Work Sucks
The following is the transcript of my troop deployment (i.e. ending rant) from episode 47 of my news podcast The Mind Killer. If you like it, please consider subscribing to the podcast
I’ve spent a lot of time talking about how school sucks, but one of the main reasons that school sucks so much is that it’s meant to prepare you to have a job, and jobs suck in a lot of the same ways. Most jobs are boring, repetitive, bad for your health, and give no real sense of satisfaction. It’s not quite as bad as school, because most people have at least some choices when it comes to what kind of job to work, but most people don’t have any good choices.
As we’re currently seeing, one of the choices people do have is just not to work, and many people are making that choice. Only about half of the people who stopped working during covid have come back, and there are a lot of theories about why it’s happening, but my personal theory is that lockdown gave people a taste of what life is like without needing to go to a shitty job every day, and they’re not eager to go back.
One of my biggest pet peeves, probably because adults did it to me for my entire childhood, is when people do selfish things and claim it’s for my benefit. And this is on display big time whenever conservatives and moderates, including Joe Biden, talk about “the dignity of work” as a reason why we can’t give cash assistance to people who need it, as if somehow working 40 hours a week to make someone else rich is the true path toward fullfillment. It’s all such bullshit. The rest of us might be better off if we can get someone else to do the dirty jobs, but let’s please stop pretending this is for their own good.
I don’t really have a policy prescription here. We obviously can’t just get rid of shitty jobs. But with automation likely exploding in the near future, we might be able to work less. If we start seeing real productivity gains, let’s not ignore the obvious solution: less work. Don’t let bullshit about “the dignity of work” prevent us from a society where robots do most of the work for us and we all reap the benefits. And in the meantime, if you want people to come back to work, consider offering them better jobs. That doesn’t necessarily mean higher pay (though it might). It can also be more flexible hours, remote options, paid time off, or just a boss that isn’t such an asshole.