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With the shift from blue collar to white collar employment in the developed world, I wonder if there hasn't been an overall decline in cognitive surplus in the

With the shift from blue collar to white collar employment in the developed world, I wonder if there hasn't been an overall decline in cognitive surplus in the past 50 years. After 8 hours of coding, meetings, and emails, I am done. I'm up for physical activity. But no way am I contributing to open source or doing anything cognitively challenging.

Aurornis 3y ago
When I got my first job, my older parents and extended family members laughed (in a friendly way) that these new tech companies were letting me work “bankers’ hours”. One older relative had serious concerns for my job because I said my boss liked to arrive at 7:30AM every day but I didn’t show up until 9. That was unthinkable to them. When they grew into the corporate world you were expected to be there before your boss and stay until after your boss left, finishing any last minute work before the next morning. Weekend work and long travel days were common. Going back even further, I heard stories and saw photos about my ancestors struggling to secure enough food to eat every year. Black and white photos of what was left of their dirt-floored houses. Every day was work and worry about securing basics for survival of the family farm. So if your job is a clean 8 hours of desk work with some meetings and e-mails mixed in, I’d say it’s actually less demanding than what was expected years ago.
- triceratops 3y ago
  The proportion of people who work corporate jobs vs the assembly line has surely changed though. The latter work their hours, go home and forget about work until next morning. The percentage of single-earner households was also higher back then. Having a wife who handled the domestic front lessened the load on the people working demanding corporate jobs. Nowadays it's common for both of the couple to have that type of job. And like, with all due respect, there were also a lot of mentally undemanding desk jobs back then. People got hired into them with just high school degrees. There are no "paper-pushers" anymore because there is no paper. Subsistence farmers have never been prolific producers of art or literature. That kind of proves my point.
  - ToucanLoucan 3y ago
    > The latter work their hours, go home and forget about work until next morning. I mean, you should also do this when you work a corporate job. I work as a team lead in my org, and outside office hours unless something is actively on fire, I am not responding to anything. If I see a Slack notification, I'll check it, and if it's something that absolutely 100% needs me and I'm able and not already committed, sure, I'll jump on. But anything short of that, nope. 9AM Monday I'm on it. > And like, with all due respect, there were also a lot of mentally undemanding desk jobs back then. People got hired into them with just high school degrees. There are no "paper-pushers" anymore because there is no paper. Also this is categorically not true. In tons of bigger, older corporations, there are more paper pushers than there have ever been. Academia too. Administrative jobs have been growing for decades now, absolutely ballooning in corporate America. Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber covers this in hilarious and tragic detail.
    - triceratops 3y ago
      > If I see a Slack notification, I'll check it That's already a mental tax that previous generations never had. > In tons of bigger, older corporations, there are more paper pushers than there have ever been. Consider the qualifications needed to land those jobs today. The amount of posturing, scrapping, backstabbing, and drama that goes into them. Bullshit jobs surely drain cognitive surplus.
      - ToucanLoucan 3y ago
        It is, but it's a minor one. I read it in notifications, if it's not urgent, swipe. Takes 5 seconds.
        wholinator2 3y ago
        How many of those do you get a day, as well as a proportion of daily notification number? I know that any kind of notification is a significant mental tax for me, especially if i feel compelled to check it in case it's a fire. It forces a context switch, demands you enter a completely different mode which to me is wholly incompatible with the majority of modes i enjoy taking in my free time. Personally, I'll never willingly enter an on call channel ever again. Nearly every night there was some thing i had to read and understand while i was in the middle of deep thought or creativity. Sometimes when they start they'll ping endlessly for hours. It's as if this dead claw of work is reaching in and eating away at my brain.
