11 ms·

America’s fever of workaholism is finally breaking

84 points by sharkweek 4y ago

wavelander 4y ago
Archive Link: https://web.archive.org/web/20230131131321/https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2023/01/american-rich-men-work-less-hours-workism/672895/ https://web.archive.org/web/20230131131321/https://www.theat...
- pschuegr 4y ago
  Is it just me or is that archive link also paywalled?
lordleft 4y ago
I think Americans extol work for its own sake in a rather unhealthy way. I also think "hard work" is presented as a panacea for a host of problems, including poverty, despite the fact that many poor people break their backs toiling all their lives without meaningfully climbing the social ladder. "Just work hard" is actually profoundly unhelpful advice, without specific strategies and acknowledgements of all the systemic forces that give some people a leg up (and hold many others back). Contrary to the rhetoric of the anti-work movement, I think work is bound up in self-expression, and to meaningfully contribute to the creation of something beneficial to others or to yourself is a deep human longing. I just think that we speak of work in a very crude and superficial way here in the US.
- WalterBright 4y ago
  It's never work hard, it's work smart. This is because it's about working effectively, i.e. getting things done. Working hard doing things that have little to no value is a waste of effort.
  - dmreedy 4y ago
    I feel the trick with this heuristic is that it is only measurable post hoc. It could be argued that things don't have value until they exist[0], which takes work. And plenty of things aren't valuable, until they are. So in that light, it's about oracle, or luck, directing your hard work towards efficacy. "Work Hard" is the only advice you can give without perfect knowledge of the future. We usually just leave out the depressing second half of the aphorism: "but sometimes it won't matter." [0] I can hear the entire finance industry starting to interject all at once
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      I believe the word you're looking for is "risk". Nothing is guaranteed.
      - dmreedy 4y ago
        I believe I choose my words carefully. You are correct that nothing is guaranteed. Now reconcile that with your position. What is "smart work" in light of risk?
        WalterBright 4y ago
        > What is "smart work" in light of risk? Just what I said. Do things that create value.
        dmreedy 4y ago
        And if the work you did is not "valuable", at the end of it, it is by definition not smart? Or does some smart work go unrewarded? And by complement then, does some un-smart work get rewarded? If I flip a coin and say, "it will come up heads", was the act of flipping "working smart", when it does? Is it feckless hard work when I get tails instead?
    - albntomat0 4y ago
      I think your view doesn’t consider that we can make informed estimates for the future, with plans specifically for if we’re wrong. I can choose which programming languages and other technical skills I learn based on current use, as well as estimates for their future. I could become an expert in the wrong JavaScript framework, but learning Typescript and React is far more likely to be valuable than learning to be a telegraph repairman.
  - onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago
    > This is because it's about working effectively, i.e. getting things done. It's about getting things done if you're a business. If you're an employee, and your goal is to have money to afford a nice life, it's about extracting money from the business - which, strangely, is often maximized in ways that don't involve "getting things done" i.e. delivering the business any actual value. If you want to get ahead in your career or financially - the WORST thing you can do is mindlessly do a good job at what you're told to do or what you think (after spending much effort) is the best use of your time. It's about very specifically checking the boxes that get your more pay or moving up in your career or whatever it is you're after.
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      Selling your labor for money is just another kind of business. > it's about extracting money from the business - which, strangely, is often maximized in ways that don't involve "getting things done" i.e. delivering the business any actual value. Businesses that pay people who don't provide value are soon to go out of business.
      - onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago
        > Businesses that pay people who don't provide value are soon to go out of business. Beg to differ. Nobody does this better than Fortune 500 companies.
        WalterBright 4y ago
        Fortune 500 companies can and do go bankrupt.
        willcipriano 4y ago
        They will keep making new ones
        piva00 4y ago
        But not really since they will be acquired by some other company and their ghost will keep haunting.
  - dolni 4y ago
    Isn't working smart somewhat implied? Tossing a five gallon jug on your shoulder and running up and down a flight of stairs for hours is REALLY hard work. And yet you don't see people take this on as a job and then complain about it. So instead someone goes out and gets an entry-level position. The options are limited, because they have no skills. The problem now is they never invest in building skills, so they are stuck in shit-tier jobs forever. I want to have some empathy for this. But if I go to a convenience store and somehow it takes the cashier 10 minutes to checkout 3 people, that empathy becomes hard to find. At the end of the day, every person getting a paycheck needs to produce more value to the business than they get paid. The only other way is to tax people who DO actually contribute and spread the money around. There are some serious concerns of fairness about that.
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      > Isn't working smart somewhat implied? Too many people believe in the labor theory of value, meaning one should get paid according to how hard and long one works. This theory is a false god, because employers do not care how long or hard you work, they only care about the value produced. Being smart means applying your efforts at producing value, and finding ways to produce more value.
      - dmreedy 4y ago
