Monday, February 28, 2022

Trump running in 2024....why should ANYONE vote for him?

 So, Trump seemed to imply at CPAC that he is going to run in 2024. And I have to really ask...why? While I know he's popular, heck, last I looked, if he ran vs Biden again, he would win, I really don't understand why anyone can still rationally support him at this point. 

First of all, the dude basically tried to overthrow the 2020 election and cause an insurrection. No Donny, you didn't win. You lost, it was a legit election, there weren't fake notes, and your attempted insurrection of the capitol is disgraceful. Trump is a disgrace to this country, and after that, this crapstain should never be allowed to run again. But, because we have a fiercely tribalistic and partisan political system, one party literally just let him get away with borderline treason. Okay, that might be a bit too loaded, but you get the idea. The fact is, that should've killed any popularity he had left. But instead now half the GOP believes the election was rigged. To be fair, they've been in their own little world for over a decade now, but the amount of misinformation these guys believe is disturbing.

And then you have his recent statements on Putin where he believes that his invasion is "genius". Like, what the actual ####? People are dying brutal deaths from this autocratic regime that is invading Ukraine, and Trump is PRAISING him?! Imagine if he was president now. He would make America look like a joke. I might not like Biden on a lot of things, but I respect his finesse in handling this crisis and keeping America out of it directly while also sanctioning putin and helping the ukrainians. 

Like, really. I've always said it, but it needs to be said again. Trump is a moron. He's an idiot. No one should ever take his opinions seriously, ever, and I really dont understand why he has any support other than the democrats sucking. He isnt even a real populist on economics. He's just repackaging reaganomics in a populist way. 

Like really, democrats and their failures aside, I cant understand why anyone can support the modern republican party. Trump is a scam artist. He's stupid at best, and a Putinesque authoritarian at worst. He has no place in our political system, and I encourage everyone to not vote for him or the republicans.

Putin's actions seem to be backfiring hard

 So...as I watch coverage of the ukraine conflict, I cant help but feel like we're seeing a massive realignment in international politics, and it's not going well for Russia. Russia claims a core argument for invading Ukraine was it being afraid of it joining NATO. Well...congratulations, Putin, you just guaranteed its existence for the past 50 years. Sweden and Finland are considering joining. Kosovo wants to fast track its membership. Germany is expanding its military budget and will be meeting its 2% nato requirements which weren't being enforced (accomplishing a goal Trump had but failed to get anywhere in pushing). And even SWITZERLAND is freaking taking a side and sanctioning Russia.

Meanwhile, Russia's invasion makes it look like a joke. They've already lost more soldiers than we did of all of Iraq. They're losing entire columns of tanks and vehicles to anti tank fire, and so far I only know of them taking ONE decently sized Ukrainian city. They have poor logistics, their troops are low on morale, and Ukraine so far is arguably WINNING. Russia though it could blitzkrieg it's way into the country, but it's failing miserably, and looking like a paper tiger in the process.

The economic consequences are imploding their economy too and turning their billionaire class against them. And ultimately Putin is looking more and more desperate as he threatens to use nukes, because nothing else is going his way. 

Honestly, does Putin not understand he shook up the hornet's nest and turned the entire international community against him? Or is he just in too deep to pull out at this point? Either way, the further he digs in, the worse it gets for him. He's turning the entire international community other than other authoritarian regimes and puppet states against him. He's guaranteeing the relevance of NATO for the next generation. And if he fails to succeed in Ukraine, Russia's influence is going to be weaker than ever. 

Seriously. I'm not kidding. Putin lost as many troops in 4-5 days as we did in 8 years of Iraq. When we invade, it goes smoothly, it's the occupation of territory for years afterwards is the problem. Putin is losing manpower and machinery like crazy. They look  so weak right now. Like they don't have their crap together and that despite their intimidating military force, that force is nowhere near what the west can manage. If they cant even succeed in Ukraine, they really dont stand a chance vs the west. The only thing keeping them relevant is lots of meat shields to throw at the enemy and nukes. 

While I can't imagine NATO ever invading Russia like Putin seems to fear (and I believe doing so would be a disaster), NATO is winning the moral and geopolitical arguments outside of Russia's borders. And I wouldnt be surprised if we fast track Ukraine into NATO after all of this. BOOM, now NATO is literally on Russia's doorstep, which is exactly what it was trying to prevent. Congratulations, Vlad, you played yourself.

Sunday, February 27, 2022

Briefly discussing the problems with the far left on Russia

 So...it seems like the biggest American support bloc for Russia seems to be the far left of the spectrum. It's weird. And i've been noticing it over the past year, but the far left ends up becoming so far left they end up wrapping back around to being extreme on the bad end of the spectrum again. it's literally horseshoe theory at work. Like in 2016, I criticized a lot of aspects of American capitalism and pushed for ideas to fix it. Now, many people I previously aligned with have gone so far left they're simping for literal socialism and communism, authoritarianism, and a lot of the same nonsense the Trumpers support. It's unreal. Like, it's like their entire perspective is being defined as being opposed to whatever institutions they hate, in this sense, the democratic party. But in this case, it leads to them becoming unironically pro trump and pro fascism while also being pro communism and leftism. It's weird. And in the case of Russia and China, they end up simping for them, while condemning our imperialism. There are entire subreddits full of people like this like genzedong, which seems to be a lot of western asian kids who like china for some reason and defend the PRC. It's ridiculous. And in the case of Russia, they're unironically defending Putin and his actions. It's levels of stupidity that make me cringe, and it's a huge reason I've since abandoned "the left" and became more toward the "center" than I appeared. I want to emphasize it's more a rhetocial change due to the nature of the times. The fact is just a few years ago, we didn't have literal socialist sympathizers be common online. These guys arose out of being anti democratic party, which led to them being anti capitalism and anti american imperialism, which led to them defending literal communist countries like china and authoritarian regimes like russia. It's just unreal.

Look, ultimately, it's good to stand FOR something. If you stand AGAINST something, you're just gonna find yourself becoming more extreme and irrational just to "own" whatever you're fighting against. Being an anti ideology of a mainstream ideology isnt bad, because rather than having a nuanced worldview where you can see shades of grey and think "this is good, this isn't good", you're either this is 100% good, or 100% bad. In other words, these anti-mainstream people end up becoming the very thing they hate in another way. They start out with good intentions, criticizing aspects of the system that deserve to be criticized, but then they end up criticizing aspects of the system that exist for good reason, and think anyone who isn't as extreme for them is shilling for the mainstream. It's nonsense.

That's why, as someone who generally falls into the same ideological camp as andrew yang, I feel completely homeless outside of my little forward party clique. The far left is...at this point too far left, and committing ideological suicide every day as they become more in line with literal authoritarian communism. But then you got the other side, in the democrats, who is basically like, conservatism lite. It's baffling. I mean being more in line with say, social democracy, or human centered capitalism just gets you hated by everyone. Because everyone either views you as too extreme, or too moderate. It's baffling. But that's how I view the post 2020 environment. You got the dems who are way too conservative and uncritical of our institutions, and you got the leftists who are becoming increasingly unhinged as time goes on. It's scary. I don't like it. We need to be critical of our foreign policy at times, but without becoming so critical we wrap back around to defending the likes of Putin or Xi or advancing their interests.

Is Yang's tweet on NATO really that unreasonable?

 So, today Kyle Kulinski had a video discussing bad takes on the whole Ukraine situation. Most of the takes mentioned were objectively bad, but then he ripped Yang for not being a full on leftist and supporting full on leftist talking points. 

To quote Yang's tweet here:

"America has problems - but one has to know that international stability and norms have been reinforced by American power and decency for years - and the alternative is dark and playing out before our eyes."

Honestly...I don't see the problem with it. Kyle acted like this is taking a blind eye to the US's "war crimes" overseas and stuff, but honestly? I agree with Yang here. And to discuss my feelings on this into more detail:

Look. Yang didn't deny America has issues. And honestly, I kind of see where Kulinski is coming from, him being my age and growing up with the same historical forces at work. Millennials and people in my generation have every reason to be critical of America. We grew up in a mostly post cold war environment. We remember 9/11 happening when we were children or teenagers, we remember going to war in Iraq and Afghanistan...and we remember being betrayed. Bush, and the country as a whole really, betrayed our trust. We thought we were the good guys. We thought we were going in to liberate oppressed people, and that America was hated by our freedom. We were not aware of our imperialist history and how a lot of the world hated us for getting involved in everything. And I can honestly say a huge reason why I have the stance that I do toward foreign policy where I dont like to intervene is because of these conflicts in my formative years. I watched as military occupations just led to our soldiers dying, not a lot getting done, and a lot of collateral damage. So I generally oppose most wars of occupation around the world. And I support curtailing our presence in a lot of areas.

HOWEVER, and this is where I diverge from the far left these days, I understand that the idea that America is this evil imperialist power is one of extreme privilege, and one based on the idea that for most of our lives, America has been the undisputed hegemon in the world. When you're the only big dog, of course you can get blamed for most of our problems. But, unlike the anti war left, I never really supported a full isolationist stance, or believed we are better off getting rid of most defense spending. Like the greens wanting to cut 75% of our defense spending? That's insane. At most, I suggested around 20-25% in my UBI plans. Why? Because I understand that our position in the world is based on having an overwhelming military force that no one has a chance of beating. We spend so much on military, that we can overwhelm our enemies in a conventional war. We can fight both Russia AND China at the same time if need be. And honestly, all of that spending is specifically to deter...crap like this.

Look, American empire might have its issues, like all empire, but what people dont understand is if the US was not so omnipresent around the world, the world would be a far less peaceful place, with wars like those in Ukraine happening far more regularly. It's only been, because of the post world war II institutions and the threat of nuclear war that, so far, we have not seen World War 3. We're coming dangerously close right now, but still. 

The fact is, NATO exists specifically as a counter balance to Russia. Because if it didn't exist, Russia would roll over Europe. It would expand its economic and military influence well beyond its borders, being an imperialist country and treating hundreds of millions of people in Europe, Africa, and Asia the way it's treating Ukraine right now. We won the cold war, and we kept institutions like NATO to serve as a counterbalance. And honestly? Everything Russia has done in the past 4-5 days or so has justified the organization existing for another 50 years probably. 

And let's not get into the Asia situation. North Korea has ambitions to "unite" the Koreas back under communist rule. If not for our help, they would attack south Korea and be a very real threat to Japan too. China wants to invade Taiwan and expand its economic reach too. It's only our coalition of nations in eastern asia and Oceania that serve a counter balance. And China, given the chance, would pull the same crap. 

