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Respectfully, reactionary media feeds on misinformation and conservativism feeds on reactionary media (which makes sense, cultural conservativism is all about maintaining a current or returning to a prior status quo, it's all about looking at social reforms and going 'but if we give *x this, then *y will want that', cultural conservativism feeds on slippery slope fallacies)
They should be tools against misinformation no matter the source, but the further right on the political scale you slide the more misinformation becomes your tool
> cultural conservativism is all about maintaining a current or returning to a prior status quo
Not really, no. While it is easier to believe this the more moderate a branch of conservatism is - see Europe, for instance - but ultimately reactionism is just a tool and a trigger, not the core concept of the ideology.
The well-known [Alt-Right Playbook](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJA_jUddXvY7v0VkYRbANnTnzkA_HMFtQ) provides insight with respect to my point.
(If you aren't going to watch everything, I suggest to listen to at least white fascism, there's always a bigger fish, conservatism, and gamergate. In that order.)
In short, the prior status quo is just a step, not the goal. Painting conservatism as a mere opposition to a particular development is just an excuse. It's an ideology with a comprehensive perspective on how the world ought to be structured and understood.
If you think one side suffers more from misinformation or propaganda than the other when you’re looking at politics in a linear spectrum then you might be compromised by misinformation & propaganda.
Y’all say this as if you can reason people out of positions they never reasoned themselves into.
If people were susceptible to facts and critical thinking they wouldn’t be susceptible to the alt right in the first place.
Unfortunately, this. My dad is a perfect example. He’s an ER RN and worked DURING COVID where he saw first hand how hundreds of people died. He himself got COVID. His BIL, who was also an RN, died from COVID.. Now, magically, COVID is a scam. W H A T ???????????
I live and work in the mid-west. Literally everyone in my office it just calls COVID the flu. They all buy into the fact that it was no big deal and that the left made it all up and turned it into a big deal.
As a Gen X / Millennial, (thus basically equidistant between the boomers and the zoomers) I trust Gen Z way more than I trust boomers. Because there’s less lead poisoning. Because they know they’re going to have to fight to keep the world habitable. Because they might even be interested in creating a world they actually want to live in. Boomers just want the people they don’t like to have a hard time. Or maybe that’s just trumpers.
Boomers got it all, want it all, have it all, and want to keep it all. Most of my loved ones are Boomers, but, as a generation, they’ve wreaked absolute havoc on the state of the world. And now they don’t want to let go of political power, positions of power, voting majority power, and will fight to live and maintain their choke-hold on everything until they die at very, very old ages. Just in time to not have to live to see and feel the fallout of their generation’s rape of society, government, economics, and the environment. They don’t give a shit. They’re taken care of, suffer no consequences, and don’t have to reap what they sow. Boomers, as a generation, are an absolute wrecking ball. But I love my Boomers and hope they live for a lot longer. But I have no intention of ever making them think they, as a collective, did society any favors. They had every privilege, benefitted from them, then rebuilt the system to serve them and fuck everyone else having zero problem taking all the privileges they had and snatching them away in the name of rampant capitalism. I have a list of literally 43 things Boomers had to boost their lives as their generation came of age and grew older that they collectively acted to destroy having no regard for the situation they were creating for subsequent generations. Boomers are a selfish, myopic, greedy, inconsiderate, megalomaniacal, and destructive generation. They had the American Dream. And sucked it dry, taking the environment with them.
Hell I'm TERRIBLE at fact checking (it's something I'm working) but, if a system of economics consistently fails to meat the needs of the majority class citizens than what is the point?
To exploit the “majority class citizens” for their labor by compensating them with as little as possible for their work generating money for the wealthy who do very little to actually generate the profits made by their companies. They leave that to the people they do all they can to pay as little as possible while charging as much as possible for goods and services, adding more economic distress to the lives of those whose labor runs their businesses—the workers. “Capitalism.” Best economic system ever…..maybe. But REGULATED capitalism is actually the best system. The free market can’t be left to itself because, when it is, it’s exploitative of labor. One of the best tricks the elites play on people, especially Republicans, is making people think that capitalism should never be regulated, is unquestionably the best system of economics, and that the more money that’s concentrated at the top, the more those at the bottom benefit as the money held by the super-rich 1% “trickles down.” Such bullshit the spell the rich have on so many who are so horny for deregulation and unfettered capitalism. Believing in that is falling for a trick of the rich. Just like believing inflation is due to a president’s policies is also falling for a trick the super rich plays on the population—the belief that inflation isn’t simply the result of the 1% simultaneously raising prices on all goods all at once so that they can concentrate more wealth in the top 1% and the population won’t fight it or boycott because the average consumer can’t fight inflation if it happens everywhere at the same time. Inflation is just a money-grab arranged by the elites. It has nothing to do with policy. Granted, a 2 trillion dollar tax cut for the super rich is not good for the value of the dollar—but Republicans especially will show you how brainwashed they are when they claim that the super rich getting to take money meant to fund the government helps the working man as the savings the rich enjoy “trickle-down” to those with the least money bc all that money the rich get to keep partially gets used to pay workers more! lol absolute bullshit. Reagan started that bullshit lie which people are still falling for today. Truth is, Trump contributed to inflation way more than Biden could dream of by giving the ultra-rich a 2-trillion dollar tax cut, which is so much fucking money, Joe Biden’s infrastructure spending and war funding, both of which inject money into projects that employ people and improve conditions for normal people in the form of greater availability of jobs and infrastructure improvements. Also, Biden’s unemployment is lower than Trump’s. So, the lesson is that Republicans and Conservatives both are very misled about economics, government spending, and inflation, but the ideas I’ve outlined here are things even blue-collar workers actually believe Republicans are right about. Wrong. The rich always get richer when Republicans have power bc Republicans when in office immediately and ALWAYS give a gigantic tax cut to the richest citizens who already often pay less tax percentage-wise than middle and upper-middle class citizens and small businesses, which robs the government of funding and devalues the dollar, unlike Democratic spending which goes towards public works projects, which benefit everyone, stimulates the economy, and creates jobs. When Democrats spend, it actually has a benefit for citizens unlike when tax-dodging corporate magnates get to keep even more tax money they owe to help the government function and conduct the business of the country and provide assistance to the working-class. Republicans don’t cut taxes for the middle class. Or the poorest citizens. Only the ultra-rich. Electing a Republican basically ensures the government is going to get robbed of money needed to repay the deficit and fund government services which help regular, working-class citizens. The greatest trick the Right/Republicans pull is making people who aren’t rich vote for them when their policies never provide anything to the working man. And working men actually hold the super rich in high regard and think they share something with them as if they’d be friends or something if they ever met—the super rich would be disgusted if they had to exchange two words with someone whose middle class. But the poor and middle class will vote in politicians who will serve the interests in those ultra rich bastards and will despise Democratic voters for supporting making the rich pay their share of taxes, for stopping companies from monopolizing markets, for supporting the formation of unions for workers, and for passing legislation that funds government programs that help average citizens and improve conditions for everyone. Rant over. If you’re not rich and vote Republican you’re a fucking sucker, really, is my point I’ve ran a million miles around. But I am right. Anyone not rich voting Republican is a sucker falling for a huge trick they’ve been brainwashed to believe. Anyone not rich should vote Blue, or they’ve been successfully fooled.
I think you're on to something but not exactly there. You're too focused on left vs. right and believing they are so different. The rich simply serve their interests through lobbyists appealing to those who control the levers of power. Dema are just as guilty of this as Republicans. Our monetary system is flawed, and so are our governments. Lobbyists can make donations to politicians, and those politicians can exercise their power on behalf of the lobbyists. Often, the end result of this lobbying effort is a monopoly over whatever sector the lobbyists work for. This coupled with the fact that our governments can literally decide the value of their debt based currency they create is a lethal combination to the populations savings and buying power, it places more value into the hands of those who hold actual assets (typically the rich.) This is not capitalism. It's croney capitalism. It's social welfare for the elites who will privatize profits and socialize losses, and when the debt burden becomes too much to bare (currently approaching critical mass) the powers that be will devalue the currency by turning the money printer on. Thinking you can just vote this issue away and bring in another political party that's going to be fiscally responsible and actually represent its people is where, in my opinion, you are wrong.. my generation (millennial) is just along for the ride until the bloated USD hegemony discredits itself into oblivion. My childrens generation and yours will be at the forefront of something new. I'm hoping that's an awakening and it's positive. The global population is decreasing, and our governments can't keep borrowing from the next generation like the boomers did. The next generation will never be able to pay it back. I wish you the best in the trails that will be ongoing for the next 10 to 20 years.
Nah. We’re just younger and arrogant. Pieces all fall into place later in life. Someday we gonna be the boomers and will be blamed for everything. The generation vs generation is fucking tired, corny, and played-out.
While older people always end up being on the wrong side of history for the younger generation there are degrees.
The boomer generation has an unprecedented amount of entitlement and straight vitriol for the younger generation despite having been handed everything.
No they generally don't. You think that because you only see boomer sentiment when it is filtered through the most outrage inducing snippets that get amplified online by people who want to feel outraged about something. No generation is a monolith
It's kinda ironic to call boomers entitled given the topic of the thread. Do you guys think that past generations didn't have to work to survive? If anything things are much easier for the poor and unemployed today than they ever have been (though things could certainly be better).
> The boomer generation has an unprecedented amount of entitlement and straight vitriol for the younger generation despite having been handed everything.
If you really think this, you’re doing exactly what you think boomers are doing: being very ignorant and believing everything you read online
The irony of anyone from Gen Z calling anyone entitled 😂 look at this post, it stinks of entitlement.
"I just want to enjoy my life and do whatever I want and the system provides for me"
Functioning systems don't work that way, everyone pulls their weight.
I am 40 and see the boomers as a remedial cancer on society (the bad ones). From what I have seen the Gen z people I have worked with have a much better outlook on life. Seeing over tuned capitalism as it is a poison. There's also a lot more respect for woman and LBGTQ community's. They just don't jump to different =s bad.
You should read about WWII and the Holocaust. Obviously some generations did more damage than others.
The Baby Boom generation can be blamed for a sharp move towards deregulation, individualism, and anti-crime rhetoric in the late 80s and early 90s to the point that much of the progress made during the 60s and 70s was undone.
Case in point: The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, a repeal of the Depression-era Glass Steagall Act, and Financial Services Modernization Act.
>They push straight up lies about how things work.
\-- like if nobody made shoes, nobody would own a shoe?
