Discuss..
(midwest.social)
inkblade
FlippanarchyThe decline in unions and collective bargaining has been a big part of this is my opinion. The anti-union propaganda was so effective that a couple generations killed it off before the younger ones could see it in action.
Hey now, what's a bigger reduction in labor hours than unemployment?
Ultimately the machine wants to preserve itself and strengthen. It does this by any means. Democracies stabilize the machine in that they prevents people from becoming bothersome. All people can voice their opinions, but ultimately everybody has to be in favour of the machine in fern to be taken seriously. If the people abandon the democracy, the machine will become less stable, and have to use more coercive means to maintain itself.
Strength is all under the machine.
This is what comes to mind to me every time "the demographic problem" of aging population comes up.
Lowering the number of humans in a natural way is a good thing and economy should evolve into supporting that, not the other way around.
But we depend on a system that relies on constant grow instead so a bunch of people can rape kids without repercussion...
Lowering the number of humans in a natural way is a good thing
I don't think that's strictly true, as emissions per capita have little correlation with raw population size.
Also, when the Eugenics Axe falls, it inevitably falls on the weakest and most vulnerable. Shrinking the population will reduce the number of homeless folks, not the number of super yacht owners.
we depend on a system that relies on constant grow
We target growth of GDP, limits on inflation, and a low single digit unemployment rate. All of that can be achieved regardless of gross population size.
Consequently, we've built an economy that focuses on gaming these three numbers without regard to life expectancy, mortality rate, education rate, per capita hours worked, or real economic value produced.
We're just as happy to AI generate movie hours as grow corn or build homes. We're just as happy to bomb a hospital as build an MRI machine.
That's the rub in our economic calculus. If we were just trying to maximize the growth rate of - say - watts of power to each household? Or vacation days allocated to each worker? Or healthy life years? We have a large frontier in front of us to grow into.
But we're not doing any of that.
I don't know what you mean by eugenics axe, but I was not talking about any kind of intervention, rather the opposite, let just not panic over ageing and just try to find a way for the economy to adapt to it.
you can say what you want, but humanity has multiplied and the planet resources are limited. So the current plan of keep multiplying doesn't seem reasonable. For as much effort anyone does to not pollute, having kids is by far the biggest pollution source.
Also is not like being many humans is lowering the power gap, rich people just have more people to abuse.
To finish my point, I'm European, and unlike America, here the mid/high class are not ultra Catholic having tenths of kids, so my perspective could be a bit different than yours. There is not a clear correlation between wealth and kids, if anything inverse.
I was not talking about any kind of intervention
No. But then you're not the one setting these policies, just kinda observing their consequences from a limited vantage point.
let just not panic over ageing
This isn't a panic over aging so much as a malaise over having kids. Exorbitant rents, depressed wages, and suffocating inflation - particularly in health care and education - make children cost prohibitive.
Consequently, policy makers (largely past the baby making age) are resorting to increasingly draconian methods decide who gets to procreate and to what degree.
"White Replacement Theory" dominating public political discussions can only end in widespread social murder.
humanity has multiplied and the planet resources are limited
The resources aren't being used equitably. Ergo, "humanity" isn't to blame in the aggregate.
I’m European, and unlike America, here the mid/high class are not ultra Catholic having tenths of kids
Bro, I'm an American Catholic with exactly one sibling.
Deranged beliefs like this are exactly what end in genocide.
I was not talking about any kind of intervention
No. But then you're not the one setting these policies, just kinda observing their consequences from a limited vantage point.
let just not panic over ageing
This isn't a panic over aging so much as a malaise over having kids. Exorbitant rents, depressed wages, and suffocating inflation - particularly in health care and education - make children cost prohibitive.
Consequently, policy makers (largely past the baby making age) are resorting to increasingly draconian methods decide who gets to procreate and to what degree.
"White Replacement Theory" dominating public political discussions can only end in widespread social murder.
humanity has multiplied and the planet resources are limited
The resources aren't being used equitably. Ergo, "humanity" isn't to blame in the aggregate.
I’m European, and unlike America, here the mid/high class are not ultra Catholic having tenths of kids
Bro, I'm an American Catholic with exactly one sibling.
Historically nothing changes until the pedophile class and corrupt politicians live in fear.
Plenty of things change if they don't live in fear.
For instance, a lot more little kids get buggered
Gotta keep the people off of the streets.
It's actually the opposite. The more we can automate and the more we produce with the same time and effort input, the less we earn and the more we have to work. Which has been happening for a long time, and is why anyone thinking that AI would help anyone other than billionaires is a dummy.
This is silly, off the top of my head:
Electric lighting, Air conditioning, refrigeration, vacuums, washers/dryers, modern toilets + sewage systems, grocery stores, GPS guided + Air-conditioned combine harvesters.
