5 ms·

Employment, I ask why? Seriously, full employment is a threat not a promise. Who wants to really work? For what? Mandatory vacations, 6 months per year, 5 hou

Employment, I ask why? Seriously, full employment is a threat not a promise. Who wants to really work? For what? Mandatory vacations, 6 months per year, 5 hour work day. Then we can have full employment. As said in another comment, growth is required to spend more time with family, leisure and to do things that we really want. Well thats not the case, since no matter how much growth there is and how much an economy increases, leisure time, vacations and do what you want does not increase. Working more only produces growth so that a few people on this planet can do what they want, while all the others are still required to work more.

mike-cardwell 15y ago
With six months vacation per year, people would still complain about having to work too much.
- Tycho 15y ago
  They would also complain that those who wanted to work 80 hours per week were stealing all of society's wealth, or something.
mbesto 15y ago
We all have our reasons for working. In some cases I'd much rather be at work than say sit on a beach. I'd get bored after endless days of sitting on a beach right? I think this conversation could easily go into the "whats the meaning of life" topic, so let's try not to go there. My overall point is more so this, what's so evil/bad about the the so-called lost era in Japan? growth is required to spend more time with family, leisure and to do things that we really want. And yet Americans spend more hours at "work" than most other countries. How has our growth shown that?
- DrCatbox 15y ago
  "I think this conversation could easily go into the "whats the meaning of life" topic, so let's try not to go there." Yes, exactly. What we do with our time here is quite important to discuss, and this is usually the entrance to idologies and political parties. I wish we could talk about that more. Do you really want to work 30+ years of your life, then retire hopefully with a small amount of money (if its not "eaten" by the economy), while the top dogs do whatever they want whenever they want? It would be nice with a more balanced approach to work. Not work for work, but work for play. Free will and all that, work if you will, but I highly doubt most workers today would choose thier situation if they could.
OstiaAntica 15y ago
You have fallen for the fallacy that there's a fixed amount of "work" in the economy. That's been disproven time and again, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy Rather, employment is a dynamic pie that can grow as more people add skills and put those skills to work.
- DrCatbox 15y ago
  Interesting fallacy. However, you seldom hear anyone criticize work today, all the theories and economieswant people to work more. Why not work less? Why not work at all? How come that all the effeciency and growth still make people work? Isnt the mother of all invention necessity, to not do something mundane and boring while we could be playing and having sex or dancing. Did humans always work since they began calling themselves human? 200 000 years ago, or any modern hunter gatherer society knew of work. Work is unnecessary for life. It is in fact harmful. Just an idea to play with.
  - pinaceae 15y ago
    without doing work, you die. if you're alone, quite literally, as you would starve to death. modern man is disconnect from nature and questions work. modern man is also very surprised when nature strikes back. a simple camping trip can suddenly become a life and death situation. we live in a world of massive division of labor. hence questions like yours. money is abstract. so go on try living our there for a while, produce your own food and drink. effing hard work i tell you. a full time job.
    - philwelch 15y ago
      The Bushmen were some of the last people on earth to live as hunter-gatherers, in largely the same way that all humans did before we fucked everything up with civilization and technology. They lived very communal lives, but they didn't work anywhere close to 40 hours a week, and spent most of the day chatting and making music. They seemed pretty happy until the civilizations around them came in and ruined their culture.

mike-cardwell 15y ago

With six months vacation per year, people would still complain about having to work too much.

Tycho 15y ago
They would also complain that those who wanted to work 80 hours per week were stealing all of society's wealth, or something.

mbesto 15y ago

We all have our reasons for working. In some cases I'd much rather be at work than say sit on a beach. I'd get bored after endless days of sitting on a beach right? I think this conversation could easily go into the "whats the meaning of life" topic, so let's try not to go there. My overall point is more so this, what's so evil/bad about the the so-called lost era in Japan? growth is required to spend more time with family, leisure and to do things that we really want. And yet Americans spend more hours at "work" than most other countries. How has our growth shown that?

DrCatbox 15y ago
"I think this conversation could easily go into the "whats the meaning of life" topic, so let's try not to go there." Yes, exactly. What we do with our time here is quite important to discuss, and this is usually the entrance to idologies and political parties. I wish we could talk about that more. Do you really want to work 30+ years of your life, then retire hopefully with a small amount of money (if its not "eaten" by the economy), while the top dogs do whatever they want whenever they want? It would be nice with a more balanced approach to work. Not work for work, but work for play. Free will and all that, work if you will, but I highly doubt most workers today would choose thier situation if they could.

OstiaAntica 15y ago

You have fallen for the fallacy that there's a fixed amount of "work" in the economy. That's been disproven time and again, see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lump_of_labour_fallacy Rather, employment is a dynamic pie that can grow as more people add skills and put those skills to work.

DrCatbox 15y ago
Interesting fallacy. However, you seldom hear anyone criticize work today, all the theories and economieswant people to work more. Why not work less? Why not work at all? How come that all the effeciency and growth still make people work? Isnt the mother of all invention necessity, to not do something mundane and boring while we could be playing and having sex or dancing. Did humans always work since they began calling themselves human? 200 000 years ago, or any modern hunter gatherer society knew of work. Work is unnecessary for life. It is in fact harmful. Just an idea to play with.
- pinaceae 15y ago
  without doing work, you die. if you're alone, quite literally, as you would starve to death. modern man is disconnect from nature and questions work. modern man is also very surprised when nature strikes back. a simple camping trip can suddenly become a life and death situation. we live in a world of massive division of labor. hence questions like yours. money is abstract. so go on try living our there for a while, produce your own food and drink. effing hard work i tell you. a full time job.
  - philwelch 15y ago
    The Bushmen were some of the last people on earth to live as hunter-gatherers, in largely the same way that all humans did before we fucked everything up with civilization and technology. They lived very communal lives, but they didn't work anywhere close to 40 hours a week, and spent most of the day chatting and making music. They seemed pretty happy until the civilizations around them came in and ruined their culture.