I don't know if this is already clear or not, but I do want to clarify something. On the one hand, I support the idea that no one should have to work. On the other hand, I understand that most people do have to work. How do I reconcile that?
Well, here's the thing. Anti work isn't a movement that can be accomplished overnight. I think this is why it doesn't get taken seriously. And one thing I will criticize about Doreen, given that's still a common subject, is that she's an anarchist and has no clear goals of how to accomplish this.
Ideas are only good, as long as they're able to be accomplished. I mean that's why I hated left wing ideas as a conservative. I saw utopian ideas as unable to be accomplished. But this...this can be accomplished.
So, first of all, let's focus on how much work can be done away with? I think the pandemic really exposed that. We could probably get rid of up to 1/3 of our work force, which includes much of our service economy, overnight if we really wanted to. This would lead to some drawbacks, but we could still accomplish the basics of society, with only 2/3 of people working. We did it before, we can do it again.
And then consider UBI. A UBI if around the poverty line as studied would likely have a work reduction of probably 10-15% on average. This is just raw work hours worked mind you, not people unemployed. But the 1970s NIT studies showed that among primary earners around 5-9% less hours would be worked, and it would be higher, maybe 10-30% among more secondary earners who don't contribute many hours. I think another source I've seen that looked at this said the overall reduction was around 13%. So, we can clearly see that on paper, UBI's work reduction would be within the realm of sustainability.
Assuming UBI is implemented slowly, we probably wouldnt even notice. The economy grows yearly at a rate of 2-3% on average, if we implemented UBI over 4 or more years we could accomplish this without seeing a "recession" or drop in GDP for more than 2 quarters. So it likely wouldn't shock the economy.
Who would work? Whomever wants to. Keep in mind I'm not trying to stop people from working. If everyone gets the same $13k and people make different choices, isn't that the beauty of freedom? So many people try to measure morality in "well if everyone decided to do this would it be a bad thing?" but I look at it like this. People make different choices. They have different preferences and different tolerances. And if most people would voluntarily work with a UBI of $13k or so, and some would quit, who are we to begrudge either group? It's their choice. So as for the question of who would work...well...when subjected to the same circumstances, who wants to and who doesn't? As long as we have enough people to fill the positions that need to be filled, it doesn't matter to me.
And then we gotta consider automation. Currently automation is looked at with dread. We think "well what about the jobs?" What about them? "But how would people live if we didn't pay them?" We see this a lot. Our government is actually obsessed with preserving jobs. It's one of the reasons we hate universal healthcare. Think of the money we could save on healthcare administrators. But...it's seen as a bad thing...because jobs. So...from here we can just work on cutting out inefficiencies. If people lose their jobs...well...we have UBI. If people want to work more, we can still let the government create more jobs. I imagine the fed will be active in all of them, raising interest rates if inflation is too high, or decreasing them if too many people are "unemployed", but I say we let nature take its course there and then let the fed pull the levers whichever way is needed to ensure we keep a tight, but non coercive job market.
If people really don't want to work, and resent working, we could just automate more and more jobs. It's been said around 50% of jobs might be automated in the next 20 years. And while the jobists will say 'well there will be more jobs", some like Andrew Yang have argued it will be different this time, as new jobs will be few in number and highly skilled, while those displaced will not have the skills to do them and won't be able to find jobs. Yang sees UBI as a solution to allow us to transition into this future economy, and this is where my UBI and anti work advocacy intersects with Yang. I might be less pro work than Yang, but he is a very smart person who in my opinion clearly sees the issues with the job market in ways very few do, and is the only one who talks about reasonable solutions, and here I intersect with him.