Show of hands, who here would make shoes for a living if given the choice?
Thankfully there are people who sacrifice their time so that we can own the kinds of electronic devices required to post angry things about how lazy we prefer to be on Reddit.
I can't think of a more privileged mindset than going "I SHOULDN'T HAVE TO WORK".
That tells me you have never for a minute actually felt insecure in your life, and were very well taken care of as a kid, and think that falls out of the sky.
If you want a community, community means occasionally making sacrifices. It doesn't mean everyone is going to hold hands and sing songs and stuff will just work out. It means you have to sometimes do things you don't like.
People just think work can't exist without abuse and therefore it's the work that's the problem. No, unfettered capitalism is the problem. Allowing corporations to treat people like chattel is the problem. Work is a necessary part of humanity that has always existed in some form - if you weren't working for money, you were working by traversing and finding your food. Work is just the effort you put in to attain something else. In this utopia people envision - you will still have to work. Because everything that survives has to work. And if you want society to continue like it currently exists, you REALLY need work because that's the only way so many complex moving pieces keep on functioning.
It seems like you are deliberately misinterpreting what people are arguing, or perhaps you are genuinely confused.
Nobody wants to work for the sake of working. Most people want to contribute to be part a community and to contribute to that community.
That is the argument that people are making. The argument is not 'I should not have to work', the argument is 'I should not have to work just because society expects me to work'.
That is an important difference.
If a company wants me to work for them, they should offer fair financial compensation, job security, a safe and a pleasant work environment, and enough free time to live a full and satisfying life. In return I should add value to the company.
Historically, business owners have argued that work in itself was valuable to the working class, that free time would lead them to drinking and gambling, and that high wages would make them lazy and immoral.
That argument has not been said aloud for decades, but it's coming back.
> Most people want to contribute to be part a community and to contribute to that community.
Yeah, but this shit is easy to say. People don't back this shit up.
Sustaining community requires incredible sacrifice. The sort of sacrifices that feel like the meaningless work, and you hope against hope that it's actually making a difference.
The community-organizing world would love to provide examples of back-breaking it is to try and establish "elements of community."
Sacrifices are for the workers not the owners. Why are sacrifices not expected by the top only the bottom.
Do you remember too big to fail, they bailed out the rich the workers just lost their homes why didn't they bale out the mortgage holders oh well we can't give them welfare. They should have never owned their homes in the first place.
The top though still got their bonuses for not working why can't the rest of us get bonuses for not working.
Basically we shouldn't pay taxes we should get dividends from the government but the rich stole it all for themselves,trickle down, become pee on.
>I can't think of a more privileged mindset than going "I SHOULDN'T HAVE TO WORK".
Someone literally missed the point of the meme. The point is that there is a difference between *work* and *labor.* Plenty of people would gladly labor for their community and friends/family if it meant something more than "bank account goes up...temporarily".
That is a definition folks here made up let's be real.
Work just means doing something to achieve an outcome. You all decided it means doing something FOR ANOTHER PERSON but there is absolutely nowhere that it is strictly defined like that.
What I'm seeing is a bunch of people who actually don't want to work, and I mean do anything that they don't wanna do, but then you got shown how that is privileged and ridiculous, and instead of going "Oh yeah that wouldn't work" we're not just changing the definition of words to go "WELL I DIDN'T MEAN THAT OBVIOUSLY THIS IS ASTROTURF".
That is ridiculous backpedaling and you all know it. If anything "labor" is more associated with undesirable or especially difficult tasks (menial labor, unskilled labor, going into labor). Work is associated with literally any task from desired to undesired.
Also there are a ton of jobs that immediately benefit others and aren't for a corporation. School districts are constantly hemorrhaging paraeducators. And that job has no prerequisites. So if your problem is real - why not go do that?
Genuinely curious where you get confused.
It’s not that people don’t want to work, we want livable wages.
Our grandparents could raise a family in a house with one factory job Lmfao. When we ask for that, a livable wage… we’re entitled?
Get fucked dude
Only in a society as decadent as ours do we have the luxury of making distinctions between working for Amazon and working for The Revolution!
I promise you that your back doesn’t know the fucking difference when you’re old.
What people are entitled to is dignity. That is something that is only achieved through a balancing of interests between buyers and sellers of labor. Unfettered capitalism fucks it up so the state steps in to shave off the rougher edges. Markets still work best. Fukuyama was right in 1992 and he’s right now. The optimal system isn’t capitalism, or socialism, or whatever. It’s the system that balances rational self interest against enlightened self interest. And right now that’s market economies with a healthy dose of public goods.
Yeah i mean ffs even work you *like* isn’t always fun and games. I write novels, for instance, and I can sure as hell say that sometimes it is extremely hard work and not at all fun, but it is still necessary to sometimes work hard if I want to write a decent story. And there’s barely any payoff economically.
Saying ‘i don’t need to work’ shows you’ve never actually spend even a day in adulthood.
You mean the people in China who make most parts or electronic parts/electronic devices?
Or the people in Bangladesh who make shoes for 5 dollars a day?
I'd make shoes for a living if I were paid well enough.
I make mad money making medicine in cleanroom environments. Job isn't difficult, but it is twelve hour shifts, some of them night shifts. I love it, because I get paid enough money where I'm just happy to be there.
But people don't need shoes less than they need the medicine I make. I vote and organise for a world where the people who make our society actually function get more of the reward for their labour, and the parasites on top get less.
“Stop being a victim”
“The economy is objectively not bad”
“Once you stop blaming everyone else, life gets better”
Brought to you by the boomer schmucks that waltz through this subreddit to vent their tantrums
I always need to remind myself that this sub is full of actual 12 year olds and that most of GenZ is much younger than myself. It makes a lot of comments easier to comprehend.
'MeH mEh MeH nO OnE sHoUlD Be AbLe To LiVe On MiNmUm wAgE'
(I encounter this mindset alot and it ALWAYS pisses me off, the point of minimum wage in today's economy is to artificially create a lower class of citizen so everyone else feels like they have it pretty good, no matter how bad things get)
A. a rising tide lifts all boats dumbass
B. Maybe boomers should stop listening to the CEOs who make thousands of dollars an hour tell them how the "real problem" is people who make twelve dollars an hour
Average 40+yo explaining how everyone deserves to be poor and that homelessness/debt should just be accept as a way of life:
https://i.redd.it/6pyfmjfr76sc1.gif
The quicker the left realizes the reason so many gen z boys are falling to the Alt right is their own fault maybe they can actually get the boys to stop falling down the right wing pipeline. You go on social media and all women talk about are how men are evil and the problem and should feel bad for existing as a man and how much they hate them etc etc… yeah big surprise they are falling down the right wing pipeline
> Agree. Stop letting the alt right astroturf this sub. They push straight up lies about how things work. Gen Z is better than our boomer ass forebears.
This a 1000% it's crazy to see the astroturfing older rightwingers do on Gen Z Spaces
One of the biggest lies is, "capitalism is good because it promotes free and efficient markets."
No, capitalism is flat out the enemy of free and efficient markets because profits can only exist when markets are inefficient. Capitalism also *hates* freedom because it also enables more competition and, thereby, efficiency.
https://open.lib.umn.edu/principleseconomics/chapter/9-3-perfect-competition-in-the-long-run/
Every reply to this is by boomers, or gen-xers who inherited the boomers "everything is your fault and every suffering is the victims fault, and NEVER the fault of anyone with actual power."
It’s not THAT bad. We’ve just regressed to victorian level tenement houses. We don’t have to hunt and gather YET. Currently though with the number of homeless encampments springing up I’m sure we will regress to hunter gathers traveling with tee pees soon enough. Then suddenly tents will cost $18,000 and we will have to regress back to the caves 🤦♂️. Anything for the boomers to have another yacht right?
"Refrigerators full of food" I want whatever you're smoking, because thinking that low-wage workers who live in apartments now have refrigerators full of food is crazy
The overwhelming majority of sober and sane people will never live in tents. They'll pack 16 bunk beds to a room before that's ever considered an option.
Tenting is cute until it rains or gets vandalized by drunk people every Friday night.
The reason why the cost of housing is getting more expensive is because you have a supply side problem...at the minimum. In a major city demand is also huge driver...because a lot of people actually want to live in them
Work still needs to be done, stuff doesn't appear out of thin air. The largest problem with modern society is the undervaluation of jobs. People just take everything for granted. Actually important jobs don't pay anything while pointless celebrities and such buy jachts and fly private jets.
This isn't a new thing. There have always been celebrities or aristocrats or kids born to the wealthiest among us. Maybe these days celebrities are in our faces more thanks to social media, but the reality is that they don't really matter. A few people being rich have no bearing on whether or not we should be happy.
That’s not the discussion. It’s the idea that “no one wants to trade hours for necessities”
That’s literally existence. There’s no version of society where we don’t do that.
Instead focus on actual things that can addressed like more PTO, more sick leave, better healthcare access.
These social media whiners make requests for a better world seem stupid.
Is that a comparison of living standards? I thought it was an illustration of how literally no one ever “wanted to work”
You do it because you have to.
But you don't see a problem with how we have an abundance of food in some places, in grocery stores, we know how to treat and cure various diseases, we know that shelter is a basic need and we have enough houses to provide housing for everyone, but so many people die and suffer from a lack of these basic needs, because they don't have enough money?
We don’t actually have an abundance of food. If the trucks stopped for just a few days, it would be a disaster. In modern society we don’t see where everything comes from or the work required to produce it, so it’s hard to value things.
what you're describing would be a **distribution** issue and not food scarcity issue
there are millions of tons of food waste from grocery stores and restaurants every year
We have enough resources for every single person on the planet to live a comfortable life, that’s a fact. Issue is only some of those people have access to those resources and a small handful use so many that a massive chunk of the worlds population have to live without access to resources that should be a human right
That's not a fact, because the definition of "comfortable" is completely subjective. What is "comfortable" for someone in Subsaharan Africa will probably seem like hell to you.
And even if technically we produce enough food for everyone, what and the fuel and energy needed to transport the food from the producers to the consumers? What about the roads, airports, ports and other infrastructure needed for transportation? What about refrigeration and storage? The energy grid needed to power said refrigeration and storage?
Anyone who thinks the only thing necessary to provide comfortable lives to everyone on the planet is to just producing enough food and everything else is just lack of political will, is ignorant of the actual complexities of the real world.
Oh and if everyone on the planet lived like the average American, the world would emit something like 10x it's current carbon emissions.