        They're all false gods. Chicago economics are just as much of a demiurge as any model that includes "just" or distributional reward. It mostly comes down to whom god favors. Do you believe that most hard workers don't believe they are applying their efforts towards producing value? Do you believe that everyone who receives reward for producing value , did?
        WalterBright 4y ago
        Free markets are about enabling people to produce value and reap the benefits of that value. That works, as history very amply shows.
- balderdash 4y ago
  Two thoughts: 1) is that hard work is not the solution but rather largely a prerequisite to solving host of problems (I.e. getting out of poverty is dependent on a host of factors but if one isn’t willing to work hard, your chances are much slimmer) 2) your points about self identity being intertwined with work is an important one, and something I struggle with quite a bit.
lethologica 4y ago
Not an American, just a human being, but I was not brought into this world to work for 60 years in a job I only tolerate and then die. Forget that. That idea makes me sick to my stomach when I think about it. I am a human being and I am capable of so much more than I can even imagine. We all are. It’s a shame so much of us are forced to spend the best parts of our lives chained to a desk.
- nxmnxm99 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - OnlineGladiator 4y ago
    The guy you described sounds a lot more interesting than a desk jockey.
    - elzbardico 4y ago
      At the bare minimum, he enjoys life more.
    - nxmnxm99 4y ago
      Spoken like someone who hasn’t met people like that. They’re significantly more one dimensional than the wage slave tbh. At least the wage slave has the character of resentment.
  - gnulinux 4y ago
    These kind of comments are so heartbreaking. Is this really what you think humans are without work? You think people would just resort to hedonism, and addiction if not for corporations who kindly introduce order in our lives? When I look at humanity I see art, science, passion, inspiration, admiration and curiosity. If people didn't have to work 60 hours a week, they would be artists, parents, lovers, researchers etc... I'm truly, truly sad that not all of believe in this. I deeply apologize for this possibly snarky, irrelevant comment, maybe it shouldn't be allowed. I just wanted to offer my perspective.
mmastrac 4y ago
.
- paulpauper 4y ago
  It benefits everyone. Earning more money means higher standards of living, financial security
  - triceratops 4y ago
    Did it work?
    - WalterBright 4y ago
      Yes.
paweladamczuk 4y ago
Actually working archive link: https://archive.is/qyKaA https://archive.is/qyKaA
grammers 4y ago
> “I think the pandemic has clearly reduced workaholism,” Shin told me. “And by the way, I think that’s a very positive thing for this country.” I didn't even know workaholism was a word. Good on me, I guess. :)
luckylion 4y ago
> In 2019, I called this phenomenon “workism.” In a time of declining religiosity, rich Americans seemed to turn to their career to fill the spiritual vacuum at the center of their life. For better or (very often) for worse, their desk had become their altar. I find this a very strange idea, and I think it's mostly formed by looking at something without understanding it. The people's motivation the author finds is "they've replaced religion with work". Why isn't it more practical: there's a lot of stuff to do and they want it done, so they do it? Maybe it's just a divide where neither side understands the other, but I've never understood people who see a big task they want done and don't sink their teeth into it and work hard to get it done. I guess on Orwell's Animal Farm, there's Boxer and there's Napoleon, and Napoleon wonders why Boxer works so hard.
- piva00 4y ago
  > there's a lot of stuff to do and they want it done, so they do it? Why they do it though? What's this deep longing that causes them to be more productive instead of, you know, enjoying life? There will always be lots to be done, and the more that is done the more work will be created to be done on top. I do agree with the point that losing some sense of spirituality (not necessarily a religious/supernatural one) has removed at least one facet of facing life as a human. Doing work for the sake of feeling accomplished by completing a task seems very meaningless when you are aware you only have one life to experience whatever your soul will be able to, digging your teeth into an endless stream of stuff to do don't really aggrandise your soul, it just makes you a more efficient little human machine.
  - luckylion 4y ago
    Why do people in (at least some) poor countries work more (not necessarily more productive for lack of machinery etc, but certainly more) than those in rich countries? I believe because they need to do more to survive or increase their quality of life. I'm convinced that there are many things that need just raw manpower thrown at them to make society run as well as it does, and if we all did what in Germany is called "Dienst nach Vorschrift" (aka only do the minimum contractually required), we'd quickly end up with things falling apart. To me it roughly boils down to Kant: act in a way that could be made into law. To prioritize ones leisure and comfort over the needs of society doesn't feel like something we could make into law and still keep being a society.
endisneigh 4y ago
On one hand, working so much can't be great. On the other hand, I've noticed far fewer services now compared to say, 2015. Curious times ahead.
zxcvbn4038 4y ago
I’m not really a big fan of the “Star Trek” utopia where everyone seems to sit around painting and cooking soul food either. Been to New York City lately? We’re only 50% remote work and the entire city smells like pot around the clock. The first thing I notice when I travel out of the city is the lack of pot smell. So apparently the future is mostly getting baked and surfing Pornhub in 8K HDR on a 65” tv in full view of everyone (the apts here don’t come with window coverings so facing the tv instead of the window is the most modesty you can hope for a lot of the time). Some people need to be given a purpose because otherwise they don’t have one. There is a lot of middle ground between the two extremes of total work and no work.
- alephnerd 4y ago
  Correlation doesn't necessarily imply causation. Retail Marijuana sales have only just started in NYC around the same time as remote work, plus outdoor smoking was legalized barely a year ago, so that might be a factor to the increased prevalence of of smelling Dank in the City. Beats hotboxing your apartment or car.