Honestly, these countries do a very good job justifying America's hegemony over the world's affairs, and our bloated defense budget. We have that massive budget so we can counter both of these nations easily. We help our allies to protect us and our way of life. And honestly, I'm not just talking about capitalism either. Believe it or not, when I crap on the US, it's because we're one of the most regressive and least advanced modern industrial country compared to the others. Many of our allies? They have more vacation time, and maternity leave, and better safety nets, and aren't jailing black people systemically, I mean, when I look at other nations and what they're doing, I'm not looking at Russia or China or socialist countries as models. I'm looking at our capitalist, democratic peers. I'm looking as Scandinavia, and Western Europe, and parts of eastern Asia, and Australia, and Canada. You know? All of those countries often do things better than we do, while also having the same general model of capitalism and democracy. I believe that general model can be reformed over time to be more inclusive, egalitarian, and freeing to people over time. We don't need to give up these things to accomplish change, which is what the far left seems to want.

I know the far left likes to crap on America these days, but they're clueless. Socialism isn't the answer. Maybe we are a bit zealous with trying to impose capitalism on people. I definitely think we should be lenient to some third world countries who look into alternative economic systems, because quite frankly, early stage unregulated capitalism is hellish to me and I understand why they oppose it and flirt with left wing politics.

But at the same time, when the US intervenes overseas, it's not just about the economics. It's about the geopolitical chess board. If our guy is overthrown and they get another regime in there...are they going to align with us? Or are they going to align with Russia or China? That's what a lot of our foreign affairs is about. And that's kind of why we end up supporting questionable regimes sometimes. We might support them...because at least they support us, and nto Russia or China. Get it?

In the big picture, a lot of our foreign policy is about us controlling the world, so that Russia or China don't control it. Because that's bad. And that's what the alternative is. 

Right now, there are only four major powers out there as I see it. The US, the EU+UK (collectively), Russia, and China. 

And we can honestly consider the US and EU as one bloc under NATO. So it's NATO, Russia, and China. And Russia and China are belligerent authoritarian regimes who don't believe in human rights, democracy, or freedom at all. I mean, Yang is right, we ARE seeing that dark alternative right now in Russia's nakedly imperialistic actions. And China isn't much better. They're another autocratic regime. 

So...at the risk of sounding like a lesser evilist, YES, the US ARE basically "the good guys". Now, that's not to say we shouldn't criticize the US when it comes to it. Absolutely, we should. We should question our support for certain allies and their repressive policies, like Israel and Saudi Arabia. We should question our own interventions overseas. Just because we're "the good guys", I put that in quotes for a reason. Sometimes we still act evilly. Sometimes we do the wrong thing. Sometimes we undermine the trust of the international community. We deserve criticism. But at the end of the day, if we have to have a world where the US is the global hegemon that it is, or a more multipolar world with Russia and China carving up Europe, Africa, Asia, and Oceania among themselves, uh...I think that the status quo is fine. Right now, we're seeing a little sliver of what the world would look like if we weren't so involved in world affairs. And the results scare the crap out of me.

Should we ban Russian media?

 So, there's been a  lot of talk, some action, and a whole lot of schadenfreude about the idea of removing Russian media stations from cable, youtube, etc. Basically, the rationale is those sources of media are just propaganda full of falsehoods anyway, so, why allow them to talk?

Well, as you guys know, I'm a free speech absolutist. And I would personally be against these actions. The fact is I think people should have freedom of speech, regardless of how extreme and false their views are. As long as it's mere politics and not direct personal threats or incitements to violence, I'm okay with letting anyone talk, no matter their views. Besides, virtually everyone in the west seems to be aware that Russia is at fault. It's only the tankies and their hard line anti imperialist mentality in which they're so anti US that they wrap back around to being pro Russia that really falls for this crap. I mean, I've checked out RT myself. It's a joke. It's very obviously propaganda, and they're very clearly lying. And honestly, there's enough warnings as it is. RT means "Russia Today" after all, and there's clear warning labels put there by YT itself telling people "hey this channel is LITERALLY funded by the Russian government, take it with a truckload of salt." 

So...if you, despite knowing all about RT and the like's origins and biases, still decide to try to listen to them, well, you know what you're getting into. I dont oppose banning viewpoints. Sorry, I don't. And that includes to our enemies. Too much censorship and repression has taken place in this country due to previous "red scares" involving Russia directly, even. While anti Russian sentiment is fine, and I personally express anti Russian sentiment given this war in Ukraine, I don't support taking away peoples' rights. We've hollowed out entire left wing movements in the past simply because we were worried about "anti communism", and that led to us becoming as far right as we are, we're it's taken an entire generation of people being born and living in a post cold war environment to rediscover the left wing politics we are starting to have today. So no, it's not healthy for this country to censor viewpoints we don't like. It just leads to its own form of conformity and authoritarian here at home. Given I actually want to be NOT like Russia, that means being NOT authoritarian or restrictive of speech. 

Another thing to keep in mind in terms of our history with suppressing speech is what we did during WWI. As we know, Eugene Debs opposed the draft and openly spoke out against it and was jailed for it. That's no bueno. Like, again. It's fine to be anti Russia and pro NATO right now. I'm personally very pro NATO and anti Russia on this. And I believe most rational people are. But again, I wouldn't force such a consensus on people. Look what happens when the shoe is on the other foot. People in Russia are very anti their government right now. And the government is rounding them up by the hundred for their protests against the Putin regime. People in China are also afraid to go against their country's government, but will sometimes speak online about how they don't like this invasion either. Most sensible people around the world are on Ukraine's side. That's the thing. I honestly believe, in the face of such a black and white evil such as this, you dont need to coerce people to come to the right conclusion. That's what authoritarians believe in. And that's why America is supposed to be better than Russia. Make no mistake, I'm critical of America when it comes to it, but I'm critical of America often times for being too authoritarian or right wing and not embodying the principles that I believe it should hold. Some of these principles, like freedom, it even preaches. So no, I'm fundamentally against restricting speech, even to our very obvious enemies and ideological opponents. I'm not a fan of this "paradox of tolerance" nonsense people throw around in which to maintain freedom we need to forcibly silence people with certain viewpoints. No. Let all viewpoints be known. Win over people with logic, and reason and evidence. Educate them. Don't brainwash or indoctrinate them. If you need to do that, then your views are probably crap to begin with. Not always (see: anti vaxxer morons), but in a lot of cases, yeah.

Saturday, February 26, 2022

If there is a draft, should women be drafted?

 To discuss the screechings I've been seeing recently from certain MRA communities, apparently they're losing their crap over women not being drafted and men being drafted, claiming in this day of equal rights everyone should be drafted if there's a draft at all. And you know what? I kind of agree in principle. In the past, we've had a traditionalist division of labor in which men could fight, but women not. Men were required to fight, while women couldn't even if they wanted. Obviously this was deemed unfair, so feminists argued women should be able to fight. Traditionalists said that women were the weaker sex and couldn't fight, blah blah blah, and eventually the feminists won out. And we've had quite a few female combat vets in places like Iraq and Afghanistan. 

But, this opens up the question, if we bring a draft back, shouldn't women be drafted too? This is where feminists suddenly want to be seen as fragile and unable to fight. They want all of the privileges males have, but none of the obligations, and this pisses the MRAs off. Of course the MRAs play it up a bit too much, with some arguing women had it better in the kitchen while men get crapped on. I don't deny men get crapped on, but JESUS. Yeah...this is why I nope out of many MRA type groups fast when I come upon them. For them arguing women were better off with no rights is just...no. But, the MRAs have a point, and Yang recently brought this up on his podcast too. Men are expected to shut up, and do a lot of hard jobs in society, and give up their dreams and sacrifice, only for feminists to come along and tell them they're privileged for it. And it actually kind of feels like a slap in the face. What if men dont want to do the hard jobs or be drafted? Toxic masculine aspects of society remain in full effects, with feminists arguing for all of the benefits, with none of the responsibilities. You can see my "both sides are toxic/the same" mentality at work here. Both have valid points, but both end up being stupid.

And honestly? I am in the camp of, well, if women get the rights, they should have the obligations as well. Ideally, I like to minimize obligations. I mean, I'm fundamentally anti military conscription UNLESS you're literally Ukraine right now, that's my stance on that. I know some people love to have this idea of making everyone do a year or two of national service. No, screw that. No one should be forced to labor, especially in a dangerous military environment. Only when the state is under an imminent existential threat a la Ukraine right now is a draft acceptable to me. So unless the Ruskies are gonna "red dawn" us...yeah no, no draft.

But in this time of equal rights, should women have to fight? Absolutely IMO. We love to see women as fragile here, but unless you're pregnant or have very young children, no, I dont see a reason to exempt women. And even then that would be a deferment rather than a full on exemption. As far as I'm concerned, if you pass the medical tests, you should have to fight. We can discuss some sort of arrangement made for guardianship of children, such as grandparents or something like that, but yeah. If the country is under that much of a threat, screw chivalry and the double standards of the feminists. Women have rights now, so they can have obligations too (although, once again, to make it clear, actual coerced obligations should be minimized to the greatest extent humanly possible).

Discussing the Azov batallion and other "Nazi" myths Russia is propagandizing about

 So a common talking point from the Russian side of the argument with Ukraine is that they're going in to denazify the country. I see this commonly reposted online, and I saw it mentioned quite a bit on RT the other night. Claiming that Ukraine is Nazi and that the CIA is funding them and they gotta save it from fascism, all while repeating common literal fascist talking points about sexual degeneracy and all that garbage the far right screams about constantly (funny how fascists claim everyone else is the real fascists). The azov batallion is something I see mentioned a lot in reference to these claims so I looked into it.

So...the azov batallion is a paramilitary unit that is loosely associated with the Ukranian national guard. It's complicated. Apparently to combat Russian separatists Ukraine decided it would be a good idea to allow civilians to form paramilitary units to fight the separatists, and it just so happened that a white supremacist nutjob ended up making one and fighting separatists with it. And then a year later, these groups were pulled, so these guys no longer have any support from the Ukranian government and are essentially a militia acting under its own authority.

To have a similar situation, say there was a very thriving Mexican separatist movement in, say, Texas, a red state. And that the US government decided to allow civilians to form militias to fight it. And say, some neo nazi whack job formed a unit and was brutal, but effective against them. And then the government realizes this is a terrible idea and closes the program, but the unit kind of remains active on its own authority. That's basically what happened in Ukraine. The Ukraine government doesnt endorse nazism, heck, Volodymyr Zelenskyy (Ukranian president) is Jewish and had family members die in the holocaust. It was just a bad policy they had for a year, before they replaced the militias with their own soldiers.

Also, the claim the US funds this movement, no. The wikipedia link explicitly mentions the US government refusing to give such groups aid, and aid to Ukraine is conditional on the basis that it does not go to extremist groups who pose national security risks like that.