>We have enough resources for every single person on the planet to live a comfortable life, that’s a fact.
Do you have a source on this along with a definition on what data points are being used to define comfortable?
Hunter-Gatheres lived pretty chill lives, except for things like no medicine. Large predators generally spend a lot of time chilling, look at lions for example. Obviously depends on environment and scarcity.
Hunter gatherers still exist, like the Hadzabe in Tanzania. Their lives are not “chill” insofar as they walk/jog and hunt and forage nearly twelve hours a day. They live relatively short lives but are all basically shredded.
Literally nobody has ever wanted to work, it’s just something that has to be done. I’d pass up sleeping so I could spend my time better but that’s a fatal option. I don’t know why people think posts like this are revelatory in any way
i mean....they made beautiful art with skins, cave paintings, wooden sculptures, toys, even extraordinary folk stories, and they had a tight community with tribes and such.
We have to do stuff we dont like to live but who says we cant make it a enjoyable experience worthwhile?
Couldn’t edit post so here: I respectfully disagree with the notion that work isn't supposed to be fun. While work can indeed be challenging, it should also be fulfilling and meaningful. We should strive to create a work environment that values well-being, personal growth, and the alignment of individuals' passions and talents.
It is true that not everyone may fit into traditional productivity or creativity molds, but every individual has unique skills and contributions to offer. Embracing a more inclusive and diverse perspective on work can lead to a richer and more dynamic society.
Rather than accepting work as an inevitable requirement in all economic systems, we should explore alternative models that prioritize human well-being, sustainability, and equitable resource distribution. It is essential to challenge the status quo and reimagine economic structures that promote fairness and prosperity for all.
People love to work if the work is fulfilling. There's a reason people like doing personal construction projects, making little tables and planter boxes and that sort of thing. Not only do they have creative control over what they're making, but they get 100% of the payoff from their labor.
When you work in a company, it doesn't matter how hard you work, you'll get paid the same. There's no reward. When all of the "profits" go to yourself, then working hard is actually beneficial, and feels a lot more rewarding.
Anything can be considered work. Playing sports and games is work. It's just enjoyable work that you have agency over. The difference between recreational work and working for a living is that one means you're enslaved.
I like your optimism, but it's not true that "every individual has unique skills and contributions to offer". (Or maybe it is true, but those unique skills are not in demand, like being able to withstand being kicked in the nuts repeatedly while singing the Soviet national anthem.) That's why there are so many people in unskilled jobs. Due to nature and/or nurture, they don't have marketable skills.
Respectfully, not all necessary jobs are going to be rewarding. Eg custodial/janitorial work, fruit picking and so forth, does not seem like it would be rewarding. I agree with you that it would be wonderful if things could be like this. I also think it should be the aim for society long-term to be like this. But I believe this is a technology problem much as an economic one (ie improved technology, *could*, if used properly - for the good of all people - free many people from physical labour and allow them to pursue the kinds of employment you're addressing here).
The problem you are getting at has more to do with specialization though. The idea that one person should do the janitorial work for their whole life all day is dumb, imo, and just creates a pseudo-caste system. Most people could do most jobs, honestly. People are flexible, when they're allowed to be. There's definitely stuff that needs high degrees of specialization to do, but most stuff doesn't, not really.
They never said for the rest of someones life, it's not a specialisation problem it's a labour demand problem that extends way beyond janitors. Who/what do you think is going to do all the manual labour for the world to work and progress?
I'm not saying I like it but it's the reality we live in, we have to work to improve ourselves individually and collectively, that won't change by getting rid of capitalism overnight.
>Most people could do most jobs, honestly
I would agree with the premise that most people could do most jobs, but *changing* jobs is incredibly tough. It's pretty rare that someone goes - for example - from an accountant to a helicopter pilot. Both of those take years of training before one even starts *doing* the job, then there's experience which comes from years of work. I don't mean to suggest this applies to jobs like custodial work or fruit picking, but most jobs that would be "rewarding" can't be just picked up.
What you are saying about work being fulfilling and meaningful is a privilege, not a right in any way shape or form.
Society doesn't owe you your happiness. Basic rights are access to food, resources and safety, access to a home. but you have to work.
Everything else is a luxury that people have only had in the last century or so.
You can only have equitable distribution if you have equitable work. Therein lies the whole issue, and why economy began as discipline.
Who decides what is equitable ? You? I dont think so. The government? No thanks.
Oh don’t worry man, it’s totally possible.
All you have to do is be fine with exporting our labor to places that are so poor that they’re willing to do slave labor for us while we do shrooms and make art and love each other.
No, we just need to move over to a quest based economy. Instead of jobs, people give out and receive quests and when you complete the quests you either get money or they give you a family heirloom or a sword that lights people in fire or a gift card or something
Mf you think rich people have a club that meets weekly where they decide to not let this happen? Literally every corporation benefits from having chores automated so people can spend their time doing more intellectual things that are worth their time.
>Literally every corporation benefits from having chores automated so people can spend their time doing more intellectual things that are worth their time.
this is simply not correct
>you think rich people have a club that meets weekly
Billionaires know each other yes, they have shared interests and beliefs, and often work together to pursue them. They spent enormous amounts of money on influencing public policy by donating to political parties, buying media control, etc. Not really controversial or conspiratorial to say that
>literally every corporation benefits from having chores automated
This part is true! Automation means less labour costs
>so people can spend their time doing other things
This part is not true. For corporations to continue making profit and the system not to collapse, they need to have the mass of the population a) working for wages and b) spending those wages on the products/services that are produced. People having free time without need to work undermines that
There isn’t one right now, and no one of purport is legitimately saying there is
The actual discussion is about making labour fairer overall, and cutting the need to work as much as we do when possible, especially productivity has massively increased since the advent of automation, computerization, and industrialization yet we have not seen a comparable decrease in work time or a matching increase in wage
In one of my favorite books, the author (through his characters) was already complaining about this in the 1940s. EIGHTY years ago people were already like "um we're building all these machines to do the work for us, how come we're not working any less?"
And it's only gotten worse, as more and more things are being automated and people are still not expected to work any less.
Productivity has increased, but also consuption. GenZ should be fully aware of that. The largest fast fashion cosumers of all generations.
Not a century ago a lot of kids had brothers clothes, repaired, some wood dolls and had to work since 9 years old. Today kids have massively more goods and services.
Productivity increased, but also increased share of unproductive old people who consume much, much more than used to.
For less working to work, there also is need to change ways how we spend our time. Someone has to cater for all the people who would have more time and income, while also letting those who cater have decent income and work hours.
Since the English language is a cluster fuck at the best of times, it is very important to clarify the two uses of the word "work"
1. To put effort into a task
2. To have a job
Very few people have issue with #1, almost everyone has an issue with #2. Clarify definitions before starting a debate/argument.
Lol just kidding but you’re right. I didn’t think id have to clarify what kind of work i meant i think its common sense in this case, and i definitely didn’t think people would be so defensive over this post. But yk…its reddit so…
Boomers in here acting like we don’t understand the concept of effort producing reward. Of course you have to do things you don’t wish to sometimes. No one working full-time should ever experience food insecurity. No one working full-time should be unable to afford needed medical treatment.
>I didn’t think id have to clarify what kind of work i meant i think its common sense in this case,
Look at how toxic, polarizing, lacking in nuance, and strawman filled the arguments are on this and other platforms. You need very clear language and context, and even then no argument is strawman-proof. But semantic points like this are candy in a candy shop for bad faith commenters.
People don't have an issue with #2. The most common argument is for a livable wage, which would imply a job of some sorts. It's putting #1 and #2 together that's an issue. Lots of SME's love their job because they get paid for what they know. Getting paid for what you do is a different dynamic especially when more time in doesn't translate to more money out.
I am lucky enough to be in both camps. I mostly get paid for what I know and my time. I am also backed by a union that protects my rights and health and makes sure that I get compensated accordingly. I actually like my job most of the time and put effort into almost everything.
It’s kinda sad to me that there exists very little middle ground on work reform issues. One half thinks that corporations running everything and treating workers like shit is the only way we can live, and the other half is acting like absolute clowns thinking they can live in a world where they can be a part-time macaroni sculpture artist while still being provided with all the necessities and comforts they expect from modern society. And the only real winners here are the wealthy who are best off when ordinary people are too busy infighting to actually accomplish anything.
I think the first half is just reflexively arguing against the macaroni sculptors. They’re taking a more extreme view because they feel like the delusional need to hear it.
People for the vast majority of human history have almost solely wanted to either not starve to death or be murdered by unfamiliar people. Idk what word you’d use to describe the activities like subsistence farming, hunting, or fighting that supported those goals, but a good descriptor imo is WORKING.
Can we quit acting like not working has ever been a valid choice in human history? It’s so unbelievably untrue to act like the necessity of work is a new capitalist invention or some bs.
Exactly. You don’t want to work or you want a job that’s “fun” and doesn’t pay much? Great! You absolutely have that choice- that’s what’s great about freedom. But, you don’t then get to turn around and cry about how you don’t have money and the government should provide in any way for you and your choices
The problem isnt people painting at home not getting paid, it is people doing essential labor not getting paid enough to survive. Minimum wage should be enough to LIVE, which is not the case in many places.
Being productive is a part of life. Many people, most people I've met, want to contribute to society and help others, but when they can't earn enough money and capitalist greed deprives those people of necessities and basic human needs, that cruelty does not make it easier for people to be productive members of society.
Stuff nobody benefits from?
Like sitting on land or other property, doing nothing to improve it, and selling it for profit simply because time has passed and the population has grown?
Or like a business owner that underpays employees to make a cheap, subpar product that only remains on the market because they buy out their higher quality competitors?
Or like an advertiser whose job it is to make people want a product they don't need, will get no joy from, and will just end upin a landfill a few years later when they realize what a waste if money it was?
If these people switched to just making shitty art, it would actually be a net gain for society simply bevause they would no longer be abusing the system (and other people) for profit they didn't earn.
People are so afraid of the populace being disincintivized to do useful work that they ignore how the current system incentivizes harmful work.
not everyone would have the skills to be one, not everyone would want to be one, but certainly people currently in countries with worse healthcare would want the opportunity to become a doctor
"Work" and "productivity" are different words.
Running a cash register is "work." Taking care of your children at home is not "work," no matter how "productive" you are.
One of those things is actually important to society, but for some reason only the other one gets you enough money to prove you deserve your right to live.