- elijaht 4y ago
  No opinion on your overall point (my gut feeling is that some type of steady work is net good for society as a whole) Your evidence is ridiculous. I'm frequently out and about in NYC and I can smell pot every once in a while but not "constantly". I would also imagine that the # of folks smoking pot during work hours is minimal and I don't see an issue with it if you aren't on the clock. I have never seen porn through someones window either lol. Also most people install window coverings.
  - itisit 4y ago
    I'm out and about every day in Manhattan, uptown, downtown, and in between. And every day I smell pot multiple times per day. It is positively ubiquitous and disgusting.
- kitsunesoba 4y ago
  I think what’s being observed here is a sort of whiplash, not dissimilar to how a teenager whose upbringing has been extremely restrictive will likely go hog wild the second they’re no longer subject to their parents’ rules. If one were born into a Star Trek utopia and never had most of their spark of creativity/curiosity extinguished by a school system designed to pump out worker drones and never had the majority of their waking hours sold off just to exist, I believe they’d be a lot less likely to be a couch potato. There’s no reason the go nuts with burning personal time with “junk food” recreation when personal time has never been at a shortage.
jsz0 4y ago
The ole carrot and stick trick only works when we believe the carrot is obtainable.
jzellis 4y ago
Came here just to see the contrarian nerd opinions and by God and sonny Jesus I was not disappointed. ¦-D
flandish 4y ago
Everyone, upon entering the workforce, should be required to read Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” before they start at any job.
Damogran6 4y ago
I worked at a 60-hour-a-week-average job and the attitude of 'that was last week, what have you done for me this week' followed by being RIFed the second the spreadsheet told them to... Life's too short. I've lost two of 4 parents and working more hours aren't going to bring them back.
hpen 4y ago
Hey guys turns out I actually enjoy the satisfaction I get from working. I certainly value spending the afternoon working leaves me happier at bedtime than if I watched YouTube or whatever. It’s anecdotal but I have been feeling a sense of a war on work as of lately.
sershe 4y ago
It's interesting the comments here are about (a) dead-end jobs where they don't care about you (b) poverty and such (c) jobs one only tolerates vs self-realization. The article however is about the upper-middle class men. So, these arguments are really irrelevant to them (except maybe the caring bit, but I doubt career-oriented people are unaware of how little companies care about them - they can, after all switch, companies). In tech, I've met tons of people who work a lot because they like it and people who could have obviously retired (startup exits) but keep working anyway, in not-so-glamorous jobs, some even as ICs with all the attendant BS. Apparently less people identify with work and want to work, for a reason that Atlantic fails to tease out. Atlantic claims it's better this way but I'm not so sure. Better for whom? I'm not even certain it's better for the upper-middle class men themselves - would they get some better ways to self-actualize instead? Not a given. It's unlikely better for the economy, or for anyone else really. Everyone has different preferences. Based on those they get different outcomes. I actually have also met, and read on HN tons of people in tech who kinda resent people who work a lot because it makes them look bad. But many cannot admit this to others (or themselves) so they invent all kinds of justifications about how it's bad for people to work hard for an uncaring company not being a founder, or how it's better to have kids or go surfing and be a balanced person, or whatever. And really this outcome of getting more done is bad and maybe even fake and they are not better than me! It's like the books about athletes, where they always emphasize that people who realize their genetic potential are the ones who love the grind and train a ton in a structured way (practicing serves, reading chess books, doing drills, whatever it is). If you don't like the boring repetitive training, and don't force yourself, you won't get as good. Then you can either say "well, I am not as good at training so I'm not going to get good at this sport, it's my fault only, and that's ok". Or you can come up with some excuses or devalue others' outcomes. This article is just the latter "oh I was too lazy to practice serves so I never got good at tennis, but all those tennis players kept practicing even after making a bunch of money. Well now they are stopping and it makes me feel better, so I conclude it's better for society"
- ck425 4y ago
  > Everyone has different preferences. Based on those they get different outcomes. I actually have also met, and read on HN tons of people in tech who kinda resent people who work a lot because it makes them look bad. The reason people resent folk who work crazy hard isn't because it makes them look bad (though it's probably factor to an extent). It's because that that preference has become the default for the whole of society in the West. The article points out that both policy in the US and social norms/values have become highly preferenced towards those who work crazy hard. The point isn't that it's bad for certain individuals to value work over everything else, it's that it's bad for society as a whole. As you say everyone has different preferences but due to this shift people whose preference isn't to put work/career before everything else are being penalised. And despite the rhetoric here it's perfectly possible to value work and work hard without it being your top priority in life.
ck425 4y ago
I find it interesting that all the comments here seem to view the options as "prioritise work/career first and work as hard as possibly can" and "don't prioritise work/career at all and do as little as you can get away with". The article criticises the influence that former view is having on western society but it's not advocating for the latter as far as I can see. It's perfectly possible to value your career and work hard without putting it above everything else.

