I heard that back in the days, people used to just go when their work was done on the farms and there was no concept of 9-5 (these days seem 24 hours work). There used to be a lot of holidays. Is that true? If it is, then given the abundance in technology, why our work hours increased and why do we have such weird lives that we live to work?
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Because we’re Germans, not Italians
I am neither. I am from Asia.
OMG, Asians = Germans on steroids.
A lot of it is cultural. Capitalism continues to exploit people not just because of the machinations of a few people at the top, but also because there are many people who have so deeply internalised the logic of capitalism that they are reinforce and perpetuate their own oppression.
A phrase that I’ve found really useful in understanding this is “cultural hegemony”. This theory was originally developed in the early 1900s by the Marxist philosopher, Antonio Gramsci. It’s a pretty dense bit of political theory that I don’t feel like I understand well enough to explain well, but I’ll attempt to give the gist of it
The key thing about cultural hegemony is that it makes the dominant political ideology seem like it’s natural and inevitable. We see this when people recognise the awfulness of their working or living conditions, but then shrug it off by saying “that’s just life”. They can’t imagine any alternative. I see it a lot in my daily life when people see the crafts I make and say “wow, that’s so good, you should sell those” — people are conditioned to only see value in terms of monetary value.
I am South Asian and that “that’s just life or fate” attitude is common where I live.
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Because living is more expensive now than before. In medieval times, you had a 30m² wooden house on your farm that you probably built yourself, no heater, no car, no brand clothes, no washing machine, no electricity at all, no water pipes, etc.
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Because when you work on a farm for yourself, you keep 100% of your work. When you work for a company, it keeps most of your work for itself and gives you some compensation in return that depends on a combination of “how much do you need for living” and “how easily could you find another job”.
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Because we have always worked to live, living isn’t easy or cheap, but there’s also no reason to make it any harder than it has to be, well except to keep those with more in power. The farm was literally 24hrs of work. When you went home, which was still on the farm, was because you couldn’t see anymore because the sun went down or because you were too tired to keep going. Summer break from school was created so that kids and teachers could work the farms during summer.
No matter what your boss says, you are only required to work the hours that you’re contractually obligated to work. Your boss and peers might not like you very much and maybe resent you for it, but that’s your call to make. When you start a job you are signing a contract, it can be as simple as a single sentence or a full on novel. You and they are only required to fulfill the minimum requirements of the contract.
There’s more time off today and 8hr work days because of unions and farm life sucks, it’s straightforward and simple but it still sucks. Before unions there were no paid holidays, only the rich got time off.
Seems like someone is feeding you propaganda and glorifying the bad old days. It’s not great now but it beats what it was 100 years ago, which is not that far away.
The more productive we have become the greater the opportunity cost of not working has become.
People generally tend to choose to work the same hours to afford more stuff.
I personally don’t like the productivity idea. We are not machines. We make ourselves great by our imperfections.
That is not what productivity means. It means we make more stuff per hour worked, usually by letting machines do the repetitive or heavy work for us.
but why does it feel that people are more working than in past and the exhaustion and tiredness that I feel in people who do corporate jobs? I am not doing job yet but I may have to do it after I get graduated, so this thing is very concerning for me.
After I hit 40 hours I’m gone. I acknowledge there is a certain amount of privlege required to do that. It took me 20 years to get to that point but Im proud of it and I wanted to brag.
I’m so glad I work at a place where there are no late night calls, no overtime, and no time tracking. It’s all about the results you bring to the table while you’re working.
I would suspect entropy. Second Law of Thermodynamics states that total disorder is always increasing over time.
Many societies need a massive overhaul. I have no doubt that the younger generations will create new ways of living that will systematically transform the ‘9 to 5’ drudgery. AI will merely be an asset in all communities, not a director of times to come.
I don’t have hope for younger generation even though I am Gen Z myself. They are addicted to entertainment and the way they are bombarded with data have did something to them. I was also watching Times magazine where they were saying that the massive CO2 emissions can be the reason why humans appear so sad and demotivated now.
I have full confidence in your generation! Things are quite difficult in some ways right now, but I sense that in a few more years, your generation will make some very beneficial changes to the ways societies are set up. Many changes for the much better are coming ✅
Very few people I met who do not mock our generation. Otherwise everyone older than us seems to look down on our generation.
Don’t believe everything you read on the internet. Honestly, there’s so much chatbot crap floating around, it’s hard for some people to know the truth. In the depth of your heart, I’m sure that you can sense that what you’ve said isn’t true. Gen Z is dearly loved, and deeply appreciated, that’s the truth.
I have faced these types of comments from my teachers in university who will say to us that your generation is lazy, not respecting, AI dependent, and often confuse us with Gen Alpha.
Not all teachers are cool. When you want to know the truth, take the time to sense it within yourself. Despite all of the negativity in this world, your generation is full of light, and will continually add their light in many beautiful ways to the future that we’ll all share.
thanks mate.
It’s not like that everywhere in the world, but certainly heading in that direction
Where I live, the corporate culture is very weird. Many people here took inspiration from Americans and we have corporate system kinda similar to US.
What other choice is there?
Let all our work given to AI and we be sitting like rulers on it. When bored, make some music or skit and put it online or just watch AI cartoons. (A pretty naive take which I think many of the “tech-bros” have)
