Cultural Effects of Loss of Labor

[Speaker to Animals]

There exists no social contract between businesses and workers. There exists a social contract between the government and the governed. That's it.

A lot of the progs in my area built their own alternative economy. They have their own organic farms. They have the farmer's market (huge). They have their own local-food restaurants (delicious). They make their own shit as much as they can.

Join the alternative economy, dude. Stop bitching.

I thought it was lost forever.

I saved it for you.

[jbird4049]

There exists no social contract between businesses and workers. There exists a social contract between the government and the governed. That's it.

A lot of the progs in my area built their own alternative economy. They have their own organic farms. They have the farmer's market (huge). They have their own local-food restaurants (delicious). They make their own shit as much as they can.

Join the alternative economy, dude. Stop bitching.

I do not mean in the political philosophical mean, although I could do so. I mean in the anthropological, or social science sense. There are always at implicit contracts, or agreements, in every society. In our society, one of the implicit agreements was that loyalty from the employee meant loyalty from the employer. There is also the implied, or not so implied, agreement to the rule of law, and its equal use on everybody. And the that hard work will get you a least enough for the basic food, clothing, and shelter.

None of that is true anymore, or perhaps more importantly believed. We can all see the increasing poverty, the extreme wealth, the corruption. All of this adds to the loss of the work ethic. It also can lead to at least unrest, or worse, civil war.

[SuburbanFarmer]

There exists no social contract between businesses and workers. There exists a social contract between the government and the governed. That's it.

A lot of the progs in my area built their own alternative economy. They have their own organic farms. They have the farmer's market (huge). They have their own local-food restaurants (delicious). They make their own shit as much as they can.

Join the alternative economy, dude. Stop bitching.

I do not mean in the political philosophical mean, although I could do so. I mean in the anthropological, or social science sense. There are always at implicit contracts, or agreements, in every society. In our society, one of the implicit agreements was that loyalty from the employee meant loyalty from the employer. There is also the implied, or not so implied, agreement to the rule of law, and its equal use on everybody. And the that hard work will get you a least enough for the basic food, clothing, and shelter.

None of that is true anymore, or perhaps more importantly believed. We can all see the increasing poverty, the extreme wealth, the corruption. All of this adds to the loss of the work ethic. It also can lead to at least unrest, or worse, civil war.

This is more or less what I mean when I refer to 'society unraveling'. Upending social norms is a good thing, over time. It leads to new growth, and new paradigms of thought. I think we've hit some kind of Social Speed Limit here though - we've gotten rid of so many pillars of society, that there's almost nothing left. That's why we feel so isolated - it's not the fucking television or video games, it's the total wipeout of societal norms and expectations. Nobody knows how to interact with strangers anymore, or what the mutual expectations are.

Similarly, in the workplace, employers have made it abundantly clear that they no longer give any fucks about the people putting their widgets together. The only rational response to this would be for employees to do the same. Yet, we're still expected to suffer in silence, toe the company lines, and pretend that we're grateful for the opportunity to get shit on. This kind of cognitive dissonance is dangerous, to say the least.

I suspect we'll see a sharp increase in workplace violence and drug use, along with the proportional rise in domestic violence and broken homes.

[PartyOf5]

Similarly, in the workplace, employers have made it abundantly clear that they no longer give any fucks about the people putting their widgets together. The only rational response to this would be for employees to do the same. Yet, we're still expected to suffer in silence, toe the company lines, and pretend that we're grateful for the opportunity to get shit on. This kind of cognitive dissonance is dangerous, to say the least.

I mentioned this before when responding to one of TC's posts. it goes both ways. Employees no longer have any loyalty to their employers. While you are at a job, yes you are expected to not talk sh*t about that employer and act like an ungrateful PITA while on the job. Sounds like you want to air your grievances about your employer to their face. You are free to do so, but they are free to react by firing you.

You make it sound like employees are all slaves to their employer masters. If you are suffering in silence at your job, then go out and find a better one. No one is stopping you from that.

[jbird4049]

There exists no social contract between businesses and workers. There exists a social contract between the government and the governed. That's it.

A lot of the progs in my area built their own alternative economy. They have their own organic farms. They have the farmer's market (huge). They have their own local-food restaurants (delicious). They make their own shit as much as they can.

Join the alternative economy, dude. Stop bitching.