But, Russia keeps promoting the narrative that Ukraine are Nazis and that they need to go in and denazify the country. This is like Mexico invading the US because of the KKK or some random neo nazi militia that exists here. I mean, it's a lot like that. Right wing extremist groups be right wing extremist groups. They're not endorsed by the government. I would actually argue any sufficiently free country likely would have at least some neonazi whackjobs somewhere. Russia might act like that they're the whole country. They're not. That's like saying the American History X guy represents all of America.

Anyway, I just wanted to debunk that piece of Russian propaganda. Apparently a lot of Russians and their apologists are buying that one hook line and sinker. 


EDIT: One correction I want to make is after more research, yes, the Azov batallion still exists and is part of the Ukrainian military for some reason. While this fact is unfortunate, and questionable on the part of Ukraine, it should be noted that this is still a tiny minority of the country and is not representative of the entire country. Again, keep in mind US politics and the neo nazis and white supremacist groups we have. Ukraine having small minorities of nazis too is comparable to this in the best of scenarios.

More info on Russia invading Ukraine

 So, I discussed the geopolitical situation in Ukraine recently, and the real reasons Russia was invading, but then RealLifeLore on youtube came out with a lengthy video discussing all that in more detail than I provided and so much more. I recommend everyone watch it, but to supplement it, this isn't just about the geopolitical positioning of NATO. That is a large part of it, and Russia is less safe from a potential hypothetical NATO invasion if Ukraine joins NATO. However, it goes a lot deeper, the causes are also economic and energy related.

Tell me, what is it said America always invades over? OIL. And that plays a huge role here. Well, natural gas. You see, Russia has a weak economy. Despite having the largest land area, when you live in a frozen wasteland 9 months of the year, you dont have a very strong and diversified economy. Russia gets a lot of its economic success from petro dollars. They are the #1 natural gas supplier to Europe, and that's how they make their money. But, Ukraine threatens that. First of all, it does so through putting tariffs on gas that goes through its territory, causing Russia to have to reroute natural gas around the country in order to avoid paying Ukraine anything. Second of all, Ukraine has a metric crapton of natural gas within its borders. Crimea was, as far as I knew, about getting access to a warm water port. But it was also about getting access to the massive natural gas and oil reserves off of its coast. There's also a lot of reserves in the eastern region of Ukraine where the separatist movements are.So....Russia wants that stuff. First of all, because their economy is based on this stuff and it seeks to expand its access to the stuff, but also because Ukraine is a potential competitor. In recent years they've been trying to make deals with Exxon and Shell to extract the stuff, and Russia can't have that. Europe really doesn't WANT to be reliant on Russia for natural gas. Mainly because of this crap. It's a national security disaster. Russia weilds a lot of power in Europe because they CAN just shut off access to their gas overnight, and that undermines some aspects of NATO's security. So if they can get their gas from Ukraine instead, then they can cut off Russia, making it irrelevant on the world stage. 

That said, Russia is making a VERY desperate move here and going all in on invasion here. They went full on invasion of the whole country, hoping to blitzkrieg their way into keeping it in their sphere of influence and out of the hands of the west. And it's going poorly. Four days in, apparently they barely gained any ground. Their early shock and awe campaign isn't sustainable, and they lack supply lines to keep their advance up. Meanwhile the Ukranians are hunkering in. And this is making Russia desperate. Now they're apparently bringing in vacuum bombs, which are essentially weapons of mass destruction one step down from nukes. And I am getting kind of nervous that if Russia can't take Ukraine via more conventional means, they might rely on such weapons to force the Ukranians to surrender. I was kind of wondering why they were so desperate, but if Russia sees this as the do or die moment of their empire, where if they don't take Ukraine now, they will recede into irrelevance, I can see why they would do this. This is the last gasp of an empire that has been dying for over thirty years now, and if they don't act now, they might have lost the war for the 21st century. And you know what? I hope Ukraine breaks them. They're doing a good job so far. I don't know if they'll continue to do so if they go all vacuum bomb on them, but they're trying. Slava Ukraini! (I think/hope I said that right?)

The failure of gendered politics

 So...gendered politics sucks, and seems to inevitably devolve into tribalism, with both sides promoting their own brand of idpol while seemingly trying to undermine the other. I've known this for a while, if anything, I've never been comfortable with them. Even when I was a teenager, rather than call myself a "feminist", I would call myself an "equalist" or egalitarian. And I guess that is my stance. Still, given the loaded associations these terms often gather with one side or the other, I struggle to call myself such things either. 

Here's the problem with feminism. Equal rights are fine, equal rights are good. Gender critical theory is a valid academic lens through which to view gender issues. And women, in modern society, are often oppressed. They have historically been kept out of job opportunities, face glass ceilings in job advancement, and tend to suffer a lot of problems that stop them from getting ahead. 

But...despite these valid causes, feminists often end up devolving into these shrill, man hating circlejerks in which they promote their own rights, while acting like males are privileged and need to constantly shut up about everything. They end up turning into militant SJWs, acting like their group has it so bad, and the other group has it so good, and view all politics through such a lens. Just because such a lens is valid, does not mean that it is the only way to look at an issue, or that it has a monopoly on framing the issue. It quite frankly does not. And feminists, the second it comes to male issues, they tend to sweep them under the rug, not care, and if they address them at all, do so within the weird cultish SJW framework that feminists do. Despite whatever positive contributions feminism has had on humanity in the past century or so, in a modern context, they seem to be a force that makes our politics worse.

But, let's face it. The "men's rights" movement isn't any better. I've really struggled throughout the years to find a decent community for male issues, and I thought I did recently, until they turned into woman haters too. The "manosphere" as its often called is just as toxic and militant as the feminist camp, if not worse. Often it IS worse. While feminists will claim to be for equality, only to then turn around and only advocate for it on their terms while minimizing male issues, MRAs tend to be an extremely toxic bunch. At their worst, you get communities like the red pill, mgtow, or incels, who seem to long for a world long past in which women just shut the heck up, said yes to them, dated them, and got married, barefoot, and pregnant. But, putting the excesses of those guys aside, sometimes they do bring up valid issues. The acceptability of circumcision, unequal expectations in the work place and military that put a larger burden on men (see men aged 18-60 being forced to stay in Ukraine and be drafted while women can leave), inequalities with things like parental rights, child support, etc. I mean, male issues are major issues. Even Andrew Yang speaks a lot of male issues, much to the chagrin of the feminist movement. But, as I've recently found out, the MRAs still hate yang because he will also listen to the feminists, and therefore isn't pure enough for them. 

And that's kind of the problem. While I have mixed views on yang's anti tribalist "enlightened centrism" at times and think it's very poor framing (he's solidly center left IMO, and not just in the american sense), on culture war issues he's totally right. Womens' issues are issues. mens' issues are issues. But feminists want to promote womens' issues while acting like mens' issues don't exist, and MRAs like to act like men are so mistreated and persecuted while women were better off back in the kitchen. It's disgusting. Both groups see the other group as a hate group toward them, and neither are totally wrong nor totally right.

The tribalism is the problem. If we could talk about these issues objectively, and with an open mind, that would be great. But instead gendered politics devolves into "my group has it so bad, the other group has it so good, blah blah blah screw the other group", when honestly, both have valid points, but both are, in my mind, incorrigibly toxic. Really, I just hate the entire drama around both sides.

I may or may not have covered this issue before, I mean, my views on this go a long way back, but after running into various communities that were supposed to be more moderate, only for them to devolve into the same other group hating tribalistic circlejerks, I really have zero faith in these politics any more outside of Andrew Yang's nonpartisan approach.

Friday, February 25, 2022

I support a right to financial abortion

 So, this is a contentious issue among the left. The right normally takes a very traditionalist view toward sex, which combined with their economic views turns into a doctrine of personal responsibility. They believe that if you have sex, you risk the right to having a kid, and if it happens, then you shouldn't have had sex. They believe women should carry fertilized eggs to term regardless of the stage of development because "life", and that men should pay child support, because, well, he created the child and is personally responsible for it, and because men are breadwinners, they are expected to provide for their family.

Liberals seem to be a bit better, but in feminism's hypocritical stance of supporting rights for me but not for thee, they support a woman's right to choose with a ferocious furor, often accusing anyone who opposes it of sex shaming and wanting to "control women", but...let's be honest, these same feminists, when the issues becomes one of men having to pay child support, suddenly after her body her choice, it's a 50-50 proposition between them because they both had sex and created the child. Never mind we just clearly gave one party far more freedom and rights to get rid of that if they want. But men? Well, men can suffer. Any of the typical personal responsibility, sex shaming arguments that are rejected when applied to women, now apply to men. It's BS.

Here's the thing. I support a woman's right to choose. I believe that having sex isn't consent to parenthood. I accept that despite the best attempts for the parties to use birth control, that can fail. And I support the right of the parents to do what's best for them. If they don't want to have a kid, they shouldn't have to, and this is often celebrated among women who exercise this right. But if you're a man, well, you should man up and take responsibility. Again, rights for me, not for thee. 

What if you were entrapped? What if the woman said she was on birth control but wasn't? What if she poked a hole in the condom? What if it failed for completely innocuous reasons? In our current society, if you're a man, you're crap out of luck. You just signed up for debt servitude for the next two decades, and if you don't pay, we'll garnish your wages or even throw you in jail. It's BS. 

I say, if the woman has all of these rights, and the man wants no part of it, well, the man should have a right to have no part of it. He should sign his parental rights away, and not have to pay child support either. Period. 

Now, some would say "but what about the child? They might grow up in poverty!" Well...that is the mother's choice...isn't it? And maybe she should take that into consideration when deciding to have a kid. Hate to sound cruel, but if we have wide access to abortion and birth control, and it's the woman's choice, it's her choice, and she can deal with the consequences. The man might say, hey, I never wanted this. You forced this on me. It happens. Men get trapped. I'm actually, quite frankly, scared to have sex, in part because of how men are treated. The idea of having a kid I don't want is a matter of existential dread to me. And it would make my life miserable. When women face such misery, they're often looked upon with sympathy, but the men? Well, you had sex, it's your fault. Again, rights for me, but not for thee.

I'm again, not trying to hate on feminists in saying this in the sense that I support womens' rights. But I am going to pick on them when their progressivism suddenly turns into rank conservatism when the shoe is on the other foot. This is an issue I have with gendered politics in general by the way. I support women's rights, I support men's rights. I reject the tribalism and hatred both sides have toward the other side's causes. Both sides have legit grievances, and both can be pants on head stupid when it comes down to the other side. So I want to make that clear. 