84 points by sharkweek 4y ago

Archive Link: https://web.archive.org/web/20230131131321/https://www.theatlantic.com/newsletters/archive/2023/01/american-rich-men-work-less-hours-workism/672895/ https://web.archive.org/web/20230131131321/https://www.theat...

pschuegr 4y ago
Is it just me or is that archive link also paywalled?

lordleft 4y ago

I think Americans extol work for its own sake in a rather unhealthy way. I also think "hard work" is presented as a panacea for a host of problems, including poverty, despite the fact that many poor people break their backs toiling all their lives without meaningfully climbing the social ladder. "Just work hard" is actually profoundly unhelpful advice, without specific strategies and acknowledgements of all the systemic forces that give some people a leg up (and hold many others back). Contrary to the rhetoric of the anti-work movement, I think work is bound up in self-expression, and to meaningfully contribute to the creation of something beneficial to others or to yourself is a deep human longing. I just think that we speak of work in a very crude and superficial way here in the US.

WalterBright 4y ago
It's never work hard, it's work smart. This is because it's about working effectively, i.e. getting things done. Working hard doing things that have little to no value is a waste of effort.
- dmreedy 4y ago
  I feel the trick with this heuristic is that it is only measurable post hoc. It could be argued that things don't have value until they exist[0], which takes work. And plenty of things aren't valuable, until they are. So in that light, it's about oracle, or luck, directing your hard work towards efficacy. "Work Hard" is the only advice you can give without perfect knowledge of the future. We usually just leave out the depressing second half of the aphorism: "but sometimes it won't matter." [0] I can hear the entire finance industry starting to interject all at once
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    I believe the word you're looking for is "risk". Nothing is guaranteed.
    - dmreedy 4y ago
      I believe I choose my words carefully. You are correct that nothing is guaranteed. Now reconcile that with your position. What is "smart work" in light of risk?
      - WalterBright 4y ago
        > What is "smart work" in light of risk? Just what I said. Do things that create value.
        dmreedy 4y ago
        And if the work you did is not "valuable", at the end of it, it is by definition not smart? Or does some smart work go unrewarded? And by complement then, does some un-smart work get rewarded? If I flip a coin and say, "it will come up heads", was the act of flipping "working smart", when it does? Is it feckless hard work when I get tails instead?
  - albntomat0 4y ago
    I think your view doesn’t consider that we can make informed estimates for the future, with plans specifically for if we’re wrong. I can choose which programming languages and other technical skills I learn based on current use, as well as estimates for their future. I could become an expert in the wrong JavaScript framework, but learning Typescript and React is far more likely to be valuable than learning to be a telegraph repairman.
- onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago
  > This is because it's about working effectively, i.e. getting things done. It's about getting things done if you're a business. If you're an employee, and your goal is to have money to afford a nice life, it's about extracting money from the business - which, strangely, is often maximized in ways that don't involve "getting things done" i.e. delivering the business any actual value. If you want to get ahead in your career or financially - the WORST thing you can do is mindlessly do a good job at what you're told to do or what you think (after spending much effort) is the best use of your time. It's about very specifically checking the boxes that get your more pay or moving up in your career or whatever it is you're after.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    Selling your labor for money is just another kind of business. > it's about extracting money from the business - which, strangely, is often maximized in ways that don't involve "getting things done" i.e. delivering the business any actual value. Businesses that pay people who don't provide value are soon to go out of business.