This very moment I have my Instapot cooking, the dishwasher washing, the washer washing, the dryer drying, as I lie in bed (which I bought instead of made) cooled by a fan. I just took a drink from a water bottle I didnt have to whittle by hand. Life is, in this beautiful instant, pretty good.
Great, I’ll let the people in the line outside the food bank know that things are actually pretty sweet right now.
While you're doing that, ask them if the food bank line is preferable to literal famine because the crop their family spent 14 houes a day to dig by hand failed.
Thanks bro I just told them all that their life is way better than a 16th century peasant. They were stoked. Then four of them OD'd on fentanyl and fucking died.
“Sure glad I don’t live in medieval Europe, guys!”
Here's a weird trick I've learned: I just care a lot less than I used to and only do the bare minimum a lot of the time. If you're good at what you do, you can slack off quite a bit without drawing any attention to yourself most of the time. Obv only applicable in certain job roles / conditions, so I plan to stay at this job forever.
Shhh, don't give away the secret
Are you an air traffic controller? Lol
Or increased pay.
In recent times, for sure. But that's because the capitalist class have done a very good job of making people afraid to rock the boat like their ancestors did...
After all when you're one bad paycheck from starvation, or you're working two jobs just to make ends meet, your first priority is surviving.
And for those who aren't, there's a practically militarised police force to keep you down should you ever step out of line.
It's almost like the lack of unions is causing workers to have worse conditions.
It's pathetic that there hasn't been a raise in the minimum wage in like 50 years. The epstein class is completely opposed. Forget about 4 day work week. Never even mentioned. Politicians would rather serve capital than win.
I don't know. Some people I know are spending a lot of time on gaming and social media instead of doing shit in the real world. I don't know if more free time would translate in anything else than more time on addictive behaviors.
It's a complicated subject, there are a lot of issues with the current state of technology that can be blamed on capitalism but we also need to start blaming our consuming habits at some point if we at least want to promote the use of products that serves us the way we want to be served.
don't know if more free time would translate in anything else than more time on addictive behaviors.
It translates to comfort and quality of life
I mean, yeah? If you're going to be producing more in the same amount of time with no benefits and functionally a decrease in pay compensation... you're gonna start taking time for yourself. Your company won't, so why shouldn't you?
I agree with a all this. I was talking about what humans do with technology.
For every person who are on social media and gaming, there are just as many who have outdoor hobbies.
Gaming and social media as a hobby is fine just like having a few drinks is fine.
So Marx did at least have a point...
He had more than a point
nothing to discuss. this is how capitalism was designed to work. real benefits to the working class come, sadly, from fights and often involve blood.
Just to put credit back in here, without bringing more clicks to Twitter:
https://xcancel.com/orevazsn/status/2056666244300825043
Generally speaking increased worker productivity has lead to increased working hours, people today work more hours, now must be available at all hours, are being coerced into skipping legally mandated lunch breaks, into jobs with significantly worse conditions (because they can get away with it), in exchange for significantly less pay when you take into account the cost of living (yes inflation is technically stable but that doesn't matter for the average person, cost of living does).
I wouldn't say that increased ~~pay~~ productivity has led to those things. They've coincided, certainly.
I said productivity not wages, wages have decreased in relation to the cost of living
That was what I mean, just had a brain fart
It has a bit, but far far from what could have been possible (excluding the usa maybe).
The improvements were a result of labor struggle, not of the increased productivity.
Oh yes totally!
People died for these benefits.
There's a lot of improvements that have come about as a result of being technically feasible, in many cases over the objections of the workers.
E.g. safer working at heights - harnesses, scissor/boom lifts, scaffolding with kick guards and netting.
In other cases, both the workers and employers wanted improvements. Compare the nose end of a modern truck or freight locomotive with a WW2 era or even 1980s one, for example.
Chiming in to say this appears to be a quote from David Graeber's Bullshit Jobs.
I think you need to open a history book and look back more than 10 years
Or you should. This is called Parkinson's law, first stated in 1952. https://www.bbc.com/worklife/article/20191107-the-law-that-explains-why-you-cant-get-anything-done
This has observed especially with the advent of "robots" for household tasks, e.g. the dishwasher or the washing machine. Before these machines existed, wifes spent about 51 hours per week cleaning the home. After the machines where there, they spent about 52. See: https://www.umb.ch/en/blog/news/detail/parkinsons-law-and-our-daily-quest-for-more-time
That doesn't make it true. There's a Murphys law. There's a Godwin law. Plenty of others that are backed up by anecdotes and fairy dust.
Ohh, burn, dude. Sick burn. Ooohh. Snap. Other words.
Yes, people forget how brutal early industrialization was.
Children had to spend their entire day in the mines. A machine eating a finger or two per month was okay. Working 70+ hours per week was actually normal for most children and adults.
Already did and it validated the posts
U 1st
You are under thirty.