As far as the child and the potential for child poverty...I mean, dude. I support UBI, I support a generous "welfare state". But the problem is, that isn't the answer that a lot of these, quite frankly, conservatives (even the feminist liberals suddenly become conservative when the issue becomes about men) want to approach the issue from. Again, to them it's about personal responsibility. They have the attitude that society shouldn't bear the cost of raising the kid, the individual should. it's the individual's concern. It's personal responsibility. And for me, that's the problem. I prefer a world where "personal responsibility" is more limited, and we just societally solve most problems from existing in the first place. So I support a UBI, including a smaller UBI for children that would be relatively neutral from an "incentives" perspective. 

And that's my ideal. Women should have a right to abortion. Men should have a right to opt out of parenthood and parental responsibilities (including child support). Everyone should have a UBI. No one should be forced to do anything, everyone should have freedom, everyone should be taken care of, and conservatives who want to impose their traditionalist way of life on people can get screwed.

Thursday, February 24, 2022

Investigating RT during war time (and a discussion on NATO)

 So...I previously looked at RT in 2017 after we were in our mccarthyist "Russian propaganda" hysteria post 2016, but I decided, in this conflict against Ukraine, to take another look at it to see how they were spinning it. I didn't watch for super long, I was quite frankly more interested in actual coverage of the war that was legitimate, but I did watch for around an hour. 

I happened to catch it right when Lee Camp came on. And he basically happens to be the progressive golden child of the network. And he started pulling out all of the common propagandistic talking points, about how NATO promised to not to expand, and how the US wants to impose its way of life on people, and blah blah blah. And then he basically started attacking the US over issues like that involving forcing nurses to come to work and not take other jobs over poor pay, etc. All of their choices in discussion were quite intentional, and the message was basically US bad, Russia just wants to defend itself.

While I have acknowledged Russia has a valid geopolitical concern over the region, honestly, Russia has brought this upon itself. NATO made no promises to not expand eastward. Russia signed an agreement with NATO under Yeltsin to the contrary, to which he later opposed and criticized because he changed his mind. But by then, it was signed. And since then, Russia has fallen back into authoritarianism. And ironically, Russia's belligerence is what drove a lot of states like Poland to NATO. They feared Russia's aggression. 

It should be noted joining NATO is considered totally voluntary. Heck, the standards to join NATO are rather high, requiring significant requirements to conform to to be a contributing nation state, and requiring the approval of every existing nation state that is a part of it. And many European countries are NOT part of NATO, like Sweden, Finland, Switzerland, Austria and Ireland. Some states just prefer neutrality in such matters, and that is generally respected of them. 

So...eastward expansion of NATO has actually been a voluntary thing, with many nation states joining to seek protection....from Russia. Ukraine has been in a weird position of being on and off with the idea, but in recent years has been more serious about joining, which is what drove Russia to attack. Should NATO have not expanded? Well, it depends. If the expansion is voluntary and not coerced, that's fine. If one side is actively courting people to its side and bullying people to join, which is certainly what Russia would argue, then not fine.

Should Russia's security concerns be considered? Well, here's the thing. What is Russia afraid of? The US invading them? Why would we do that? They have the third biggest military in the world and if Napoleon and Nazi Germany of proven anything, invading Russia is generally not a good idea, and it's not a fight I believe is in the US's interests, or that they would actually win. I don't deny we sometimes push around weaker countries for oil or something, but Russia is a nuclear power with a large military and inhospitable terrain. And even more so, the only reason we would want to deal with Russia is because they would be aggressive themselves. Russia has "don't #### with it" written all over it, and honestly, we only want to get involved because they're attacking everyone else. So make no mistake, Russia is unequivocally the bad guy here. If they were an open free democratic society, we'd probably let them be. 

And as far as we want to push people around and force our model on people. Sure, we attack other nations, sometimes to impose capitalism and our form of imperialism on them, but let's look at who the alternatives are as far as big fish in the world. Those are Russia and China. Russia is an authoritarian state that is ALSO capitalist. They're not communist any more. They might promote leftist party lines on RT to try to win lefties over to their cause, but make no mistake, they're everything the US is as far as negatives but worse. And China? An authoritarian communist state. These guys are not moral role models to serve as an alternative to the US. The US and Europe might sometimes be hypocritical in their roles in colonialism and neocolonialism over the years, but they're still the best moral leaders the world has. No nation is perfect, and "western values" are still far better than the alternatives. 

So, just to debunk that.

To return back to the subject of RT, basically, they're propaganda. They spin things in certain ways to promote certain narratives. Not everything they say is inherently wrong. But it's crafted together in a certain way to create a narrative, and they might have a mix of truth here, some exaggeration there, some bias here, and some flat out convenient lies there. Our own corporate media isn't much better. I noticed this when I last covered RT in my previous article. They spin things in certain ways, and if anything that's why I don't trust them either.

It's important, when looking at ANY news source, to take their biases into account. You gotta keep in mind who is funding these guys, what their interests are, and take note of that when listening. You don't go to CNN if you want fair coverage of anti establishment political candidates like Bernie Sanders and Andrew Yang. You don't trust RT if you want coverage on anything related to Russia. Even before this they've always had their own weird biases toward Russian politics. Because it's a Russian propaganda outlet. 

On domestic politics, I previously considered RT to be a little better, but they still have an anti US stance and seem to promote leftism in a "hello fellow kids" sort of way to sow discord. This is why left wing criticism of Hillary Clinton was often considered to be "Russian propaganda". Sure, the Russians had a vested interest in sowing discord. But, as I said myself, does that mean we should just support the dems and political establishment out of some jingoistic form of patriotism? Hell no. My convictions are my own. Russia doesn't tell me how to think. And if they happen to agree with me, well, we're NOT the same, as I genuinely want my country to be a better place, and they just wanna screw with the political establishment. 

One thing you can tell between the Russians and myself is when RT criticizes America, they don't offer solutions. Their entire message is American bad. And while this often takes a socialist tinge to it, let's not forget, is Russia ANY better of a country than the US? Of course not. They're a terrible place to live. Me? I have explicit goals, and i criticize the country in advancement of getting those explicit goals passed. There's a difference between criticizing your country in order to make it better, and attacking it for its own sake to sow discord. I do the former, they do the latter. Which is when it comes time to criticize Russia, YOU BET i have some choice words. And I support Ukraine in this war 100%. Russia is wrong. Period. End of story.

So...generally speaking? RT spins propaganda. While some things they say might technically be true, they make a lot of embellishments and spin things in certain ways to fit the facts to their narrative. Much like most propaganda. it should be noted most propaganda doesn't outright lie to you. Sometimes it does. But more often it simply spins facts to fit their narrative. And in order to untangle what they're doing, you gotta understand their narrative. I can be biased too, admittedly, but on this issue, i feel like I'm relatively objective. I explained what russia's actual interests are, and broke the issue down into the simplest form of geopolitics and discussion of "who benefits from what?" Russia wants buffer states to protect its security. And those buffer states, wanting to be relatively free liberal democracies, seek protection from Russia. And that's the real issue at stake. In that context, Russia is the aggressor, and is completely in the wrong. Period.

Under which circumstances is a military draft ethical?

 So....there's a lot of conscription going on. Russia apparently has a military draft, and given the invasion, so does Ukraine. Honestly? It should be no surprise that I am almost completely categorically against a military draft. A draft is forced labor. I'm against forced labor, including wage slavery. However, with wage slavery, I have made it clear that when my ideals conflict with reality, and reality requires some amount of economic compulsion to make people work, I will yield to reality. Virtually all of my work on the subject that I've done recently regarding work week reductions and freeing people from a UBI are within the context that we can sustainably pursue these things. I believe we can pursue shorter work weeks in the form of lower GDP growth in practice. And a UBI would only have a work reduction equivalent to a 5-10 year hit to GDP, and if implemented over that period of time, would be easily doable, given we continually grow. But let's face it, if a country or the world faces an existential threat that requires some level of coerced labor, I can understand and respect that. I'm left wing, but I'm not stupid left wing.

 So....military draft. For me, a military draft is SO much worse than mere wage slavery. It essentially involves a state not only coercing people into some sort of service, but it also involves putting them in harm's way. You're forcing them, by gunpoint, to be put in life or death situations that get people killed. I believe that is wholly immoral under normal circumstances. If the US implemented a military draft today, I would be against it. I would be opposed to the military draft during vietnam too. Any post WWII conflict, minus MAYBE Korea, I would be completely against a draft for. Why? Because if you're going to push a draft, it should only be as a last response. The very country would have to be under a dire attack where you're fighting in the streets blocks away and you're in imminent nature of life and death. And, you would need to not be able to reasonably drive back the force with just a voluntary military.  

So...is Ukraine justified in imposing a draft? ABSOLUTELY. HOWEVER, i would throw in one caveat. To my knowledge, no one of draft age is allowed to leave the country. But, honestly? I think forcing people to serve when they would rather flee is coercive. Like, I see both sides here. The state needs people to serve to protect it, but if someone doesn't want to fight, and don't want to be put in a life or death situation, I think that their loyalty to themselves takes precedence over loyalty to country. Now, the country would have every right to sanction people who refuse to fight. Strip them of citizenship or jail them if they return, whatever. But I would let them leave at least. But, at the same time, from the state's perspective, yes, a draft is justified. The state would be trying to preserve its existence from a superior military force and take it over. ANd that suspension of freedom is necessary to prevent the complete suspension of freedom that comes from foreign conquest and occupation. So in a purely defensive war, yes. A draft is justified. But I would also argue people fleeing the country to avoid the conflict is also justified. So, it's mixed. I really don't like the idea of just saying you have to fight, period, we're not gonna even let you escape. That's state violence, just as the invasion is state violence. To me, becoming a refugee is a valid alternative from an individual perspective.

So do I fully support Ukraine's draft? I support it from the perspective of if you don't get out now, prepare to fight. But anyone should be free to leave if they so desire. If the government decides later they don't want them to come back because they bring shame to their nation, that's up to them I guess. I'm not really a super patriotic/jingoistic type of guy. I respect the people who are on Ukraine's front lines fighting and taking part of the organized defense of the country. Don't get me wrong, those guys are HEROES, and deserve  all the credit in the world for what they're doing. But...I don't like the idea of forcing people to be heroes. 

Now, you have to look at the consequences of this too. If people leave, and no one fights, then Ukraine as a nation dies. The defense is more likely to fail. And Ukraine might be taken over by the Russians. This is bad for anyone who lives there or wants to live there, and is not aligned with Russia. Don't get me wrong. Russia's invasion represents an attack by an authoritarian regime on a relatively peaceful democratic country that seeks its own freedom and independence. And those ideals are lost if Ukraine falls. But....the people who flee could live better lives elsewhere in Europe. And I think that they have a right to pursue that. I dont like the idea of telling people they're morally required to die for a cause, even if the cause is righteous. Even if it saves others. To me, it goes against my core ethics. And even in the face if existential threat, yeah, I still am uncomfortable claiming that kind of positive moral duty if alternatives exist. 

