We Don’t Need to Work So Much (2015) | Hacker News Reader

We Don’t Need to Work So Much (2015)

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256 pointsthesumofall360 comments

As an European working with lots of American contractors in the tech field, I'm always impressed by their work ethics. The put in 10-12 hours, 6 days a week.

But from talking with them, it seems like their focus is on retirement - hopefully in their 50's. That's their grand plan, because that's when they'll start "living".

It's a bit of a contrast to us Scandinavians - as we really like to live in the present. No pie in the sky dreams.

Which is also why we guard our working rights and work-life balance like a national treasure.

which then begs the question: if you spent your whole life working more, and focusing on getting more money, assuming that you can retire in your 50s, can you REALLY stop working? or will you depress yourself because there's nothing else to do? retiring early seems great on paper, but at what cost?

Yes, it depends on work and what type you are. I've talked with lots of older colleagues that dread retirement, mostly because they enjoy work and they also enjoy the people they work with.

Some people will do just fine with their hobbies and projects, others will have a hard time adapting - many even coming out of retirement, due to boredom. Really depends on the individual.

One thing I've heard a lot, from older colleagues, is that people tend to become mentally dull once they go into retirement - at least on the skills they used daily at work.

You need to be pretty disciplined and motivated to maintain your skills at a professional level, once there's no hurry or pressure to deliver anything. Days turn into weeks, weeks into months, months into years - before you know it, you've spent a couple of years of your retirement just chilling around.

also, can you really stop working in your 50s when the health problems come and you realize you now need your employer for the health insurance?

or you can buy it yourself. budget for it like any other expense. it's not necessarily cheap, but it's not something so astronomical that no one can afford it at all. Many people somehow find $700/month for their favorite SUV, but $700/month for health insurance is unattainable.

I'm not saying the system is great - I'm in favor of single-payer system overall. But tying access to health insurance to employment as a default mindset really has to be stopped, somehow.

Most of the people for whom $700/month for health insurance is unattainable are not spending $700/month on car payments. There's bound to be some overlap, sure, but let's keep the focus on the fact that expecting everyone to pay $700/month in order to not go bankrupt from health expenses is insane.

Isn't the average monthly payment in germany over $800?

National average is around 3800. Minimum is 1584, I think.

The maximum monthly payment you can have for german public health insurance is 14.6% of 4.687,50 EUR per month in 2020 - that's about 800USD. Mind you, maximum, not average.

14.6% of your wage is the health insurance deductible, 4.687,50 EUR is the so-called "Beitragsbemessungsgrenze", that is the cap from which on your wage is free - it's regularly adjusted (upwards usually).

You can reach that maximum if you are self employed and voluntarily member of the public health insurance - meaning you have to pay both the employers and the employees share. If you're employed, your employer pays about half of it.

Your chosen health insurance can optionally add an extra fee, usually less than a percent or two, most are free.

How does this work if you're unemployed? Is there a separate public option? Or do you just keep on with whatever you may have had before, without paying?

Also, that "maximum/wage" thing - is that per person, or for a household (spouse/kids/etc)?

If you're on unemployment or welfare payments the state pays for you. If you live off savings and don't have income you can pay a base rate (a little bit below 200€).

The level of care is independent of your payment, if you're unemployed you're still covered without payment, students are covered for free until they're 27 (there are ways to loose coverage, but just being unemployed is not one). Like the sibling comment pointed out: if you're living of savings, there's a minimum payment.

The cap is per wage, so every person earning a wage gets the same cap applied to their individual income. (one of the ways that households with a single high earner profit, while two people earning a moderate wage have less). No bonus for kids here, buy if you're member of the public health insurance, your kid is covered for free.

"but let's keep the focus on the fact that expecting everyone to pay $700/month"

Everyone's paying it, in one manner or another, either through subsidies, or employer contributions, or paying direct. These are the average costs (relative to location and age) for health insurance plans from for-profit health insurance companies.

But the context was with respect to people planning to retire in their 50s. Plenty of people budget for car payments, and they can budget for health insurance costs too.

Car payments only last for five years.

I was going to point that out myself. yes. many people do end up continuing that cycle, although there is some ability to stop which is different than other more pressing things (like insurance).

Keep in mind that $700 a month private personal health insurance isn't going to cover any of your week to week/month to month expenses. You'll end up with a $10k deductible or higher

And then there are denied claims and out of network costs.

People often think of their insurance as good (or will respond so on surveys), until they actually call upon it and it evaporates, leaving them with multiple hundred-thousand-dollar bills related to the treatment of cancer.

Neither is most "employer-provided" insurance. A few folks have 'gold-plated' plans where they are hardly out of pocket for anything, but most people with health insurance plans, of any stripe, still have moderately sized deductibles, on top of paying a portion towards the monthly premium anyway.

Best system in the world

Well, in all fairness, my and my wife's health care in the USA has been WAY better than it was in Japan. It costs like 20x as much, though. That's my theory as to why nobody in power wants to actually fix the US system. Maybe the system really is the best if you have unlimited money and unlimited tolerance for bureaucracy

I pay $800/month on top of what my employer covers for our health insurance. And it's still worse insurance than what most of my friends and family have. If you work for a small company or are trying to buy off the marketplace, health insurance is insanely expensive.

If you're working for a megacorp, they might be self-funding their own insurance plan. Otherwise, it is just 'insanely expensive', we just have a system where some portion of that insanity is 'hidden' by employers participating in the transaction (much like FICA tax 50/50 split).

I did some work for a small insurance broker - about 15 employees. They provided health insurance for all employees. They invited me to a few company meetings, and the owners asked what people thought the cost of the insurance was, per month, per person. Lots of $100 and $150/month guesses. I said '$600'. Someone laughed, and the owner said "you're close - it's $586". The room went silent. It was going to be going up to, IIRC, something like $630/month, and he was preparing people for "hey, we're going to cover this, but we're probably not going to be able to do much else, or may have to cut back some minor reimbursement stuff."

Very out of touch comment. People worried about Health insurance are not paying $700/month for a monthly car payment.

Maybe instead of trying to paint the problem of american healthcare access as a mindset issue, you can recognize that there are many legitimate problems with linking healthcare to employment.

Why should anyone go broke over a medical expense? Why in a developed country? Why is that only a common fear in the US?

In the context of retiring early and planning for expenses, it's not out of touch. If someone is planning on retiring by their 50s, they surely have thought of health insurance and put it in their budget.

thank you. that was the context - someone retiring in their 50s.

"can you really stop working in your 50s when the health problems come and you realize you now need your employer for the health insurance?"

If you get to your 50s, think you can retire, and don't have a plan for this stuff, you're out of touch.

That seems overly dramatic. Yes, you can retire in your 50s (or 30s-40s with a good paying job) and stop working. There is always plenty to do in this great wide world that we live in if you have even a modicum of imagination.

Yet going on the FIRE or fatFIRE (financial independence, retire early) forums you encounter countless examples of people who achieve early retirement and lose their minds. They’re bored because they worked so hard and no longer know what to do with themselves. They didn’t spend any time developing other interests or hobbies because they were engrossed in chasing the paycheck. Some are so engrossed in chasing the money that they don’t even stop to consider what they MIGHT do if they retire early.

I rarely seem to see that on the FIRE forums. It seems like 99% of people on those forums are trying to achieve FIRE, and very little discussion about those who have.

I think that might be confirmation bias. The people who happily retire and have the freedom to do whatever they want are less likely to talk about it on a forum; they'll just go live their lives. Conversely, if a person banks all of their happiness on retiring early and then is unhappy they are more likely to talk about it on a forum. It's a similar phenomenon to the prevalence of negative reviews outweighing positive reviews.

Here's an option: keep working, but without any of the stress associated with needing to work.

This isn't rocket science, workaholics.

Having spent much time there I've encountered plenty of people who haven't been bored in retirement.

That's the beauty of being FI anyways, if you want to work then work. If you don't want to work then don't work. Simple as that.

When you have been indocrinated your whole life that work is what defines you "Hi, this is John, he's a software engineer/banker/barista/etc", it's difficult to let go.

My wife once talked to an elderly lady that was working in her 80s because she said she had nothing to do, as she had worked all her life in multiple jobs.

I guess imagination gets eroded when you are conditioned to be a wage slave for too long.

My 82-year old relative is like this. She's so accustomed to working hard all her life that even when she could retire easily on alimony and pension, she's so wired to work hard in blue-collar work. She works at a natural foods store and is such a superstar she got some kind of regional (like multi-state US) employee year award. That's what makes her happy. She genuinely likes to serve other people, too. Definitely not my thing but I have infinite respect for it. All about that eudaimonia.

Edit: all the constant activity (always had hobbies on the side too) has kept her in good physical shape plus decent diet and she's Japanese. Definite oba-tank who will probably soldier on well past 100.

There are also cultural factors about how you present your work. GC Rota wrote about the mathematics culture in the 50's that European and US researchers worked similar amounts, but the Europeans took great care to present an image of working less than they actually did, and the US researchers often presented an image of working more than they did.

My experiences of working both in the US and in Europe (Germany and Switzerland) was that the number of hours worked in the US was higher, but the intensity of work was lower: There was more office chitchat, more goofing around, more "watercooler/coffee talk", and so forth. There is also an extreme culture of "presenteeism" in the US that starts in highschool (where being physically present is much more important than being attentive in any form).

> "presenteeism" in the US that starts in highschool (where being physically present is much more important than being attentive in any form).

This is an important point, and kinda scary; because I'm now actively aware of it and how I haven't viewed it this way before.

I call it "performative productivity" since it's actually a performance.

This is a bit ironic, since this is exactly the description that Americans generally have of the Japanese.

Well everything is relative. If you lack an example more extreme than you by definition your stance is the most radical - which is neither inherently good nor bad.

As another European who has worked with a few Americans, I've seen a lot of "presenteeism", long hours but not really any greater productivity than their European counterparts

My experience is much the same, they always want to be seen arriving early and leaving late but are happy to do fuck-all in between.

Because a lot of management just seems to be looking for evidence of work happening and presence is seen as evidence.

This is exactly true. I have a friend who used to spend "long hours" in the office. He basically did a VPN into his home network, where he works on hobby projects. Oh yeah, lots of reddit browsing, too. Presence is often equated with productivity.

I have coworkers who do minimal work to just get by and show up in meetings with strong opinions and argue endlessly over slack. They are generally smart but very lazy and very disorganized, so much so that people have brought it up the manager a few times but the manager shrugs and does not want to do much since it requires a lot of effort on manager's part to have difficult conversations and fix things.

I (average american employee) don't get paid more to work harder or more efficiently and do better, but if my ass isn't in that seat from 8am to 5pm you can bet I'll be paid less.

You want people to work harder? Pay them more for it. Or at least fairly

Average Aussie here. "Presenteeism" is totally a thing here too. I would argue that linking pay to product, rather than linking pay to timesheet would get people to work more. Directly link motivation!

But linking pay-to-product can be a hard problem!

Long story short (I have refactored this comment a few times), employees are "significant investors" in the business and should be paid as such.

Stock options are a perfect example of this.

Note the "significant" bit though. Most places with "stock options" do it as a token option. A bargaining chip of employment, to negotiate and minimise costs for the company. In Australia, mostly not an option at all.

Which leads to your: "You want people to work harder? Pay them more for it. Or at least fairly"

Or as I think: If I don't have skin in the game then why should I care?

Same here. I especially loathe the "watercooler talk", when people just hang around and chit chat to burn another half hour.

But I have to admit, I have also seen this behaviour in European engineers, so it is not unexpected.

Honestly I think there's a limit somewhere to how much useful work people can do in a week anyway!

I wholeheartedly agree. Even if it is not about "all this week's work has been finished", but "this week's work has taken a toll on me, thus I may not be productive until I get some rest".

I'm a German developer that live in the US and I'd never go back.

Even if I was poor I'd rather stay in the EU.

What do you mean never go back? Never go back to the US? Or never go back to Germany?

I think GP meant to say lived in the US, as his last sentence implies that he currently lives in the EU.

I'm a German that lived in the US, I'd never go back to the US. (to live/work)

Why not?

Perhaps you're working with a self selecting group of Americans.

As a US based developer with almost 20 years of experience across four cities and (as a consultant) many different corporate cultures, I've never met a single person who consistently works 10+ hour days, or more than 5 days per week.

That's a bold claim. How well do you know all your coworkers schedule?

As somehow who has worked for a shorter period of time, I've met dozens of such folk, many of which I have provided support for on weekends or odd times at night.

In either case, anecdotes are not adding much to the discussion.

> That's their grand plan, because that's when they'll start "living".

Strikes me how similar this is to the mentality in adolescence so prevalent: once I get to college, then I’ll start “living”!

We just keep kicking the can.

There's many things you can't really do as an adolescent. Considering you can't choose where you live and have little to no income.

I find it hard to empathize with FIRE people [0] because I like my job. But the few I've discussed it with absolutely despise working. Like all-consuming, life-purpose-defining revulsion. And I think there's a feedback loop to it, because in trying to "get it over worth" they increase the intensity and make it worse for themselves. Then it becomes all the more important to get it over with quickly.

I wonder if the European attitude is just more similar to mine, being comfortable with and accepting of a job as a backdrop to build a life around, rather than something intolerable to escape from ASAP at any cost. Probably has to do with the jobs themselves being more comfortable.

[0] https://www.investopedia.com/terms/f/financial-independence-...

> being comfortable with and accepting of a job as a backdrop to build a life around.

As a Berliner, this is what most of my colleagues aim at. They all have colourful lives outside the office setting.

I'm in the same boat as you. I don't totally get the push to retire early. In fact, I don't think I'll ever retire if I can continue working and doing something that I enjoy. I have colleagues who dream of spending their days on a golf course or doing projects around the house. That sounds like a horribly boring life, to me. I'd love to be able to keep working at and solving technical problems until I die. That, and I think my spouse and I would hate each other if we had to spend every moment together. We love each other dearly but also appreciate our time away from each other.

Solving technical problems until you die sounds much more boring than having the freedom to solve technical problems one day, teaching the next, volunteering the third, and taking the family on an extended weekend trip the rest of the week... or literally anything else you want to do. To each their own I suppose.

You my friend, has just described a Professor job at a typical US University. The tenured Professor in US can work until their chosen last day in the office, i. e. as long as they are capable of working.

Academia is not without its downsides. The road to tenure sucks and generally pays peanuts compared to industry. It's not for everyone.

More importantly, those were just examples. Replace teaching with running a bookstore or tending to a community garden or living on a sailboat in the Med and all of a sudden, professorship isn't nearly as desirable. You can always find someone to teach after a long career in industry, no need to lock yourself into academia. :)

I'd say that we, at least the Nordic counties - which I am familiar with, have decent enough social/welfare programs, that people can be a bit more selective about their employment. You're not tied up to your work, otherwise you're SOL as far as healthcare etc. goes.

Furthermore, we have more free time/vacation, nicer hours, less commuting, and what not. So you often don't feel like you're living at work - or even worse, work that you hate.