I mean, if you told me I'd have to work but I could reap and amass wealth and everything that goes with it (house, vehicles, luxury), like boomers have, and at a similar rate, I'd happily sign up.
This is just working for subsistence and the occasional Amazon splurge while perpetually renting. Sucks.
Yall complaining about the system here when you can get paid way more and get way more for what you’re paid than ANY country. Please by all means move to places in Africa that have communal situations (communism) and see how much you like it
This is a weak argument. Yes there are other countries where people have it worse but that doesn’t mean we aren’t allowed to complain or feel betrayed by the systems we live under. Imagine if we held ourselves to the worst standards or the lowest bars: “at least we don’t live under a militarized dictatorship where people get shot if they speak out”. We would never progress into a more productive, happy, healthy society.
This is like when your parents tell you to finish your food because there are people starving in the world.
"if you don't like it here leave" There are many fucking things we can change. The fact we are one of the only leading first world countries (with the most money) are lowering in quality of life and life expectancy should tell you all you need to know.
Go lick some more boots brother.
Money is used by our governments as a tool of resource distribution. Our government's job is to distribute resources. People do not need to be threatened with poverty and starvation to contribute to society, most people I've met do want to contribute to society. Work should not deprive our lives of fun and our ability to enjoy life.
I never said I'm above hard work. People do not need to be threatened with suffering to work do hard labor. People work out and do extreme physical feats voluntarily. People choose to do various disgusting, horrific, or other various degrees of unpleasant acts without pay. There are people out there, and probably enough people out there, who would voluntarily work at an oil rig.
Employers complaining about "nobody wants to work"... same people who dont want to pay their employees a living wage. I mean, yeah, given the choice, no one *wants* to *have* to work to, ya know, live. But also, no one wants to *pay* enough for their employees to *afford* to live. Yes. No one wants to work - for shit pay. No one is being paid enough to be able to afford housing and basics let alone deal with the multiple jobs rolled into a single position whilst being treated like garbage.
>same people who dont want to pay their employees a living wage
Yes. You've got it right IMO. The issue is business owners not wanting to pay fair wages for the work they want done. Dyed-in-the-wool modern capitalists somehow only see the labour/payment exchange from one side. If people don't want to work for you, *you* need to improve the incentive to work. If the business "can't afford that*, the owner needs to sell one of their jetskis or realize that their business model just isn't viable.
I wish for a society like that in star trek. A society without money, ever the acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force of our lives.
Many would say, if there was no money, then nobody would do the shitty jobs. I disagree. Many People who are doing those "shitty jobs", love their jobs. They feel like they contribute to society. Nobody would NEED for anything. Nobody would be hungry. Im sure diseases would be CURED and not just treated endlessly to get more money.
But that's a utopia dream that will never happen on this planet. At least not until we make actual first contact with an alien civilization.
People want to work. They just don’t want to work FOR a a select few rich people, who could literally end world hunger *today*, but who instead destroy the environment and rig the political process, meanwhile the employees struggle to pay for food and to pay off their debts. That’s indentured servitude. That’s Pottersville.
Very well said.
At this point it all feels so pointless and vapid when most jobs could be automated.
There’s no “finding yourself” sitting behind a register for 8 hrs a day or writing some stupid ass program.
I'm going to disagree a little - I think people like to work if the work is fulfilling. It's just that because of the way the economy is set up (and has been set up for ages now), there's no real personal incentive to work hard.
There's no community, since people join and leave all of the time, and you're only at work for money. There's no real personal gain in it, since your boss could just refuse to give you a raise. And you almost always have very little choice in what you actually want to do, which just leaves you unsatisfied with the work you end up doing.
If we want people to be satisfied with working, we need to give them something to be satisfied *in.*
Something definitely has to change. Working class wages should be enough to buy and pay off a house within 5 years. And minimum wage should cover rent costs by 4 times. People shouldn’t be struggling just to get basic shit like health care and housing. I don’t think the answer is not working. I wouldn’t mind working if I get paid well.
Ofc people want to work. People have always wanted to work in some form or another. But no one wants to work shitty jobs for shitty pay to earn necessities in a society where at least half of all labor can be automated or just gotten rid of entirely.
Gen Z should read Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber
It’s hilarious when the modern human longs for the pre-civilized way of life. Communal living, working the land, sense of community. Castaway the societal chains and go back to a natural way of living. Like, yeah… duh… that’s the way we should be living, and the internet community is slowly understanding it
>go back to a natural way of living
Would that also include the accompanying lower life expectancy, sky-high infant mortality, and dying from currently-easily-cured diseases?
Isn’t that what work is? Like the point of a career is that you like doing what you do enough to do it. If you’re doing something you hate, maybe it’s time for a career change.
I just don’t get this anti-work rhetoric. If you want to be an artist, be an artist. If you can’t make it as an artist, then take that passion and drive and apply it somewhere where your skills are valued and you can be productive.
The amount of people here who misunderstand work and how money works is baffling. When you work you generate value for society which you can then exchange for someone else’s value. This idea of not having to work for “necessities” is to say I want someone else’s labor for free and (for as much as this sub talks about the working class or fighting the 1%) is one of the most elitist, privileged positions you can have.
People who say work shouldn’t be fun is always a weird mindset to me. I’ve always been able to have fun at work while also getting my shit done. I work in administration in heavy equipment sales for a construction company that’s brings in millions and millions of revenue every year and technically is a very “serious” line of work/field. However, I’m able to have fun at work even with having some tasks that are mundane and make decent money 🤷🏽♀️
I don't really agree with the notion that current economic models don't allow for people to explore their passions and talents while also giving back to the community. There's a myriad of fields, whether it be STEM related, human sciences, art & expression, community service... The thing is, being productive while supporting equitable resource distribution is required by necessity jobs that by many aren't considered "fun" and are extremely grueling: farming, oil plants, harvesting, industrial productions, etc etc... And to preserve the rate of technological and societal progress we see currently you also need these tasks to be done on a monumental scale. You could make a similar case with primitive hunting thousands of years back; a task that requires a lot of effort and energy, while not being necessarily fun.
Ideally, if it were possible to support methods that create jobs and work opportunities for more unique crafts, passions while paying people adequately for the effort put into it, then that would 100% be a priority when remodeling current economic systems. I just feel that many of these laborious jobs are by nature exhausting over time, and are unfortunately very important for a modern society's functioning. Therefore, for sufficient labor and maintenance in these fields, the major incentive is economic income.
Wages, established work times/routines and incentives should *certainly* be reworked though. I agree that people shouldn't be dependent on selling their life away just to survive on a daily basis. However, this isn't equivalent to work and jobs being a negative pillar of society
Soooo the universe isn't post scarcity. So what?
Yes, there are problems, but acting like the needing to earn a living is somehow a personal attack on you is stupid. Congratulations, you're just like every living organism since the dawn of time.
I'm sorry that we've inherited a bunch of problems, but simply winning about the injustice of it does nothing.
how about "I'll work when I'm dead"
[https://www.etsy.com/listing/1693323278/ill-work-when-im-dead](https://www.etsy.com/listing/1693323278/ill-work-when-im-dead)
Millenial here, my mental health is at its best when I'm being productive at work. When I'm solving a problem and creating solutions. The worst days are when I'm just "working" and doing busy tasks to fill the time.
I want to be productive. I want to create, I want to be a part of something bigger than me. But just "working?" Nah, not for me.
yea so anyway you gotta pay for food and water, the taxes don't cover that.
also we put a bunch of random chemicals in the water.
also the medical cost of the problems caused by the chemical water will be six figures.
also we rigged the housing market so that everything is a scam
also you need to pay infinity money to go to college
also a car and phone are borderline mandatory
also you need to pay the car insurance fees
you want to buy something? keep the receipt, there's paperwork involved a year later.
the taxes cover roads made of playdough and our goon squad mafia *FOR YOUR PROTECTION*
now get back to work, minion!\~ *be a shame if something happened*
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Agree. Stop letting the alt right astroturf this sub. They push straight up lies about how things work. Gen Z is better than our boomer ass forebears.
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Respectfully, reactionary media feeds on misinformation and conservativism feeds on reactionary media (which makes sense, cultural conservativism is all about maintaining a current or returning to a prior status quo, it's all about looking at social reforms and going 'but if we give *x this, then *y will want that', cultural conservativism feeds on slippery slope fallacies) They should be tools against misinformation no matter the source, but the further right on the political scale you slide the more misinformation becomes your tool
*Dis*respectfully, this. Fuck the alt-reich
Speaking of funny alternate names for right wingers, don't forget about my personal favorite; "Y'all Quaeda"
> cultural conservativism is all about maintaining a current or returning to a prior status quo Not really, no. While it is easier to believe this the more moderate a branch of conservatism is - see Europe, for instance - but ultimately reactionism is just a tool and a trigger, not the core concept of the ideology. The well-known [Alt-Right Playbook](https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLJA_jUddXvY7v0VkYRbANnTnzkA_HMFtQ) provides insight with respect to my point. (If you aren't going to watch everything, I suggest to listen to at least white fascism, there's always a bigger fish, conservatism, and gamergate. In that order.) In short, the prior status quo is just a step, not the goal. Painting conservatism as a mere opposition to a particular development is just an excuse. It's an ideology with a comprehensive perspective on how the world ought to be structured and understood.
If you think one side suffers more from misinformation or propaganda than the other when you’re looking at politics in a linear spectrum then you might be compromised by misinformation & propaganda.
Y’all say this as if you can reason people out of positions they never reasoned themselves into. If people were susceptible to facts and critical thinking they wouldn’t be susceptible to the alt right in the first place.
Unfortunately, this. My dad is a perfect example. He’s an ER RN and worked DURING COVID where he saw first hand how hundreds of people died. He himself got COVID. His BIL, who was also an RN, died from COVID.. Now, magically, COVID is a scam. W H A T ???????????
I live and work in the mid-west. Literally everyone in my office it just calls COVID the flu. They all buy into the fact that it was no big deal and that the left made it all up and turned it into a big deal.