But what if Russia doesn't stop at the Ukraine? Well, if Russia decided to take over the rest of the world, there will be nowhere else to run. So is leaving really doing anything but delaying the inevitable? Honestly, I think righteous democratic states like the Ukraine have a moral right to impose a draft for self preservation. But people in the sake of their own self preservation, have a right to flee the conflict zone. However, if they stay, they should fight. 

What about Russia's draft? Well, they're the aggressors, and they're an authoritarian regime. Their draft isn't justified. They're under no immediate danger. If NATO invaded them, under no provocation, and decided to simply expand territory like Russia is doing now, Russia would be justified in imposing a draft on their people. But, they're the aggressor, and to me a draft is only morally on the table in defense of imminent attack on one's homeland. There's only been two times in US history I would say a draft was black and white justified. And that was the civil war and WWII. In both wars, there were direct attacks on the homeland that precipitated the conflict, and the existential nature of the conflict justified it. But, beyond that, not really. 9/11 was a terrorist attack by a NGO, not an organized military attack by a state power. There was no occupying force there. And Al Qaeda also had complex motives leading to the conflict being more morally ambiguous. So thats a little different.

But yeah, that's my stance on drafts. I don't like drafts. Drafts are one of the greatest evils a state power can commit against its citizens, and should only be done in the case of an extremely dire need of them. Again, we're talking an imminent existential threat against the country itself from a foreign military power with the explicit intention of killing people and occupying the territory. In those cases, such as Ukraine is facing now, a draft is justified. At the same time, I don't necessarily fault people for trying to evade it by fleeing to a country not involved in the conflict. That is an individual moral decision one must make. I think telling people they can't leave, like Ukraine is trying to do now, is a bit sus to me. I understand where they're coming from and why they do that, but really. I just dont like the idea of morally requiring people to essentially die for a country, or any cause. If they'd rather go, go. But I would also be okay with the state in question kicking them out in such a case and not allowing them to return. You flee, you throw your lot in with whomever you flee to. Have a nice life.

This Ukraine situation is screwed up

 So...this isn't going to be a long article, more a blurb, but I've been following the coverage for the past day, and this is messed up. Russia didn't just invade the two regions they claimed they were acting to "protect" (read: annex), they invaded the whole country. And civilians have been fleeing for their lives, some have died, some Ukrainian soldiers died. Ukraine isn't letting men under the age of 60 to leave because they're going to start conscripting, and I've been hearing reports of radiation spikes near Chernobyl, which the Russians now occupy.

It's not all bad news though. The russians have been pushed back in a lot of ways. They're losing a lot of soldiers and equipment, and morale among Russian soldiers is very low. Some are surrendering, some are deserting, tanks are getting blown up, planes and helicopters shot down. So they are incurring heavy losses. Apparently the Ukrainians retook an airport which is good. And Russia is facing massive protests at home. So that's good. While I wish no ill will against the Russian people, as many of them are forced into this mess, honestly, I hope this invasion is as costly to the Russians as possible, and I like the fact that they're being bled dry and that Ukraine isn't being a complete pushover. The world is largely united behind them, while Russia seems largely condemned.

I stand 100% behind Ukraine here, and completely condemn Russia. Yes, I know some of the online left likes to push the fact that NATO expansionism is making Russia nervous and causing them to lash out. I've actually been making that argument for years. At the same time, given this brazen aggression, yeah, no, screw Russia. Much of NATO's expansion east has been voluntary on the part of the countries involved, as they seek attention from a belligerent power like Russia, with Ukraine having been trying to get into NATO for years, and NATO kind of sitting on the issue purely out of not wanting to piss off Russia. So, no, screw Russia. We're not being imperialist here, and for anyone wanting to know why NATO still exists and why it's expanded eastward in the first place, THIS IS ####ING WHY!

Seriously, I know hating on the US is popular among the online left, but this is the game we're playing all the time. Most acts of "imperialism" on our part are mostly to draw parts of the world to our sphere of influence, where if we didn't, Russia and China would be doing this crap all the time. The world is not a nice place, and we act as a world empire explicitly to minimize the the influence of rival powers. And between this and watching China take passes at Taiwan with aircraft, I want to remind people this is why we have such a huge military. A lot of it is so that we can fight both Russia and China at the same time if needed. Our strategy is to have such overwhelming military force no one tries to challenge us. And while I do think we go a little overkill, the past few days have done a good job justifying that explicit strategy.

The US isn't perfect. Don't get me wrong. We do a lot of shady crap. But, to some extent, we act as we do explicitly because if we didn't Russia and China would have free reign to do whatever they want, and trust me, they would be far worse. 

Speaking of the US's response so far. It's mostly sanctions so far, and I approve of that. I've been leery of what we should be doing here, recognizing if we do nothing it could embolden more aggression, but at the same time, if we get involved directly, it could spiral to WW3. So remaining out of it militarily but imposing sanctions that seem to have some teeth and seem to be screwing up economy really good. That's appropriate given the circumstances. Keep in mind Ukraine isnt part of NATO. It's been wanting to get in, but we've been sitting on our hands with it. And Russia, whose geopolitical strategy seems to rely on expanding as far west as possible to prevent troops from gathering on its borders and being able to invade, the way they're doing right now, has been completely opposed to it, hence the invasion (allegedly). It's possible though, and it's been argued that Russia wants to reconstitute the old soviet union, of which Ukraine was a part of. So...yeah. 

Anyway, that's all I have to say on the subject in general. Honestly, I hope this doesn't spiral to WW3. And I hope the Ukranians give the Russians hell. They probably won't win in terms of a formal military conflict (although given their size they're doing an admirable job), but if they can make occupying Ukraine as painful as possible, they might eventually have to give up and leave.

Tuesday, February 22, 2022

Discussing Blyatzkrieg 2022 (Russia invasion of Ukraine)

 So, guys, it's happened. Russia is doing it. They're invading eastern Ukraine. I already discussed the core geopolitical forces at work encouraging this, but that's not the official story Russia is putting out. While Russia is thinking in terms of geopolitics, Putin is claiming that the Russian population there want's to declare themselves independent from Ukraine, and they're "recognizing" it and sending in a "peace keeping force".

This is nonsense by the way. Russia was astroturfing this movement for years, explicitly so they could pull this crap. Most of the support here is fabricated to my knowledge, with Russia using social media manipulation in a blatant attempt to manufacture consent. Most Ukrainians do NOT support becoming part of Russia. 

This is not uncommon for Russia. They pulled the same stuff in 2014 with Crimea, after all. But let's face it. Most Ukrainians want to be independent of Russia, and Russia wants that land to serve as a buffer zone between them and the west. That's what's really going on. It's just raw, naked geopolitics and imperialism. As I like to say with politics, there's the reason, and then there's the reason behind the reason. One his a politically correct pretext, the other is the real reason. 

Anyway, now that Russia did it, we're in dangerous territory. This could ignite WWIII, if this doesn't make WWIII inevitable. I want to remind you guys of WWII. Hitler invaded the Sudetenland under a similar pretext as Putin is using now. And at first, the western allies tried to appease him by letting him do what he wanted. But then he started invading other crap and WWII eventually started.

That's the danger we're in now. We could turn a blind eye to this, but Putin could treat that blind eye as weakness and keep pushing his luck until we DO get in a conflict. At the same time, if we respond too aggressively, it could ignite a conflict here and now. Let's not forget how a rigid system of strategic alliances led to the powder keg that was WWI. We ended up getting some Arch duke shot, leading to one country declaring war on another, and then one country backing up another, and another backing up another, until everyone is fighting over something stupid and arguably avoidable.

And given how much more terrifying war is now, if we ever got into an all out war again, this might be bad. So we don't want all out conflict with Russia. But if Russia is gonna bring it, we might have to call them on it at some point. 

For now, the US is responding with economic sanctions. Which i think is smart. It's a response. It could mess up Russia's economy. And this is why Russia is acting out in the first place. Again, Russia is in a state where the US and NATO can be highly effective at shutting down Russia's economy on demand. All we need to do is flip a few switches. 

But for now, we don't seem to be offering boots on the ground support. Which is good. We COULD call Russia on their BS, but if we do, again, that could lead to one heck of a hot war we don't want to have. It's been common practice since the cold war never to engage russia directly, but to covertly help its enemies when they invade them. And they do it to us too. So that's how politics is played between two nuclear powers. The goal is to make these actions COSTLY without getting involved directly. If Russia wants to play games, we can play games. Confronting them directly should be a last resort only. 

I want to note that despite that relative noninterventionist stance, I support Ukraine 100% in this situation, and see Russia as completely in the wrong. They're being aggressive, they're being bullies. And again, they need to be called on it. But let's use other tools in our vast arsenal before we consider a hot conflict with them.

Monday, February 21, 2022

The insidiousness of mainstream econ: why we don't have shorter work weeks

 So, I've had these arguments a lot online over the years. Whenever I bring up John Keynes' argument (even before today) citing that by 2030 we should be working 15 hour work weeks, I always get shut down when talking to mainstream capitalists. I get all the standard lectures. I get told, "oh, we could have done that, but Americans CHOSE longer work hours! We prefer higher living standards and prefer NOT to work less!" I'll get told about how "labor saving technology doesn't eliminate work, it just creates more work!", as if that's some sort of moral argument against technological employment. I always get some runaround about the nature of the human condition and how we just can't do it, and how Keynes miscalculated how much we like to work and consume. Now, to be fair, Americans in particular are a people who pride themselves on hard work to a ridiculous degree, and high consumption, but let's dismantle some arguments I've come across.

The idea Americans "choose" to work long hours

This is something insidious that exists within our culture. We love to pride ourselves on our freedoms, and we always love to act like America is a place of freedom, blah blah blah. But I don't see it as true. I mean, imagine you're someone who WANTS to work less than 40 hours. What are your options?

If you go apply for a white collar job that pays well, and say, you know what I wanna work for you, but I only want to work 20 hours a week, what are they gonna tell you? They're gonna laugh at you and tell you to get the fudge out of their office. When you apply for jobs, you accept an employment contract. You basically put yourself in service of an employer, and they dictate your life to you. Most jobs are designed to be 40 hours a week. many high paying ones can even be more. A lot of them are "salaried" positions, rather than hourly positions, in which people are given a certain pay for the year, and they work as many hours as told by employers. Maybe sometimes they WILL work 20 hour weeks. But often times, they'll work more than 40, sometimes up to 60-80 or even more. A lot of white collar jobs in say, computer related fields are like this. Doctors, nurses, lawyers, all expected to work long hours, with no option of refusal. Even managers of retail or food service type places will often work long hours, with little to show for it. And honestly, you can't really say no. The employer dictates the terms, you're either in or out.