- kwhitefoot 3y ago
  I have a question. Aurornis' comment was greyed for me. What does it really mean when that happens. How many people have to downvote what seems a perfectly reasonable comment before it starts to fade? Edit: changed is to was because it's no longer grey.
  - Hendrikto 3y ago
    > All comments start with a score of 1 point […]. After users reach 501 Karma, they gain the ability to downvote another comment. Downvoted comments (i.e. with a score < 1) reduce their placement on the comment thread and will appear desaturated to other users deemphasize them. There is no upper limit on the score of a comment, but the minimum score is -4 points. Additional downvotes after that still subtract points from the user's Karma, but the comment won't go below -4. [0] So one downvote is enough, it seems. [0]: https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented
    - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
      The one example I saw in a quick search that was -4 (dead) did not have the arrow to allow downvoting. So it appears that, once it's at -4, you can't subtract any more points from the user's karma via that post.
      - ptero 3y ago
        You generally cannot downvote old posts (24 hrs and above I think, but not sure), but can upvote for months (maybe forever). Was the post you checked with no downvote arrows older than 24 hrs?
        AnimalMuppet 3y ago
        Found another one to double check. It says "dead", so I assume that means it's at -4. It also doesn't say [flagged], so it's not flag killed. 19 hours old. No down arrow. No up arrow either, for that matter. No arrows at all. The only thing I could do was vouch for it. But almost all of that author's recent comments are dead, so maybe what I'm seeing instead is someone who's shadowbanned.
- Hendrikto 3y ago
  You are missing a crucial point: Until very recently, it was completely normal to have at least one person per household completely dedicated to household stuff, like cleaning, tidying, shopping, childcare, etc. Nowadays, both parents have to work full-time, and are expected to take care of that in addition to everything else. Also, there is lots of research showing that subsistence farmers actually worked both fewer days, as well as fewer hours, compared to the modern standard. 8+ hours workdays are not natural in any way, they were introduced through the industrial revolution.
  - AlecSchueler 3y ago
    > Nowadays, both parents have to work full-time, and are expected to take care of that in addition to everything else. This is true, those social expectations are in place. But I think it's worth noting that it generally doesn't happen this way in practice. Even though women have entered education and the work force, often in higher numbers than men, they are still doing much more additional unpaid labour than men in every country in the world [0]. Would it be fair to say that women have experienced the effects we're talking about to a greater degree? 0: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/989567/Unpaid-and-Unrecognised1.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...
  - swalling 3y ago
    There is also compelling evidence that hunter-gatherers had even more daily leisure time than both modern industrial or historical agricultural societies. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_affluent_society https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_affluent_society
- immibis 3y ago
  But a lot of people work 40-hour desk jobs and still struggle to secure enough food to eat every year. The amount of job work may have decreased, but that doesn't mean life is easier. If one 9-5 job doesn't pay enough, you can't just work two of them. And, the work isn't as secure. Your "farm boss" (whoever that was at the time) couldn't fire you from your farm because he was struggling as much as you were, and he'd have to do your work himself, but a lot of office work is completely meaningless and just doesn't need to get done.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