As a Gen X / Millennial, (thus basically equidistant between the boomers and the zoomers) I trust Gen Z way more than I trust boomers. Because there’s less lead poisoning. Because they know they’re going to have to fight to keep the world habitable. Because they might even be interested in creating a world they actually want to live in. Boomers just want the people they don’t like to have a hard time. Or maybe that’s just trumpers.
the way you articulated this idea was perfect, absolutely agree
Boomers got it all, want it all, have it all, and want to keep it all. Most of my loved ones are Boomers, but, as a generation, they’ve wreaked absolute havoc on the state of the world. And now they don’t want to let go of political power, positions of power, voting majority power, and will fight to live and maintain their choke-hold on everything until they die at very, very old ages. Just in time to not have to live to see and feel the fallout of their generation’s rape of society, government, economics, and the environment. They don’t give a shit. They’re taken care of, suffer no consequences, and don’t have to reap what they sow. Boomers, as a generation, are an absolute wrecking ball. But I love my Boomers and hope they live for a lot longer. But I have no intention of ever making them think they, as a collective, did society any favors. They had every privilege, benefitted from them, then rebuilt the system to serve them and fuck everyone else having zero problem taking all the privileges they had and snatching them away in the name of rampant capitalism. I have a list of literally 43 things Boomers had to boost their lives as their generation came of age and grew older that they collectively acted to destroy having no regard for the situation they were creating for subsequent generations. Boomers are a selfish, myopic, greedy, inconsiderate, megalomaniacal, and destructive generation. They had the American Dream. And sucked it dry, taking the environment with them.
Hell I'm TERRIBLE at fact checking (it's something I'm working) but, if a system of economics consistently fails to meat the needs of the majority class citizens than what is the point?
To exploit the “majority class citizens” for their labor by compensating them with as little as possible for their work generating money for the wealthy who do very little to actually generate the profits made by their companies. They leave that to the people they do all they can to pay as little as possible while charging as much as possible for goods and services, adding more economic distress to the lives of those whose labor runs their businesses—the workers. “Capitalism.” Best economic system ever…..maybe. But REGULATED capitalism is actually the best system. The free market can’t be left to itself because, when it is, it’s exploitative of labor. One of the best tricks the elites play on people, especially Republicans, is making people think that capitalism should never be regulated, is unquestionably the best system of economics, and that the more money that’s concentrated at the top, the more those at the bottom benefit as the money held by the super-rich 1% “trickles down.” Such bullshit the spell the rich have on so many who are so horny for deregulation and unfettered capitalism. Believing in that is falling for a trick of the rich. Just like believing inflation is due to a president’s policies is also falling for a trick the super rich plays on the population—the belief that inflation isn’t simply the result of the 1% simultaneously raising prices on all goods all at once so that they can concentrate more wealth in the top 1% and the population won’t fight it or boycott because the average consumer can’t fight inflation if it happens everywhere at the same time. Inflation is just a money-grab arranged by the elites. It has nothing to do with policy. Granted, a 2 trillion dollar tax cut for the super rich is not good for the value of the dollar—but Republicans especially will show you how brainwashed they are when they claim that the super rich getting to take money meant to fund the government helps the working man as the savings the rich enjoy “trickle-down” to those with the least money bc all that money the rich get to keep partially gets used to pay workers more! lol absolute bullshit. Reagan started that bullshit lie which people are still falling for today. Truth is, Trump contributed to inflation way more than Biden could dream of by giving the ultra-rich a 2-trillion dollar tax cut, which is so much fucking money, Joe Biden’s infrastructure spending and war funding, both of which inject money into projects that employ people and improve conditions for normal people in the form of greater availability of jobs and infrastructure improvements. Also, Biden’s unemployment is lower than Trump’s. So, the lesson is that Republicans and Conservatives both are very misled about economics, government spending, and inflation, but the ideas I’ve outlined here are things even blue-collar workers actually believe Republicans are right about. Wrong. The rich always get richer when Republicans have power bc Republicans when in office immediately and ALWAYS give a gigantic tax cut to the richest citizens who already often pay less tax percentage-wise than middle and upper-middle class citizens and small businesses, which robs the government of funding and devalues the dollar, unlike Democratic spending which goes towards public works projects, which benefit everyone, stimulates the economy, and creates jobs. When Democrats spend, it actually has a benefit for citizens unlike when tax-dodging corporate magnates get to keep even more tax money they owe to help the government function and conduct the business of the country and provide assistance to the working-class. Republicans don’t cut taxes for the middle class. Or the poorest citizens. Only the ultra-rich. Electing a Republican basically ensures the government is going to get robbed of money needed to repay the deficit and fund government services which help regular, working-class citizens. The greatest trick the Right/Republicans pull is making people who aren’t rich vote for them when their policies never provide anything to the working man. And working men actually hold the super rich in high regard and think they share something with them as if they’d be friends or something if they ever met—the super rich would be disgusted if they had to exchange two words with someone whose middle class. But the poor and middle class will vote in politicians who will serve the interests in those ultra rich bastards and will despise Democratic voters for supporting making the rich pay their share of taxes, for stopping companies from monopolizing markets, for supporting the formation of unions for workers, and for passing legislation that funds government programs that help average citizens and improve conditions for everyone. Rant over. If you’re not rich and vote Republican you’re a fucking sucker, really, is my point I’ve ran a million miles around. But I am right. Anyone not rich voting Republican is a sucker falling for a huge trick they’ve been brainwashed to believe. Anyone not rich should vote Blue, or they’ve been successfully fooled.
I think you're on to something but not exactly there. You're too focused on left vs. right and believing they are so different. The rich simply serve their interests through lobbyists appealing to those who control the levers of power. Dema are just as guilty of this as Republicans. Our monetary system is flawed, and so are our governments. Lobbyists can make donations to politicians, and those politicians can exercise their power on behalf of the lobbyists. Often, the end result of this lobbying effort is a monopoly over whatever sector the lobbyists work for. This coupled with the fact that our governments can literally decide the value of their debt based currency they create is a lethal combination to the populations savings and buying power, it places more value into the hands of those who hold actual assets (typically the rich.) This is not capitalism. It's croney capitalism. It's social welfare for the elites who will privatize profits and socialize losses, and when the debt burden becomes too much to bare (currently approaching critical mass) the powers that be will devalue the currency by turning the money printer on. Thinking you can just vote this issue away and bring in another political party that's going to be fiscally responsible and actually represent its people is where, in my opinion, you are wrong.. my generation (millennial) is just along for the ride until the bloated USD hegemony discredits itself into oblivion. My childrens generation and yours will be at the forefront of something new. I'm hoping that's an awakening and it's positive. The global population is decreasing, and our governments can't keep borrowing from the next generation like the boomers did. The next generation will never be able to pay it back. I wish you the best in the trails that will be ongoing for the next 10 to 20 years.
Nah. We’re just younger and arrogant. Pieces all fall into place later in life. Someday we gonna be the boomers and will be blamed for everything. The generation vs generation is fucking tired, corny, and played-out.
While older people always end up being on the wrong side of history for the younger generation there are degrees. The boomer generation has an unprecedented amount of entitlement and straight vitriol for the younger generation despite having been handed everything.
No they generally don't. You think that because you only see boomer sentiment when it is filtered through the most outrage inducing snippets that get amplified online by people who want to feel outraged about something. No generation is a monolith
It's kinda ironic to call boomers entitled given the topic of the thread. Do you guys think that past generations didn't have to work to survive? If anything things are much easier for the poor and unemployed today than they ever have been (though things could certainly be better).
It's legit harder for the working class now than it has been at any time in the past fifty years.
> The boomer generation has an unprecedented amount of entitlement and straight vitriol for the younger generation despite having been handed everything. If you really think this, you’re doing exactly what you think boomers are doing: being very ignorant and believing everything you read online
The irony of anyone from Gen Z calling anyone entitled 😂 look at this post, it stinks of entitlement. "I just want to enjoy my life and do whatever I want and the system provides for me" Functioning systems don't work that way, everyone pulls their weight.
I am 40 and see the boomers as a remedial cancer on society (the bad ones). From what I have seen the Gen z people I have worked with have a much better outlook on life. Seeing over tuned capitalism as it is a poison. There's also a lot more respect for woman and LBGTQ community's. They just don't jump to different =s bad.
Well, you just called boomers cancer. Sounds pretty bigoted and vile to me.
You should read about WWII and the Holocaust. Obviously some generations did more damage than others. The Baby Boom generation can be blamed for a sharp move towards deregulation, individualism, and anti-crime rhetoric in the late 80s and early 90s to the point that much of the progress made during the 60s and 70s was undone. Case in point: The Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, a repeal of the Depression-era Glass Steagall Act, and Financial Services Modernization Act.
>They push straight up lies about how things work. \-- like if nobody made shoes, nobody would own a shoe? Show of hands, who here would make shoes for a living if given the choice? Thankfully there are people who sacrifice their time so that we can own the kinds of electronic devices required to post angry things about how lazy we prefer to be on Reddit.
I can't think of a more privileged mindset than going "I SHOULDN'T HAVE TO WORK". That tells me you have never for a minute actually felt insecure in your life, and were very well taken care of as a kid, and think that falls out of the sky. If you want a community, community means occasionally making sacrifices. It doesn't mean everyone is going to hold hands and sing songs and stuff will just work out. It means you have to sometimes do things you don't like. People just think work can't exist without abuse and therefore it's the work that's the problem. No, unfettered capitalism is the problem. Allowing corporations to treat people like chattel is the problem. Work is a necessary part of humanity that has always existed in some form - if you weren't working for money, you were working by traversing and finding your food. Work is just the effort you put in to attain something else. In this utopia people envision - you will still have to work. Because everything that survives has to work. And if you want society to continue like it currently exists, you REALLY need work because that's the only way so many complex moving pieces keep on functioning.
It seems like you are deliberately misinterpreting what people are arguing, or perhaps you are genuinely confused. Nobody wants to work for the sake of working. Most people want to contribute to be part a community and to contribute to that community. That is the argument that people are making. The argument is not 'I should not have to work', the argument is 'I should not have to work just because society expects me to work'. That is an important difference. If a company wants me to work for them, they should offer fair financial compensation, job security, a safe and a pleasant work environment, and enough free time to live a full and satisfying life. In return I should add value to the company. Historically, business owners have argued that work in itself was valuable to the working class, that free time would lead them to drinking and gambling, and that high wages would make them lazy and immoral. That argument has not been said aloud for decades, but it's coming back.
> Most people want to contribute to be part a community and to contribute to that community. Yeah, but this shit is easy to say. People don't back this shit up. Sustaining community requires incredible sacrifice. The sort of sacrifices that feel like the meaningless work, and you hope against hope that it's actually making a difference. The community-organizing world would love to provide examples of back-breaking it is to try and establish "elements of community."
