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A lot of people also have, arguably, less control over their circumstances than ever before. Many Americans are effectively wage-slaves - unable to quit their
by fwip 5y ago
A lot of people also have, arguably, less control over their circumstances than ever before.
Many Americans are effectively wage-slaves - unable to quit their jobs, because they rely on the income and have nearly no savings.
Rent has to be paid. Food has to be bought. Car insurance, taxes, dentist appointments - you can't stop making money, because you can't stop paying money.
Moving costs an up-front investment that you don't have. Land is expensive, and even if you had the skills to build your own lodging, it has to be up to code.
Pivoting to self-employment might seem easy in the age of Uber, but the reality is that it is incredibly difficult to earn yourself a living without playing by somebody else's rules. In the past, you could decide to earn a living as a fisherman simply by fishing and selling your catch. Handy with a hammer? Supplement your income on an ad-hoc basis by helping out your neighbors.
The stress of dealing with everyday life can be so overwhelming that the only thing a person has juice left for at the end of the day is turning on the television, scrolling twitter, and eating those Doritos. And that television (and even twitter) isn't telling you any ways out of the invisible, ubiquitous cycle you're stuck in.
- gen220 5y agoI’ve been reading some oral histories from early/mid-20th century, midcoast Maine in the last month. One theme is scarcity (and the ingenuity borne of it). People didn’t have a lot, so they needed to be clever with what they had. They worked incredibly hard, and invented/sought out tools to make their lives physically easier. They toiled for most of their lives, but they saw their known tool get easier as time went on (upgrading from jute to nylon netting, hydraulic winches instead of manual cranks, sonar instead of trial and error). The people who worked (what seemed to me to be) the worst jobs had a common refrain: “the best thing about X is nobody tells me to do <hard thing> at <unreasonable time> in <unreasonable conditions>. I’m my own boss, make my own decisions, and it keeps me happy.” They owned all the highs, lows, and war stories of business ownership. Also, a fun anecdote. They asked one guy “what would you tell somebody young who’s new into fishing?” He thought hard, then said “I would tell them to study hard and become a doctor or a lawyer or something, if they’re interested in money”. Made me chuckle! Anyways, this is to say that it’s always been hard to seek out self employment or total self sufficiency. Generally, you could always trade off comfort for autonomy [1]. Nowadays, we as a society have made inhabiting that material discomfort nearly illegal, as you imply. We raised the floor of material suffering, but the emotional and psychological floor is only elastically attached to that material floor, with an elasticity coefficient that seems to vary widely from person to person. It seems to have been a monotonic transformation so far, but time will tell. [1]: https://www.granolashotgun.com/granolashotguncom/hp5pmb0n95ut9hyeatewotgd2n1ebr https://www.granolashotgun.com/granolashotguncom/hp5pmb0n95u...
- GordonS 5y ago> Many Americans are effectively wage-slaves - unable to quit their jobs, because they rely on the income and have nearly no savings. Specifically in the USA it's even worse, since jobs are linked to healthcare.
- fwip 5y agoI did mean the USA, my apologies for the confusion. We here in the US often forget about the rest of the Americas.