And it is possible to live the FIRE-lifestyle here, if you plan ahead and live somewhat frugally. But still, there's an expectation that you contribute to the system.

> You're not tied up to your work, otherwise you're SOL as far as healthcare etc. goes.

I have a dream that someday the "workplace <-> health insurance" link will be broken in the US. For a few years I thought we might have had a chance, but it seems to have become a back-burner issue again.

The thing that is most maddening about employer-sponsored health insurance is the people who have it don't realize how big of a gulf there is between what is affordable for them vs others in terms of health care.

I have friends with good employer health insurance that go to the doctor over every little cough and sniffle and funny rash.

I have decent health insurance, but it costs enough and has a high enough deductible that every potential trip to the doctor is prefaced with "Is this an issue worth $100?" That's a pretty high bar to clear. Usually you go to the doctor and the answer is "well just wait and see if it goes away." That's not $100 worth of advice.

And if it's after hours, you're looking at closer to $500 minimum. I can't count the number of times my wife and I have debated "Is this bleeding bad enough for a $500 bill?" when one of the kids does something dumb and gets hurt.

>>I have a dream that someday the "workplace <-> health insurance" link will be broken in the US. For a few years I thought we might have had a chance, but it seems to have become a back-burner issue again.

Does the set of Affordable Care Act healthcare plans that can be purchased by individuals by themselves qualify as breaking the link? I know that they're not all perfect, but it seems like a step in the right direction.

The costs are just unbearably high.

$2000-$4000/mo family plans?

It's a mortgage with only downsides and no appreciation.

That seems high. I had an individual plan a couple years ago which was around $300 a month. As I understand, pricing varies widely by state, so maybe that explains the difference.

It's about the same cost as work-provided insurance, without having to work for the employer.

The upside is you get health care.

If your employer offers a health plan, you are ineligible for subsidies.

As it stands now, I think the last I checked a family plan costs ~$3k / month for me.

If I qualified for subsidies, I could get the same plan free. And I think that was also factoring in my current income, only changing whether my employer offered a health plan.

Edit:

Looked it up. In November 2019, the cheapest family plan available on the marketplace in my area was a "Catastrophic" level plan with a $16,300 total deductible for $1217.90 / month.

> I have decent health insurance, but it costs enough and has a high enough deductible that every potential trip to the doctor is prefaced with "Is this an issue worth $100?" That's a pretty high bar to clear. Usually you go to the doctor and the answer is "well just wait and see if it goes away." That's not $100 worth of advice.

I actually like this (generally speaking) as it causes you to bear some of the upfront cost and allows you an easy way to question the value of an action. With that being said, we should all be able to email our PCP to get answers to questions or schedule 15 minutes video calls.

I’m not against UHC, I think as I’ve mentioned before there are merits to both approaches (we just happen to do neither in the US). What I like about “is this worth $100” is that it introduces some upfront personal responsibility and decision making versus “well I sneezed let’s go to the doctor it’s free!!”.

Absolutely.

I just wish it was a more evenly distributed fee. I don't particularly mind that it's expensive to get care (I wish it was a bit less expensive), but the fact that I know so many people who go there seemingly on a whim precisely because it's cheap is frustrating.

You can enjoy your job and pursue FIRE. FIRE just gives you options. You can either stop working, do other work that doesn't pay as well or at all, or keep working and live at a much higher standard of living. Maybe the company you like working for only gives you a few weeks off per year and you want to take 1-2 months of unpaid time off. Maybe you don't want to care about layoffs or market changes or bad management. Maybe one day you wake up and decide you want to spend time with your kids and productive work can take a breather for a while.

It's foolish to focus just on enjoying your job right now, finances be damned, without planning for the future. For what it's worth, I think it's also foolish to despise your job every day for years and years just to retire a few years earlier. But that's not what FIRE is, that's just one group of people taking it to extremes, as is common in any endeavor. For most people, it just means diligently and consistently setting money aside that will give them a level of freedom that those who don't will never achieve.

Yep - this is my take, financial independence gives you freedom.

It's not about hating your job (or even loving your job) - it's about buying your own independence. For those without family wealth it's building your own safety net and bringing money related anxiety to zero and making it easier for your children to take bigger risks too.

This lets you take more risk (like doing a startup) with the downside risk contained. There's a reason startups are more often started by people with family wealth, they're ultimately risking a lot less.

Americans work hard in part because there's more upside potential than in Europe, but there's also more downside risk. I think we could do more to protect the lower bound which would be good for entrepreneurship and society, but we shouldn't put restrictions on the upside (I'd argue restricting upside disincentives risk taking and wealth creation).

One of my main 'contrarian' opinions is that wealth inequality isn't actually a big deal, and as long as you protect the lower bound is desirable in a society. You also need to control how that wealth is leveraged into political power though (and that can be a problem).

Maybe we are talking past each other. By “FIRE” I mean the ability to live on investment income, exclusively and permanently, decades before a typical retirement age.

Retirement on a normal schedule and security for a few months of rest here and there are, I would say, baseline financial responsibility (if you can afford them). These are marginal sacrifices, not a lifestyle/subculture.

There is lean FIRE, fat FIRE, barista FIRE, only FI, and several other variations of FIRE

> I find it hard to empathize with FIRE people because I like my job.

It's not about having to quit your job. It's about having the option to quit if you decide to. Should you decide not to quit you can keep earning money, without having any real need for it, which means you can invest and get even more money.

It's great that you enjoy your job _today_ (you are probably a minority). But what about 5 years from now? 10 years? Whatever you are working on may change. If you are an employee, your manager could be replaced by a crappy one. If you own your company, the market forces might change.

Not having your job tied to your ability to put food on the table frees you to do whatever you may decide to do.

Interesting perspective. As a software engineer it is unlikely that the world will ever lack satisfying work for me for very long (recessions notwithstanding). If it does, as a reasonably smart and academically successful person, I think I could transition to whatever is next. Maybe it helps that I saw both my parents change careers via graduate school while I was growing up. But you’re right, it is a gamble, and if I were more risk averse I might want stronger insurance against the possibility.

FIRE literally means Retire Early. Otherwise it's just FI.

Considering the phenomenon of Bullshit Jobs it's kind of hard to imagine people not despising them. I spend my days dreaming of what I could do to fight climate change but not (yet) being able to find ways to do what seems worthwhile just because I can't figure out how to make it cover expenses. How much more science, art, and simple joy could be produced if we were not forced to compete with one another for necessities? Some things produce natural competition (water in the desert) but we have so much damn wealth it's _absurd_ that anyone even fears that losing their job means homelessness.

Last year I bought a dirt cheap (sub-100k) house in the countryside with good internet because I don't _ever_ want my boss to have the power to take the roof over my kids' heads. I am not quite FIRE but it certainly helps.

"A child free from the guilt of ownership and the burden of economic competition will grow up with the will to do what needs doing and the capacity for joy in doing it. It is useless work that darkens the heart. The delight of the nursing mother, of the scholar, of the successful hunter, of the good cook, of the skillful maker, of anyone doing needed work and doing it well—this durable joy is perhaps the deepest source of human affection, and of sociality as a whole."

https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Ursula_K._Le_Guin

Sure, you like your job...now.

Everyone has different life experiences. Many people have had bad experiences and believe early retirement to be their best option.

I hope you can broaden your mind to at least emphasize with people who do not entity their job.

> But from talking with them, it seems like their focus is on retirement - hopefully in their 50's. That's their grand plan, because that's when they'll start "living".

It goes much deeper than that. The notion that work could not possibly be "living" is much more popular in Europe too. With employment so over-regulated and entrepreneurship discouraged it's easy to see why people treat "work" in a very transactional way.

For most people there just isn't a lot of obvious upside waiting for them if they work extra hard. Salaries are extremely compressed compared to the US. The only way to make real money[0] in Europe is by running a business but that's discouraged too.

Even education - there's no Ivy League of Europe, there's no Stanford. There are some schools that may be considered good, but elite - not really.

[0] well I guess anywhere, but there are many diverse career paths in the US that will reliably get you to a few hundred k. In Europe not so much.

Oxford and Cambridge perhaps?

Well, if you consider that Europe then yes.

For anybody living outside of the UK, going there isn't all that different from going to the US. The tuition is only somewhat cheaper too I think. As opposed to most "best" schools in mainland Europe being essentially free for locals.

So I'd assume any kid in Europe planning to go to Oxford is probably planning to apply to American schools too.

And not sure how reliably you could get accepted too. Like say for myself, when I was younger I really wanted to go to one of the top US schools (ended up not going to any). It was pretty obvious to me I'd never get accepted if I went to a local high-school so went to a prep-school in the US. The UK, I assume, has their equivalent of that too.

> For anybody living outside of the UK, going there isn't all that different from going to the US. The tuition is only somewhat cheaper too I think. As opposed to most "best" schools in mainland Europe being essentially free for locals.

The EU citizens from outside the UK are able to study in Scotland without paying any tuition fees.

The University of Edinburgh is as highly ranked internationally, as Yale, Columbia, and Cornell[1].

The University of St Andrews is as highly ranked locally, as Cambridge and Oxford[2].

> So I'd assume any kid in Europe planning to go to Oxford is probably planning to apply to American schools too.

That's completely wrong. Almost nobody is considering the US when applying to the universities in England, because England offers Tution Fee Loan to all EU students, that only needs to be repaid when one's income is over the repayment threshold[3].

However, this might end in 2021, because of Brexit.

[1] https://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-un...

[2] https://www.theguardian.com/education/ng-interactive/2019/ju...

[3] https://www.ucas.com/finance/student-finance-england/tuition...

> because England offers Tution Fee Loan to all EU students, that only needs to be repaid when one's income is over the repayment threshold

I stand corrected on this then.

> The University of Edinburgh is as highly ranked internationally, as Yale, Columbia, and Cornell

The rankings I have to disagree with, I'd like to see something that compared expected income or net worth for graduates.

Let's say you're given an opportunity to go to "University of Edinburgh" or Yale with all costs paid for. I think you'll have a hard time finding people who would pick the former.

> The rankings I have to disagree with, I'd like to see something that compared expected income or net worth for graduates.

Universities are primarily ranked by the quality of their research output, not by the expected net worth of their graduates.

> Let's say you're given an opportunity to go to "University of Edinburgh" or Yale with all costs paid for. I think you'll have a hard time finding people who would pick the former.

At least in Europe, a graduate of University of Edinburgh would be worth as much as a graduate of Yale in most industries, including finance, law and tech. They would have equal chances of getting a banking job in London, or working for a FAANG company in Zurich.

The Ivy League only really matters, if one wants to live in the US. And most Europeans don't. Because Europe is not about becoming super rich, but about never becoming poor.

For instance, in my EU country I can take as many years off as I want, and still remain fully covered by the national health insurance by paying just 40€ / month. If a broke my leg tomorrow, it wouldn't cost me anything at all.

Therefore, I couldn't care less about being "a high net-worth individual" as long as I don't need to stress about the basic things in life, and have enough freedom to work only with – or for – the companies I really like.

> The Ivy League only really matters, if one wants to live in the US

Of course not. You'll still have a better network even if you don't stay in America. Say if you need VC funding for your startup in Europe, you'll be dealing with Americans sooner than later. Or if you're dealing with China or India, they share the same preference too. It'll help. And although there aren't that many truly private European VCs I sincerely doubt they wouldn't notice.

I doubt most people outside of the UK know the University of Edinburgh. Everybody knows the top US schools. Never heard of anybody bragging about a University of Edinburgh credential.

I'm not even remotely a fan of higher education or the academia at all. But nonetheless like most people I would notice if somebody had a highly-coveted credential.

> At least in Europe, a graduate of University of Edinburgh would be worth as much as a graduate of Yale in most industries, including finance, law and tech. They would have equal chances of getting a banking job in London, or working for a FAANG company in Zurich.

That point is moot, obviously you couldn't do any major hiring if you expected American credentials in Europe.

Yet, the reverse likely isn't true. A Yale credential would open more doors in America and wouldn't close any in Europe. Hence it's superior.

> I doubt most people outside of the UK know the University of Edinburgh. Everybody knows the top US schools.

My point was, that for 99% of Europeans living in Europe, there is absolutely no difference between a degree from Yale and a degree from University of Edinburgh.

Therefore, given a chance, probably 60-70% would still go to the UK rather than the US, just because it's much closer from home.

> For most people there just isn't a lot of obvious upside waiting for them if they work extra hard. Salaries are extremely compressed compared to the US

Exactly!

Even in a fairly well paid European country like Germany the salaries are a joke for high performers.

It is difficult as a dev to earn, even after a decade of experience and working incredibly hard, more than €100k/year.

But a good junior with 1-2 years of experience can earn €50k/year.

So you can’t even make double after taxes of what a junior makes. Almost no matter how hard you work.

And yet you could take it easy and have a great work life balance and after a decade be earning €80k/year.

> Even education - there's no Ivy League of Europe, there's no Stanford. There are some schools that may be considered good, but elite - not really.

This is in part because research is organized differently in other countries. Lots of world-class research happens in Germany, but in research institutes rather than universities.

> Salaries are extremely compressed compared to the US.

That's because in Europe social welfare contributions are usually deducted from your salary automatically, thereby making it lower. Which, however, doesn't necessarily mean you're getting less.

> Even education - there's no Ivy League of Europe, there's no Stanford. There are some schools that may be considered good, but elite - not really.

Elite on what scale? I've had the pleasure to see what [math/physics] research at various universities in the US and in Europe looks like and I don't think there is any difference in quality. How would there be one? I think I remember reading somewhere that about 50% of STEM professors in the US are from outside the US.

Besides, the Ivy League-related elitism in the US to a large degree comes from the marketing that those schools (need to) do. They are private institutions after all – in contrast to most European universities –, so they need to maintain that myth.

> doesn't necessarily mean you're getting less

Of course you're getting less. If you're not using any of the programs you're getting a terrible deal. If you want private healthcare you're going to have to pay for it yourself (and it will only cover basics). I never used a government program once in my life. Actually I'm not even covered by the socialized healthcare. Not that I would like to be, but if I get seriously sick as in cancer there isn't a viable private option. But for normal doctors and procedures I can pay cash just fine.

But either way you cannot explain the differential with just taxes. There are many places in Europe where you might end up paying less as a percentage than America. It's regulation and overall culture too.

Not to mention all sizable EU countries have a lower GDP per capita. Economically they're just inferior.

> Elite on what scale?

No, the point isn't that these schools produce people of vastly superior intelligence or skill. The point is a 15 year old in high school does not feel a lot of pressure to work super hard to get into an "elite" institution, because it's simply not on the radar for most people. .

Just like most people don't have a prospect of a promotion offering vastly superior pay, they don't have a prospect of a school offering vastly superior opportunities.

> Even education - there's no Ivy League of Europe, there's no Stanford. There are some schools that may be considered good, but elite - not really.