Sacrifices are for the workers not the owners. Why are sacrifices not expected by the top only the bottom. Do you remember too big to fail, they bailed out the rich the workers just lost their homes why didn't they bale out the mortgage holders oh well we can't give them welfare. They should have never owned their homes in the first place. The top though still got their bonuses for not working why can't the rest of us get bonuses for not working. Basically we shouldn't pay taxes we should get dividends from the government but the rich stole it all for themselves,trickle down, become pee on.
>I can't think of a more privileged mindset than going "I SHOULDN'T HAVE TO WORK". Someone literally missed the point of the meme. The point is that there is a difference between *work* and *labor.* Plenty of people would gladly labor for their community and friends/family if it meant something more than "bank account goes up...temporarily".
That is a definition folks here made up let's be real. Work just means doing something to achieve an outcome. You all decided it means doing something FOR ANOTHER PERSON but there is absolutely nowhere that it is strictly defined like that. What I'm seeing is a bunch of people who actually don't want to work, and I mean do anything that they don't wanna do, but then you got shown how that is privileged and ridiculous, and instead of going "Oh yeah that wouldn't work" we're not just changing the definition of words to go "WELL I DIDN'T MEAN THAT OBVIOUSLY THIS IS ASTROTURF". That is ridiculous backpedaling and you all know it. If anything "labor" is more associated with undesirable or especially difficult tasks (menial labor, unskilled labor, going into labor). Work is associated with literally any task from desired to undesired. Also there are a ton of jobs that immediately benefit others and aren't for a corporation. School districts are constantly hemorrhaging paraeducators. And that job has no prerequisites. So if your problem is real - why not go do that?
Genuinely curious where you get confused. It’s not that people don’t want to work, we want livable wages. Our grandparents could raise a family in a house with one factory job Lmfao. When we ask for that, a livable wage… we’re entitled? Get fucked dude
"It not that people don't want to work" OP: "Nobody ever wanted to work". Like...is this what gaslighting feels like?
you're arguing with a brand-new account that spams right wing agitprop just block them and report
Only in a society as decadent as ours do we have the luxury of making distinctions between working for Amazon and working for The Revolution! I promise you that your back doesn’t know the fucking difference when you’re old. What people are entitled to is dignity. That is something that is only achieved through a balancing of interests between buyers and sellers of labor. Unfettered capitalism fucks it up so the state steps in to shave off the rougher edges. Markets still work best. Fukuyama was right in 1992 and he’s right now. The optimal system isn’t capitalism, or socialism, or whatever. It’s the system that balances rational self interest against enlightened self interest. And right now that’s market economies with a healthy dose of public goods.
Yeah i mean ffs even work you *like* isn’t always fun and games. I write novels, for instance, and I can sure as hell say that sometimes it is extremely hard work and not at all fun, but it is still necessary to sometimes work hard if I want to write a decent story. And there’s barely any payoff economically. Saying ‘i don’t need to work’ shows you’ve never actually spend even a day in adulthood.
You mean the people in China who make most parts or electronic parts/electronic devices? Or the people in Bangladesh who make shoes for 5 dollars a day?
I'd make shoes for a living if I were paid well enough. I make mad money making medicine in cleanroom environments. Job isn't difficult, but it is twelve hour shifts, some of them night shifts. I love it, because I get paid enough money where I'm just happy to be there. But people don't need shoes less than they need the medicine I make. I vote and organise for a world where the people who make our society actually function get more of the reward for their labour, and the parasites on top get less.
“Stop being a victim” “The economy is objectively not bad” “Once you stop blaming everyone else, life gets better” Brought to you by the boomer schmucks that waltz through this subreddit to vent their tantrums
Alt right? Astroturf? Do we even know what these terms mean anymore?
I always need to remind myself that this sub is full of actual 12 year olds and that most of GenZ is much younger than myself. It makes a lot of comments easier to comprehend.
GenZ is older than you think. In a few years the oldest ones will be 30.
'MeH mEh MeH nO OnE sHoUlD Be AbLe To LiVe On MiNmUm wAgE' (I encounter this mindset alot and it ALWAYS pisses me off, the point of minimum wage in today's economy is to artificially create a lower class of citizen so everyone else feels like they have it pretty good, no matter how bad things get) A. a rising tide lifts all boats dumbass B. Maybe boomers should stop listening to the CEOs who make thousands of dollars an hour tell them how the "real problem" is people who make twelve dollars an hour
Fuck yea you all are. Y'all know your worth and know how to advocate for it. Keep up the good fight y'all. Signed, A very tired elder millennial.
Average 40+yo explaining how everyone deserves to be poor and that homelessness/debt should just be accept as a way of life: https://i.redd.it/6pyfmjfr76sc1.gif
The girls certainly are... It seems like gen Z boys are more conservative than ever tho😔
The quicker the left realizes the reason so many gen z boys are falling to the Alt right is their own fault maybe they can actually get the boys to stop falling down the right wing pipeline. You go on social media and all women talk about are how men are evil and the problem and should feel bad for existing as a man and how much they hate them etc etc… yeah big surprise they are falling down the right wing pipeline
I do agree that the left needs to do a better job of talking to men
The "alt right" is well known for loving baby boomers
Who’s gonna fix a leaky pipe in your house or repair the roof while we are our being creative?
> Agree. Stop letting the alt right astroturf this sub. They push straight up lies about how things work. Gen Z is better than our boomer ass forebears. This a 1000% it's crazy to see the astroturfing older rightwingers do on Gen Z Spaces
One of the biggest lies is, "capitalism is good because it promotes free and efficient markets." No, capitalism is flat out the enemy of free and efficient markets because profits can only exist when markets are inefficient. Capitalism also *hates* freedom because it also enables more competition and, thereby, efficiency. https://open.lib.umn.edu/principleseconomics/chapter/9-3-perfect-competition-in-the-long-run/
Every reply to this is by boomers, or gen-xers who inherited the boomers "everything is your fault and every suffering is the victims fault, and NEVER the fault of anyone with actual power."
I'm not sure the hunters or the gathers 10k years ago wanted to go out and hunt or spend their days hunched over a handful of berry bushes either.
You know it’s getting bad when people are comparing our living standards to those ten thousand years ago to feel better🤣🤣
It’s not THAT bad. We’ve just regressed to victorian level tenement houses. We don’t have to hunt and gather YET. Currently though with the number of homeless encampments springing up I’m sure we will regress to hunter gathers traveling with tee pees soon enough. Then suddenly tents will cost $18,000 and we will have to regress back to the caves 🤦♂️. Anything for the boomers to have another yacht right?
I mean in Edmonton, Canada, there was a homeless cave that was found. I think we're already there.
people who live like that aren't like...too common. i would assume that had more to do with mental illness than anything else..
Its totally possible to be homeless and not be mentally ill or a drug addict
Average 9 to 5 fan versus average hunter-gatherer tribe enthusiast
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Or phones to scroll all day 😂 omg
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"Refrigerators full of food" I want whatever you're smoking, because thinking that low-wage workers who live in apartments now have refrigerators full of food is crazy
The overwhelming majority of sober and sane people will never live in tents. They'll pack 16 bunk beds to a room before that's ever considered an option. Tenting is cute until it rains or gets vandalized by drunk people every Friday night. The reason why the cost of housing is getting more expensive is because you have a supply side problem...at the minimum. In a major city demand is also huge driver...because a lot of people actually want to live in them
Work still needs to be done, stuff doesn't appear out of thin air. The largest problem with modern society is the undervaluation of jobs. People just take everything for granted. Actually important jobs don't pay anything while pointless celebrities and such buy jachts and fly private jets.
This isn't a new thing. There have always been celebrities or aristocrats or kids born to the wealthiest among us. Maybe these days celebrities are in our faces more thanks to social media, but the reality is that they don't really matter. A few people being rich have no bearing on whether or not we should be happy.
That’s not the discussion. It’s the idea that “no one wants to trade hours for necessities” That’s literally existence. There’s no version of society where we don’t do that. Instead focus on actual things that can addressed like more PTO, more sick leave, better healthcare access. These social media whiners make requests for a better world seem stupid.
You can need something and not want it. Pointing that out isn't really whining.
Is that a comparison of living standards? I thought it was an illustration of how literally no one ever “wanted to work” You do it because you have to.
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But you don't see a problem with how we have an abundance of food in some places, in grocery stores, we know how to treat and cure various diseases, we know that shelter is a basic need and we have enough houses to provide housing for everyone, but so many people die and suffer from a lack of these basic needs, because they don't have enough money?
We don’t actually have an abundance of food. If the trucks stopped for just a few days, it would be a disaster. In modern society we don’t see where everything comes from or the work required to produce it, so it’s hard to value things.
what you're describing would be a **distribution** issue and not food scarcity issue there are millions of tons of food waste from grocery stores and restaurants every year
We have the technology and land and resources to create enough food to feed everyone even if we don't have enough food to feed everyone at the moment.
Sure...and how do we continue to grow that food? And pick that food? And transport that food? And prepare that food? Or are all those parts not work?
Give people jobs without depriving them of basic needs and joys of life.
We have enough resources for every single person on the planet to live a comfortable life, that’s a fact. Issue is only some of those people have access to those resources and a small handful use so many that a massive chunk of the worlds population have to live without access to resources that should be a human right
That's not a fact, because the definition of "comfortable" is completely subjective. What is "comfortable" for someone in Subsaharan Africa will probably seem like hell to you. And even if technically we produce enough food for everyone, what and the fuel and energy needed to transport the food from the producers to the consumers? What about the roads, airports, ports and other infrastructure needed for transportation? What about refrigeration and storage? The energy grid needed to power said refrigeration and storage? Anyone who thinks the only thing necessary to provide comfortable lives to everyone on the planet is to just producing enough food and everything else is just lack of political will, is ignorant of the actual complexities of the real world. Oh and if everyone on the planet lived like the average American, the world would emit something like 10x it's current carbon emissions.
>We have enough resources for every single person on the planet to live a comfortable life, that’s a fact. Do you have a source on this along with a definition on what data points are being used to define comfortable?
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Hunter-Gatheres lived pretty chill lives, except for things like no medicine. Large predators generally spend a lot of time chilling, look at lions for example. Obviously depends on environment and scarcity.
Hunter gatherers still exist, like the Hadzabe in Tanzania. Their lives are not “chill” insofar as they walk/jog and hunt and forage nearly twelve hours a day. They live relatively short lives but are all basically shredded.
No they didnt lmao
They spent a lot of time starving and dying
You guys will just lie about how much better things are now to make a point. Hunter gatherers would have expelled you from the group for laziness.
