So, another common criticism I see from the left about the royal family. Getting a lot of posts denigrading them for not having a "job". I decided I would actually address this and redirect the vitriol around this subject where it deserves to go.
So, yeah. A lot of the jobist, work happy left, is attacking the royal family for not "working" in a traditional sense. And, I'm going to be honest. I kind of get it, but at the same time, I feel like I should probably redirect the hatred and anger here where it belongs.
I mean, it sucks to be a "commoner" and be forced to work, meanwhile this royal family lives on the taxpayer's dime in EXTREME luxury. It isn't fair. And I get it. That IS unjust. It reminds me of when I was a conservative and screamed about how my family had to work while people on welfare get crap for free. It's the same basic concept of injustice. Being forced to work while subsidizing other people who don't have to. BUT...and this is the problem with the jobist left. If you follow the logic of this resentment to its logical ends, you get the weird fixation on jobs and full employment that we have today. This is a weird fixation on both the right and the left that keeps us stucks in our old ways. the right screams about people on welfare, and the left screams about capitalists, landlords, and the royal family. While the left is a little more legitimate in their criticisms, the fact that these two sides seem more like each other than they should is concerning.
So...how do we address this criticism? Well, it goes back to, again, "I have to work and they don't." So because of that we all have to work. Everyone has to work in order to justify their existence. THe right insists on a world where everyone works for themselves and screw everyone else, and the left insists on a world where we all have to work for the common good. But as Bob Black would point out in his essay "The Abolition of work", these two sides merely quibble over specific grievances, and over the details of how the work is to be done. But no one actually challenges the idea of work at all.
I mean, to make my stance clear, I dont think we should work at all, if we can make such a world possible. I don't value work, I think it's nasty, unpleasant, and rather than trying to spread the misery to the entire population we should strive to minimize how much we all have to work in the first place.
And I know, I hear the criticisms in my head already. "But we can't eliminate ALL work, and we won't be able to make this possible until we have machines doing everything and we all live in a state of post scarcity", but eh...no. Not really. Actually. I mean, sure. We can't get rid of all work. We need some stuff to be done. Some sausage to be made. But that doesn't mean that we should force everyone into employment. We go overkill in the other direction. We try to pump up productivity numbers to higher and higher amounts. We build our society around working as much as possible and producing as much as possible, and consuming as much as possible, and it's insanity. Quite frankly, this isn't healthy for us as people, as there is more to life than just work, and it also isn't healthy for the environment, as we're overproducing and consuming at rates that aren't sustainable for the long term existence of humanity. Eventually this society will collapse if we can't achieve sustainability with environment. And then we will all be worse off and WISH we would've achieved some happy medium while we had the chance.
There are two potential ways we can move in the direction of reducing our work, without violating the principle at play at the core of the resentment that drives crazy pro work attitudes. First, we can reduce the work week. We can continually work less and less as we become more productive. I've discussed this previously, in how we could have traded GDP growth for reduced working hours. Honestly, 40 hours is too much. I know that 100 years ago it seemed utopian given the brutal standards of the gilded age, but let's face it, it still sucks. Our whole lives still revolve around work. Sure we "work" 8 hours. But then with breaks, it's 9 hours. With commute times, it can go up to 10-12. Then with 8 hours of sleep, we're up to 20. And if you don't sleep too well, you might need to be in bed 9-10 hours to get 8 hours of actual sleep. So now you're left with like 2-6 hours of other "free time". And if you include preparing meals, bathing, using the bathroom, and doing other things necessary for the sustenance of life, what time do you have left? Our current lifestyles are a slog. We just work and work and work and do and do and do. We rarely have time for ourselves. We insist we all have to do this like we're back in the days in which we had to farm just to not starve in the winter. It's ridiculous. We just saw with COVID we could eliminate wide swaths of work available in a blink of an eye if we really needed to. It's our cultural fixation on work and extra productivity that makes it essential that we continue to live like this. We could do with less work in society if we wanted to. Not saying it would come with no sacrifices, but honestly, those sacrifices are worth it for me if it means more work life balance. What's the point in all of this stuff if we don't have time to enjoy it?