    - onlyrealcuzzo 4y ago
      > Businesses that pay people who don't provide value are soon to go out of business. Beg to differ. Nobody does this better than Fortune 500 companies.
      - WalterBright 4y ago
        Fortune 500 companies can and do go bankrupt.
        willcipriano 4y ago
        They will keep making new ones
        piva00 4y ago
        But not really since they will be acquired by some other company and their ghost will keep haunting.
- dolni 4y ago
  Isn't working smart somewhat implied? Tossing a five gallon jug on your shoulder and running up and down a flight of stairs for hours is REALLY hard work. And yet you don't see people take this on as a job and then complain about it. So instead someone goes out and gets an entry-level position. The options are limited, because they have no skills. The problem now is they never invest in building skills, so they are stuck in shit-tier jobs forever. I want to have some empathy for this. But if I go to a convenience store and somehow it takes the cashier 10 minutes to checkout 3 people, that empathy becomes hard to find. At the end of the day, every person getting a paycheck needs to produce more value to the business than they get paid. The only other way is to tax people who DO actually contribute and spread the money around. There are some serious concerns of fairness about that.
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    > Isn't working smart somewhat implied? Too many people believe in the labor theory of value, meaning one should get paid according to how hard and long one works. This theory is a false god, because employers do not care how long or hard you work, they only care about the value produced. Being smart means applying your efforts at producing value, and finding ways to produce more value.
    - dmreedy 4y ago
      They're all false gods. Chicago economics are just as much of a demiurge as any model that includes "just" or distributional reward. It mostly comes down to whom god favors. Do you believe that most hard workers don't believe they are applying their efforts towards producing value? Do you believe that everyone who receives reward for producing value , did?
      - WalterBright 4y ago
        Free markets are about enabling people to produce value and reap the benefits of that value. That works, as history very amply shows.
balderdash 4y ago
Two thoughts: 1) is that hard work is not the solution but rather largely a prerequisite to solving host of problems (I.e. getting out of poverty is dependent on a host of factors but if one isn’t willing to work hard, your chances are much slimmer) 2) your points about self identity being intertwined with work is an important one, and something I struggle with quite a bit.

lethologica 4y ago

Not an American, just a human being, but I was not brought into this world to work for 60 years in a job I only tolerate and then die. Forget that. That idea makes me sick to my stomach when I think about it. I am a human being and I am capable of so much more than I can even imagine. We all are. It’s a shame so much of us are forced to spend the best parts of our lives chained to a desk.

nxmnxm99 4y ago
[flagged]
- OnlineGladiator 4y ago
  The guy you described sounds a lot more interesting than a desk jockey.
  - elzbardico 4y ago
    At the bare minimum, he enjoys life more.
  - nxmnxm99 4y ago
    Spoken like someone who hasn’t met people like that. They’re significantly more one dimensional than the wage slave tbh. At least the wage slave has the character of resentment.
- gnulinux 4y ago
  These kind of comments are so heartbreaking. Is this really what you think humans are without work? You think people would just resort to hedonism, and addiction if not for corporations who kindly introduce order in our lives? When I look at humanity I see art, science, passion, inspiration, admiration and curiosity. If people didn't have to work 60 hours a week, they would be artists, parents, lovers, researchers etc... I'm truly, truly sad that not all of believe in this. I deeply apologize for this possibly snarky, irrelevant comment, maybe it shouldn't be allowed. I just wanted to offer my perspective.