In the world's top 20, there are 10 North American universities and 7 European universities at the moment[1]. That's not such a huge difference, given the fact, that undergraduate degrees in most European countries are only taught in the local language. As a result, only universities in the UK and Switzerland are able to reach the "elite" status – and these countries combined are much smaller than the US.

[1] https://www.topuniversities.com/university-rankings/world-un...

> that undergraduate degrees in most European countries are only taught in the local language

While "most" might be true quantitatively, from what I've seen most of local "best" schools do offer studies in English. Most top schools in Germany seem to offer this. Even an American could get in on these super cheap deals. But there aren't that many takers (from the US). Given the enormous cost differential you'd think people would be storming these schools.

I have some Indian friends that attend such a program at a local university. From talking to them most wanted to go to US (some Canada) but couldn't get in or afford it and this was their second choice. Also none are planning to stay.

The rankings, again, I have to dispute. The best way to rank schools would be to actually ask people which schools they'd go to if cost/admissions wasn't a factor.

> While "most" might be true quantitatively, from what I've seen most of local "best" schools do offer studies in English. Most top schools in Germany seem to offer this.

Even in Germany, probably 90% of the undergraduate courses are taught in German only. The percentage of postgraduate courses available in English is much higher, though. Still, most professors are required to be able to teach in the local language. Therefore, the number of international faculty members outside the UK and Switzerland is very limited.

> Even in Germany, probably 90% of the undergraduate courses are taught in German only

Because there isn't a lot of demand for English courses? Otherwise you'd expect them to increase prices and offer more English courses.

We can go even further - if Germany really offers anything close to an American standard of living and education you'd expect many people would learn German and go live there.

> Because there isn't a lot of demand for English courses? Otherwise you'd expect them to increase prices and offer more English courses.

That's because the first undergraduate degree is completely free for all Germans.

> We can go even further - if Germany really offers anything close to an American standard of living and education you'd expect many people would learn German and go live there.

My entire point was, that European universities outside the UK and Switzerland are unable to compete with the US schools, because they are very unattractive options for foreign professors who don't speak the local language.

I see this with traveling. I love traveling and 100% plan on using some of the money I've gotten from tech to travel. But many of my classmates have an attitude of "later". They make decent salaries, they have the time and freedom. But they don't do anything cool with it! I get living within your means and being frugal but damn if you're making six figures you can afford a trip or two.

As a Scandinavian who moved to the US, my impressions from my limited personal experience is that

- Swedes do clock out after 8 hours, but they work all that time.

- Americans can spend a lot more time at work, but there is a lot of "just hanging out" going on.

I have heard this exact statement from multiple Swedes. I have seen them goof off just like their American counterparts.

Obviously we try to fit in when abroad.

This was the Stockholm office, but the foreigners (especially the English) absolutely had an impact haha.

As an American that makes good money, I don't think medical costs make retiring in the USA in my 50s a high likelihood probability.

There is a medical cost cliff at 65 when Medicare (large medical subsidies for retired-aged people) kicks in, but the private medical costs of an old-but-not-quite-65 person are pretty high, especially in the USA where pretty much all food is optimized to overload your senses (and as a side-effect, your pancreas).

I hope you show due appreciation for the products and services those 70 hr weeks brought to your present life.

The whole ‘we should work less’ meme strikes me as more about the meaninglessness of modern work, moreso than our desire to have more leisure time. In other words: people want more meaningful work, not merely to have less meaningless work. Maybe this is an American-centric idea, wherein your work is strongly tied to your purpose and identity, but I don’t see how you can simply brush away an activity that takes up 1/3 of your time.

The example in the article (Amazon packing plants) is perhaps the most pointless Kafkasque job one can imagine: packing boxes of mostly unnecessary consumeristic products.

Speaking only personally, but I want to be working so much that I have little leisure time, but only because the work I’m doing is fulfilling and fundamentally important. I have no desire to have more leisure time to consume content (which is what most people do: look up the hours spent watching TV/video per person, or social media usage), as I don’t think consumption activities are ultimately fulfilling.

The pleasures of urban populations have become mainly passive: seeing cinemas, watching football matches, listening to the radio, and so on. This results from the fact that their active energies are fully taken up with work; if they had more leisure, they would again enjoy pleasures in which they took an active part.

-- Bertrand Russell, 1932 http://www.zpub.com/notes/idle.html

People have a lot of leisure time today, so much so that Americans, on average, watch about 4 hours of television/video per day.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Television_consumption

I really don’t think working a 40-hour a week job is the hold up here.

> People have a lot of leisure time today, so much so that Americans, on average, watch about 4 hours of television/video per day.

You have a fundamentally different view of leisure time than what Bertrand Russel is talking about. In his view, leisure is something in which one has to be actively engaged in. Modern television, however, outsources much of this: laugh tracks are a prime example, but another example would be the BBC's Sherlock series which doesn't make it possible for the viewer to figure out "who done it", it only has Sherlock swoop in and connect dots that were never shown.

I think we are talking past each other. I interpreted the quote to mean, “if people had more time, they would be more involved in leisure activities, not simply consuming.”

As I said, I don’t think the issue is one of time. It’s more that there is a massive industrial complex pushing you to consume, click, engage, etc., while cultural movements that encourage creating things and active engagement are niche at best.

I think you misinterpreted the quote. You counter by saying people have 4 hours of time to spend watching TV.

But the quote never mentioned insufficient time, only insufficient energy.

> This results from the fact that their active energies are fully taken up with work;

This lack of energy makes people passively consume, e.g. listen to the radio (as the quote mentions), or watch TV (as you mention). Rather it's the notion that people's energy's are so drained from (often seemingly meaningless) work, that they have no desire to do anything but just consume idly. I don't know if that's true or not, but I personally do feel it is. When I'm doing 40-60 hour workweeks, I've got no desire to do anything that isn't largely passive. Whereas when I worked 20 hours at most, I was always busy teaching myself something or building something.

> Rather it's the notion that people's energy's are so drained from (often seemingly meaningless) work, that they have no desire to do anything but just consume idly. I don't know if that's true or not, but I personally do feel it is. When I'm doing 40-60 hour workweeks, I've got no desire to do anything that isn't largely passive. Whereas when I worked 20 hours at most, I was always busy teaching myself something or building something.

I've always felt like forty hours is less than ideal, but I don't see the connection with meaninglessness. During the period in my life when I had an unchallenging job[1], I found myself ravenous for active mental work after-hours: I'd learn new things in my field, read econ papers constantly[2], and it was probably the most productive adult period of my music-learning life. Now that I have an intense, very intellectually challenging job, I understand for the first time in my life why people might want to watch TV, especially at the regularity that most do it.

[1] I wouldn't describe it as meaningless, but it wasn't intellectually challenging at all

[2] I have a minor in econ, so enough to understand many papers at a relatively superficial level

> BBC's Sherlock series which doesn't make it possible for the viewer to figure out "who done it", it only has Sherlock swoop in and connect dots that were never shown

I realize this is a little off-topic, but this is something that the original Holmes did as well. Almost every story was solved because Holmes had already spent time "off-camera" doing things, or already happened to know about obscure poisons, etc. It all feels very deus-ex-machina.

It wasn't until the Agatha Christie era when it became customary for mysteries to show all of the clues that the Detective encounters to be also given to the Reader, so that the reader can try to figure it out before the detective exposes things.

>>This results from the fact that their active energies are fully taken up with work

from the previous comment

I suspect it's what media consumption does to people, along the lines of David Foster Wallace, who famously threw his TV out.

It makes it easy to experience perfection without doing anything. You can feel the perfect romance of beautiful people, and take a perfect vacation - without actively doing anything yourself.

But that raises your expectations for everything. So you don't do anything yourself anymore, you just consume.

That, combined with a meaningless work, or rather a busyness fetish (dont want to be seen as lazy even though you're not productive), creates the mordern life.

No, thank you. I take imperfection and less neuroticism (and less work hours) any day over this.

We had a rapid check of this hypothesis with unemployment high in the US. People were sitting at home with nothing to do.

Perhaps the massive jump in active leisure will suddenly manifest but so far no such thing has come to be.

I don't think people being unemployed and staying at home due to a global pandemic is remotely comparable to a situation where people were financially stable but worked less.

Go on then, tell us what factors break down. We can use other similar events to correct for them.

The fact that people don't feel free to enjoy leisure activities when their future is uncertain.

Imagine a person with health conditions that fit the high risk population of COVID mortality. Now, imagine those people with other health conditions (let's say obesity or heart disease) having a small accident that isn't life threatening but does require a trip to the hospital where they have a higher likelihood of contracting COVID.

If I'm one of those at risk people, my "active" activities are going to lean to the safer options I can find like walking or jogging. No mountain climbing, kayaking, skiing, and so forth.

I explained this to my parents who have a few existing health conditions that have a high correlation with COVID mortality rates based on the data I've seen. They don't need to go into the hospital for a cut or injured finger if they can avoid the accident in the first place. Obviously if a real emergency arrives you need to weigh the risks of contracting COVID vs the emergency (an admittedly nearly impossible task) but you should try to minimize risks for the time being where you can to try and avoid that situation completely.

Basically you need to be a little more risk averse than you may normally be under the assumption a minor injury is manageable if you're potentially susceptible to COVID right now.

I can tell you that in the musician communities I participate in, there was a surge of new members who are either returning to a hobby or starting fresh.

It seems to have receded already though.

I made my first 2 tracks in over 10 years

Tell that to the bike shops in my area, which have seen unprecedented business and have trouble keeping things in stock.

> Perhaps the massive jump in active leisure will suddenly manifest but so far no such thing has come to be.

Have you tried to buy exercise equipment lately? What about hiking backpacks? Have you been to Lowe's? Have you heard that there are protests happening across the country?

It seems to me like there has been a massive jump in active leisure.

Seems more likely to me that the people that were previously going to the gym decided to buy their own equipment. There's also something to be said about the quantity of exercise equipment inventory available at any given time.

Possibly, which is why I included three other examples.

Perhaps in part, but bicycle sales are also through the roof producing significant back orders.

This is a good point. I accept this. Especially because I paid an exorbitant $700 for a set of 260 lbs from FringeSport because only their tacticool "MILSPEC" bumper plates were available.

Among my friends who are laid off from the virus, I've seen a great deal more of them painting and recording music; they're not aspiring to "make it," they're just doing more of their creative projects. Very small sample size but it makes me sad how it took a global pandemic to give them the time to do their things.

Even for employed people that have been relieved of the grind of commute and unnecessary hours the office, everyone I know is creating more - art (paintings, photography, writing, music) or exercising more, or focusing on their own programming projects or whatever

I bought a bike because I have at least 6-7 hours additional each week to do something new instead of commute, although as suspected, work is already attempting to steal from me.

Quarantining outside a big city has opened my eyes to how much urban life is purely consumptive activity. Living in a low density area, just having space and a vehicle to transport supplies I was able to grow vegetables, restore an old motorcycle, build a computer from components, cook and cure meat etc. In my small city apartment all of this activity would've either been impossible or required spending lots of money- turning what was either a fun hobby or a value generating activity into just consumption.

My father recently described this phenomenon to me as, "buying one's lifestyle." I'd never heard the phrase before but I think it perfectly describes what so many of us do in urban areas once we've established a foothold financially.

I have actually done all the things you list living in Brooklyn, NY over the past seven years. But it hasn't come easy. I grew the vegetables at a community garden, which took years for me to get into. I had to work on the motorcycle in the alley way of my building, which due to recent crime increases in the area is now untenable. I cook and cure my own meats on occasion but due to the high costs associated with getting good meat, the tiny kitchen I have to work with, and the vegan next-door neighbors who roll their eyes at me any time they smell a steak cooking, I obviously don't do it as much as I'd like.

The value of the city for me, as someone who both grew up here and then returned after school to pursue work, has been all of the metropolitan values: living so near so many interesting, distinct, and different kinds of people. I work in tech and media but I really tend to enjoy the company of those who work in other fields - I enjoyed the diversity of interests, talents, and values here in NYC. But every place has a point where things become too oppressive and expensive to yield any further cultural benefits - and we clearly hit that mark here even before quarantine.

Now, with quarantine in effect, the one thing I really cherished and held onto over the years - being near people - has become a major detractor living in NYC. Without a magnificent amount of reversals, I will be looking to buy property in a state where I am not paying an entire paycheck in taxes to my city government.

We moved to a small town some years ago and I agree with you. A lot of our "leisure" time is taken up with our somewhat massive garden and food processing in general, which we enjoy. We are also building a new greenhouse, fixing fences, etc. and we've converted our garage to a combination gym/woodworking shop, which makes for the occasionally dusty workout.

If I worked at my job less, I'd have more time for these productive activities and I certainly wouldn't pine away searching for "meaning" in my day job, that's for sure.

Well part of that has to do with a significant amount of the value add of a dense area like a city is doing things that involve lots of people, especially people who are somewhat strangers. This isn't exactly possible when there's a plague.

That doesn't make those activities consumerist though.

Really much of the "consumerism" is a fundamental of civilization and complexity - specialization yields benefits. Production is geared to what they are "best" at economically for better yields. Consumption still occurs even when DYIed paired with production. It may even be more wasteful ironically. To go a bit anti-Nilhist meaning is what you make it - one can reasonably find both labor and consumption to fufill requirements meaningless.

I wanted to post the link exactly to the same essay "In praise of Idleness". Glad to see this essay resonates with other people.

> fundamentally important.

Don't you think that because of the way we have set up our economies (service economy, high productivity low compensation, high inequality) there aren't enough fundamentally important works that need doing or people with enough resources that they can make their own important work? If more than half of all individual people in America are trapped making $<31,000 a year working full time at a fundamentally unimportant job I simply don't see a way out.

Half the country simply doesn't have the resources in time or money or opportunity to find that fulfilling work or make fulfilling work for themselves.

System seems opposed to human happiness and fulfillment.

It is definitely a structural problem with the modern Western post-industrial economy. I don’t pretend to have a solution, but it seems to me that people will tolerate rough working conditions or boring jobs if there is an overall mission or purpose; compare WW2 factory workers to contemporary Amazon workers.

I think that's a much harder comparison than you're giving it credit for. Amazon workers don't all despise their job, and WW2 factory workers who did despise their job would have been a lot less likely to get a platform. Who knows which fraction is really higher?

Most work is not fulfilling. You do not even need "Bullshit Jobs" questionnaire responses to show that, ever increasing record number of people needing psychiatric medication to get through their day should be proof enough that something is fundamentally wrong.

Let us not kid each other. For most people their "work" is not a choice. The system is set up so that it is either you take whatever job you can to survive, or it is homelessness and no health benefits for you and your kids.

And no, pointing out that nobody should 'need' to work 2 full time shit jobs to merely put food on the table and meet rent isn't "Marxism". We are producing more "wealth" per capita than at any point in history (at the cost of destroying the planet btw), but still we require burned out elderly workers to keep at it until they literally die.

