6 ms·

This is a rather simplistic view of life IMHO. What’s wrong with people working for rent or groceries? What do you expect everyone to work on?

by su8898 2y ago

mmooss 2y ago
> What’s wrong with people working for rent or groceries? Many people are compelled to do that, but almost everyone wants more out of life. Strong evidence is that they take more whenever they can get it.
- deadbabe 2y ago
  If you could get whatever you want out of life, right now, with no effort, what would you want exactly?
  - tempestn 2y ago
    I'd travel the world, taking in diverse centers of culture, history, and nature. I'd try to learn new languages. I'd do more track days, karting, and Ultimate. I'd buy a shell and try to get back into rowing. I'd play more computer games. I'd play ping-pong, foosball, and board games with my kids. I'd coach kids' sports. I'd go to more plays and concerts. Even movies. I'd volunteer. Of course I wouldn't do ALL of that, since even without work there are only so many hours in the day. But I certainly wouldn't want for things to do!
    - deadbabe 2y ago
      Some people do all that and still work, you probably just need better time management. You could study a language before work in the morning, and then go row for a bit. Then go to work. Then you could play computer games from 5 to 6, play ping pong with kids from 6 to 6:30, eat a dinner, coach kids soccer from 7 to 8, volunteer open source from 8:30 to 9:30, catch a movie at 10.
      - ok_dad 2y ago
        So simple! Just as easy to do it as saying it right?
        hanspeter 2y ago
        Exactly, saying it’s the easy part. But even without a job, you still need energy and motivation. The tax of switching between tasks (or hobbies) doesn’t magically disappear. Neither does the time suck of social media.
      - deleted 2y ago
        [deleted]
      - layoric 2y ago
        If you're wealthy and healthy, and even so only some of that timeline _may_ be possible, most just unrealistic. >You could study a language before work in the morning, and then go row for a bit. Ok, gotta be in by 9am, 30-60 minutes commute, 30 minutes learning a language, gotta eat, shower, coffee, get my row boat mounted and at the lake 20 minutes away, prep, do a 20 minute row, back again so realistically you'd need to be up at 6am, not unreasonable. > Then go to work. Then you could play computer games from 5 to 6 Did you end work at 4pm or work from home, either way that is likely a short day but ok. A lot of people are forced to have commutes or work in a job that can't be remote, not to mention work much longer days. Hell isn't "60 hours is the sweet spot" for a work week now? (quoting Google's founder recent comments). > play ping pong with kids from 6 to 6:30, Have enough room to have a ping pong table at home, that must be nice, but yeah doable. > eat a dinner, coach kids soccer from 7 to 8, Who cooked dinner? Who cleaned up? That shit doesn't just happen by itself. So you prepped, cooked, ate and cleaned up, wrangled kids into car for soccer, and got the game field ready to play all in 30 minutes? Nope. > volunteer open source from 8:30 to 9:30, Game ended on time, kids didn't hang around to talk to team mates, straight in the car, no issues, and less than 30 minutes transport. Nope. > catch a movie at 10. 30 minutes to get kids to bed, baby sitter on time (and you can afford one), doable at some ages sure. Movies are regularly 90-180 minutes so you're in bed at like 1am? For a 6am start? Again transport not taken into account. The reason people think you can work 60 hours a week, every week, is because they don't do all the everyday things that need to get done, they have other people to do it. Also rarely do they leave enough gaps in their schedule for other peoples priorities.
  - mmooss 2y ago
    > with no effort I want effort, lot's of it, but let's not nitpick ... Off the top of my head: Nobel Prize winning, world-beneficial research; lots of loving, open, deeply connected relationships; grow rapidly; be someone people turn to for support (because I help them), ... I already do at least one of those things. :)
  - borgdefenser 2y ago
    It is really besides the point because of the way the dopaminergic system works. What was good enough yesterday is expected today and won't be good enough tomorrow. That is practically what makes us human. Whatever you get today with no effort won't be enough tomorrow. The ideal modern life is really one that is challenging enough that you don't get everything at once but not too hard that you can't make progress.
operationcwal 2y ago
I think if you let your imagination wander and you end up seeing the scale of potential we have and what we could really achieve, stuff like paying for rent and groceries starts to feel archaic and wasteful, or as some kind of artificial constraint holding us back as a species.
bsder 2y ago
> What’s wrong with people working for rent or groceries? Why should people have to work to be able to afford rent and groceries? Poverty is difficult enough to escape--not having to worry about rent and groceries would sure help. There is a reason why school meal programs are such a success.
andai 2y ago
Well, even if we agree that's the best we can aim for as a species (how sad), soon we won't even have that luxury.
lurk2 2y ago
> What’s wrong with people working for rent or groceries? There's nothing wrong with people who have the ability to work for groceries being compelled to work for groceries. The rent issue is complicated by the fact that land ownership prioritizes those who have already had time to accumulate wealth over those who have not. There are some issues with abandoning prices on land entirely (e.g. if land has no cost, how do we decide who gets to live in the most desirable locations?), but there's a compelling case to be made that the contemporary system of real estate financialization is similar to the enclosure movement both in terms of its structure and impact. It becomes a question of those with good credit (typically the rich and old) being able to (in aggregate) buy up all of the desirable land and thus to set monthly claims on the income of those with bad credit over and above the level of claim that would be possible if the property purchases could not be financed by loans. There is a legitimate cost to constructing a building and renting it out, but there is no real cost to land except the cost the market assigns to it. This might not be the worst thing (recall our example of allocating land in desirable locations), but when prospective landlords can take out loans against the property, the property's value is driven up beyond what any reasonable person would be willing to pay for the property's use. If you couldn't derive rental income from property, it would not make economical sense to finance these purchases beyond what you needed for your own use. This would (in theory) lead to lower prices. Henry George is the figure to look at here.