mmastrac 4y ago

paulpauper 4y ago
It benefits everyone. Earning more money means higher standards of living, financial security
- triceratops 4y ago
  Did it work?
  - WalterBright 4y ago
    Yes.

paweladamczuk 4y ago

Actually working archive link: https://archive.is/qyKaA https://archive.is/qyKaA

grammers 4y ago

> “I think the pandemic has clearly reduced workaholism,” Shin told me. “And by the way, I think that’s a very positive thing for this country.” I didn't even know workaholism was a word. Good on me, I guess. :)

luckylion 4y ago

> In 2019, I called this phenomenon “workism.” In a time of declining religiosity, rich Americans seemed to turn to their career to fill the spiritual vacuum at the center of their life. For better or (very often) for worse, their desk had become their altar. I find this a very strange idea, and I think it's mostly formed by looking at something without understanding it. The people's motivation the author finds is "they've replaced religion with work". Why isn't it more practical: there's a lot of stuff to do and they want it done, so they do it? Maybe it's just a divide where neither side understands the other, but I've never understood people who see a big task they want done and don't sink their teeth into it and work hard to get it done. I guess on Orwell's Animal Farm, there's Boxer and there's Napoleon, and Napoleon wonders why Boxer works so hard.

piva00 4y ago
> there's a lot of stuff to do and they want it done, so they do it? Why they do it though? What's this deep longing that causes them to be more productive instead of, you know, enjoying life? There will always be lots to be done, and the more that is done the more work will be created to be done on top. I do agree with the point that losing some sense of spirituality (not necessarily a religious/supernatural one) has removed at least one facet of facing life as a human. Doing work for the sake of feeling accomplished by completing a task seems very meaningless when you are aware you only have one life to experience whatever your soul will be able to, digging your teeth into an endless stream of stuff to do don't really aggrandise your soul, it just makes you a more efficient little human machine.
- luckylion 4y ago
  Why do people in (at least some) poor countries work more (not necessarily more productive for lack of machinery etc, but certainly more) than those in rich countries? I believe because they need to do more to survive or increase their quality of life. I'm convinced that there are many things that need just raw manpower thrown at them to make society run as well as it does, and if we all did what in Germany is called "Dienst nach Vorschrift" (aka only do the minimum contractually required), we'd quickly end up with things falling apart. To me it roughly boils down to Kant: act in a way that could be made into law. To prioritize ones leisure and comfort over the needs of society doesn't feel like something we could make into law and still keep being a society.

endisneigh 4y ago

On one hand, working so much can't be great. On the other hand, I've noticed far fewer services now compared to say, 2015. Curious times ahead.

zxcvbn4038 4y ago

I’m not really a big fan of the “Star Trek” utopia where everyone seems to sit around painting and cooking soul food either. Been to New York City lately? We’re only 50% remote work and the entire city smells like pot around the clock. The first thing I notice when I travel out of the city is the lack of pot smell. So apparently the future is mostly getting baked and surfing Pornhub in 8K HDR on a 65” tv in full view of everyone (the apts here don’t come with window coverings so facing the tv instead of the window is the most modesty you can hope for a lot of the time). Some people need to be given a purpose because otherwise they don’t have one. There is a lot of middle ground between the two extremes of total work and no work.

alephnerd 4y ago
Correlation doesn't necessarily imply causation. Retail Marijuana sales have only just started in NYC around the same time as remote work, plus outdoor smoking was legalized barely a year ago, so that might be a factor to the increased prevalence of of smelling Dank in the City. Beats hotboxing your apartment or car.
elijaht 4y ago
No opinion on your overall point (my gut feeling is that some type of steady work is net good for society as a whole) Your evidence is ridiculous. I'm frequently out and about in NYC and I can smell pot every once in a while but not "constantly". I would also imagine that the # of folks smoking pot during work hours is minimal and I don't see an issue with it if you aren't on the clock. I have never seen porn through someones window either lol. Also most people install window coverings.
- itisit 4y ago
  I'm out and about every day in Manhattan, uptown, downtown, and in between. And every day I smell pot multiple times per day. It is positively ubiquitous and disgusting.
kitsunesoba 4y ago
I think what’s being observed here is a sort of whiplash, not dissimilar to how a teenager whose upbringing has been extremely restrictive will likely go hog wild the second they’re no longer subject to their parents’ rules. If one were born into a Star Trek utopia and never had most of their spark of creativity/curiosity extinguished by a school system designed to pump out worker drones and never had the majority of their waking hours sold off just to exist, I believe they’d be a lot less likely to be a couch potato. There’s no reason the go nuts with burning personal time with “junk food” recreation when personal time has never been at a shortage.