We used to have, at least in Europe, capitalism combined with a strong social security in healthcare, schooling and basic provisions for those at the bottom, financed through a progressive taxation regime at the top end. This worked fairly well for all. Yes, there were huge differences in lifestyle affordance between the poor and the very rich, but nobody needed to be homeless or without healthcare. While ofc tax-evasion was a thing, it wasn't ultra-weaponized like it is today.

If you think of extreme communism as a horizontal line and extreme capitalism as a vertical line, the old model was more like a sigmoid on the contribution/reward plane. Moderation is best in all things.

> Let us not kid each other. For most people their "work" is not a choice. The system is set up so that it is either you take whatever job you can to survive, or it is homelessness and no health benefits for you and your kids.

I'm not about to complain about my software development job in the US, but if not for job insecurity I'd rather clerk (not even own) at some small retail shop in Europe. And yes I've done "menial" jobs—take away the stresses of US healthcare and retirement systems and worries about your kids' ability to pay for school, add European amounts of time-off, and lots of those jobs are pretty damn great, actually, job-insecurity aside (which is not a trivial thing, I grant—point is about what's "fulfilling" or satisfying in a job).

Never heard being a clerk is a desirable job, I'd be interested to hear why you think that? I really have no idea what clerks do, I previously thought it was just paper pushing

As in sales clerk. Ring up sales, stock shelves, putter about and put things in order. Read a book or knock out some pushups if it's a really slow day, everything's in order, and the owner's not a dick. That kind of thing.

[EDIT] sense 5 in Webster's 1913. Apparently it is, or at least was, a US usage.

5. An assistant in a shop or store. [U. S.]

I'll second this person's opinion. I used to work in a small town computer shop many years ago as a sales/support "clerk". I spent all day helping people directly, many repeat customers. The job was pretty chill and there was a somewhat new problem to solve every day. I worked fixed hours and when I went home I could completely focus on whatever I wanted to do now that I wasn't working. The wage sucked, slightly above minimum wage isn't great, but it was enough for me at the time.

Contrast that with my FAANG job I have now. The pay is phenomenal. But it basically swallows my life. Between the long hours, weekend on-calls, constant churn, all for a customer I've only spoken to indirectly via a project manager. It's hard to feel like the work you're putting out is really making a difference in anyone's life. With covid and the lack of direct human contact as well, I'd go so far as to say I'm practically pushing commits into a void everyday and getting paid for it, there's very little if any feedback for my work. First-world problems, I know. But if you took away the pay differences, I know which job I'd choose in a heartbeat.

How much percent of the population have a job and how much have a career?

...an activity that takes up 1/3 of your time.

Averaged over the year standard work hours in my country, 37.5h/week, is less than 1/5 of your time.

Factor in commuting. When I commuted to London I spent 4 hours in transit. Get up at 7am, at my desk at 9am. Leave work at 5:30p and get home at 7:30pm. Many people do this. Their whole week is spent working, eating, and sleeping for two exhausted days off at the weekend and a barrage of unattended tasks, chores, neglected relationships deferred during work hours.

Edit: I am not sure how you got to 1/5th. By my calculation of the waking hours in a week 37.5hrs is ~1/3rd of 112hrs.

Many people do this.

Yes but average is lower. First Google hit:

Value for the US (Minutes): 26.6:

https://www.indexmundi.com/facts/united-states/quick-facts/a...

Ok, well in the UK the average is 59 minutes. Being an average it means many people are having longer commutes than that. I'd like to see the mean number.

https://news.sky.com/story/average-commute-to-work-now-takes...

It’s comparable, US number is one way. With one hour commute per work day it’s a little over 1/5 then. With four hour daily commute you are over 1/4 but not close to 1/3 of your time.

As I said, there are around 112 waking hours in a week, spending 37.5 of them working is not 1/5th of your week, it's close to 1/3.

They don't link to the study but they say 221 hours per year and since there is about 220 working days per year, I think the 59 minutes figure is per day, not for each way to/from work. So about 30 minutes one-way. The US study saying 26.6 minutes is also one-way. So basically they are fairly similar and reasonable.

A 2-hour one-way commute just seems crazy to me, I know it exists but I think it's very extreme.

Highkey why I decided to move out of my parent's place after almost 2 years of a similar 4-hour commute day. I had no life, no friends, and it actually drove my relationship at the time into the shitter.

Doesn't help that rent in my metro area ain't cheap but I was able to score a relatively cheap apartment that makes my commute 35-40 mins each way. I suppose since I work remote I'm not getting my money's worth but this is still a better way for me to live.

My dad did this commute for around 11 years, got laid off, got a job a half hour drive away and his QoL is drastically improved. If housing were more accessible where jobs were (or if public infrastructure was improved to drastically increase throughput/efficiency) we would probably be much happier- we'd probably be even happier if we just bit the bullet and went as remote as possible or chose 4 day workweeks, and to be quite honest it's probably easier at a macro level to force that kind of change than to figure out a way to fit more sardines into electric cars in tubes.

Are you factoring in sleep?

37.5 work hours times 45 work weeks

divided by

365 days times 24 hours.

Ok, so you're not. 8 hours of our day aren't really "ours" to do with as we please. We can for a while, but it catches up to us.

Ah yes, the creative accounting of it! The bullshit we like to buy into.

7.5 hours of official "work", 30 min lunch break with which you cant do anything, 2x 30 min commute. 9 hours gone! You need to sleep 4.5 hours to be able to do it. 13.5 hours gone! It seems like you would have 10.5 hours for yourself but there of course are the standard chores, shopping, cleaning, cooking, eating, open the mail, pay your bills, interact with friends and family. We are told (cultural) this is all totally recreational!

Can you show up at work at 8:00 sharp? I think more usual is 7:45 to start at 8:00. The 30 min commute means you have to leave at 7:15. The average morning routine is 30 to 90 min. We do this to get to work and getting up at 6:15 is rather unfunny. (Plenty of jobs start at 7:00 or even earlier)

You finish at 16:00 but before you are out of the building 15 min are gone. 16:45 you get home. Why cant I park any place? humm, its 16:55 now. You might need to shower and/or change cloths, oh its 17:30 already? Quick to the store! 2x20 min drive, 10 min strolling around, 10 min to park again. Oh its 18:30? wtf? quick do some cooking. 37 min of cooking 19:07. A short hour to eat 20:00.

And then you have to spend 2 hours not doing anything useful or you wont be fit for work the next day. (note the contradiction in terms) After 5 days of that you also really need to spend the entire weekend relaxing or you eventually wont be able to work. Of course reality wont allow for that so people still burn out.

Slaves? uhm?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0oMEuyhBkRo

This is why working from home is so much better for one's quality of life and mental health.

Wake up when your body has rested enough. 0-minute commute. No dead time where you fake-work or time where you are not working anymore but can't yet do personal projects. In fact it's sometimes the other way around: you can multiplex activities by doing chores without breaking your work-related train of thought (I have solved multiple bugs while hanging clothes on the drier rack). When you are done with your task (even if it took less time than anticipated) it's a 0-minute context-switch to your personal life. No social pressure to eat at specific hours (much easier if you are into intermittent fasting for example).

This conflates different problems. Notwithstanding how meaningful work is, we'd benefit from reduced hours and more leisure time.

I agree. I think most people want to do something with their lives, something fulfilling. Like raise a family, fix up their house, paint, make music, and so on. Some people want to build businesses.

Point is, a lot of people find their jobs tedious, tiring, and depressing. They have no energy to do the things they want to do after work and so they switch off in front of the TV or whatever.

We have not really come all that far from 150 years ago. The work is safer, more comfortable perhaps, but for many people it's soul sucking tedium.

> no desire to have more leisure time to consume content

I have noticed this over the last year too.

Since I have started climbing, playing league soccer and doing (incredibly amateur) jam sessions, I have found it impossible to watch TV shows/ movies or waste too much time mindlessly surfing on reddit/social media.

I will however, call all of them leisure. They are important to me, and I do put in serious effort to consistently improve in all of them, but there is something fundamentally leisurely to the nature of it.

> the meaninglessness of modern work

Compound that with the insistence that you interview for your job sometimes as often as every day (if you do daily standups): even if there's nothing visibly productive to do, you have to conjure something that somebody else can observe the effects of. Programmers, for example, ought to be able to spend time - lots of it - investigating new technologies in preparation for future tasks, but with the tyranny of JIRA, we're expected to do something that somebody else can easily check on at least every day if not more often. And this is a job that requires years of self-study just to qualify to do.

I think there is probably an organisation out there that's a better fit for you.

I've seen orgs run 'agile' like a military operation - Jira rules everything, with timesheet plugins so that everyone can account for every part of their day down to 15 minute intervals. Where there is a reprimand for choosing the wrong category of meeting ticket to assign an hour to.

I have seen teams pre-Agile where you were left alone, sometimes for months at a time, to produce... hopefully. Maybe.

But in the middle I've worked for a number of organisations where a status report in the morning scrum of "I'm reading up about X and evaluating Y in preparation for big feature Z next month" is perfectly acceptable.

> in preparation for big feature Z next month

You actually know about big features months in advance? Now I'm jealous.

Oh, I always know about the big features they specify too vaguely to actually implement and then change their minds about wanting at the last minute months in advance.

Haha, sometimes I know about them before the product owner because I've bothered to read the standard and legal requirements around what we're trying to implement...

I was going to write a quick sentence, then it turned into a rant, then decided against it and will let your words stand. I couldn't agree more.

> In other words: people want more meaningful work, not merely to have less meaningless work.

The truly frustrating thing about this is sometimes all that takes is keeping your employees informed. My current job's work feels very empty because management simply will not update us on the state of negotiations and sales unless we do something just short of cornering them while holding socks stuffed with soap. Meanwhile, they've promised more transparency multiple times.

This is only a five person company, so it's not like we're asking for much (or, really, anything at all -- this should be a normal and expected feature of a small startup).

It seems like such an easy way to keep your employees knowledgeable about what their work is actually going towards and without that, it's just a purposeless slog. I need a new job.

> but I don’t see how you can simply brush away an activity that takes up 1/3 of your time.

But if you've cut down on that, it doesn't.

> I have no desire to have more leisure time to consume content

Other people do. But they also want more leisure time to do up the house, see family, see the world, join a local sports club, pick up a hobby, enjoy life. It's harder to do that around a full time job, especially one with a long commute attached.

Tibor Scitovsky once remarked that the most rewarding leisure tends to be skilled leisure: playing a musical instrument, sports, drawing and painting and so on. and that as people start to work less, they will increasingly need to learn how to spend their free time in a way that doesn't make them miserable or bored. Reminds me a lot of the maker ethos as well: production is more satisfying than consumption.

Long work hours are also harmful when they make it hard to spend time with your kids, time to resolve personal issues or wind down after a stressful period, time to study. For a lot of people, weekends are stuffed so full of errands, appointments and grocery shopping that there's very little time left to actually recover from the work week.

Point taken, though, the quality of work often matters more for wellbeing than the quantity.

I chose to work in the public sector of Denmark because I’m ideologically inclined that way. That was decades ago, today I would chose to work here because of how much less hours I work compared to my old university friends in the private sector. They earn more money than me, but except for one of them who founded and now manages a successful company, it’s not that much more money. In fact when you calculate in all the extra hours they work, my extra weak of paid vacation, my better paternityleave, the two extra paid child’s sick leave days I get (per time your child is sick), the two yearly extra vacation days (per child under the age of 7) and my pension, I probably only earn around 10-20% less than them, and I get to spend so much more time not working. Hell I even bumped my hours to 30 a week for a while when my daughter was born. That was expensive, but it’s something you aren’t offered in a lot of private sector jobs.

I can’t begin to imagine how you guys in America get through life working so much. Let alone how on Earth you raise a family, maintain a relationship and have time for yourselves while you do it.

That's very similar in most government jobs in Europe, I believe. I don't know about the US, but I expect it's similar there as well.

I'm afraid that it works out great for you because others are working more. Individually, that's a good decision for you, but it's not a model you can make society run on, at least not at the same level of output we're currently providing. If everybody had the same circumstances you have, we couldn't afford everything we can afford now, unless there's some explosion in productivity, which is hard to believe for the majority of jobs where it's not about "coming up with the right idea".

I don't think this is true. In my experience a lot of work time is just wasted time. Often nothing is accomplished. A lot of extra hours for meetings are not productive at all. A lot of extra hours looking into that bug ("so we can fix it today") is not productive at all..

I think you have the impression that working longer means being more productive. I don't believe that. I am often more productive if I have a shorter work day.

Also your argument doesn't make too much sense to me because OP already says that he is paid less. So it's not like he gets the same for less work. He gets less for less work.

> I don't think this is true. In my experience a lot of work time is just wasted time. Often nothing is accomplished. A lot of extra hours for meetings are not productive at all. A lot of extra hours looking into that bug ("so we can fix it today") is not productive at all..

And this is not true in public sector ? :D

Probably also there.. does this contradict anything I said?

That just means that doing more hours won't help more.. where ever you are (there are always exceptions).

I would say equal amount of time is being wasted even if you work less hours but public sector tolerates less being done. For example your morning windup routine is the same, your lunch takes the same time, you need to go to bathroom, pointless meetings are still there - I don't really see what would improve about my productivity if I worked less hours - what would I be able to eliminate in order to shorten my time at work ?

Even if time is "wasted" with breaks at work this time is between events - not at the end of the day - and I usually don't have the ability to compress it.

And also the economics of working more hours once you become a critical contributor are very different from a person staying in late for appearances - adding a person to take over the load has multiple costs - hiring risk, training and on-boarding time, extra sync and communication slowing things down.

I see. I don't have experience with the public sector myself but what I meant is this:

If I have only a 4 hour workday, people(bosses) think twice about wasting my time with useless meetings. Also it gives me energy to start into a day with only 4 or 5 hours ahead instead of 8h+.

Of course having a shorter workday doesn't make it 100% productive. But my personal experience is that it is MORE productive. Sadly most of my days are 8h+.

I also want to add that a tired, worn out developer might even cost productivity by introducing flawed code into the codebase. Did you ever do a serious code review while being tired? I don't see how that works. Then others have to deal with all this stuff afterwards.

My old neighbour taught me a valuable lesson back when I was a teenager fixing his computer problems: you don't get paid for the time you spend on something, but for the time you save the other person.

For me fixing his computer was easy work, not worth getting paid for at all for the time it cost me. But he insisted paying me because I was saving him evenings of work if he had to fix it himself.

This does not apply to every sector though and you will need to spend a lot of time (eg: my entire childhood "playing" with computers) to be of actual value to someone else.

So instead of having all this time wasted being "your" time wasted, try to maximize the value per hour you can bring to the right person so you can use the rest of the time to do the things you love (which might as well be chasing after that bug).

But he said specifically that he earns 10-20% less than his friends (and probably a lot less than the one who founded his company), so in fact he can afford less than them. It's just that he is content with that much.

On the other hand, many private companies don't contemplate (on don't look favorably upon) employees who work part time or anything below the standard 40 hoours/week, so if you do work in the private sector you don't have much of a choice. If everyone was magically allowed to reduce his/her working hours and salary by the same percentage I wonder what would be the outcome.

