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Joined 2 years ago
Cake day: March 6th, 2024
  • Talaraine@fedia.iotoAsk Lemmy@lemmy.world•Why do we live to work rather than work to live?
    2·
    17 hours ago

    It’s doing things like handywork around other people’s houses, babysitting, errand-running, walking dogs, driving people to appointments, all paid in cash at the time of service. It’s hard to make that work steady enough to live on, but it can be done!

    The funny part is how romantic it seems…all the free time you’ll have, right? Then when you start you realize that every other breathing moment is you trying to find more of that work to do because you need more money.

    And sure, culture is a thing that is just as crushing as your boss. We all answer to someone, eventually.

  • Talaraine@fedia.iotoAsk Lemmy@lemmy.world•Why do we live to work rather than work to live?
    2·
    18 hours ago

    Oh I definitely agree that the ethics involved are problematic, no question. And I also agree with the premise that we need strong unions for our own protection against that predatory behavior!

    But working for the man is, in fact, optional. You can start your own business, be a gig worker, or just be an under-the table helping hand for cash. Having done those things myself, though, has taught me they are often feast or famine arrangements… so in the end I too am working for the man, simply because it’s steady pay.

    Edit to add that AI is obviously an unknown factor in this equation. It’s good at its niche tasks but terrible at others, and if you want one that actually has all the capabilities of a regular worker, it’s going to be expensive. Several companies are just finding out after they fucked around. I wouldn’t count us out yet.

  • Talaraine@fedia.iotoAsk Lemmy@lemmy.world•Why do we live to work rather than work to live?
    7·
    18 hours ago

    Man, I get where you’re coming from, it all seems endless and stupid.

    I was just thinking about this the other day in fact, but then imagined what life was like as a hunter gatherer. The search never stops for food, there is rarely an abundance, and nothing to keep that abundance from rotting away when you have it.

    Every creation we’ve ever made is to simplify our lives and/or to protect them. Building those things increase abundance and leisure time for awhile, but then the birth rate goes up and we need to build more. Building better communication (to simplify our lives) meant that more people from farther away need stuff, so we need to increase production, so more workers are required. It’s a feedback loop.

    Some world events pause or reverse this loop for awhile, but it never stops. If you want these things that help around the house so you don’t have to do them, that costs money, so you work.

    I’ve seen stories of people who just move out to the woods for decades, but though they are ‘independent’ from the man, they’re still struggling day to day and often end up stealing stuff that others bought so they can get by, or relying on common taxpayer services when things go awry.

    I think it’s simply a part of the universe. I learned once that life isn’t the opposite of entropy, it’s a small opposing force that itself decays. Something something rage against the dying of the light. Anyway, /rantoff