jsz0 4y ago

The ole carrot and stick trick only works when we believe the carrot is obtainable.

jzellis 4y ago

Came here just to see the contrarian nerd opinions and by God and sonny Jesus I was not disappointed. ¦-D

flandish 4y ago

Everyone, upon entering the workforce, should be required to read Upton Sinclair’s “The Jungle” before they start at any job.

Damogran6 4y ago

I worked at a 60-hour-a-week-average job and the attitude of 'that was last week, what have you done for me this week' followed by being RIFed the second the spreadsheet told them to... Life's too short. I've lost two of 4 parents and working more hours aren't going to bring them back.

hpen 4y ago

Hey guys turns out I actually enjoy the satisfaction I get from working. I certainly value spending the afternoon working leaves me happier at bedtime than if I watched YouTube or whatever. It’s anecdotal but I have been feeling a sense of a war on work as of lately.

sershe 4y ago

It's interesting the comments here are about (a) dead-end jobs where they don't care about you (b) poverty and such (c) jobs one only tolerates vs self-realization. The article however is about the upper-middle class men. So, these arguments are really irrelevant to them (except maybe the caring bit, but I doubt career-oriented people are unaware of how little companies care about them - they can, after all switch, companies). In tech, I've met tons of people who work a lot because they like it and people who could have obviously retired (startup exits) but keep working anyway, in not-so-glamorous jobs, some even as ICs with all the attendant BS. Apparently less people identify with work and want to work, for a reason that Atlantic fails to tease out. Atlantic claims it's better this way but I'm not so sure. Better for whom? I'm not even certain it's better for the upper-middle class men themselves - would they get some better ways to self-actualize instead? Not a given. It's unlikely better for the economy, or for anyone else really. Everyone has different preferences. Based on those they get different outcomes. I actually have also met, and read on HN tons of people in tech who kinda resent people who work a lot because it makes them look bad. But many cannot admit this to others (or themselves) so they invent all kinds of justifications about how it's bad for people to work hard for an uncaring company not being a founder, or how it's better to have kids or go surfing and be a balanced person, or whatever. And really this outcome of getting more done is bad and maybe even fake and they are not better than me! It's like the books about athletes, where they always emphasize that people who realize their genetic potential are the ones who love the grind and train a ton in a structured way (practicing serves, reading chess books, doing drills, whatever it is). If you don't like the boring repetitive training, and don't force yourself, you won't get as good. Then you can either say "well, I am not as good at training so I'm not going to get good at this sport, it's my fault only, and that's ok". Or you can come up with some excuses or devalue others' outcomes. This article is just the latter "oh I was too lazy to practice serves so I never got good at tennis, but all those tennis players kept practicing even after making a bunch of money. Well now they are stopping and it makes me feel better, so I conclude it's better for society"

ck425 4y ago
> Everyone has different preferences. Based on those they get different outcomes. I actually have also met, and read on HN tons of people in tech who kinda resent people who work a lot because it makes them look bad. The reason people resent folk who work crazy hard isn't because it makes them look bad (though it's probably factor to an extent). It's because that that preference has become the default for the whole of society in the West. The article points out that both policy in the US and social norms/values have become highly preferenced towards those who work crazy hard. The point isn't that it's bad for certain individuals to value work over everything else, it's that it's bad for society as a whole. As you say everyone has different preferences but due to this shift people whose preference isn't to put work/career before everything else are being penalised. And despite the rhetoric here it's perfectly possible to value work and work hard without it being your top priority in life.

ck425 4y ago

I find it interesting that all the comments here seem to view the options as "prioritise work/career first and work as hard as possibly can" and "don't prioritise work/career at all and do as little as you can get away with". The article criticises the influence that former view is having on western society but it's not advocating for the latter as far as I can see. It's perfectly possible to value your career and work hard without putting it above everything else.