> But he said specifically that he earns 10-20% less than his friends (and probably a lot less than the one who founded his company), so in fact he can afford less than them.

If he has a defined benefit pension and they don’t he’s probably going to come out ahead if he lives long enough. Given he’s in government and they’re not that’s a reasonable assumption.

He earns 10-20% less but they work significantly more than 10-20% more. If they worked (and had worked) the same hours per year, they'd make significantly less money than he does.

That's expected, the state pays it's employees very well for a multitude of reasons, but primarily: to buy their loyalty, to make them less susceptible to bribes, and to encourage stability. It also has no reason not to, there's no competition.

I don't know the Danish situation, but e.g. a teacher in Germany will have a pension that is higher than the salary of 70-80% of the population.

Teachers in Germany also have 19.5 (now 18.5) years of education. There are few jobs that require more (e.g. doctors).

So, how much percent in pension payments for teachers would the German taxpayer save if the state required, say, one year less teacher education?

The question does not make sense to me. It‘s a market. You require a masters degree and an additional tough 1.5 years of training? Better pay me well, through salary or benefits. Let‘s not kid ourselves: most of us (highly qualified) white collars in the private sector enjoy some additional retirement scheme and can reach much higher salaries.

Why shouldn't a teacher have a high pension? I can't think of a job that's more important to the long-term viability of a country than that of a teacher.

A high pension is one thing. A pension that's higher than the salary of most of the population is quite another.

I'm not arguing that teacher shouldn't be paid well, I'm saying that the state is paying it's officials very well. Not because of the jobs they do, but because of who employs them. Teachers in Germany that are not employed by the state get significantly less.

>unless there's some explosion in productivity...

Or if the historical increase in productivity would have benefited the workers instead of the capitalists. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

https://economics.stackexchange.com/questions/15558/producti...

If you look down that thread there's a first valid argument against this : breaking down the "productivity increase" by industry shows the huge growth comes from software, also if you look at how they track productivity in manufacturing it's also misleading - if you account for stuff like outsourcing the only sector that's seeing huge real growth is computer related.

And software/computer economics are a story of their own.

Productivity growth is largely overstated.

That's the US though, and this is Denmark. European countries, and especially the Nordic countries are set up very differently with regards to income equality.

But generally, it's a hard thing to determine that exactly. How much is that 10% gain in life expectancy worth? How comparable is the life of 1970 with that in 2020? Inflation is a difficult thing to tackle.

But sure, changing wealth distribution is an option as well. Unless that happens though, somebody else has to work more to cover what another person works less.

Having worked in software industry for too long, I've come to conclude that the majority of the workforce today is spent on experimentation (i.e. "let's try project X" in corporate and "a new startup to try X"). There is so much money available in the hands of the rich (angel investment, venture capital) to fund these experiments.

Most of these fail but they keep us working.

Mais naturalement, in R&D the R part is exactly that. It's really hard to do.

> but it’s something you aren’t offered in a lot of private sector jobs.

To an extent isn’t this because these types of benefits aren’t affordable? The pension, extra vacation, etc wouldn’t be possible without the tax revenue raised from your friends who are working more hours.

In America there is a saying “good enough for government work.” I think a lot of public sector jobs get a bad rep because they hand out middle class lifestyles (arguably maybe even upper middle class in Washington DC metro area) at the expense of the private sector.

A lot of government employees (and contractors) just got paid to sit at home for 3-4 months during the pandemic if they worked in secure areas (can’t take classified information home). That’s a benefit that the private sector just can’t provide.

I guess I don’t really agree with the article. We need hard work, it’s what keeps the system going. We have it so much better than other parts of the world and we shouldn’t take that for granted.

The reason why public sector jobs are so unproductive, imo, is because there are no real bosses. Everyone's an employee, all the way to the top. No one's remuneration is affected whether you do more or less, better or worse. The logical course for all concerned is to always take the path of least resistance. As long as the paperwork is in order there's nothing to worry about. And even if it's not, there are ways around that too. Best quote I ever heard from an government employee was an unopened letter often answers itself

The public sector isn’t in general unproductive, except maybe in the US where one major party has been working hard to sabotage it for the last 40 years or so. What might surprise some people is that remuneration isn’t what foremost motivates , e.g., teachers or nurses.

Big companies are often as unproductive as the public sector, with whole departments often existing just to make some managers feel important.

That phenomenon is the reason old established big companies get disrupted. No one disrupts the public service, they are the permanent only business in their sector.

> No one disrupts the public service, they are the permanent only business in their sector.

That's not necessarily true. Governments frequently intervene in the running of public companies. Also, many public companies compete against privately run businesses.

I think you misread. The "public service" here is a reference to the government, not to public companies (which are still privately-run businesses despite being listed on public stock exchanges).

Large private enterprises, publicly-traded or otherwise, that fall prey to inefficiency get disrupted. Governments do not get disrupted short of foreign invasion or revolution, so the inefficiency remains entrenched.

Actually, by "public companies" I meant "publicly owned/run companies". I can see now that this was poorly worded.

> Governments do not get disrupted short of foreign invasion or revolution

And also elections. This is especially true in countries that don't have a two-party system.

Hm. I can't think of any significant examples here of a company owned or run by the government. I know that such things are more common elsewhere, but at least in my mind I tend to classify them as extensions of their respective governments rather than as anything like private corporations. I suppose the real question in this context is whether that government would let them be disrupted and replaced with a competitor they perhaps have less influence over.

> And also elections.

Sure, in theory. I suppose if an election actually changed things enough to be considered "disruptive" then you could consider that a form of revolution, but disruption of that sort generally has exactly the opposite effect: Everything becomes much less efficient as the new party struggles to take control, and then gradually returns to baseline as they realize that it's the masses of unelected bureaucrats that really run things on a day-to-day basis. Even if they were explicitly running on a platform of improving the efficiency of public services, it's not as if there is any actual competition in the provision of those services. People aren't choosing between two or more proven service providers; at best they have the current entrenched system with its known issues and a bunch of vague promises regarding a half-cooked proposal for a replacement which the candidate may never see implemented and which probably wouldn't work as advertised even if it were.

This, so much this. I have been working as a cunsultant at both large companies and the public sector. And they are often unproductive - and for the same reasons. Loads of middle management that needs to be included in every decision-making, but noone that dares to actually make a decision without first asking their managers.

In my eyes, the reason much of the public sector is unproductive is not because it is not motivated by profit. But rather that it is too similar to large companies with loads different management-levels.

I once worked in the public sector when they embraced real autonomous teams with leaders that could actually make decisions when the team needed it. It was just as efficient as the best agile teams I have worked at in the private sector.

The real insight here (which you allude to) is that (all else being equal) large organisations are inherently inefficient. If you take the classic libertarian view that government is inefficient and extend the logic to apply to all large organisations (and indeed individuals who control large amounts of wealth) then you end up at a very interesting political position that can provide a unified critique of both modern capitalism and soviet style communism by explaining the failings of both as being due to concentration of power (state power in the case of communism, economic power in the case of capitalism).

Neither is inherently inefficient. It’s just that both types of organisations can afford inefficiencies, while a small private company usually can’t afford it.

That doesn’t mean that small companies always are more efficiently run in all aspects. I expect my local McDonalds be much more efficient than the small sushi place around the corner, which can afford being inefficient due to low rent and probably close to minimum salary for the owner.

My brother works in HR at a fairly high level at HUD. He reminds me that most large government agencies have to expect that 1/2 of their employees have below average talent and motivation. So they design many of their processes to function under this assumption.

While HUD is certainly less productive (per capita) than a small team of highly talented people, turns out that in most large organizations half the people are below average talent/motivation. And designing for this instead of pretending that all of your staff is above average allows them to have higher productivity.

No need for the American exceptionalism here.

> The public sector isn’t in general unproductive, except maybe in the US where one major party has been working hard to sabotage it for the last 40 years or so.

Do you realize that (1) half of all government spending is at the state and local levels; and (2) many states and cities have been run by “the other party” (not the bad one) for decades? Cities like Chicago, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Baltimore, etc., have been run by Democrats for longer than many posters on HN have been alive. If there was any truth to the notion that the US public sector is poorly managed because “one major party” “sabotages” it you should see a marked difference in the states run by the other party. But you don’t. Indeed, the major population trend in the US is people leaving Democrat-run states and moving to Republican-run states.

Last time I checked, more than the majority of what I pay in taxes go to the federal government, not state or local, where it is re-distributed to other parts of the country most of whom have elected representatives from "the other party" and whose disproportionate representation changed a national election.

You're overlooking sales, property, and business taxes that folks don't see directly (e.g. property taxes built into rent), which go to the state and local governments. But overall, about half of all government spending in the U.S. is at the state and local levels: https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/sites/reg_cit_glance-2018-41-e....

For many of the things people complain about (transit, housing, education, policing) 90% of funding and 99% of oversight authority happens at the state and local level. Republicans in national government have pretty much zero say over say affordable housing policy in California. Trying to pin California's failures in those areas on Republicans in Kansas is specious.

First of all, you're only talking about income taxes, which as you rightly pointed out are concentrated in the Federal government. Once you factor in property and sales taxes, the distribution is roughly 50-50.

Second of all, even if you only take into account income taxes, Federal income taxes aren't re-distributed to other parts of the country in the way that you think.

The biggest line items in the Federal budget is (in decreasing order) are:

- Social Security

- Medicare + Medicaid

- Defense

Social Security isn't really "distributed" to other parts of the country, it's mostly concentrated in regions where retirees happen to live. Ditto Medicare.

You could argue that Medicaid is "distributed", however it is funded by both States and the Federal government[1].

The comment to which you are replying is correct: most public sector services like education, electricity, water, sewage, libraries, law enforcement, fire departments, etc are all funded predominately at the state and local level.

[1] https://www.kff.org/medicaid/state-indicator/federalstate-sh...

I don't think the case you're trying to make is as clear as you want it to be. Most cities have mayoralties dominated by Democrats; Democrats are the urban party. Pennsylvania has bounced back and forth between the Democrats and Republicans for decades; people are leaving San Francisco because it's too successful. Chicago and Illinois are, to their detriment, run by a Democratic machine, but I think that's the best example you have, and it's not like there aren't basket case Republican states for me to rebut with.

You can massage the data to tell any story you want.

To your point about city mayoralties, on average, Republican-led metros have lower inequality and higher cost-of-living-adjusted incomes than Democrat-led metros[1][2].

There isn't really a strong correlation between successful government and the predominant governing party. What you'll find is that things are not so simple that you can pin all of our problems on a single party in a neatly packaged way.

[1] https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2014/10/why-are...

[2] https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/13/upshot/red-blue-diverging...

I agree, at least with regards to local politics.

> To your point about city mayoralties, on average, Republican-led metros have lower inequality and higher cost-of-living-adjusted incomes than Democrat-led metros[1][2].

Isn't it just that they are smaller and less successful?

There doesn't appear to be a size/population correlation.

> less successful?

That depends on what your criteria for "success" is. San Francisco has among the highest per capita GDP of any city in the Union as well as a thriving technology economy, but also has the highest rate of homelessness, as well as the highest percentage of people living below the poverty line. What does "success" mean?

It seems a little weak, for instance, to call out the success of Provo, which is indeed Republican-led, but is part of the Democratic-led SLC combined statistical area. Yes: lots of suburbs and exurbs are Republican-led! They're also drafting off the larger economies of other urban areas.

I'm not sure that it's fair to say that Provo is drafting off of the Salt Lake economy. It's not just a bedroom community for Salt Lake; it's got its own universities (plural), hospitals, and tech scene. About the only thing it doesn't have is an airport.

It's as far from SLC as Elgin is from Chicago. Claremont has a bunch of different colleges; it's still part of LA metro. The point is that Provo wouldn't have the economic advantages it's taking advantage of without the economy of SLC in close proximity.

All true. And yet, Provo is far more independent than your examples, both geographically and socially/economically.

How big is Claremont? How big is the LA metro area? How big is Elgin compared to Chicago? Provo is maybe half as big as Salt Lake.

When you're in Claremont, and you want a night out, do you stay in Claremont? Do you in Elgin? In Provo, you're more likely to stay local than go up to Salt Lake. As I said, it's geographically more distinct, but there's also a more insular mindset. "Claremont" is a legal entity, and it's a collection of colleges, but it's not much of an entity in peoples' minds. It's just part of the LA metro area, sharing LA's smog. Provo, in contrast, has a separate identity from Salt Lake, and even has separate smog.

Provo is about as big as Elgin, which also has a separate identity from Chicago (as, of course, does Claremont).

Colorado Springs is probably the better example for the argument.

All right, let me put it this way. Provo isn't just a suburb of Salt Lake. Provo has its own suburbs (most of Utah County). Claremont doesn't. (I don't know about Elgin.)

Colorado Springs does. It has a much more independent existence. It's across the Palmer Divide from Denver. It probably depends on the Air Force at least as much as it depends on Denver. In the same way, Provo probably depends on BYU as much as it depends on Salt Lake. (Whereas Elgin and Claremont are much more tied in to Chicago and LA, respectively.)

How many residents of Elgin work in Elgin? I suspect the fraction is much higher in Provo (and Colorado Springs).

The data from the linked articles explicitly compares urban centers, not suburbs/exurbs.

And also, as another commenter pointed out, suburbs/exurbs can also be net producers themselves.

I took Provo from the lede of the article you provided.

Are people leaving San Francisco because the city government is too successful? That doesn't seem to be my understanding from reading and talking to people from that city.

It seems to me the biggest reason people are leaving San Francisco seems to be the rent is too damn high which is a pretty straightforward effect of the city's housing policies.

I think it's pretty clear that the Republicans party doesn't have a monopoly on poorly run government at the city and state level. (At the federal level there does seem to be a large gap in the ability to govern between parties.)

One small correction, which is that the housing crisis in SF is a function of the region's housing policies, not just the city's failures. Some of the governance problems here are just structural, that there's no one with authority to tell Palo Alto that they can't be a leafy suburb anymore and need to build high-rises.

Whenever people point out how poorly government services are run everywhere in America, someone replies (like OP) that it’s because Republicans “sabotage” the operation of government. My point isn’t that Republicans could run it better; my point is that you can’t blame dysfunctional government on Republican “sabotage” when so many state and local government services controlled by Democrats is also dysfunctional.

We’re seeing this happen with police. Police funding and administration is almost entirely a local matter. If Chicago PD is running CIA-style interrogation sites (or what’s happening in Baltimore or Atlanta or Minneapolis) you can’t blame Republicans. If schools aren’t good or transit is bad, or housing is expensive, you can’t blame Republican “sabotage.”

It’s a perverse argument. It’s saying to disregard Democrats’ obvious failures to run government services—it would all be better if you just gave Democrats more power. (That is not to say that Republicans would run things better. For the most part, they wouldn’t even claim to, and would point to that as justification for doing less. My recently-red/trending purple Maryland county has pretty good government services, but mostly because it doesn’t try to do much.)