So as far as I'm concerned, over time, maybe jobs will, and should disappear. And if they do disappear, and we have all of this productivity, then maybe the UBI should be raised in this new normal. Maybe most people will work odd jobs part time as dog walkers like Doreen. I could literally see that being the future of work for those of us who don't have advanced comp sci degrees. Some jobs will always remain, and people will do them because they see purpose in them and because they are paid for them and desire higher living standards. So let them do them as they wish. I think its fine some have work ethic more than others. Let them do the jobs if they desire to. Again, if everyone has the same UBI and everyone makes different choices, isn't it good some work and some don't? What I dont understand is this idea we need to keep creating more jobs and working the same 40 hour weeks we did in the 1930s. While 100 years ago the 40 hour work week seemed utopian, in an era where 15 hour work days were once common, these days it's like...a relic of the past. So...rather than insisting on more jobs at 40 hours a week, we could pursue fewer jobs, allowing only those who want to work, to work, and those who dont work,, to not work. And it would all happen slowly and organically.
For me, the anti work cause is not a sprint, it is a marathon. We're never gonna abolish all work over night. People make that fallacy a lot. They think, "hahaha you wanna abolish work? But we need work, imagine what would happen if everyone quit tomorrow".
Yes yes, if everyone quit tomorrow, society would implode just like the caricature in your head, you get it. But your mediocre 100 IQ take misses the point. Not all of us are anarchists who have no clue what we're talking about. I have grappled with the logistics of how. And the answer is to do what I described. Implement a UBI, make it around poverty level, let the market decide. And then let nature take its course from there. If we automate work, don't try to make new work. If we do make new work, make it productive work. Not just meaningless service jobs created just to keep the system running as is. And over time, let automation eat jobs away, and maybe reduce work hours.
Our big reason we still work like we did 100 years ago is mostly cultural. We morally believe work is right, that full employment is good, and we pursue policies that actively encourage it everyone working at 40 hours a week, while often failing a portion of the population in the process to keep inflation in check. It's just nonsense. Heck let's talk inflation. We have a society where we act like everyone has to work, but then we keep unemployment bouncing between 4% and 8% generally. That's 4-8% that are looking for work that can't find it. More discouraged workers not even included in that states. More people who are employed, but underemployed, or in jobs they hate or are a poor match for their skillset.
And then we wonder why poverty exists, and why people are unhappy. In a sense it all comes down to this insane economic policy of ours. We keep insisting everyone must work, but then we keep the economy like a game of musical chairs because if everyone who wanted a job could find one, inflation would happen. That's kind of what I was trying to say in my inflation and UBI article. Yes, the mere fact of giving people money to spend, and giving workers bargaining power, can have an inflationary effect. Our economy is rigged in a way that it only functions properly when some people are perpetually un and underemployed. yet we still insist on full employment. It's madness. No wonder I'm so disaffected from work.
My point is that while unemployment is a fact of life, we could move the goalposts of society where we stop pursuing full employment and job creation and simply give people a UBI. keep unemployment at whatever rate it needs to be to keep the system stable via the federal reserve. But....give everyone a UBI to end poverty, and also give people more freedom. And if some wish not to participate, DONT FORCE THEM. This is what I'll never get about our economy. It seems clear we can't support full employment structrually, yet we still insist on forcing everyone to work and keeping up this farce that if we dont that the system will fall apart. If the work reduction isnt catastrophic, no, it won't. We could do away with 1/3 of the work force now and still take care of everyone. And we could automate half the existing jobs in the next few decades. We could organically pursue a less pro work world. We just simply choose to continue full employment for cultural and political reasons. We don't NEED to do it. We can choose otherwise.
And that's why I'm anti work. It's not about abolishing all jobs overnight. It's recognizing that over the next several decades, we could end poverty and also greatly reduce our labor force without negatively impacting our quality of life if we wish. We just have to choose that option. We could've all this time after all. That's why John keynes said by 2030 we would only have to work 15 hour weeks. We couldve accomplished that had we structured society in a way to reduce the work we do. Instead we kept working the same work weeks in his time and kept artificially inflating the economy full of meaningless jobs to the point of absurdity and cruelty. So yeah, hopefully by 2130, we will actually hit 15 hour work weeks, or less. That is my anti work dream. And that's how we can reasonably accomplish it.
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