The second way to address the issue of work is through a basic income. Let's go back to disucssing the issues with both the left and right wing examples of resentment. The left hates the idea of having to work to produce surplus value for those who own. They want the "ownership" class to have to work like they do. It's the fact that they have to, but these other guys don't. And these other guys are living off of their labor. And that's the problem with welfare according to the right too. "I work so hard why do others get crap for free?"
Well...what if we all got crap for free? What if we got the same amount of crap free and we were all free to make our choices from there? As I see it, if we have a UBI, there is no resentment to be had. Why should there be? If all productivity is taxed at a certain rate, put into a common pot, and redistributed back equally, then we all get something. The whole "I work so hard why do they get something for free?" argument becomes a lot weaker. Because you ALSO get stuff for free. And if they can choose not to work, you can theoretically choose not to work. But...would you want to live like the person who doesn't work if you yourself don't work? No? Then you chose to work when they didn't, and you shouldn't feel resentful for it. Mathematically, a UBI would benefit roughly 75% of the population, including many "workers". Heck, those who would be made worse off are those who are most successful under the current system. The "upper middle class" and the rich, so to speak. People who make more than $80000 individually, or closer to $100-200k+ in terms of household income (depending on household size and composition). I mean, at that point, you're likely not working because you have to. You're a winner in the economy and work because you want to. You love the high living standards and the luxuries and the privilege that come with your job. You wouldnt give it up even if you had the chance because it's just so lucrative.
The point is, under this system, everyone has the same options. We all make the same, roughly $14000 a year, but we all choose differently. Many people will work, but some won't. And if people choose differently, why should we resent each other? THe fact is, the left and the right act like crabs in a bucket. They are all so resentful of each other the second someone tries to climb out of the bucket, they try to pull them back in. And that's just messed up. We should try to break ourselves out of this mindset so we can all escape the bucket that is work and live as we want.
I acknowledge we can't get to a full post work society overnight. A lot of necessary labor still has to be done. But over time that amount of labor should go DOWN, not UP. We shouldnt seek "full employment" if people cant say no to it. We should give people freedom as the power to say no, and then we should distribute whatever work is left as supply and demand dictates. If we NEED more people to work for society to function, we reduce UBI to the highest possible level, to ensure that enough people are "willing". But over the long term, the UBI should go up, coercion to work should go down, and the amount of work that has to be done should drop.
Incentives to work are good. We should reward people who do work and provide carrots to encourage them to do so. And a lot of work is good. It produces good things. But I think we should get beyond COERCING people to greater degrees than absolutely necessary to make the things we NEED. A lot of goods and services in society are nice to haves, but not necessary to have. It's nice to have a Dennys for people to go to to get food. But if denny's closed up, society wouldn't be as harmed as we think. We dont NEED sit down restaurants. And amusement parks. ANd movie theaters. And rock concerts. These are all nice to have, but no one should be COERCED to produce these things.
Honestly, as long as the UBI is sufficient to live on, and the basics of society are produced without issue, we should just leave work to supply and demand. if people want to work, fine. If they don't, fine. if a good or service is produced at a price someone is willing to pay for it, why should we discourage this from happening? I just dont believe in coercing people to be productive beyond what is essential for society to function. As I said, over time, UBI should go up, and the amount of work we do should go down.
Why am I going into all of this about a post about Queen Elizabeth? Well, again, because people are taking pot shots at the idea of the royal family not working, but that's where I differ from the left. The left wants to strip people of their power and force everyone to work for a living like they do. Rather, I want to make everyone live like royals. I want us all to be shareholders and capitalists, and parasites, all sharing in the fruits of society's labor and productivity, with the people who choose to volunteer to advance society through their contributions getting higher standards of living. I dont begrudge those who don't want to work, and think that we all should strive for that lifestyle. It isn't fair that soome have to work, and others don't and live off of the labor of others. But for me, the solution isn't to make everyone work, its to reduce the need to work as much as we do in the first place so that we all can be free.
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