That you are wrong about small pieces of this is what makes your comments interesting. :)

I take your broader point that it's unproductive to pin the productivity concerns of the public sector on Republicans; especially in state government, I probably agree with you in sort of assigning good governance and management to the GOP, and expanding public employment and benefit rolls to Democrats.

But, like, I think you'll have a hard time making the argument that run amok policing isn't at least somewhat attributable to Republican voters. It's not "sabotage", in the mostly-mythical Grover Norquist sense, but it's a public policy mistake they mostly own.

> But, like, I think you'll have a hard time making the argument that run amok policing isn't at least somewhat attributable to Republican voters. It's not "sabotage", in the mostly-mythical Grover Norquist sense, but it's a public policy mistake they mostly own.

I’m not sure I understand. Baltimore just revealed a new budget that contains zero cuts to the police budget.

Blarg. Half thought. I mean, Baltimore just revealed a budget that contains zero police cuts. All 15 council members are Democrats. How is this Republicans’ fault?

Under funding and subsequently under staffing federal organizations to "defang" them or to show them as being ineffective to support a position of reorganization and subsequent merger with another organization to alter who has oversight (as a power play) or to just remove them completely has been a long-time page in the political playbook. This is an sub element of the "starve the beast" approach and has been well documented [1]. To be clear, I'm not here to argue the efficacy of this approach but merely to point out it is real and is happening.

[1]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starve_the_beast

When rayiner says unproductive I think he means inefficient. And understaffing and budget cuts shouldn't drive efficiency lower, if anything they should drive it higher. Similar to how corporations get more efficient after layoffs.

“Starve the beast” is a rhetorical boogeyman. Conservatives tried it, and we just decided to run a structural deficit instead. Nobody’s budget ever gets cut. CDC’s budget, for example, has tripled since 1992, adjusted for inflation.

But my point is, even if you think that phenomenon actually exists in practice rather than theory, shouldn’t Democrat-run state and local-level places be a counter-example? School, police, transit, etc. are all mainly state-level services. In places like Illinois and New York and California, it’s Democrats that set the taxes and Democrats that set the budgets and Democrats that oversee spending. In those places, you should see a marked difference between federal services (where big bad Republicans have a say) and state and local services (where it’s all controlled by a one-party Democratic system). But you don’t.

Local spending is generally where I see the most obvious productivity from government spending.

Local government spending is what educates the children, paves the roads, keeps my house from burning down or getting robbed, runs the parks and libraries, etc.

"Everyone's an employee, all the way to the top"

A lot of established public companies are like that.

Yes and they wither away as a result then that's when layoffs happen and hostile takeovers etc

Neither Apple or Microsoft are managed by the original founders - and they seem to be doing OK. I've worked for public companies that are pretty old (50+ years) and they had superb management.

They have both had to adjust to competitors along the way and faced disruption. Apple nearly looked like going out of business at one stage before they brought Jobs back. They operate in a world where the Mac and the iPhone have to compete with a major rivals. Microsoft have had to develop their Cloud business as Windows becomes less important. The Public Sector never needs to do anything like that.

I'm not sure that my experience of the public sector and the private sector in the UK quite aligns with the ideological position that private sector automatically means better managed, better services and better motivated people.

In fact, the most insanely motivated people I've ever met were in the public sector.

>To an extent isn’t this because these types of benefits aren’t affordable? The pension, extra vacation, etc wouldn’t be possible without the tax revenue raised from your friends who are working more hours.

They just told you that their still making 10-20% less than colleagues in the private sector - when all benefits are factored in. So obviously those benefits are basically as affordable as employing someone at private sector type wages . Of course they are in Denmark, so the benefits for the private sector are also a lot better than you get in the U.S - at least for non-FAANG (I believe for FAANG as well but haven't researched)

Sure, but if his friends had to work 20-30% more then there is an obvious disconnect.

Individual A and B both make $200k a year. Individual A made that by giving an hour long speech. Individual B made that by working all year. On paper they are treated the same, but their reality is drastically different. You can't just tell person B "you don't need to work so much." They wouldn't be at the same level as person A without having done so.

Everyone is different. Some people are insanely smart. Incredibly efficient. Ridiculously productive. For every person out there that is making as much as you and working less there is also someone working more and making less. "We don't need to work so much" is a privilege, and in my personal opinion, is unrealistic.

The private sector doesn't just fund the public sector. It's a misconception to assume that this is a one way street.

Every dollar that is spend in the public sector flows into the private economy as well. For instance, the wages paid to civil servants and employees in the public sector ultimately gets spend in private businesses: food, clothes, entertainment, housing and so on. Public investments in public infrastructure also create wealth in the private sector: public procurement is a prime example, public funding and grants are another example. The there's the creation of value through education (schools & universities), ensuring security (law enforcement & justice), mobility (roads & bridges), health (hospitals),... which create the affordances for private enterprises to become successful (no Silicon Valley without skilled/schooled workers, right?)

Also, let's not forget that 'money' is above all a token of exchange that represents economic value, it's not the economic value proper. Government and the public sector aren't competing with the private sector: the primary goal is governing the distribution of wealth in society according to a prevailing economic framework or ideology, and managing the supply/volume of money in an economy is an important lever to do just that.

> A lot of government employees (and contractors) just got paid to sit at home for 3-4 months during the pandemic if they worked in secure areas (can’t take classified information home). That’s a benefit that the private sector just can’t provide.

No. But at the same time, unemployment benefits are in essence the public sector directly stepping in because the private sector runs out of liquidity.

> We need hard work

This is true. All of the above doesn't negate the work that happens in the private sector or private businesses. On the contrary. What we ought to remember is that value creation is equally, if note more, important as wealth creation.

Put differently, there's no point in gazing at the trillions of dollars that get shifted around if the entire discussion becomes detached from any tangible value which gets created and consumed. Whether it's the bread of the sandwich you ate for lunch, or whether it's the leather in the shoes you're wearing.

The thing that worries me more then discussing who gets an arbitrary amount of money and who doesn't, is supply chains, manufacturing, businesses,... all of that shuttering due to this health crisis. The one thing that truly drives people to the street and bloody riots is a scarcity of something as basic as wheat and bread.

I appreciate your points. I should have re-read my post before I submitted. My intention wasn't to bash the public sector, but to try to point out some of the philosophical differences between the two.

> That’s a benefit that the private sector just can’t provide

They actually can. Businesses have a lot of profit that they pump directly into the hands of investors in the form of dividends and stock buy backs. They have massive capital expenditure projects. Many or all of these things could be put on hold or slowed so that cash-on-hand to handle expenses can be saved.

Business practices seem to say that saving money for a rainy day is a dumb move for the business, because profit is the only goal or money saved is wasted because it’s not doing anything productive. That line of thinking is just plain wrong. So much of the recessions that impacted so many and required massive government bailouts could have been prevented by increased cash-on-hand. The implication that you’ll go out of business guaranteed if you aren’t constantly investing in growth at the highest possible level is asinine.

Fiduciary duty is to the shareholders. There is a misconception that you are not a shareholder. Do you have a 401k? A pension? Any investments? Everyone benefits, even if you're only getting a few dollars from the dividend payment.

Rates are at historical lows, sitting on piles of cash is bad business. Those massive capital expenditure projects are as cheap as ever.. the point is to encourage spending when the economy is struggling. If you want to blame someone you should blame the fed for years of artificially lowered rates.

> Fiduciary duty is to the shareholders. There is a misconception that you are not a shareholder.

You seem to have a misconception that fiduciary duty must be to shareholders. Plenty of people (although it's a lot more common in Europe than the US) hold the viewpoint that companies have a duty to their employees. IMO our economy would end up a lot more balanced if companies paid higher wages rather than passing that money on to shareholders.

> You seem to have a misconception that fiduciary duty must be to shareholders.

Fiduciary duty for a public company is to the shareholders, by definition. The board and officers of the corporation serve as the agents of its owners, their principals, without whose investment the corporation would not exist. Of course there is usually some overlap between the shareholders and the employees, and the company has other kinds of duties toward its employees in the form of contracts as well as a less formal stake in employee retention and goodwill. If you want a co-op structure where the shareholders and the employees are one and the same, that sort of thing does exist and can sometimes work out reasonably well but there are some obvious trade-offs when it comes to raising capital. In particular you can't fund growth by selling equity, only by going into debt, which means the co-op and its shareholder-employees are taking on the lion's share of the risk if the venture should fail.

> Under the U.S. legal system, a fiduciary duty is a legal term describing the relationship between two parties that obligates one to act solely in the interest of the other

https://www.investopedia.com/ask/answers/042915/what-are-som...

As far as I'm aware fiduciary duty actually has a broad meaning as above. Of course under our current legal system, fiduciary duty is to shareholders. But there's no reason why we have to setup society like that.

Co-ops are a good way of organising things, but as you say they have downsides. But there are lots of in-betweens. For example, we could require that a proportion of the board (say 25%) are employees. The markets have shown that they are willing to invest a lot of moeny in companies like Facebook where preferential shares allow non-majority shareholders to retain control of the company.

Going by your broader definition, then: If there are shareholders, and there is any kind of fiduciary duty at all, then it must be to the shareholders. The officers of the corporation cannot act solely in the interest of more than one master. If they must act solely in the interest of some other party with mostly opposing interests, such as the employees, then there will be no non-employee shareholders. It would defeat the point of holding an equity stake in the company.

The officers and board represent the shareholders because the shareholders own the company. The employees do not own the company. Their relationship to the company is transient at best; they have an ongoing and hopefully amicable relationship but no real stake in the company's future. Either side can terminate the employment contract at will with at most a few weeks' notice and some minor payout (or payback) of (un)accrued benefits. If a given employee wants to take an equity position in the company and obtain some influence and a portion of the profits they have only to purchase some shares, but in practice they would probably be better off investing that same money in a more diversified portfolio. I myself could hold a "democratic" share in my employer (market cap divided by number of employees) right now via my 401k if I put most or all of it in company stock, but I'd really rather not take that kind of risk.

Everything you said is true, and at the same time misses an important nuance. Yes, your obligation is to maximize shareholder value, but there are an infinite number of ways to do that. Treating your employees like crap and paying them the minimum you can may temporarily maximize your returns for a quarter, but your hiring and training costs will rose as employee turnover goes up. “We treat our employees well because we believe that that maximizes our organization’s long term productivity and profitability“ is a perfectly reasonable approach to addressing your fiduciary duty to your shareholders.

Companies have a lot of leeway in deciding how to execute their fiduciary duty. They can honestly say "We believe giving our rank-and-file employees generous benefits and compensation is good for the long-term health of the business." and it couldn't be challenged in court. Some companies do in fact operate that way; for example, Costco. They don't all have to operate the way they do because of "fiduciary duty".

Executives that waste company money(that's what you're proposing) are quickly deposed. They literally can't do this.

> To an extent isn’t this because these types of benefits aren’t affordable? The pension, extra vacation, etc wouldn’t be possible without the tax revenue raised from your friends who are working more hours.

Not really. My terms are actually widely available in a lot of private sector jobs, just not in software development. If I was a HR consultant in a private company, I would have basically the same rights as I do now.

It’s because the rights come from unions, and being in the public sector as a software development puts you on the same category of unionisation that any other white collar public worker. So my rights are the same as anyone else in the administration.

Software development in the private sector never really unionised in Denmark. Partly. Because there was never really a need as there were always more jobs than developers.

There are a few private companies that try to attract developers with benefits, but the vast majority of them do it with money.

That's because every day has 16 hours of living in it. Every hour is precious. 16 hours is enough to do all of those things.

About my favourite thing about Europe vs America (maybe even just SF) is how much the people I work with care about doing things. It's not even for anyone else. It's like that scene in The West Wing where Sam Seaborn is told he doesn't have to finish a speech, but he looks up and says, "I just. I just want to nail this."

I love working with people like this.

Are you suggesting that Europeans don't care about doing things?!

In English, "how much" is used to express degree. So, for instance, if I said "A marked difference I noticed between driving in San Francisco and in Mumbai was how much honking I heard in the latter" what that means is "There was significantly more honking in Bombay than in SF". Concluding "there is no honking in SF" would be reaching beyond what is stated.

And I'm suggesting exactly what I said. I didn't make any claims about nationality or ethnicity. It isn't some racist claim that a European can't do it. It's a claim that in Europe I didn't see this as much as in SF (where way more people were like this irrespective of national origin).

But all this is a waste. The sentence structure is a classic from the '90s: Are you really saying "thing that person wasn't saying"?!! Are you really comparing "thing that no one was comparing" with "other thing"?!

Pity.

My comment was part jest, part awe. I clearly read too much into what you were saying. Apologies.

All good. The back and forth of speech allows for lower-effort clarification so I'm sure this interaction would have done better in real life.

The problem isn't time though, it's energy. Even if the day might have 16 hours, you're still limited on energy.

An interesting take on life extension is stimulant drugs. TANSTAAFL but if you live the crucial years of your life at 100% instead of 75% and you die at 60 instead of 80, you actually break even in how much life you led, even though you had 20 fewer years.

I don't think it's possible, or at the very least sensible to attempt quantifying life like this. Personally, I wouldn't want to live this way.

To each their own, but I think two hours with my loved ones over one hour with my loved ones is a quantifiably superior option.

May we both be happy through our chosen methods.

> I think two hours with my loved ones over one hour with my loved ones is a quantifiably superior option.

It's not that simple though. There are so many assumptions in this statement, that aren't easily proven/disproven. Is two hours of kissing your partner really better than a minute of kissing? Are the circumstances also relevant? Maybe two moments aren't even comparable at all?

You seem to have (as so many people do nowadays) the assumption that all of life is completely quantifiable, measurable (as soon as we have the technology). Theory of science shows that this is a belief, which can never be proven or disproven.

Personally, I believe the opposite, that no matter how great our technology gets, there are certain things, that will never be measurable.

So I disagree with your above statement, that one of them is the quantifiably superior option. I think they can't be compared at all.

Some people like working you know. When you have small children it's really tough to work 40 hours (I have two little ones) per week but children grow up very quickly. Before you know it you're back where you were, more or less.

I feel like you are incredibly privileged that you can afford to to have a family while working so little hours in the public sector and I suspect your situation is not the norm in DK.

Friends of mine who moved to SE/NL/DE/DK are definitely working the full 40h/week and sometimes more since, as they say, living there is very expsensive.

From my experience, the Europeans who toot their "life is so good here, why do other people work so much?" horn are privileged enough to have a hand-me-down property bought/inherited from their (grand)parents, and since rent/mortgage is the biggest expense here, with property prices rising 8 times faster than wages, that property ownership early in life, which they take for granted, gives them the clear advantage that allows them to not bother with the rat race and could even live comfortably on minimum wage.

That of course, is not the norm for everyone and especially not if you've just emigrated here, so anyone wishing to own their own property one day has no choice but to jump in the meat grinder and join the rat race.