This is a rather simplistic view of life IMHO. What’s wrong with people working for rent or groceries? What do you expect everyone to work on?

by su8898 2y ago

This is a rather simplistic view of life IMHO. What’s wrong with people working for rent or groceries? What do you expect everyone to work on?

mmooss 2y ago

> What’s wrong with people working for rent or groceries? Many people are compelled to do that, but almost everyone wants more out of life. Strong evidence is that they take more whenever they can get it.

deadbabe 2y ago
If you could get whatever you want out of life, right now, with no effort, what would you want exactly?
- tempestn 2y ago
  I'd travel the world, taking in diverse centers of culture, history, and nature. I'd try to learn new languages. I'd do more track days, karting, and Ultimate. I'd buy a shell and try to get back into rowing. I'd play more computer games. I'd play ping-pong, foosball, and board games with my kids. I'd coach kids' sports. I'd go to more plays and concerts. Even movies. I'd volunteer. Of course I wouldn't do ALL of that, since even without work there are only so many hours in the day. But I certainly wouldn't want for things to do!
  - deadbabe 2y ago
    Some people do all that and still work, you probably just need better time management. You could study a language before work in the morning, and then go row for a bit. Then go to work. Then you could play computer games from 5 to 6, play ping pong with kids from 6 to 6:30, eat a dinner, coach kids soccer from 7 to 8, volunteer open source from 8:30 to 9:30, catch a movie at 10.
    - ok_dad 2y ago
      So simple! Just as easy to do it as saying it right?
      - hanspeter 2y ago
        Exactly, saying it’s the easy part. But even without a job, you still need energy and motivation. The tax of switching between tasks (or hobbies) doesn’t magically disappear. Neither does the time suck of social media.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - layoric 2y ago
      If you're wealthy and healthy, and even so only some of that timeline _may_ be possible, most just unrealistic. >You could study a language before work in the morning, and then go row for a bit. Ok, gotta be in by 9am, 30-60 minutes commute, 30 minutes learning a language, gotta eat, shower, coffee, get my row boat mounted and at the lake 20 minutes away, prep, do a 20 minute row, back again so realistically you'd need to be up at 6am, not unreasonable. > Then go to work. Then you could play computer games from 5 to 6 Did you end work at 4pm or work from home, either way that is likely a short day but ok. A lot of people are forced to have commutes or work in a job that can't be remote, not to mention work much longer days. Hell isn't "60 hours is the sweet spot" for a work week now? (quoting Google's founder recent comments). > play ping pong with kids from 6 to 6:30, Have enough room to have a ping pong table at home, that must be nice, but yeah doable. > eat a dinner, coach kids soccer from 7 to 8, Who cooked dinner? Who cleaned up? That shit doesn't just happen by itself. So you prepped, cooked, ate and cleaned up, wrangled kids into car for soccer, and got the game field ready to play all in 30 minutes? Nope. > volunteer open source from 8:30 to 9:30, Game ended on time, kids didn't hang around to talk to team mates, straight in the car, no issues, and less than 30 minutes transport. Nope. > catch a movie at 10. 30 minutes to get kids to bed, baby sitter on time (and you can afford one), doable at some ages sure. Movies are regularly 90-180 minutes so you're in bed at like 1am? For a 6am start? Again transport not taken into account. The reason people think you can work 60 hours a week, every week, is because they don't do all the everyday things that need to get done, they have other people to do it. Also rarely do they leave enough gaps in their schedule for other peoples priorities.