I do not mean in the political philosophical mean, although I could do so. I mean in the anthropological, or social science sense. There are always at implicit contracts, or agreements, in every society. In our society, one of the implicit agreements was that loyalty from the employee meant loyalty from the employer. There is also the implied, or not so implied, agreement to the rule of law, and its equal use on everybody. And the that hard work will get you a least enough for the basic food, clothing, and shelter.

None of that is true anymore, or perhaps more importantly believed. We can all see the increasing poverty, the extreme wealth, the corruption. All of this adds to the loss of the work ethic. It also can lead to at least unrest, or worse, civil war.

This is more or less what I mean when I refer to 'society unraveling'. Upending social norms is a good thing, over time. It leads to new growth, and new paradigms of thought. I think we've hit some kind of Social Speed Limit here though - we've gotten rid of so many pillars of society, that there's almost nothing left. That's why we feel so isolated - it's not the fucking television or video games, it's the total wipeout of societal norms and expectations. Nobody knows how to interact with strangers anymore, or what the mutual expectations are.

Similarly, in the workplace, employers have made it abundantly clear that they no longer give any fucks about the people putting their widgets together. The only rational response to this would be for employees to do the same. Yet, we're still expected to suffer in silence, toe the company lines, and pretend that we're grateful for the opportunity to get shit on. This kind of cognitive dissonance is dangerous, to say the least.

I suspect we'll see a sharp increase in workplace violence and drug use, along with the proportional rise in domestic violence and broken homes.

We will?

The don't look behind the curtain, it's all fucking fabulous narrative put out by the general establishment, is already helping to make people crazy. Everyone below the top 20%, and many of them too, can see the cliff, but nooo, it's good, not to worry. That cliff is not there. Have a tax cut, and smile! And the scary, horrible, awful part is that too many of the elites seem to believe this.

So, I think you are right except that it has already been happening for at least a generation.

Or do you mean that we are reaching not just an increase, but a tipping point in the despair, and the insanity? Like we have politically with the election of Trump, or the whacked actions of the intelligence community?

[SuburbanFarmer]

Similarly, in the workplace, employers have made it abundantly clear that they no longer give any fucks about the people putting their widgets together. The only rational response to this would be for employees to do the same. Yet, we're still expected to suffer in silence, toe the company lines, and pretend that we're grateful for the opportunity to get shit on. This kind of cognitive dissonance is dangerous, to say the least.

I mentioned this before when responding to one of TC's posts. it goes both ways. Employees no longer have any loyalty to their employers. While you are at a job, yes you are expected to not talk sh*t about that employer and act like an ungrateful PITA while on the job. Sounds like you want to air your grievances about your employer to their face. You are free to do so, but they are free to react by firing you.

You make it sound like employees are all slaves to their employer masters. If you are suffering in silence at your job, then go out and find a better one. No one is stopping you from that.

More than ever, that seems to be the case - employees are regularly discarded and fucked over whenever it's convenient for a large corporation. I've probably held 30+ jobs in my life, and a handful of 'serious/career' jobs in the past 5 years. They're all the same. Wringing out every last drop, to make the next quarter look good. Massive turnover rates are ignored, worker complaints are laughed down, and nothing changes unless it's a 'new initiative' from the top. I have experienced very few environments where the worker was genuinely valued, and even then, only by the lower management.

As for my current job, it's the worst I've seen outside of food service. I've been on the job hunt for most of my time here, but I refuse to lower my salary and provide less for the family. Middle class trapped, just like every other shmuck.

I suspect we'll see a sharp increase in workplace violence and drug use, along with the proportional rise in domestic violence and broken homes.

We will? I think you are right except that it has already been happening for at least a generation. Or do you mean that we are reaching not just an increase, but a tipping point? Like we have politically with the election of Trump, or the whacked actions of the intelligence community?

That's exactly what I mean - things can slowly get worse for a while, but with the addition of our lovely new Police State and corporations running every aspect of daily life, our society is turning into a pressure cooker. For reference, watch Falling Down some time. It's one of those prophetic movies that nailed modern life exactly.

[atanamis]

Can't really speak to wether or not US youth's work ethic is worsening, not being American, but the logic that you can only apply the old Protestant work ethic to hard/manual labor jobs needs abit of explaining. Either your work ethic applies to all work sectors, or you don't have a work ethic. My brother made co-owner of a small, but succesful tech firm last year. It's not hard physical labor, but he didn't get to his post by just sitting around watching YT vids.