Even hourly positions often end up pressuring people to work long hours. While hourly workers get time and a half, you're basically told, you're doing overtime, or you're fired. So people will often make good money at these positions, making anywhere between $15-30 an hour typically, but at the end of the day, the boss tells them when and how long to work, and the worker complies or finds another job.

But say a boss did give you a cold $30 an hour doing skilled work and let you choose to work, say, 20-30 hours a week. Say that was a possibility. You make $40,000 instead of $60,000, you're in relatively good shape. Okay...what about healthcare? Oh wait, you don't get healthcare. You only get healthcare if you're employed to work full time. And because you're now a "part time" worker, guess what! You can get screwed I guess! That's kind of the importance of the full time and part time distinction. 40 hours is full time. You're expected to work that many hours and your life is designed around that standard. Again, your life is designed for you. It's designed to make you work long hours. While you're free on paper to work less, you often can't, because of the sanctions that are available too. And let's not forget what happens to a lot of people who do work part time.

Since the ACA, part time work has become a norm among a low of lower wage working class workers. Employers don't want to pay insurance, and give people benefits, so they keep hours down to keep wages low. Many part time workers only work 25 hours a week, for wages around maybe $10 an hour. That's $250 a week, $1000ish a month, around $13,000 a year. You can't live on that well. That's basically what my UBI would give people for free. You could probably live on it, with at least one other person, but alone, would be tough. Most people decide to work multiple jobs because of this, working maybe 50 hours a week at two jobs, bringing in a cool $26,000 a year, because of this structure. Because the minimum wage isn't a living wage, people have to work long hours just to be able to survive. Because workers work part time, they get denied benefits.

Where's the freedom in being able to actually decide your work hours? The structure of the system basically compels people to work longer hours. And rather than be outraged and push for freedom, a lot of people brag about how hard they work and how miserable they are and how little sleep they get, seemingly one upping each other over how much their lives suck compared to each other. And a lot of pressure to stop the system from changing is from these miserable people who would rather they all have to suffer, than to actually ALLOW someone who is "lazy" to work less. No. The system is designed to force us all to work long hours and be miserable. And a lot of the population accepts it because it's all they know, they don't have the education to know how to change it, and they'd rather punish people they deem lazy than free themselves.

A lot of this is kind of forced on them too. Cultural attitudes are transmissible from one person to another, and from generation to generation. Your parents might think like this, so they teach their kids to think like this. Their peers might think like this. And the whole system acts as a coercive force to control how people think and stop them from thinking they can make the world better. It's how I used to think as a conservative, and why I now find conservatism revolting. Many of those guys literally think a better world is not possible, that ruin will come upon anyone who tries to improve society somewhat, and that they work so hard and are miserable, and you should be too. 

This is why I find my major political goals to be so important. We need a UBI to give people the power to say no, and to actually be able to come to the negotiating table with employers as an equal who can walk away, not as a prospective slave.

This is why we need to formally reduce the work week. If we designed our lives around fewer hours at work, through regulation, just as we designed our lives around the 40 hour standard we've always had, then that would be the standard things like wages, working hours, and employment benefits would be designed around. 20-30 hour weeks are possible. I feel like I demonstrated that in my previous article.

This is also why we need medicare for all. By removing healthcare off the table, we would not only free employers from a steep cost as Yang would say, we would free people from dependency on jobs. 

These goals are important, in order to shift the window. I believe that while right libertarians will claim we're free to do this or that, that freedom only exists on paper. As I keep saying, our lifestyles are designed for us, and we're essentially coerced to live that way. I don't think people realize the coercion until you actually point out how you CAN'T actually live that way. Then they'll say something like "oh yeah, because people will just be lazy and sit around if we let them, no one actually WANTS to work". And then I get to internally screaming SO WHY DONT WE DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT!? Obviously, we need SOME incentives. I'm not dumb enough to go full on "anti work" where I think abolishing all work is possible. But a UBI and shorter work weeks is very possible. 

The idea that technology might replace some jobs, but replaces them with other jobs

Another argument I often hear is that technological automation is a myth, and that automation has never delivered on its promises to reduce how often we work, and that in the long term, we just create more jobs. Jobs jobs jobs! It's the religion of jobs!

Except jobism really is a religion or a cult. I'll explain the mechanics that keep this going. Let's go back to the 2008 recession here. We had a housing crash, tons of people got fired, and unemployment skyrocketed to 10%+. People were out of work, and this was a bad thing...because people had no money, how can they have money if they don't work?! So what did the government do? Talk about stimulating job creation. The second we lose jobs, there's intense public pressure to create more jobs. And because the standard length of time people are expected to toil for is 40 hours, people end up working that long or longer. And what jobs were created? often low paying jobs, the kinds of jobs that dont give you healthcare and are part time. So what happened? People ended up flooding the market looking for work, accepting the low pay, and horrid working conditions, and long hours at multiple jobs because no one wants to give them healthcare, and that was just how it was. That's actually what radicalized me. Graduating college into this mess of an economy in which nothing but low pay work was available and people were struggling immensely for like $8-10 an hour. And then unemployment went down, democrats patted themselves on the back, and told themselves what good of a job they did. Which led to 2016, with Bernie and Trump being populist alternatives to the establishment, and the rest is history. 

The fact is, jobism is a cult, and our economy is very sick. The second we lose work, we correct for that by making more work to keep the population employed. Because that's how it always has been. We could choose to automate work, and then work less, but instead we insist on coercing people into jobs that sometimes aren't there and are often a mismatch for them. And many of them pay low, treat employees poorly, etc. I mean, I'm basically explaining how we got into the situation.

Also, technological automation doesn't always lead to jobs in the same area they are lost. I sometimes watch this guy on youtube called the geography king, and he talks about different parts of the country, sometimes explaining the worst parts of the country in terms of poverty. And I notice many of them have something in common, cross referencing them from other sources like Jeremy Rifkin's "the end of work". Many of them suffered from technological unemployment. One area is the mississippi delta. It's a largely African American area, and it has insane poverty. Why? Well, because in the day those folks picked cotton. But then we invented machines to pick cotton for us. And this put those people out of work. And now the area is poor as dirt. Many of them actually decided to leave for greener pastures, going up north to work in factories in places like Detroit, except, oh god, you probably see what is coming next, then we automated and outsourced the car factories, and now Detroit is one of the poorest cities in the US and a massive ghetto. Much of the rust belt is like this by the way. Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin, and that;'s actually why democrats are losing control of these areas. Trump talked about making america great again and bringing the jobs back (such a juvenile, unrealistic, but sadly, understandably attractive promise for people who have no hope), but honestly, can he? Not really. And not being a jobist, I think those jobs are not to be saved. 

I mean, Andrew Yang's War on Normal people and call for UBI is just about this. Automation putting tons of people out of work, and people not being able to find jobs to match. And while the democrats shift to supporting successful large urban centers and telling these people to "JuSt MoVe", they stand to lose a lot of voters in the next/currently ongoing party realignment if they don't shape up. Hence my own political desperation. 

West Virginia is another very destitute area like this. It was never great in terms of prosperity, but it had its economic vitality based on coal, an increasingly outdated and dirty energy source that democrats want to regulate (rightfully) away. But, without coal, what economy does a place like West virginia have? Outside of the prospect of tourism and going full Gatlinburg/Pigeon forge, well...none, really. So, those areas have gotten very poor, very fast, with no hopes of improvement. 

Meanwhile, jobs are created in increasingly dense city centers that can't sustain the influx of population in terms of housing, leading to the massive rent increases I've been discussing on this channel. That's the plight of the modern economy. Where there are jobs, rent is high, where rent is low, the job market is terrible. That's always been a thing, but I feel like this has been exacerbated in recent decades. 

So...for me, jobs aren't working. We create new jobs to replace old jobs and act as if there will always be a steady supply of jobs as if it's a religious faith, even though there often aren't enough jobs for people in many areas and people languish in poverty as a result. 

Another point I want to touch on is the idea of David Graeber's BS job too. There are a lot of jobs where you work for 40 hours, but you can do the work in 15. Some people on reddit even report automating their jobs and screwing off all day. They don't tell their bosses. Why? Because they would be fired if they did. If they're not working, why are they needed? So they need to keep up the appearance of working in order to keep their jobs, even though this system is stupid.

Even if they work less than 40 hours in a 40 hour week, they can't let on that they do. Again, if their jobs really dont have that much work to them, they can be let go. Or alternatively, they can be given more work. Sometimes efficiency is rewarded (punished) with more work. And even in low wage jobs this can be a thing. America very much has a "if you have time to lean you have time to clean" attitude in which looking busy trumps efficiency. it has to do with our culture.

So that's the problem to me. It's not that getting rid of work inevitably leads to more work. It's that our culture and social structure ensure that we try to employ as many people as possible for 40 hours a week, and that we don't allow people to jump ship. Efficiency is punished. People are let go, or given more work, or a pay cut. Any jobs eliminated we automatically strive to create more jobs to replace them with, because we know that they need to work to get money to survive. 

We don't allow people to work less. We punish them financially in doing so. And this isn't going to change unless we actively change our social structures to ALLOW us to work less. Again, we need a UBI to deal with the poverty problem job displacement causes in the first place, and we need it to give people an option to say no to the absurdity of it all. We also need to reduce our work weeks directly, so that we can stop putting up the appearances of HAVING to work longer hours.

Our culture and system of incentives ensures that as long as nothing changes, people are forced to continue working 40 hours, and more jobs will just replace old jobs that are eliminated, often with imperfect tradeoffs in the first place. Again, our lifestyle is designed, and we are not allowed to say no.

The idea that no one wants to live like it's 1930 any more

This one has some legitimacy. First of all, you can't live like 1930 any more, because that world no longer exists and has moved on. You can't have a 1:1 comparison with the past, simply because despite accounting for inflation cost of living was so much different. Take housing. A $12k GDP per capita like in the 1930s won't even cover rent in a lot of places in the US. So you CAN'T live like that. It's also why I think large futuristic GDP numbers are useless. Sure we might have $318k GDP per capita in 100 years, but if rent is $10,000 a month, what's the point? 

So let's face it, even accounting for inflation somewhat, you CAN'T live in the US like it's 1930.

But say we did change slowly over time in the way described in the last article, organically growing more slowly or having steady state economy for 100 years. Well, that's why I think the better comparison rather than time periods is COUNTRIES. I mean, we can't live like 1930 because the reason we would have shorter work weeks is because we use technology to work less. But many countries overseas have that kind of tech today, even if they're "poor."

If you lived like we did 90 years ago, we'd be living like an upper income third world country like China or something. Which isn't terrible these days, but it's not great. We do want to live better. But that's also why I ran scenarios to grow more slowly rather than a steady state economy. We DO want to live better. But still. Even if 15 isn't realistic and just a point of hypothetical contention if we wanted to live like China does. Are my 23-30 hour work week ideas unrealistic?

