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> This is such a weird disconnect between middle class white collar workers and the rest of the country. Want to hear a bigger disconnect? Most jobs we need to

by hgs3 3y ago

> This is such a weird disconnect between middle class white collar workers and the rest of the country. Want to hear a bigger disconnect? Most jobs we need to maintain our standard of living are blue collar jobs. Think waste disposal, plumbing, carpentry, textile, farming, transportation, etc... By contrast most white collar jobs are unnecessary fluff mostly dedicated to producing luxury goods, bean counting, or high-tech entertainment. About the only white collar jobs we need to live well are medical personnel. > It feels strange to be offered the chance to work less than half as much as another human and receive substantially greater rewards for my efforts. You are paid based on how difficult it is to hire your replacement. Blue collar workers are paid less because the availability of able-bodied people is high. It's supply and demand.

dragonwriter 3y ago
> By contrast most white collar jobs are unnecessary fluff mostly dedicated to producing luxury goods, bean counting, or entertainment. About the only white collar jobs we need to live well are medical personnel. “Bean counting” (which I take as not just accounting, but management, analytics, auditing, investigation, and legal and dispute resolution) is what makes sure the combination of resources are where they need to be for other (including blue collar and medical, and everything in the supply chain of either) jobs to be able to happen at all, and which deals with the fact that the humans doing them aren’t robots and have coordination needs. If you want an economy much beyond individual subsistence farming, you need “bean counting”, and you need more of it the farther from that you want to be. Coordination costs are real.
- mlyle 3y ago
  > and you need more of it the farther from that you want to be. Obviously there's some optimum amount of coordination and allocation of resources. There's an upper bound on how much is useful, though. I worry that we're creating more and more empty administrative and make-work middle management work, especially in many sectors. Look at higher education, and what it costs these days (as a society and individually). But there's fewer senior actual "production" faculty and researcher jobs around per capita, and the compensation for them has significantly fallen in real value. An administrative and management class has captured a huge portion of the value to questionable benefit. It's most clear there, but I worry that we're dedicating too many resources to middle management and excessively clever intermediaries.
Paul-Craft 3y ago
> Want to hear a bigger disconnect? Most jobs we need to maintain our standard of living are blue collar jobs. Think waste disposal, plumbing, carpentry, textile, farming, transportation, etc... By contrast most white collar jobs are unnecessary fluff mostly dedicated to producing luxury goods, bean counting, or high-tech entertainment. About the only white collar jobs we need to live well are medical personnel. You don't even need to think that hard. Remember 3 years ago, when only "essential workers" had to physically go in to work anymore? That's pretty much why.

by hgs3 3y ago

dragonwriter 3y ago

> By contrast most white collar jobs are unnecessary fluff mostly dedicated to producing luxury goods, bean counting, or entertainment. About the only white collar jobs we need to live well are medical personnel. “Bean counting” (which I take as not just accounting, but management, analytics, auditing, investigation, and legal and dispute resolution) is what makes sure the combination of resources are where they need to be for other (including blue collar and medical, and everything in the supply chain of either) jobs to be able to happen at all, and which deals with the fact that the humans doing them aren’t robots and have coordination needs. If you want an economy much beyond individual subsistence farming, you need “bean counting”, and you need more of it the farther from that you want to be. Coordination costs are real.

mlyle 3y ago
> and you need more of it the farther from that you want to be. Obviously there's some optimum amount of coordination and allocation of resources. There's an upper bound on how much is useful, though. I worry that we're creating more and more empty administrative and make-work middle management work, especially in many sectors. Look at higher education, and what it costs these days (as a society and individually). But there's fewer senior actual "production" faculty and researcher jobs around per capita, and the compensation for them has significantly fallen in real value. An administrative and management class has captured a huge portion of the value to questionable benefit. It's most clear there, but I worry that we're dedicating too many resources to middle management and excessively clever intermediaries.

Paul-Craft 3y ago

> Want to hear a bigger disconnect? Most jobs we need to maintain our standard of living are blue collar jobs. Think waste disposal, plumbing, carpentry, textile, farming, transportation, etc... By contrast most white collar jobs are unnecessary fluff mostly dedicated to producing luxury goods, bean counting, or high-tech entertainment. About the only white collar jobs we need to live well are medical personnel. You don't even need to think that hard. Remember 3 years ago, when only "essential workers" had to physically go in to work anymore? That's pretty much why.