- mmooss 2y ago
  > with no effort I want effort, lot's of it, but let's not nitpick ... Off the top of my head: Nobel Prize winning, world-beneficial research; lots of loving, open, deeply connected relationships; grow rapidly; be someone people turn to for support (because I help them), ... I already do at least one of those things. :)
- borgdefenser 2y ago
  It is really besides the point because of the way the dopaminergic system works. What was good enough yesterday is expected today and won't be good enough tomorrow. That is practically what makes us human. Whatever you get today with no effort won't be enough tomorrow. The ideal modern life is really one that is challenging enough that you don't get everything at once but not too hard that you can't make progress.

operationcwal 2y ago

I think if you let your imagination wander and you end up seeing the scale of potential we have and what we could really achieve, stuff like paying for rent and groceries starts to feel archaic and wasteful, or as some kind of artificial constraint holding us back as a species.

bsder 2y ago

> What’s wrong with people working for rent or groceries? Why should people have to work to be able to afford rent and groceries? Poverty is difficult enough to escape--not having to worry about rent and groceries would sure help. There is a reason why school meal programs are such a success.

andai 2y ago

Well, even if we agree that's the best we can aim for as a species (how sad), soon we won't even have that luxury.

lurk2 2y ago

> What’s wrong with people working for rent or groceries? There's nothing wrong with people who have the ability to work for groceries being compelled to work for groceries. The rent issue is complicated by the fact that land ownership prioritizes those who have already had time to accumulate wealth over those who have not. There are some issues with abandoning prices on land entirely (e.g. if land has no cost, how do we decide who gets to live in the most desirable locations?), but there's a compelling case to be made that the contemporary system of real estate financialization is similar to the enclosure movement both in terms of its structure and impact. It becomes a question of those with good credit (typically the rich and old) being able to (in aggregate) buy up all of the desirable land and thus to set monthly claims on the income of those with bad credit over and above the level of claim that would be possible if the property purchases could not be financed by loans. There is a legitimate cost to constructing a building and renting it out, but there is no real cost to land except the cost the market assigns to it. This might not be the worst thing (recall our example of allocating land in desirable locations), but when prospective landlords can take out loans against the property, the property's value is driven up beyond what any reasonable person would be willing to pay for the property's use. If you couldn't derive rental income from property, it would not make economical sense to finance these purchases beyond what you needed for your own use. This would (in theory) lead to lower prices. Henry George is the figure to look at here.