Working You To Death, aka More With Less
The essential Sunfell today linked to a post from former Clinton Labor Secretary Robert Reich on how the central cause of America’s economic collapse has been the wealth transfer from the many to the few:
As a result, typical Americans have run out of coping mechanisms to keep up their standard of living. That means there’s not enough purhasing power in the economy to buy all the goods and services it’s producing. We’re finally reaping the whirlwind of widening inequality and ever more concentrated wealth.
The comments on Sunfell’s post get into the masochistic level of obssession Americans have with hard work, a favorite topic of mine for the incredible bullshit it is. How many times in a day do you hear someone complaining about XYZ issue because it’s harming “hard-working Americans?” I’m surprised that hasn’t become our official title–the United States of Hard-Working America, because that’s what we’ve become.
We have this passive-aggressive love of work, in that we love to think of ourselves as being thrifty, industrious, and frugal, but we really hate our jobs. People willingly accept all of the indignities of the modern working world–stagnant pay, soul-crushing office culture, few real benefits, little or no vacation time, constant overtime with no pay, little opportunity to unionize–because they feel like they have to sustain their lifestyles. (”I’ve got kids to feed,” “I’ve got a mortgage to pay,” etc.) Meanwhile, the stated reason we work–to build wealth for ourselves and our families–is being siphoned away to a select group at the top of the economic strata who never need to work, but are boundless in their capacity for rapacious greed.
It’s a subtle form of slavery, and on some conscious level, we’re aware of it. But we can’t face it. We can’t admit it, because then we’re faced with the miserable powerlessness of being unable to change anything. So we subconsciously shunt it aside and thump our chests in false pride over how wonderful it is that we work ourselves harder than the friggin’ Japanese, who (as Sunfell notes) have a specific word for “death from overwork” in their language. They invented the concept, and even if we can’t match them in building better cars, we can surpass them in working ourselves to death. Joy and rapture.
My current job is demanding in one level–it’s a six-day workweek, averaging nine hours a day–but it’s also very easy for a few reasons. First and foremost, I work from home, which is a balm to my soul. Not only does it save money and reduce my carbon footprint, but it’s so much more relaxing than having to put up with a gray, soulless office and little cubes with people crammed next to each other like cattle. When your daily commute consists of about a dozen steps from your living room to your office, you’re a lot more motivated.
Second, my work has meaning. I know it makes a difference. That’s the real key to avoiding the mental slavery of our work fetish culture. You have to find meaning in what you do. It has to have some kind of spiritual, psychological component, or it’ll destroy you in the long term.
There are signs that the larger working world is recognizing this. Telework is gaining acceptance in the private and public sector at incredible rates. Utah is shifting to a ten-hour, four-day workweek to give its employees more time with their families and savings on gas costs. Some employers are even switching back to pensions from 401K plans, giving their employees one less headache to worry about and more focus on doing their jobs.
I think (or I like to think) that we’re on the verge of a fundamental shift away from the Puritanical, Calvinist ethos that saturates American society that demands endless labor and sacrifice for the hope of future gains, towards a more balanced approach where you enjoy your job more because it gives you real benefits and a real reason to keep doing it. We need to accelerate this trend and demand more from our culture of work than simply nodding and smiling as we’re repeatedly ass-banged with no lube.