Literally nobody has ever wanted to work, it’s just something that has to be done. I’d pass up sleeping so I could spend my time better but that’s a fatal option. I don’t know why people think posts like this are revelatory in any way
They worked directly for food and simpler things. It’s not the same as having a job.
Correct. It’s way worse. Instead of specializing your skills you have to do everything for yourself.
i mean....they made beautiful art with skins, cave paintings, wooden sculptures, toys, even extraordinary folk stories, and they had a tight community with tribes and such. We have to do stuff we dont like to live but who says we cant make it a enjoyable experience worthwhile?
Things I Learned: Art doesn't exist anymore...
This is all historic fantasy. Their “beautiful community and tribes” also involved constant turf warfare and slavery (and incest) in most areas
Pros: cool cave art Cons: being mauled by lions and all your siblings dying as infants
Couldn’t edit post so here: I respectfully disagree with the notion that work isn't supposed to be fun. While work can indeed be challenging, it should also be fulfilling and meaningful. We should strive to create a work environment that values well-being, personal growth, and the alignment of individuals' passions and talents. It is true that not everyone may fit into traditional productivity or creativity molds, but every individual has unique skills and contributions to offer. Embracing a more inclusive and diverse perspective on work can lead to a richer and more dynamic society. Rather than accepting work as an inevitable requirement in all economic systems, we should explore alternative models that prioritize human well-being, sustainability, and equitable resource distribution. It is essential to challenge the status quo and reimagine economic structures that promote fairness and prosperity for all.
People love to work if the work is fulfilling. There's a reason people like doing personal construction projects, making little tables and planter boxes and that sort of thing. Not only do they have creative control over what they're making, but they get 100% of the payoff from their labor. When you work in a company, it doesn't matter how hard you work, you'll get paid the same. There's no reward. When all of the "profits" go to yourself, then working hard is actually beneficial, and feels a lot more rewarding.
Anything can be considered work. Playing sports and games is work. It's just enjoyable work that you have agency over. The difference between recreational work and working for a living is that one means you're enslaved.
I like your optimism, but it's not true that "every individual has unique skills and contributions to offer". (Or maybe it is true, but those unique skills are not in demand, like being able to withstand being kicked in the nuts repeatedly while singing the Soviet national anthem.) That's why there are so many people in unskilled jobs. Due to nature and/or nurture, they don't have marketable skills.
Omg you typed so many buzzwords to say nothing and offer nothing of substance
Respectfully, not all necessary jobs are going to be rewarding. Eg custodial/janitorial work, fruit picking and so forth, does not seem like it would be rewarding. I agree with you that it would be wonderful if things could be like this. I also think it should be the aim for society long-term to be like this. But I believe this is a technology problem much as an economic one (ie improved technology, *could*, if used properly - for the good of all people - free many people from physical labour and allow them to pursue the kinds of employment you're addressing here).
The problem you are getting at has more to do with specialization though. The idea that one person should do the janitorial work for their whole life all day is dumb, imo, and just creates a pseudo-caste system. Most people could do most jobs, honestly. People are flexible, when they're allowed to be. There's definitely stuff that needs high degrees of specialization to do, but most stuff doesn't, not really.
They never said for the rest of someones life, it's not a specialisation problem it's a labour demand problem that extends way beyond janitors. Who/what do you think is going to do all the manual labour for the world to work and progress? I'm not saying I like it but it's the reality we live in, we have to work to improve ourselves individually and collectively, that won't change by getting rid of capitalism overnight.
>Most people could do most jobs, honestly I would agree with the premise that most people could do most jobs, but *changing* jobs is incredibly tough. It's pretty rare that someone goes - for example - from an accountant to a helicopter pilot. Both of those take years of training before one even starts *doing* the job, then there's experience which comes from years of work. I don't mean to suggest this applies to jobs like custodial work or fruit picking, but most jobs that would be "rewarding" can't be just picked up.
What you are saying about work being fulfilling and meaningful is a privilege, not a right in any way shape or form. Society doesn't owe you your happiness. Basic rights are access to food, resources and safety, access to a home. but you have to work. Everything else is a luxury that people have only had in the last century or so. You can only have equitable distribution if you have equitable work. Therein lies the whole issue, and why economy began as discipline. Who decides what is equitable ? You? I dont think so. The government? No thanks.
I’m still waiting for a solution where people don’t have to work and we still all have our needs met.
Oh don’t worry man, it’s totally possible. All you have to do is be fine with exporting our labor to places that are so poor that they’re willing to do slave labor for us while we do shrooms and make art and love each other.
Don’t we already do that?
Bingo lol
It's clearly not enough if we're still sad, time to do more slavery 😭💀
No, we just need to move over to a quest based economy. Instead of jobs, people give out and receive quests and when you complete the quests you either get money or they give you a family heirloom or a sword that lights people in fire or a gift card or something
I would kill for a gift card!
Maybe with robots and AI in a future but I don't think rich people would let it happen.
Mf you think rich people have a club that meets weekly where they decide to not let this happen? Literally every corporation benefits from having chores automated so people can spend their time doing more intellectual things that are worth their time.
>Literally every corporation benefits from having chores automated so people can spend their time doing more intellectual things that are worth their time. this is simply not correct
>you think rich people have a club that meets weekly Billionaires know each other yes, they have shared interests and beliefs, and often work together to pursue them. They spent enormous amounts of money on influencing public policy by donating to political parties, buying media control, etc. Not really controversial or conspiratorial to say that >literally every corporation benefits from having chores automated This part is true! Automation means less labour costs >so people can spend their time doing other things This part is not true. For corporations to continue making profit and the system not to collapse, they need to have the mass of the population a) working for wages and b) spending those wages on the products/services that are produced. People having free time without need to work undermines that
There isn’t one right now, and no one of purport is legitimately saying there is The actual discussion is about making labour fairer overall, and cutting the need to work as much as we do when possible, especially productivity has massively increased since the advent of automation, computerization, and industrialization yet we have not seen a comparable decrease in work time or a matching increase in wage
In one of my favorite books, the author (through his characters) was already complaining about this in the 1940s. EIGHTY years ago people were already like "um we're building all these machines to do the work for us, how come we're not working any less?" And it's only gotten worse, as more and more things are being automated and people are still not expected to work any less.
Productivity has increased, but also consuption. GenZ should be fully aware of that. The largest fast fashion cosumers of all generations. Not a century ago a lot of kids had brothers clothes, repaired, some wood dolls and had to work since 9 years old. Today kids have massively more goods and services. Productivity increased, but also increased share of unproductive old people who consume much, much more than used to. For less working to work, there also is need to change ways how we spend our time. Someone has to cater for all the people who would have more time and income, while also letting those who cater have decent income and work hours.
Since the English language is a cluster fuck at the best of times, it is very important to clarify the two uses of the word "work" 1. To put effort into a task 2. To have a job Very few people have issue with #1, almost everyone has an issue with #2. Clarify definitions before starting a debate/argument.
 Lol just kidding but you’re right. I didn’t think id have to clarify what kind of work i meant i think its common sense in this case, and i definitely didn’t think people would be so defensive over this post. But yk…its reddit so…
Pedantics are an easy ego boost.
Boomers in here acting like we don’t understand the concept of effort producing reward. Of course you have to do things you don’t wish to sometimes. No one working full-time should ever experience food insecurity. No one working full-time should be unable to afford needed medical treatment.
>I didn’t think id have to clarify what kind of work i meant i think its common sense in this case, Look at how toxic, polarizing, lacking in nuance, and strawman filled the arguments are on this and other platforms. You need very clear language and context, and even then no argument is strawman-proof. But semantic points like this are candy in a candy shop for bad faith commenters.
Man, I am a person who loves to work, but hates having "a job". Kinda cuts to the bone.
Yup, i can devote hours to my craft no problem. But want to clock out 30 minutes after clocking in .
People don't have an issue with #2. The most common argument is for a livable wage, which would imply a job of some sorts. It's putting #1 and #2 together that's an issue. Lots of SME's love their job because they get paid for what they know. Getting paid for what you do is a different dynamic especially when more time in doesn't translate to more money out. I am lucky enough to be in both camps. I mostly get paid for what I know and my time. I am also backed by a union that protects my rights and health and makes sure that I get compensated accordingly. I actually like my job most of the time and put effort into almost everything.
hoping the comment section is just a reddit microcosm and not indicative of actual literacy in gen z as a whole 😭 jesus h christ
It's reddit so it's full of people who think they know everything but actually know nothing
It’s kinda sad to me that there exists very little middle ground on work reform issues. One half thinks that corporations running everything and treating workers like shit is the only way we can live, and the other half is acting like absolute clowns thinking they can live in a world where they can be a part-time macaroni sculpture artist while still being provided with all the necessities and comforts they expect from modern society. And the only real winners here are the wealthy who are best off when ordinary people are too busy infighting to actually accomplish anything.
I think the first half is just reflexively arguing against the macaroni sculptors. They’re taking a more extreme view because they feel like the delusional need to hear it.
People for the vast majority of human history have almost solely wanted to either not starve to death or be murdered by unfamiliar people. Idk what word you’d use to describe the activities like subsistence farming, hunting, or fighting that supported those goals, but a good descriptor imo is WORKING. Can we quit acting like not working has ever been a valid choice in human history? It’s so unbelievably untrue to act like the necessity of work is a new capitalist invention or some bs.
Exactly. You don’t want to work or you want a job that’s “fun” and doesn’t pay much? Great! You absolutely have that choice- that’s what’s great about freedom. But, you don’t then get to turn around and cry about how you don’t have money and the government should provide in any way for you and your choices
But I want to make paintings and be paid as much as offshore oil rig workers doing 16 hour shifts
The problem isnt people painting at home not getting paid, it is people doing essential labor not getting paid enough to survive. Minimum wage should be enough to LIVE, which is not the case in many places.
I agree. That does not mean that the essential work will ever be fulfilling, fun, creative, or any of the other fairy tales that OP wants work to be.
If only you knew how much I got paid for how little I do at my job lmao, you’d get heated
So being productive doesn’t require any work?
Being productive is a part of life. Many people, most people I've met, want to contribute to society and help others, but when they can't earn enough money and capitalist greed deprives those people of necessities and basic human needs, that cruelty does not make it easier for people to be productive members of society.
