to talk about a labor shortage. Much of which are jobs that shouldn't exist (ad sales), or things that can be automated.
- dolni 5y ago
  Executives making too much is not a problem with people having careers and specializing. Executive pay will not, nor should it ever, equal worker pay. I am not going to pretend multiple millions in yearly compensation is reasonable. But there is a bit more responsibility at the executive level than there is at the bottom. Non-working investors are assuming risk. It is a different class of contribution than a worker. And don't forget, those "non-working investors" also include your average folk who are saving for retirement.
  - luffapi 5y ago
    You said: > That people reject taking on a career and being productive members of society is troubling. It also displays a ton of ignorance. I’m saying it’s not ignorant at all, opting out of a system stacked against you is highly logical. I would find it far more troubling if people just ignored the inequality in their own companies and blindly worked to make others rich. That is the real problem.

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

retinaros 5y ago

you know what will happen day one after UBI? all rent will increase to the extent where UBI will go into rich people pockets

jurschreuder 5y ago

I think it's good. Not everybody needs to work anymore, with current levels of automation. We need to normalize not working, instead of the opinion "if I have to work you also have to work".