Aurornis 3y ago

When I got my first job, my older parents and extended family members laughed (in a friendly way) that these new tech companies were letting me work “bankers’ hours”. One older relative had serious concerns for my job because I said my boss liked to arrive at 7:30AM every day but I didn’t show up until 9. That was unthinkable to them. When they grew into the corporate world you were expected to be there before your boss and stay until after your boss left, finishing any last minute work before the next morning. Weekend work and long travel days were common. Going back even further, I heard stories and saw photos about my ancestors struggling to secure enough food to eat every year. Black and white photos of what was left of their dirt-floored houses. Every day was work and worry about securing basics for survival of the family farm. So if your job is a clean 8 hours of desk work with some meetings and e-mails mixed in, I’d say it’s actually less demanding than what was expected years ago.

triceratops 3y ago
The proportion of people who work corporate jobs vs the assembly line has surely changed though. The latter work their hours, go home and forget about work until next morning. The percentage of single-earner households was also higher back then. Having a wife who handled the domestic front lessened the load on the people working demanding corporate jobs. Nowadays it's common for both of the couple to have that type of job. And like, with all due respect, there were also a lot of mentally undemanding desk jobs back then. People got hired into them with just high school degrees. There are no "paper-pushers" anymore because there is no paper. Subsistence farmers have never been prolific producers of art or literature. That kind of proves my point.
- ToucanLoucan 3y ago
  > The latter work their hours, go home and forget about work until next morning. I mean, you should also do this when you work a corporate job. I work as a team lead in my org, and outside office hours unless something is actively on fire, I am not responding to anything. If I see a Slack notification, I'll check it, and if it's something that absolutely 100% needs me and I'm able and not already committed, sure, I'll jump on. But anything short of that, nope. 9AM Monday I'm on it. > And like, with all due respect, there were also a lot of mentally undemanding desk jobs back then. People got hired into them with just high school degrees. There are no "paper-pushers" anymore because there is no paper. Also this is categorically not true. In tons of bigger, older corporations, there are more paper pushers than there have ever been. Academia too. Administrative jobs have been growing for decades now, absolutely ballooning in corporate America. Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber covers this in hilarious and tragic detail.
  - triceratops 3y ago
    > If I see a Slack notification, I'll check it That's already a mental tax that previous generations never had. > In tons of bigger, older corporations, there are more paper pushers than there have ever been. Consider the qualifications needed to land those jobs today. The amount of posturing, scrapping, backstabbing, and drama that goes into them. Bullshit jobs surely drain cognitive surplus.
    - ToucanLoucan 3y ago
      It is, but it's a minor one. I read it in notifications, if it's not urgent, swipe. Takes 5 seconds.
      - wholinator2 3y ago
        How many of those do you get a day, as well as a proportion of daily notification number? I know that any kind of notification is a significant mental tax for me, especially if i feel compelled to check it in case it's a fire. It forces a context switch, demands you enter a completely different mode which to me is wholly incompatible with the majority of modes i enjoy taking in my free time. Personally, I'll never willingly enter an on call channel ever again. Nearly every night there was some thing i had to read and understand while i was in the middle of deep thought or creativity. Sometimes when they start they'll ping endlessly for hours. It's as if this dead claw of work is reaching in and eating away at my brain.
kwhitefoot 3y ago
I have a question. Aurornis' comment was greyed for me. What does it really mean when that happens. How many people have to downvote what seems a perfectly reasonable comment before it starts to fade? Edit: changed is to was because it's no longer grey.
- Hendrikto 3y ago
  > All comments start with a score of 1 point […]. After users reach 501 Karma, they gain the ability to downvote another comment. Downvoted comments (i.e. with a score < 1) reduce their placement on the comment thread and will appear desaturated to other users deemphasize them. There is no upper limit on the score of a comment, but the minimum score is -4 points. Additional downvotes after that still subtract points from the user's Karma, but the comment won't go below -4. [0] So one downvote is enough, it seems. [0]: https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented https://github.com/minimaxir/hacker-news-undocumented
  - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
    The one example I saw in a quick search that was -4 (dead) did not have the arrow to allow downvoting. So it appears that, once it's at -4, you can't subtract any more points from the user's karma via that post.
    - ptero 3y ago
      You generally cannot downvote old posts (24 hrs and above I think, but not sure), but can upvote for months (maybe forever). Was the post you checked with no downvote arrows older than 24 hrs?
      - AnimalMuppet 3y ago
        Found another one to double check. It says "dead", so I assume that means it's at -4. It also doesn't say [flagged], so it's not flag killed. 19 hours old. No down arrow. No up arrow either, for that matter. No arrows at all. The only thing I could do was vouch for it. But almost all of that author's recent comments are dead, so maybe what I'm seeing instead is someone who's shadowbanned.
Hendrikto 3y ago
You are missing a crucial point: Until very recently, it was completely normal to have at least one person per household completely dedicated to household stuff, like cleaning, tidying, shopping, childcare, etc. Nowadays, both parents have to work full-time, and are expected to take care of that in addition to everything else. Also, there is lots of research showing that subsistence farmers actually worked both fewer days, as well as fewer hours, compared to the modern standard. 8+ hours workdays are not natural in any way, they were introduced through the industrial revolution.
- AlecSchueler 3y ago
  > Nowadays, both parents have to work full-time, and are expected to take care of that in addition to everything else. This is true, those social expectations are in place. But I think it's worth noting that it generally doesn't happen this way in practice. Even though women have entered education and the work force, often in higher numbers than men, they are still doing much more additional unpaid labour than men in every country in the world [0]. Would it be fair to say that women have experienced the effects we're talking about to a greater degree? 0: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/989567/Unpaid-and-Unrecognised1.pdf https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/...
- swalling 3y ago
  There is also compelling evidence that hunter-gatherers had even more daily leisure time than both modern industrial or historical agricultural societies. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_affluent_society https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Original_affluent_society
immibis 3y ago
But a lot of people work 40-hour desk jobs and still struggle to secure enough food to eat every year. The amount of job work may have decreased, but that doesn't mean life is easier. If one 9-5 job doesn't pay enough, you can't just work two of them. And, the work isn't as secure. Your "farm boss" (whoever that was at the time) couldn't fire you from your farm because he was struggling as much as you were, and he'd have to do your work himself, but a lot of office work is completely meaningless and just doesn't need to get done.

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]