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This weekly thread will focus on work and work culture.
This has been a back-burnered issue since COVID came and upended many workplace traditions worldwide, but I’d really like to hear about what you all think about it!
Some Starters (and don’t feel you have to speak on all or any of them if you don’t care to):
- What is the ideal work / life balance? Right now, the worldwide average is 5 days per week, 8-5 PM. Is this too much / too little / just right?
- With productivity skyrocketing and wages falling, what would you like to see to fix things?
- Would you accept less money and shorter hours?
- What would you feel minimum wage should do to adjust?
- Do you feel that the current resurgence of Unions is positive or negative?
I just quit my job to start a business with a friend and I thought the reaction I received from my coworkers was interesting. Most were genuinely confused, didn’t understand why I would want to quit, and were surprised that I would do so without any guarantee of employment somewhere else (somewhere that isn’t a non-funded startup).
One manager, at a loss for words, just asked (in a weirdly childlike way) “why?” And I didn’t have a good answer for him. Because I can’t imagine staying at this job until I’m middle management? Because I hate the internal corporate pressure to produce crappy software? Because I want to set my own schedule and have a shot at wealth that will give me freedom from the 9-5 before I’m in my 60’s?
I want to be free, and I want my son to be free.
I think many people have a deep aversion to being unemployed, or are scared of being in an untenable financial situation. If I have an unexpected expense in the next three months, I’m screwed, and that’s a scary place to be in. It’s not a place that most of my coworkers have ever been in. It’s been a while since I’ve been in that place, but I have been there, and rolling the dice with your home or vehicle on the line is easier when you have had the experience of doing so, failing, and recovering from that failure. If you were raised middle class or in stable poverty of some sort, you may never have found yourself with all of your belongings in a rucksack and then come back from it.
Anyway, just an observation.
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What is the ideal work / life balance?
I agree with you that one size doesn’t fit all, but I feel there has to be some kind of baseline standard. When I was looking around, I was unable to find when the current standard in North America changed from 9-5 to 8-5, but that shit needs to stop. A large amount of work is now decentralized due to computer and data storage, so there’s no reason hours have to be (with in-person requirement exceptions like restaurants and stores). Given the productivity increases of the last 50 years, we could work one day a week and still be more productive than equivalent work week 50 years past.
Greedy CEOs
I strongly believe that income ratios would be one of the most impactful things we could do. No person working full-time at a company deserves more than, say, 5 times more than any other full-time employee and should factor in “perks” like dividends and such. This kind of thing should be legally mandated.
UBI
I adore the idea of UBI, but we have to make sure the implementation is solid. I love some of the ideas I’ve seen from economists for them (and no, economists are not interested in growing bottom lines, they’re interested in how economic systems function). I also feel the economy has to be made more cyclical which would assist in this.
Unions
I like the resurgence as well, but I’m wary of power and sway over things not related to the unions. The leaders of these unions need to be kept honest just like corporate leaders should be because the ability to abuse the power is also possible (see many union leaders in the 1970s). Open books to members of the union should be the minimum required.