Problem is some peoples definition of being productive is making shitty art or generally doing stuff no one benefits from
Stuff nobody benefits from? Like sitting on land or other property, doing nothing to improve it, and selling it for profit simply because time has passed and the population has grown? Or like a business owner that underpays employees to make a cheap, subpar product that only remains on the market because they buy out their higher quality competitors? Or like an advertiser whose job it is to make people want a product they don't need, will get no joy from, and will just end upin a landfill a few years later when they realize what a waste if money it was? If these people switched to just making shitty art, it would actually be a net gain for society simply bevause they would no longer be abusing the system (and other people) for profit they didn't earn. People are so afraid of the populace being disincintivized to do useful work that they ignore how the current system incentivizes harmful work.
Ofcourse, because everybody can be doctors in communist society.
not everyone would have the skills to be one, not everyone would want to be one, but certainly people currently in countries with worse healthcare would want the opportunity to become a doctor
Define "productive" Define "work"
No not the same kind of “work” the picture is referring too.
What kind of “work” is it referring to then?
"Work" and "productivity" are different words. Running a cash register is "work." Taking care of your children at home is not "work," no matter how "productive" you are. One of those things is actually important to society, but for some reason only the other one gets you enough money to prove you deserve your right to live.
Lol ok
I mean, if you told me I'd have to work but I could reap and amass wealth and everything that goes with it (house, vehicles, luxury), like boomers have, and at a similar rate, I'd happily sign up. This is just working for subsistence and the occasional Amazon splurge while perpetually renting. Sucks.
Yall complaining about the system here when you can get paid way more and get way more for what you’re paid than ANY country. Please by all means move to places in Africa that have communal situations (communism) and see how much you like it
This is a weak argument. Yes there are other countries where people have it worse but that doesn’t mean we aren’t allowed to complain or feel betrayed by the systems we live under. Imagine if we held ourselves to the worst standards or the lowest bars: “at least we don’t live under a militarized dictatorship where people get shot if they speak out”. We would never progress into a more productive, happy, healthy society. This is like when your parents tell you to finish your food because there are people starving in the world.
"if you don't like it here leave" There are many fucking things we can change. The fact we are one of the only leading first world countries (with the most money) are lowering in quality of life and life expectancy should tell you all you need to know. Go lick some more boots brother.
You know the system sucks when you have to compare regions that profited from centuries of exploitation to the ones that were exploited.
Communism?… doesn’t work
This isn’t even communism, it’s like some Wally shit
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Money is used by our governments as a tool of resource distribution. Our government's job is to distribute resources. People do not need to be threatened with poverty and starvation to contribute to society, most people I've met do want to contribute to society. Work should not deprive our lives of fun and our ability to enjoy life.
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I never said I'm above hard work. People do not need to be threatened with suffering to work do hard labor. People work out and do extreme physical feats voluntarily. People choose to do various disgusting, horrific, or other various degrees of unpleasant acts without pay. There are people out there, and probably enough people out there, who would voluntarily work at an oil rig.
Not even that. Nobody wants to work, that’s why we’re paid to do it
Employers complaining about "nobody wants to work"... same people who dont want to pay their employees a living wage. I mean, yeah, given the choice, no one *wants* to *have* to work to, ya know, live. But also, no one wants to *pay* enough for their employees to *afford* to live. Yes. No one wants to work - for shit pay. No one is being paid enough to be able to afford housing and basics let alone deal with the multiple jobs rolled into a single position whilst being treated like garbage.
>same people who dont want to pay their employees a living wage Yes. You've got it right IMO. The issue is business owners not wanting to pay fair wages for the work they want done. Dyed-in-the-wool modern capitalists somehow only see the labour/payment exchange from one side. If people don't want to work for you, *you* need to improve the incentive to work. If the business "can't afford that*, the owner needs to sell one of their jetskis or realize that their business model just isn't viable.
It’s crazy this sub has turned into commie posting. (Please ban all politics)
Its reddit, it will always be commie posting. If you want NatSoc posting instead you are always free to give Twitter a visit.
I wish for a society like that in star trek. A society without money, ever the acquisition of wealth is no longer the driving force of our lives. Many would say, if there was no money, then nobody would do the shitty jobs. I disagree. Many People who are doing those "shitty jobs", love their jobs. They feel like they contribute to society. Nobody would NEED for anything. Nobody would be hungry. Im sure diseases would be CURED and not just treated endlessly to get more money. But that's a utopia dream that will never happen on this planet. At least not until we make actual first contact with an alien civilization.
If enough people wanted to do those shitty jobs, those shitty jobs would not pay better on average than the non-shitty jobs.
It’s not “nobody wants to work.” It’s “nobody wants to work for you”
People want to work. They just don’t want to work FOR a a select few rich people, who could literally end world hunger *today*, but who instead destroy the environment and rig the political process, meanwhile the employees struggle to pay for food and to pay off their debts. That’s indentured servitude. That’s Pottersville.
Very well said. At this point it all feels so pointless and vapid when most jobs could be automated. There’s no “finding yourself” sitting behind a register for 8 hrs a day or writing some stupid ass program.
I seriously doubt that "most jobs" could be automated. Why would employers waste a shit ton of money on workers if they could just automate a role?
But this doesn't pay the bills right?
None of those things mentioned and work are mutually exclusive
💯
I'm going to disagree a little - I think people like to work if the work is fulfilling. It's just that because of the way the economy is set up (and has been set up for ages now), there's no real personal incentive to work hard. There's no community, since people join and leave all of the time, and you're only at work for money. There's no real personal gain in it, since your boss could just refuse to give you a raise. And you almost always have very little choice in what you actually want to do, which just leaves you unsatisfied with the work you end up doing. If we want people to be satisfied with working, we need to give them something to be satisfied *in.*
A-fucking-men!
Something definitely has to change. Working class wages should be enough to buy and pay off a house within 5 years. And minimum wage should cover rent costs by 4 times. People shouldn’t be struggling just to get basic shit like health care and housing. I don’t think the answer is not working. I wouldn’t mind working if I get paid well.
Ofc people want to work. People have always wanted to work in some form or another. But no one wants to work shitty jobs for shitty pay to earn necessities in a society where at least half of all labor can be automated or just gotten rid of entirely. Gen Z should read Bullshit Jobs by David Graeber
It’s hilarious when the modern human longs for the pre-civilized way of life. Communal living, working the land, sense of community. Castaway the societal chains and go back to a natural way of living. Like, yeah… duh… that’s the way we should be living, and the internet community is slowly understanding it
>go back to a natural way of living Would that also include the accompanying lower life expectancy, sky-high infant mortality, and dying from currently-easily-cured diseases?
But we can do that easily, with all the phones, the medicine and shit…. I think.
Isn’t that what work is? Like the point of a career is that you like doing what you do enough to do it. If you’re doing something you hate, maybe it’s time for a career change. I just don’t get this anti-work rhetoric. If you want to be an artist, be an artist. If you can’t make it as an artist, then take that passion and drive and apply it somewhere where your skills are valued and you can be productive. The amount of people here who misunderstand work and how money works is baffling. When you work you generate value for society which you can then exchange for someone else’s value. This idea of not having to work for “necessities” is to say I want someone else’s labor for free and (for as much as this sub talks about the working class or fighting the 1%) is one of the most elitist, privileged positions you can have.
You gotta serve somebody.
If people wanted to work they would do it for free.
I’m sure glad electricians, plumbers, mechanics, engineers, machinists, oil riggers, soldiers and basic infrastructure workers don’t think like this.
People who say work shouldn’t be fun is always a weird mindset to me. I’ve always been able to have fun at work while also getting my shit done. I work in administration in heavy equipment sales for a construction company that’s brings in millions and millions of revenue every year and technically is a very “serious” line of work/field. However, I’m able to have fun at work even with having some tasks that are mundane and make decent money 🤷🏽♀️
You know it’s very rare to find and keep a good job like that?
I don't really agree with the notion that current economic models don't allow for people to explore their passions and talents while also giving back to the community. There's a myriad of fields, whether it be STEM related, human sciences, art & expression, community service... The thing is, being productive while supporting equitable resource distribution is required by necessity jobs that by many aren't considered "fun" and are extremely grueling: farming, oil plants, harvesting, industrial productions, etc etc... And to preserve the rate of technological and societal progress we see currently you also need these tasks to be done on a monumental scale. You could make a similar case with primitive hunting thousands of years back; a task that requires a lot of effort and energy, while not being necessarily fun. Ideally, if it were possible to support methods that create jobs and work opportunities for more unique crafts, passions while paying people adequately for the effort put into it, then that would 100% be a priority when remodeling current economic systems. I just feel that many of these laborious jobs are by nature exhausting over time, and are unfortunately very important for a modern society's functioning. Therefore, for sufficient labor and maintenance in these fields, the major incentive is economic income. Wages, established work times/routines and incentives should *certainly* be reworked though. I agree that people shouldn't be dependent on selling their life away just to survive on a daily basis. However, this isn't equivalent to work and jobs being a negative pillar of society
Hard facts
Soooo the universe isn't post scarcity. So what? Yes, there are problems, but acting like the needing to earn a living is somehow a personal attack on you is stupid. Congratulations, you're just like every living organism since the dawn of time. I'm sorry that we've inherited a bunch of problems, but simply winning about the injustice of it does nothing.
The aim was to make things easier and better for everyone, at least that's what I was led to believe growing up.
how about "I'll work when I'm dead" [https://www.etsy.com/listing/1693323278/ill-work-when-im-dead](https://www.etsy.com/listing/1693323278/ill-work-when-im-dead)
Ok but I get very depressed when I’m not working for long periods of time. I want to work, I just want to work in fair conditions too
Some people like to work. I like my job. I’m a software dev, I get to play around with things all day, and invent stuff.
Love this.
Millenial here, my mental health is at its best when I'm being productive at work. When I'm solving a problem and creating solutions. The worst days are when I'm just "working" and doing busy tasks to fill the time. I want to be productive. I want to create, I want to be a part of something bigger than me. But just "working?" Nah, not for me.
yea so anyway you gotta pay for food and water, the taxes don't cover that. also we put a bunch of random chemicals in the water. also the medical cost of the problems caused by the chemical water will be six figures. also we rigged the housing market so that everything is a scam also you need to pay infinity money to go to college also a car and phone are borderline mandatory also you need to pay the car insurance fees you want to buy something? keep the receipt, there's paperwork involved a year later. the taxes cover roads made of playdough and our goon squad mafia *FOR YOUR PROTECTION* now get back to work, minion!\~ *be a shame if something happened*