I mean, if we lived by "1950s" standards, that's like living in Portugal or various former Eastern Bloc countries today. That's what "15" or so hours actually looks like. If we worked 23 hours, we could theoretically live like Japan, or New Zealand, or the UK. If we worked 26, we could live like Germany. 30? Sweden. 

I mean, these are all countries that exist, are considered wealthy, and have very high living standards. Many of them might be better off than us in some ways, even if not in raw GDP. Why? because they do seek things like greater work life balance, or more income equality, or better working conditions. Raw GDP isn't everything.

And because people love to act like people like to work for higher living standards, well, let me put it this way. If you're gonna have to work 40+ hour weeks regardless, isn't it good to get paid while doing it? if you work as much stocking shelves at walmart for 25 hours a week and then getting a second job at the kroger down the street for a similar amount and make a grand total of $26,000 a year, but you could instead work a job that pays $75,000 for roughly the same amount of hours, with you getting healthcare and other benefits with it, what are you going to strive to do?

Our society rewards higher status and living standards. But it never rewards less work. That's the myth of meritocracy in this country. We love to act like those who make more work so much harder, but they don't. They often get there as a matter of their education, upbringing, geography, and luck. Can work ethic play a role? Perhaps in some cases, to some degree. But let's not act like the people at the bottom are LAZY. They're not.

So...can we really say that people CHOOSE higher living standards freely? It's more like, they're incentivized to pursue careers that at least allow them to be comfortable in life, and perhaps pursue higher skilled more brain intensive work, than breaking one's back doing "grunt work" that's physically demanding. While there clearly is an element of "skill" to "skilled labor", again, much of it has more to do with opportunities than work ethic. Our system ensures we all have to toil for 40 hours. It just ensures some are more rewarded than others for the same amount of time. So why not pursue the work that's easier and more lucrative while patting your back while doing so?

Conclusion

The point of this article is to basically throw back the work worshippers' arguments back in their face, as they mock the idea of Johgn keynes' 15 hour work weeks. Mainstream capitalists like conservatives, neoliberals, right libertarians, and even work happy social democrats love to act like we Americans CHOSE longer working hours, or that longer working hours are inevitable because jobs will always exist, but let's not act like that choice actually exists on an individual level. Our system is designed to force people to work 40 hours a week or more. People are actively sanctioned financially with a loss of opportunities ans catastrophic loss of income or other basic necessities if they choose a lifestyle that does not involve putting the socially approved amount of work in. There are very real sanctions in place for choosing another kind of life. And honestly, while the individual choice is nonexistent, the collective societal choice always exists. And honestly, we choose, collectively, to work as long as we do.

Any time we take the idea of reducing work hours off the table, or implementing a UBI, we remove that choice from the overton window. When we pursue more jobs whenever efficiencies allow us to do more with less, then we get exactly what we get. More jobs. When we reward efficiency with more work, we encourage inefficiency. When we have an autocratic worker-employer relationship workers can't say no to, and then incentivize labor laws to exist around a 40 hour work week, don't be surprised when we get exactly that.

The first step to solving this problem, is admitting the problem exists. And I feel like people don't like to admit it exists. We CAN have a better world, we CAN have a better future. But it would involve changing our system to make such possibilities actually possible. You can't just choose, on an individual level, to work less and accept a lower, but still acceptable standard of living. You either work 40 hours a week or more, or you're poor. Period. It's not a matter of choice, there is no tradeoff, because employment relationships and the legal system exist as they do, as long as 40 hours is the societally approved norm, that's what we will get.

This is why we needed the 40 hour work week in the first place. People seem to forget without labor laws we still would probably be working the same 100 hour weeks of the 19th century. let's remind people employers would have child labor if they could. Heck many are trying to loosen those restrictions to force teens to work during the "labor shortage" (which is also artificial and societally constructed via our institutions going haywire post covid). No. We CAN do better. I have shown it to be possible. But, we need to actually update our standards for the 21st century to make it happen. So let's not buy into any more BS excuses for why we can't. As the leftists would say, it's all "pure ideology" anyway. Let's actually CHOOSE this, collectively. There's no reason 30 hours a week, or even 25 or so, can't be the norm if we actually willed it into existence. But, it must be done collectively.

Sunday, February 20, 2022

What would our work weeks look like if we passed on economic growth in the form of shorter work weeks?

 So, my post the other day got me thinking: gee, if we could work 5 hours less than we could have 10 years ago and have the same economy we did per capita, what could we have done over the past century or so? And that's what I want to look at today. 

Now, obviously, we don't want to not grow at all. So I'll be looking at different models of how we could have traded various levels of growth into shorter working hours over time. I'll be starting with 1938, with the FLSA (and thus, 40 hour work weeks) being implemented, and running simulations where every 10 years or so I look at how we could've traded some of that growth for shorter working hours. I'll look at simulations where we trade varying levels of economic growth for shorter hours. I admit, this might not be a perfect simulation. Working hours might not scale perfectly with growth. Some industries need more labor than others. Could you imagine nurses having 15 hour weeks during COVID? Yeah, I can't either. At the same time, automation might eliminate other jobs entirely. Still, this should give an AN IDEA of what could have been done if we shifted working hours to account for greater productivity over time, and what we could do over the next century if we continue to grow like we have. 

First, let's look at GDP over time, and then correct it for inflation.

Year

Nominal GDP

GDP in 2022 dollars

Percent change

1938 (“1940”)

$670.94

$13,378.26

N/A

1950

$2,085.98

$24,334.82

+81.9%

1960

$2,969.28

$28,202.94

+15.9%

1970

$5,280.90

$38,265.84

+35.7%

1980

$13,085.64

$44,648.08

+16.7%

1990

$23,923.14

$51,460.93

+15.3%

2000

$36,818.33

$60,112.66

+16.8%

2010

$49,330.01

$63,603.08

+5.8%

2021 (“2020”)

$72,183.03

$72,183.03

+13.5%

So, we see, with the 40 hour work week standard, we generally see around 15% growth per decade, but it varies. The end of the great depression, WWII, etc. really exploded the economy post 1938. The 1960s were also a really great decade. On the flip side, the great recession in 2008 seemed to stunt most of the gains made during the 2000s. 

Okay, so, here's a thought experiment. What if instead of growing, we just lived in the late 1930s forever living standards wise? What would our work hours look like over time? I wouldn't recommend doing this, but assuming hours scale linearly, this is what I come up with:

Year

GDP growth

Work week

1938

N/A

40 hours

1950

+81.9%

22 hours

1960

+15.9%

19 hours

1970

+35.7%

14 hours

1980

+16.7%

12 hours

1990

+15.3%

10.4 hours

2000

+16.8%

8.9 hours

2010

+5.8%

8.4 hours

2021

+13.5%

7.4 hours

So, yikes. We could be working a lot less in theory. But there are a few things I don't like about this. First of all, we SHOULD grow somewhat. The GDP per capita in 1938 was like what China's is today roughly. And honestly, going straight to 22 hours due to an anomalous high gdp growth seems a bit insane to me. I mean, WWII was responsible for much of that. So I think from now on I'm going to start from 1950. So imagine Harry Truman managed to pass some sort of law where every 10 years some of our our productivity gains would be translated into lower working hours.

Doing the 100% scenario over from 1950 this is what I come up with:

Year

GDP growth

Work week

1950

N/A

40 hours

1960

+15.9%

34.5 hours

1970

+35.7%

25.4 hours

1980

+16.7%

21.8 hours

1990

+15.3%

18.9 hours

2000

+16.8%

16.2 hours

2010

+5.8%

15.3 hours

2021

+13.5%

13.5 hours

While the 1960s are still anomalous in terms of high GDP growth, it gives a telling picture. In one decade, we could cut our number of working hours by one per day, having 5 7 hour days. After 60 years of this, we could've been living Keynes dream of 15 hour work weeks. Of course, this is still assuming we live like we did in 1950. And while that wasn't terrible, it was lacking compared to today with the economy only being 1/3 of the size per capita it is today. I mean, if we compared this to how people live today, we would be similar to Portugal or Bahrain. That actually ain't that bad. We're talking middle income countries that aren't really poor, but aren't really rich either. Much of eastern Europe and the oil rich countries in the middle east tend to live in a similar way too. 

So, let's do something a little different now. We don't want no growth at all. So let's assume that we grow at 50% of the rate we actually did, and then we cut working hours half as much as we did in the chart above. How would we live then?

Year

Real GDP growth

Adjusted GDP growth

Adjusted GDP

Working hours

1950

N/A

N/A

$24,334.82

40 hours

1960

+15.9%

+8.0%

$26,281.61

37.1 hours

1970

+35.7%

+17.9%

$30,986.01

31.5 hours

1980

+16.7%

+8.4%

$33,588.83

29.1 hours

1990

+15.3%

+7.7%

$37,175.18

27 hours

2000

+16.8%

+8.4%

$39.213.89

24.9 hours

2010

+5.8%

+2.9%

$40,351.10

24.2 hours

2021

+13.5%

+6.8%

$43,094.97

22.7 hours

Well, we would have grown much less, down from around 200% to around 77%. Still, looking at international comparisons being just short of $43,439 puts us with Israel as our closest peer. And because that might not resonate directly to some, to compare it to other countries, we're talking similar to Canada, France, San Marino, the UK, New Zealand, and Japan. Significantly less rich than we are now, but we're doing quite well for ourselves. I mean, we're in "Europe" territory. And the relatively "good" part of Europe too. Like middle income Europe. Not as rich as say, Germany or some of the Scandinavian countries, but still quite well off. And the tradeoff? Well, we still work almost half as many hours as we do now. So ask yourself, would it be worth living like you lived in much of Western Europe if you could work 43% fewer hours in the process? Think about it. Another way of thinking about it, it would be like living in the US some time during the late 1970s. 

Say we considered that GDP hit to be too much. Okay, let's adjust it to 25% of GDP gains are translated into fewer working hours. What would happen then?

Year

Real GDP growth

Adjusted GDP growth

Adjusted GDP

Working hours

1950

N/A

N/A

$24,334.82

40 hours

1960

+15.9%

+12.0%
$27,255.00
38.5 hours

1970

+35.7%

+26.8%
$34,559.34
35.4 hours

1980

+16.7%

+12.5%
$38,879.25
33.9 hours

1990

+15.3%

+11.5%
$43,350.37
32.7 hours

2000

+16.8%

+12.6%
$48,812.52
31.3 hours

2010

+5.8%

+4.4%
$50,960.27
30.9 hours

2021

+13.5%

10.1%
$56,107.25
29.9 hours

Here, we see a scenario in which translating 25% of our GDP gains over time into less working hours sees a reduction from 40 hours to 30 hours. And while we would see a hit to GDP, we would still be living a country such as Iceland, the Netherlands, Sweden, Australia, Qatar, Austria, or Finland. Those are RICH countries. Or, put another way given GDP growth seemed to stagnate over the past few decades, we'd be living like we did in the mid 1990s. Ah, good times. Ya know, while tech has gotten better, I don't really feel that much richer otherwise. If anything I feel poorer given my dad was making good money at the time off of a solidly middle class income. I imagine a lot of middle class "90s kids" struggling in the current economy feel the same.