For what it's worth I live in Denmark, working a private sector full time (37/week, usually less) job with a nice salary - though nothing out of the ordinary for my education and experience. Came from a middle class family: My mom is a nurse and my father is an engineer. No life-changing inheritance from grandparents (~$10.000).

My wife stays at home with our 2 year old daughter.

We own an apartment in Copenhagen that we bought some 5 years ago, though we're obviously still paying a mortgage on it (0% loans definitely made that easier!). We're paying it down aggressively, though still have quite a bit of cash left to invest.

From my experience it's about priorities. We rarely go out to dinner and don't own a car - hopefully never will. Rarely buy new clothes.

While it might not be the norm, it's not something that's completely unheard of.

One major factor though is probably student loans. When my wife and I left the university we both had savings of roughly $15.000. A year later, we bought the apartment. That would have been impossible if we had debt we needed to overcome first. If your friends moved here with significant debt, they're definitely playing catch-up compared to their peers.

It sounds like you are in a great situation, by why would you aggressively pay down a 0% interest loan?

Nobody likes to be in debt, the sooner you can get rid of it, the better.

Is it though? if you have a 0% loan wouldn't it make more sense to pay as little as possible to the loan, and the surplus you save invest in something that gives you a return on your money?

Depends if it's fixed-rate

Hmm. But if you were investing that money even in some sort of risk free investment like time deposit, you'd be earning free money.

There is no such thing as risk free investment.

Including cash.

There definitely are investments that have a better risk/reward ratio than carrying a 0% interest debt on a mortgage.

e.g. savings accounts with 1% interest in the EU which are government insured up to 100k. Plus mortgage debt tends to have fiscal benefits in most countries, too. That's a better idea than paying off a 0% mortgage. Especially past a certain point where there's plenty of equity in the home.

There's generally virtually no financial reason to pay off a 0% debt apart from some edge cases here and there. People do it for peace of mind, which is of course fine, but it only works because of financial illiteracy as it's not the most financially optimal decision to make. (even not the least risky).

The problem with "financially optimal" strategies is that tend to ignore the fact that income can be lumpy. If everything is steady-state then it's "optimal" (as in better returns) to run highly leveraged. The problem is that life for individuals is not steady-state: you might lose your job, the economy might crater, the currency might get devalued, the property/stock market crash, etc. A 0% loan on a residence can be quite a problem if your income is 0 for some reason. Unlike a CEO who still gets his golden parachute if his highly leveraged, "financially optimal" company encounters "unforseeable" "turbulence" and ends up bankrupt, a bankruptcy in Me Myself and I, Inc. could be disastrous. Like, family on the streets disastrous. Individuals opting for peace of mind are minimizing downside risk, not maximizing "upside potential". Financiers can afford to take risks that end up with them blowing up, but when it's your life that blows up if some problem comes, minimizing the downside is a pretty maximizing strategy. The fact is, we know there we be periods of difficulty, we just don't know what the specific difficulty will be in advance.

I've got no clue how that's really meaningful in this case. I just mentioned there's a 1% interest government-insured savings account available, i.e. if the bank goes bankrupt, you still get your money. The only instance where you don't get your money is when the government goes bankrupt and doesn't honour its obligations. In that scenario, your mortgage debt would be even more screwed.

Meanwhile, getting 1% return on a 30 year mortgage puts you in a much safer, financially cushier position, than having had 0% returns for that period in time. Would you rather have 40k saved + 10k interest saved up in savings saved up in a government-insured savings account when you lose your job, or would you rather have a 40k lower mortgage debt and slightly lower payments or a lower time-to-payoff? Particularly given that mortgage payments can be furloughed and negotiated in times of payment difficulty. The answer is very clear. Choosing 0% returns over 1% returns in this case is the riskier choice.

If T-bonds default we've got bigger problems to worry about.

There are investments where the only risk is that the issuing government collapse- in which case the title to your property would be at risk as well.

This is true logically, but it's important to understand that most people behave based more on emotion than logic. Being debt-free brings a peace of mind that you don't get with rational maximization of returns while maintaining debt unless you are particularly mathematically inclined.

It's a little bit more complicated than I let on.

Loan is structured in 2 parts: Bankloan and mortgage.

Mortgage is at roughly 0% and has a fixed payment for the duration - I cannot pay it differently than the initial agreement.

The bankloan is at (I believe) 3%. I've roughly doubled my contributions to this loan, making it roughly equal to the amount I'm investing each month. I'm missing ~$10.000 on it now, so I think i'll just pay it down and have that out of the way.

Being ahead also means that I'll have a way easier time if I ever need to buy something big one month - I can just choose not to pay that loan and not invest this month and I'll have plenty of money to spend. It's nice having some free cash flow :)

0% loan? I can't even comprehend that living in South Africa

What's the loan situation down there? :-)

Well, currently the repo rate is extremely low historically, so you could get a mortgage at between 8-10%, if you have good credit history.

How did you get 0% loans? That is an incredible privilege, and reinforces what the previous poster says imo.

Pretty standard rate in Denmark these days. Everyone can get it. Fixed rate 30 year loan is at 0.5%. Variable rate loans (what I have) is at -0.63%.

I just rounded it to 0%.

> Europeans who toot their "life is so good here, why do other people work so much?" horn are privileged enough to have a hand-me-down property bought/inherited from their (grand)parents

Most people never get any inheritance before their parents die; you're basically retired when it happens.

People with a decent job in Europe (such as engineering) have a pretty comfortable life without considering any inheritance, even if they're paid less and work less than American equivalents.

Europe is big. You shouldn’t generalize that easily. Most of well paying jobs still are located in expensive cities.

That's not true in my experience -- at least in the Netherlands. My friends and family have wages that would be considered low in the US, but they live very comfortable lives and many of them work four days a week.

I looked it up and the average work week in the Netherlands is apparently 29 hours a week [0]. The average inheritance in the Netherlands is €23K [1], and as another commenter mentioned many people don't receive an inheritance until they're in their 40s or 50s.

So many people in the Netherlands are able to live a comfortable live while working part-time, without having to rely on an inheritance.

EDIT: However, as you pointed out, rising housing costs are an increasing issue in the Netherlands. The issue is that not enough houses are being built. I hope that that's something that'll be addressed soon.

[0] https://money.cnn.com/gallery/news/economy/2013/07/10/worlds... [1] Source in Dutch: https://www.evivanlanschot.nl/kennis/geldzaken/erfenissen-fe...

> EDIT: However, as you pointed out, rising housing costs are an increasing issue in the Netherlands. The issue is that not enough houses are being built. I hope that that's something that'll be addressed soon.

This is often said but I'm not sure it's true, I'm not sure if housing costs rising is really because of too few houses being built.

There's a few things to untangle. First is housing costs. They've not actually risen so dramatically as people think. Home prices have increased, but interest rates have sharply decreased. From a peak of 13% in the 80s, to 5% prior to the 2007 crisis, to around 1% today.

To put that into perspective for a 30 year mortgage: in the 80s on a 13% interest rate, you were paying the full mortgage price every 7 years, just in interest alone. Today, you pay the full amount in interest alone just once every 100 years.

Second, nominal prices increase a lot, but nominal wages do, too.

The better approach to look at housing costs is not to look at prices (which the media and regular folks go crazy about), but a simple indicator: % of wages spent on housing. And this metric hasn't really gone up radically. It's been on the rise again recently, but it's also below historical peaks.

But then we still don't know if we simple don't have enough homes, or enough homes to satisfy new desires and cultural norms. I think it's the latter. The number of homes in the Netherlands has outpaced population growth the past 50 years. The number of households has also outpaced population growth. And the average number of people per home has decreased. And the average home size has only increased. In other words, it's not necessarily a housing problem, it's more of a luxury problem, at least when compared to the past. We've got more housing per person than ever, yet we feel as if housing is unattainable. In large part that's because we don't want to share housing as much anymore. There's a ton of people, even in relationships, who prefer to have their own home instead of share like Dutch people did much more in past generations. That's okay, I do too (and live by myself, I prefer it), but that's a choice of luxury, not some kind of human right. Home-ownership has never been higher.

Lastly, there's location. You can have a trillion square metres but if it's not in Amsterdam, we'll still have people say there's rising housing costs because they can't live in Amsterdam. There's actually a lot of affordable real estate in the Netherlands, it's just not going to be in the capital in cycling distance from work. And again, that's a choice/preference, not a human right. Living say 45m or an hour from work is seen as a lot in the Netherlands, in many countries that's quite normal. A lot of what we see as high housing-costs in the Netherlands, are considering prime locations. When talking about affordability, with Dutch public infrastructure, you'd have to look at 30-60 minutes away from work. Most of that real estate is very affordable.

That's not to say housing costs aren't on the rise or that it's all fine or without any issues... there's definitely issues. But I think a bit of nuance is important, too. People (not you necessarily) act as if the Netherlands has a housing crisis and sometimes it gets overblown.

As for your link on inheritance, I think median figures would tell a very different story. I'd guess that the bottom 50% inherits basically nothing, and the top 30% a lot. Many of my friends who went to uni have parents who own a home that's >500k, a pension fund, investments, some cash. A lot of these will at some point be getting a very large handout that basically covers their retirement goals and means they really don't have to do any kind of saving on the side (apart from the employment pension package) and can spend every penny they earn. That technically also allows people to work less.

Anyway, so much for the pedantics.... On your larger point, I fully agree. It's absolutely quite possible and quite normal too, to work parttime, even those without any inheritance. I currently work 40 but I could easily do 32, even 24, financially speaking.

I think you might have to be privileged to never work full time, but I know plenty of people of different backgrounds in Europe who in their late 20s early 30s started reducing how much they work for one reason or another and were able to do so. On the other hand, I know very few in my age group (mid 30s) that live in a hand-me-down property. If there is such a property in the family it is usually where the parents live.

Of course reducing work, comes with compromises what you can afford and is not feasible for a lot of jobs. And yes, for certain goals/timeframes there is no choice but to jump in the meat grinder, at least for a while. But there often are alternatives to stay out of it and live a comfortable live.

Also if you move to a country from abroad it will take you a while to live there efficiently. E.g. many of the expats I met in Switzerland complain about how much of their salary they spend on restaurants, services, etc. Sure it's very expensive, but they also use them like ten times more often than a Swiss would. Same for me as a Swiss living in Colombia. I regularly overspend just by being used to do things a certain way and being ignorant of the tweaks.

It very much depends on where you live.

In Norway, you can "slave away" while paying the equivalent to a $1500/month rent on a small-to-medium apartment, or pay down mortgage on a $400k "starter" apartment in the city.

But if you're lucky, you can find a more rural job, where you only pay like $500/month rent, or could just buy a whole house for the same price that'll get you a small 1 bedroom apt in the city.

There's a ton of variance in the prices here. But then again , larger cities = more jobs. Especially in tech.

What do you do with your time?

Every time I hear this question asked of someone who isn't a workaholic, I try to fathom the complete lack of imagination that the asker must posses, and I fail.

Spend it with my family. Doing hobbies, I’m a big blood bowl nerd so that takes up a lot of my free time. Read books, watch movies, have fun with friends. Stuff like that.

Sometimes I program for fun.

I also work as an external examiner for CS students. Though that is only during finals, so twice a year. Mostly to keep up with what’s happening, but I’ll admit it’s a nice side income.

My former boss used his spare time to get an MBA and build a startup that he later sold before he moved on to higher management somewhere else. So you can also do that sort of thing if you’re so inclined. He didn’t have any children though. ;)

I used to have a lot of free time (working in academia), and I switched to a software engineer role in the private sector. I miss the free time, but I'm also learning new things and I feel I have more space to grow and more opportunities overall.

As for the salary, I earn twice as much. Practically, my lifestyle hasn't changed but I save all my extra income. I could work part-time and still earn more than before but I'm concerned about the future (retirement, medical expenses... all these things which are covered by the state now, but who knows where we'll be in 25 years). I'd rather earn money now when I have the chance. I'm not sure it will last.

That being said, I still have good work life balance (living in a "socialist" country).

You have been selected as one of the few people in the society who we will pay way above market rate.

Someone like me would probably need to work 80hrs a week just so that my children can catch up with the level of comfort that you have.

And I'm not one of those people who tell others to "check their privilege". It's great to be where you are, and yeah, the government jobs here where I live pay double the market rate for half the work.

But if everyone worked the same way as you, then the world simply wouldn't exist.

All of the good stuff was created by people who worked overtime.

>All of the good stuff was created by people who worked overtime.

What if those creations were largely responsible to lazy people who had time to think of innovations instead of grinding away? I think it takes all types, honestly.

My European take on this: while upper class salaries might be 2-3x above middle-class salaries they don’t afford you a lifestyle that would be unrecognizable to a middle-class family. Maybe a nicer neighborhood, maybe more long-distance traveling, a good restaurant from time to time. But you’re certainly not removed from the idea that even a smaller loss in income has a direct impact on your lifestyle. So the upper class is as afraid of a loss in income as the middle class. And while middle class jobs are often union protected and have a stable market of supply and demand, upper class jobs are often highly specialized and a transition might not be as easy after having lost a job

I always thought of the upper class as relying on return on capital rather than a job. The well educated professionals with high incomes that the article talks about are upper-middle class.

Yes so I think although salaries can vary 2 or 3 times (probably less post tax) the actual job you do can be a major differentiator in lifestyle.

An artist doing their own thing making the same amount of money as a person at a corporate job has a fundamentally different lifestyle although salaries may be comparable.

When you're in upper-class, you usually have more money or estate. You also have a better network. You have more probabilities of knowing someone who might help you find a job or start a project. And people will put more easily trust in you. You have better education. So it's far easier to get back on your feet, even though people tend to convince themselves otherwise because it's always hard to hear you have advantages that others do not have.

Upper-class in Europe is mostly old money with inherited real estate and/or family-run companies passed from generation to generation. They never see it as necessary to participate in the arms race of the middle and upper-middle class. Flashy cars and designer clothes are not something they aspire to. You’d rather see them in an old Volvo or Mercedes estate.

That's a very broad generalization that covers millions of people.

The vast majority of employees in the EU are not part of a union, it is around 10 - 15%. They get protection trough legislation from times unions were more common though.

Unions make sense for artists since the broad availability of art and entertainment is often hit or miss. Not the best works always win and if there is considerable success, income can get extremely high while others struggle to get by. Especially educational works do get paid poorly. These are essential services compared to another upper middle class manager from a consumer perspective.

At least in Germany you don't have to be a member of the union to benefit from their negotiations. About 50% of employees work under a so-called "Tarif" contract, terms of which get negotiated by unions.

(Also europe.. ireland)

I would confirm this take. I would also say that "upper class" in modern european terms, refers to something different then in other times... or possibly in the US. We have a more cultural take on class. It's not just about income.

First, our cutoff for "elites" is a lot lower. This is sometimes reflected in proposed laws. For example, when France implemented a wealth tax, they set the cuttoff around €1m. Other laws and proposed laws around europe tend to have a similar take. In US equivalents, thresholds are proposed aropund $50m-$1bn.