If hard manual labor jobs are disappearing, a work ethic is only going to disappear along with it, if all employers from all job sectors start not giving a damn about the level of effort their employees invest in the workplace. I can't really see that happening anywhere in the world.

Bjorne, the theory being presented here is that the loss of low skill jobs makes people ill suited for the higher skill jobs even if they learn the skills. The benefit of manual labor jobs was that you don't need deep skills to do many of them. So a high school student could get a manual labor job, learn to work hard at a young age, then later complete college and go on to work hard at a high skill job. What is being suggested here is that the lack of demanding low skill jobs will mean that by the time someone learns higher skills they will have missed some essential developmental window to learn a strong work ethic. To look at your brother's case, did he engage in demanding work while in high school and college before getting the opportunity to do the kind of work he does now? Or was he allowed to do what he wanted through most of high school and college until he had high end skills to enter the workforce? The question presented is whether it is POSSIBLE for someone whose first job is a highly skilled position they get after years of education to be able to exhibit what was once a normative work ethic. I'd say that determining the accuracy and ubiquity of apeman's anecdote is precisely the question for this thread:

All this is true. I grew up middle class, white collar worker area in CT. I was one of the only kids in my class with a paper route, one of the only who cut laws, etc.

I banged nails framing houses during summers in college despite being a top nerd, everyone thought it was weird and that I should have some useless unpaid internship instead.

As a ski bum for 3 winters tahoe, I held like 20 jobs and learned how hard it is to scrape by.

So when I finally went to law school -- where you are directly competing with the other students for the all-important class rank -- how could these soft, whiny, wimpy, excuse-making, trust fundy kids who never held a real job possibly out-compete me? They couldn't.

In fact, my fellow students still complain daily on facebook about how unfair life is, yet I still see no evidence of them ever having gotten their hands dirty, or even over come a single professional hardship. They are over-educated professional losers.

Does working jobs like apeman did make him more likely to succeed in college, and later in the workforce? Is there any data on this we can locate? If I tell a high school or college student to just focus on getting good grades rather than picking up jobs wherever they can am I sabotaging their ability to be successful? Is it becoming harder for these students to find such jobs? I do think that the demand for low skill jobs in our economy is shrinking, and can be expected to continue shrinking as robotics and AI become better and cheaper. The day is it cheaper for McDonalds to install a burger making machine than to pay staff, those jobs will disappear forever. Paper routes will die with the newspapers. Lawn mowing will be done by automated machines. Will these jobs still exist, and will their lack undermine our ability to staff the highly skilled professional jobs of the future?

And of course there is the ever looming question of whether everyone will be able to do such jobs, and if not what we will do with the no longer necessary workers. Until the Great Depression, the length of the workday shrank at a continual rate. People used to work 12+ hour days 7 days a week. Then it dropped to 6 days a week, and eventually to 5. Day length dropped to 10 hours, then to 8. What does the future bring? Will we all work 6 hour days 4 days a week? Will some of us work while the rest seek a patron? For those who will need to work to maintain the machinery everyone else depends on, what will cause those people to have the motivation to do what they do? Luxury? Power? A sense of self achievement and adventure? The world is changing, and just as people several hundred years ago would be unable to recognize modern life we will be unable to recognize what is coming. But thinking about it will help us make it happen.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

Protestant Work Ethic is some straight up bullshit. Telling someone God will favor them for keeping their head down and carrying water for some other fucking asshole?

No godamn thank you, I'll carry my own water for my own reasons all day, but breaking my back to please the sky father. Bah, you can keep it.

[TheReal_ND]

That's not what the Protestant work ethic is. My understanding of it is that God provides for those that provide and to be charitable. There is no institutionalized taxation involved other than the tithe which was never emphasized to any degree that the Church of Rome promoted. Protestantism was in general a rebellion against the Church of Rome that you seem to hate for their tithes which were law in places like France during their revolution.

[Hanarchy Montanarchy]

I'm not concerned with taxation. I am concerned with being expected to work my fingers to the bone out of some misplaced since of duty or belief in magical reward.

Work smart, not hard says I. Protestant Work Ethic says you get right with god through hard work and discipline rather than through confession and the sacraments. Somehow I doubt it.

I've no problem with hard work, but I'll do it for my edification, and I won't be confessing or going to mass either.