I was going to go further and do 10%, but let's be honest, if 25% only got working hours down to 30, 10% would get us down to like 36 or something. I could do a model for something in between 25% and 50%, but I think this model gives a good inference of that. Something along the lines of 26 hours a week with a GDP per capita around $50,000. That would put us in line with German, Belgium, Macao, or Hong Kong. In other words, not bad off at all.

To summarize my findings though, this chart should be handy.

Scenario

100% growth

90% growth (inferred)

75% growth

63% growth (inferred)

50% growth

0% growth

GDP

$72,183.03

~$66,000

$56,107.25

~$50,000

$43,094.97

$24,334.82

Working hours

40/week

~36/week

29.9/week

~26/week

22.7/week

13.5/week

Closest countries in living standards

US, Norway

US, Denmark, Singapore

Sweden, Australia, Qatar, Austria

Germany, Belgium, Macao, Hong Kong

France, San Marino, Israel, UK, New Zealand

Czech Republic, Portugal, Bahrain

Rough time period in American history

2021

Late 2010s

Mid 1990s

Late 1980s

Late 1970s

1950

Essentially, the more growth is diverted into reduced working time, the greater the hit to overall GDP growth there is, but the shorter working hours will be. What we find acceptable will be subjective, but we can find a point on the GDP curve between work life balance. I'm just trying to demonstrate how we can reduce working hours, and if we pursued working hour reductions instead of GDP all of this time, we could be working less, maybe even much less. There's no reason why we can't reduce our working hours to 30-35 hours. Heck, we could work around 20-30 and still be "rich" compared to most of the world. While GDP is weakly correlated with happiness, clearly more GDP doesn't necessarily mean more happiness, if conditions don't change elsewhere. If we're still struggling to survive, and still spending most of our time working, what's the point? Wouldn't it be better to work 30 hours and live like Sweden does? Or 25 hours and live like Germany? or 20 and live like the UK? Really, we don't understand how rich we are, and how those numbers on a chart don't make us happy. We're at a point in time where many of us are nostalgic of the past. Many of us miss the 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, and/or 1990s. We remember things being better when we were young than they were now. And in some ways they were better. My parents grew up with unions and a middle class income you could get out of high school. And I remember my childhood in the 90s and 2000s to be the happiest times of my life. If anything, in my case, what made my happiness go down was growing up and realizing how crappy life under the status quo really is. I don't want to spend my life working, and worrying about surviving. I would live with a slightly lower living standard if it meant more work life balance, and more economic security. 

Anyway. Let's say we wanted to start NOW, in 2022. Let's imagine with an average growth rate of 16% a decade (very typical overall) for the next century, what life could be under the following scenarios going forward. 

100% growth scenario (no work reductions)

Year

GDP (16% growth rate)

Working hours (0% reduction)

2021

$72,183.03

40/week

2030

$83,732.31

40/week

2040

$97,129.49

40/week

2050

$112,670.20

40/week

2060

$130,697.44

40/week

2070

$151,609.03

40/week

2080

$175,866.47

40/week

2090

$204,005.10

40/week

2100

$236,645.92

40/week

2110

$274,509.27

40/week

2120

$318,430.75

40/week

These are the kinds of numbers John Keynes must've been looking at a century ago when he thought we would all be working 15 hour weeks. I always here from jobist liberals and the like "oh anti work is so impossible now, maybe 100 years from now"...but here's the thing. if you're obsessed with growth at all costs, it's ALWAYS 100 years from now. We could all work for 40 hours a week for $300k in real terms in 100 years, and you know what? We would still say it's not enough. How do I know this? Because John Keynes in 1930 looked at our hypothetical GDP in the 2000s the exact same way. And he thought, wow, with all of this extra productivity, we will reduce our working hours, won't we? Won't we? Dude must be rolling over in his grave.

Now let's run the other scenarios I did above.

75% growth scenario

Year

GDP (12% growth rate)

Working hours (3.85% reduction)

2021

$72,183.03 40/week

2030

$80,844.99
38.5/week

2040

$90,546.39
37/week

2050

$101,411.96
35.6/week

2060

$113,581.40
34.2/week

2070

$127,211.16
32.9/week

2080

$142,476.50
31.6/week

2090

$159,573.68
30.3/week

2100

$178.722.52
29.2/week

2110

$200,169.23
28.1/week

2120

$224,189.53
27/week

I know, large hypothetical numbers, but it still applies. And we got similar results to the past 70 years. We see a similar hit to GDP, but then we have to again wonder, how much GDP is enough GDP? How much GDP is too much GDP? Is all of this GDP even sustainable for our environment? Now imagine if we continued off of the already existing 75% GDP growth scenario and did it for another 70 years. Where would we be now with working hours? Down to around 20.5. That's where. 

Now let's do the 50% growth scenario

Year

GDP (8% growth rate)

Working hours (7.41% reduction)

2021

$72,183.03 40/week

2030

$77,957.67
37/week

2040

$84,194.29
34.3/week

2050

$90.929.82
31.8/week

2060

$98,204.22
29.4/week

2070

$106,060.44
27.2/week

2080

$114,545.40
25.2/week

2090

$123,709.03
23.3/week

2100

$133,605.75
21.6/week

2110

$144,294.21
20/week

2120

$155,837.75
18.5/week

So with a 50/50 split, we could double our GDP while getting down to 18.5 hours a week. We will only have half the GDP as we would under the no work reductions model, but again, you have to ask, is it worth it, and is it even sustainable? Honestly, working less seems preferable to high hypothetical numbers. And just because you're probably wondering, because this curve isn't much different than real world data in the past 70 years, if we had been doing this since 1950, we would probably see 10.8 hour weeks by 2120 if we followed the trend all the way from 1950.

I didn't do this earlier, but let's say we do a 25% growth scenario

Year

GDP (4% growth rate)

Working hours (10.71% reduction)

2021

$72,183.03 40/week

2030

$75,070.35
35.7/week

2040

$78,073.17
31.9/week

2050

$81,196.09
28.5/week

2060

$84,443.94
25.4/week

2070

$87,821.69
22.7/week

2080

$91,334.56
20.3/week

2090

$94,987.94
18.1/week

2100

$98,787.46
16.2/week

2110

$102.738.96
14.4/week

2120

$106,848.52
12.9/week

This is a more aggressive anti work scenario, but it shows that over the next 100 years, if we forgo most economic growth in favor of shorter working hours, we can be working 13 hour weeks 100 years from now. Is this not worth it? It depends. Only growing the economy roughly 50% over a century seems pathetically low, but the results speak for themselves. Honestly if we decide 20 is the ideal amount of working hours, the 50% scenario would be better. And we could get to 27 with the 75% scenario. It's really up to us.

And finally, a zero growth steady state model.

Year

GDP (0% growth rate)

Working hours (13.79% reduction)

2021

$72,183.03 40/week

2030

$72,183.03 34.5/week

2040

$72,183.03 29.7/week

2050

$72,183.03 25.6/week

2060

$72,183.03 22.1.week

2070

$72,183.03 19/week

2080

$72,183.03 16.4/week

2090

$72,183.03 14.1/week

2100

$72,183.03 12.2/week

2110

$72,183.03 10.5/week

2120

$72,183.03 9.1/week

So yeah, that's A LOT of work reduction. But is 9 really worth it over 13? That's subjective, but honestly, I'm not really in favor of a full on steady state economy. There should probably be SOME balance between growth and work. Both the 100% and 0% scenarios seem silly to me. All that growth with no social change seems like a waste of effort. You're not making society better at its core. Even I realize now in 2022 we can do better. All things considered, based on the last 70 years, I think something between the 50-75% growth scenario would probably be ideal. Or perhaps a few decades of steady state followed by 100% growth once we find the right balance. But ultimately, I think 50-75% would be ideal overall over the course of the next century. We shouldn't be working the same 40 hour weeks of the 1930s. And if we find ourselves doing this 100 years from now, whatever reincarnated me is walking around will probably die from an aneurysm if I ever reach the same educated state I'm currently in again. 

Anyway, to summarize the last 5 charts

Scenario

100% growth

75% growth

50% growth

25% growth

0% growth

Estimated GDP 2070

$151,609.03

$127,211.16

$106,060.44

$87,821.69

$72,183.03

Estimated working hours 2070

40/week

32.9/week

27.2/week

22.7/week

19/week

Estimated GDP 2120

$318,430.75

$224,189.53

$155,837.75

$106,848.52

$72,183.03

Estimated working hours 2120

40/week

27/week

18.5/week

12.9/week

9.1/week

Those are my projections over the next 100 years. Whatever we choose is up to us. We could go all work, and no play, meaning a 4x GDP growth, or, we can go no growth and work 1/4 as much. Or we can do something in between. I think the 50% scenario of roughly 2x the growth for half the hours might be ideal. I'd be able to live with the 75% scenario if it can be done under indepentarian/human centered capitalist ideals. I mean triple GDP with 1/3 reduction in working hours can work if we go full on UBI/human centered capitalism and most people still voluntarily work. 

Anyway. That's my article on this subject. Basically, when people wonder why we never got to live John Keynes future this strategy, it's because we chose maximal growth over reduced working hours. If we reduced working hours each decade since the 1950s, we could still live like a western industrialized country, while working in the ballpark of 20-30 hours a week. We could've lived the 15 hour weeks Keynes talked about, but we would've sacrificed most growth. 

Looking into the future, we have the same choice. We can either grow at a maximal rate, or we can work less and choose some balance between the two. We could be working around 30 hours a week in 50 years and still grow at a solid rate. We could work around 20-25 hours in 100 years and still be far richer than we are now. We could've made these same choices in the past century, but we didn't. I personally wish we would've at least gone the 75% route, if not the 63% route. 

And before anyone asks what UBI would do, UBI would be projected to have a work reduction on average around 10-15% based on the 1970s NIT studies. This would only be a temporary, one time work reduction though, and would be like the equivalent of forgoing a single decade in growth or less. If implemented over a period of years, we would barely notice the difference. And then we would continue growing. We're also ignoring how much UBI could grow the economy through the multiplier effect. So human centered capitalism according to UBI would be far more mild than any of these scenarios over the long term. This article is more about reducing working hours directly.