Here in Ireland, the top thresholds of income tax are near (even below) median full time income... €44k. Also, our public housing system houses around 20% of the population. The quality of housing is better than the lower end of private rentals... which tend to house employees of Google FB, etc.

Meanwhile, there's a lot more emphasis on cultural divide here. In the UK, the "anywhere vs somewhere's" is a popular take on modern class division. Anywhere's being internationally oriented, college educated people. Somewhere's being locally oriented. It corresponds to a more evergreen take: professional class vs working class.

In both cases, the income gaps are smaller than the cultural gaps. A college graduate working in Google account management for €35k can earn half what a plumber earns, but the class divide is still what it is. This is actually a significant dynamic in Ireland now. We have a lot of middle-income white collar jobs at international tech companies, with questionable long term security. We have a lot of higher paying blue collar jobs, mostly construction adjacent.

Often, the economic differences between classes just comes down to neighborhoods, property wealth and accumulated family wealth... not necessarily income. Often, but not always. The lowest 25% income families tend to be distinctly, and proudly working class. The genuinely wealthy tend to be upper class.

Class is complicated in europe. It can be quasi-ethnic, with accents, body language and cultural subtleties playing a big role. It doesn't correspond neatly to income.

What makes you think it "corresponds neatly to income" in the US?

There's economic class, social class, and socio-economic class. These are three different things, and that's also true in the US.

i don't

  the economic differences between classes just comes down to neighborhoods, property wealth and accumulated family wealth... not necessarily income.

In the long run salaries (incomes) tend to subsistence levels, capital dwarves labor and it all comes down to "accumulated family wealth". That's the normal. Postwar raised the relative value of labor for a while but that cycle is coming to an end.

> Maybe a nicer neighborhood

This one is huge. Trying to afford a decent, spacious (non-luxurious) home with access a small garden, that isn't an hour+ commute from your workplace, is a true luxury especially in any in-demand urban region. Not having to waste hours of your life commuting definitely separates the plebs from the rest.

Eric Weinstein calls this the "elite precariat."

Here’s an observation: employees, companies & countries that are winning tend to work harder. Those that are merely coasting or declining - eg in a situation where there is nothing to win with more effort - work less hard.

Elon Musk - “no one changes the world working 40 hr weeks” - is trying to win in a global competition. Your uncle Bob who is Director of QA at Oracle? Probably not playing to win.

Countries like Japan or SKorea or China are trying to win. US is trying to win. Denmark or Italy are no longer trying to win a world-wide competition.

No one has shown that individuals, companies or countries can wim while working less than the competition.

Win what exactly?

Besides the "win what?" question from the other commenter, how long has, say, Germany been ahead of China?

Probably 150 years, now? When I say "ahead", I mean per capita, a huge national GDP doesn't really help me much as an individual.

And I doubt the average German works more than the average Chinese.

Working harder doesn't equate to working more.

I get what you mean about trying to win on the level of people and even companies. Winning or being in the game to win is motivating and when you see an excellent payoff curve where each hour is delivering value, working longer does not feel so bad.

When you use this logic for larger entities though, it falls down. Very few countries are in that kind of rapid growth mode for long as an entire country. Indeed, you've grouped some wildly different countries together there.

South Korea and Japan had periods of extremely rapid and impressive growth where it really did make sense to say that the entire country had organised themselves and sacrificed in order to win. Their goal was to grow their children's standard of living and they succeeded. Is aging, inward looking Japan on 2020 still playing to win? Or have they won enough to enjoy the fruits of that victory?

China is a country that is still on the rise.

Is "the US" trying to win at a national level? I don't think so. I think that parts of the country are full of people who are trying to win but on a national level? I think the best we can hope for is that the humiliatingly inept set of responses over the last six months are a galvanising moment for Americans on the order of Meji era Japan.

I also think that you've given Uncle Bob quite a good job for someone who's not too bothered about winning. Oracle might have a reputation as not such a great place to work, but I rather suspect that making it to their director of QA takes quite a lot of winning along the way!

If you want a tech example of not fussed about winning, maybe someone doing SAP implementation or running internal business logic as a 9-5 is a better example.

Also it's a bit odd comparing Italy and Denmark since I'd be hard pressed to come up with two countries that are so different!

Denmark's labour productivity is the highest in the EU after Ireland and Luxembourg, both of which have distorted figures because of financial concentration of assets there by American tech companies. Italy's is not much more than half that of Denmark.

>> the last six months are a galvanizing moment for Americans on the order of Meji era Japan.

Or how about Sputnik? Or the Great Depression, Civil War, etc. I like to think that the US has changed course when a course change was required. It often takes a crisis to trigger it.

the explicit linking of a country's success with corporations success is an extremely skewed and unhealthy set of metrics that usually prioritize the wants of a small minority - see stockholders and those running the company

I'm not saying how large / cutting edge companies perform doesn't matter because it certain does - but I believe pursuing only "what is good for companies" is a major source of many of the problems America faces today. see massive income equality, the holllwing out of the middle class, the disappearance of manufacturing jobs, tying healthcare to employment, etc.

Just because the company you work for or the country you live in wants to "win" the world economy doesn't mean that every citizen and employee can and will ascribe to that model. If people work hard because they are forced to and not because they want to, you create (as we have) a society full of burnt out employees unable to relieve the stress they get from working a job that barely pays their bills.

I don't see that as "winning" unless you're talking specifically about the billionaires and politicians who benefits from this slave labor.

> Your uncle Bob who is Director of QA at Oracle? Probably not playing to win

Depends on if you are playing to win at life or to win at "the game".

It's also the fact that many modern, well-paid jobs are actually somewhat satisfying. Humans get off on solving problems, as long as they are allowed autonomy, mastery, and purpose.

The things I do at work are the things I would do also in my spare time, if I had more of it. I like solving puzzles. So if I'm going to do this stuff anyway, why not get paid for it?[1]

Of course, I don't want to do it for more than around 40 hours[2] a week (mainly because I have other things I also want to do, and there's only so many hours in total to do all the things in) but I do want to do it for a significant portion of my day. I need that intellectual stimulation to be happy.

But I can imagine some people want to go "beyond the average" and really show their employers their commitment. In a world where people happily volunteer 40 hours a week to satisfy their inner desires, there's little room to do anything other than offer 60 hours to prove yourself better.[3]

[1]: Well, I know why. If your employer is bad you won't find work as fulfilling. So maybe my hypothesis doesn't hold up anyway.

[2]: Now that I have a young child at home, I'm starting to think about asking for less than 40 hours. There have simply become more other interesting things for me to do.

[3]: Well, you could work more efficiently instead, which would be my preferred solution. But I think a lot of people are stuck in a rut of average skill but want to present themselves as beyond average. At that point you cannot do "better", you can only do "more". (Which might lead to better, come to think of it.)

This has always bothered me. In the US there is no way I have seen beyond running your own business to negotiate the time spent working. When I started in the work force I thought taking a smaller salary for 4 day work week would be a reasonable tradeoff but everyone thought I was nuts. I have tried over the years asking for more vacation or shorter weeks for a pay cut but workplaces are just not equipped to handle those sorts of requests. The system here does not value free time in the same way it does money.

I good reason to start your own business I guess. Did you consider freelancing?

There are exceptions. For example my current employer, a decent-size public company, allows employees to purchase up to one week of extra vacation time each year. (Straight time—equivalent to unpaid time off, but with the cost spread out over the year in the form of reduced pre-tax salary and no change in other benefits.) I've known several coworkers who did the 4-day-week thing for months at a time rather than taking long vacations. They are also open to negotiating shorter hours or alternative schedules.

This is made worse by those insufferable over-zealous team members with a i-can-wag-my-tail-harder-than-you attitude. They send emails from holiday expressing their concern over a change, which frankly no one gives a damn about, and moan their semi-brags on how they are dying under work because how random senior managers (who don't give a crap about them and are just playing them to get more work done) have "insisted on my involvement". These are the kind of rotten apples who don't have a life and drag those that do have/want one to the bottomless pit of overwork. /rant

This, a hundred times. I try to gently tell junior colleagues to avoid that trap. You just create a rod for your own back, and you indirectly harm the more senior people with more commitments outside of work.

I can relate though. Some newer people are eager to please. I was a bit like that when I was younger. I wish someone had taken me aside and pointed out the problem with it.

This is a side effect of organisational structure, imo, less so personality.

Modern companies have an increasingly "court politics" culture and structure. Many roles are unique, and organisational structure is constantly changing. "Senior Customer Advocate can mean something prestigious one day, something menial the next, and be eliminated as a role the following week.

These dynamics are constantly negotiated in meetings, group emails and such. One or two meetings can turn someone from pivotal to "what does he actually do here?" People are highly aware of, sensitive to, and responsive to status dynamics. Status uncertainty is a major source of anxiety.

"Know your place" was a slogan of anglo society for many centuries. We tend to interpret that, from our modern liberal/republican perspective, as horrible. It's a tool of patriarchy, class suppression, etc. That is true. It was. But it also played on realities of human psychology. We are status seeking and are happier when our status is high, but we have natural coping mechanisms to deal with a low-but-secure social status. Insecurity of status is highly anxiety inducing.

That's where that insufferable, over-zealous tail wagging comes from. It's also why you notice it especially when people are on holiday. They're not present to monitor and defend their status. That status really is insecure. They could really lose it over a vacation.

As an alternative perspective, they’d make the exact same rant about how you’re the rotten apple.

Toxic people will use whatever excuse is necessary to justify their behaviors.

If they want to wage slave, slave away. Leave the rest of us out of the theater production. Unless your job involves life safety, it doesn’t matter all that much.

Again, they would also call you toxic for the inverse reasons.

Ie “if they don’t want to work hard and build a career, so be it. Don’t drag down the rest of us” etc.

Two sides to the story is what I’m getting at.

Not every side is valid, or carries the same validity, is my point.

Recently I came across this video "The design for easy life": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b2eoQyYoUww

I live in Thailand and am very interested in working less for other people and more for myself. At first I though I'd need to invest maybe 500.000 USD and then perhaps I should be able to live on investments. But this video changed my mind, perhaps I should be able to get by with a lot less.

This Thai farmer claims to work about 1 hour a day and that 1 hour of daily work generates for him around 50 USD. More than enough to take care of his family.

Another interesting video from this farmer on "Sufficiency": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LWwh5N0JRhk

I love that man. Brilliant mind. I have lived a Digital Nomad lifestyle for 2 years and when I was in homestays on the countryside, I always felt relaxed and blessed. Just some chickens roaming around, some fruit you could pick. Simple life.

Big polluted cities like Bangkok and Penang drove me nuts.

One owner of one of those simple homestay farms quit his farming activities and became a taxi driver, on Lombok (Indonesia). Lombok just got a brand-new airport and they expect more tourists coming in from Bali eventually. The man became a taxi driver to make more money for "a better life".

I get it. Everybody wants a shot to live "the dream" and you gotta start somewhere, but --> you don't know what you have til it's gone.

If you are on salary and you are putting in more than 40 hours a week, you are working to buy your boss his vacation home, not your own.

The core idea of the article can be found in a paragraph somewhere in the middle of the piece

> What all of these explanations have in common is the idea that the answer comes from examining workers' decisions and incentives. There’s something missing: the question of whether the American system, by its nature, resists the possibility of too much leisure, even if that’s what people actually want, and even if they have the means to achieve it. In other words, the long hours may be neither the product of what we really want nor the oppression of workers by the ruling class, the old Marxist theory. They may be the byproduct of systems and institutions that have taken on lives of their own and serve no one’s interests. That can happen if some industries have simply become giant make-work projects that trap everyone within them.

Now. I strongly believe that software / IT industry is one of those make-work projects.

This is the logic of economics based on infinite growth and advertising which accounts for a great deal of modern 'IT'.

Companies hacking the human brains availability heuristic need to out-advertise their peers. So they're all stuck on an arms race treadmill. They can only pause if a competitor falls by the wayside, but of course soon will come another...

For growth the advertising companies must find ever better ways to capture attention and harvest eyeballs. It doesn't matter if the users find their services frustrating or depressing just so long as they're compelled to keep _looking_ at them.

The internet revolution should've made product discovery cheaper than ever, instead it now costs more than at any time in history, it's in-fucking-sane. We should just be paying for services including a product discovery service.

I agree - I have seen a lot of make-work in my previous job at a big company. Every push to production required a couple dozen signoffs and simply collecting those could often represent a couple days of exhausting and meaningless work.

In America, too many benefits are tied to full time employment. The biggest one is health insurance. This creates a huge imbalance of power between employer and employee. The absolute worst time to lose (affordable) health insurance is when you become unemployed. It makes no sense! This doesn't even go into people or families with chronic illness.

In this way, in order to maintain these benefits, Americans must do what they feel whatever it takes to keep their jobs. That's the number 1 incentive.

This is not the product of an institution that has taken on a life of its own. Universal healthcare as a majority of support among Americans (as long as you don't attach Obama's name to it, anyway), but neither party (especially not Republicans) have shown an interest in delivering this to its constituents.

"systems and institutions that have taken on lives of their own and serve no one’s interests".

This is closer to the Marx view of capitalism than some sort of vulgar theory about a conspiracy of the ruling class against the workers. In fact, Marx was very much influenced by Feuerbach analysis of religion/god. An entity is created by humanity (god/capital) but then takes life on his own and controls the actions of his human creator, who forgot is the creator (is alienated). The ruling class is also shaped by this very "vampire" as Marx called it.

In service sectors of the economy, work can be created out of thin air, without any proportional returns in the form of increased well-being of society.

For example, you may spend days improving every little detail of that customer email template, for marginal or no returns over the previous template.

I'm from Germany and none of my friends work full-time anymore.

50% - 80% is the norm.

What is your approximate age group for your friends and are all your friends in the same industry? Just curious about what things are like.

30-40

All different industries.

Healthcare, IT, agriculture, retail, magazines and books.

I'd love to work 4 days a week. It just doesnt seem like it's possible. But having Wednesday's off and being able to actually take a week or more of vacation a few times a year as a manager would make my life so much better.

It's a little disappointing they don't address the idea of peer competition.

We live in a time of insane material wealth, so we create artificial scarcities of necessities to ensure peers compete with each other.

The article does mention the substantial rises in productivity we've had, but this: "There’s something missing: the question of whether the American system, by its nature, resists the possibility of too much leisure, even if that’s what people actually want" merited far more exploration.

There's a horrible positive feedback loop going on.

Say 10 people want a home in an area that has, oh, 8 homes.

If somebody chooses to work long hours, read emails on weekends, etc. they have a better shot at getting promotions and being able to outbid their peers for those homes. If someone doesn't do this, they have a better chance at falling in to the 2 people who can't afford a home.

So the workaholics work and work and work, get the raise, and buy a home with a big mortgage attached. Maybe a $1.5 million dump in San Jose. Now they're a highly-leveraged housing speculator who desperately can't afford for house prices go down. And the leverage they used to buy the house is secured with the threat of homelessness and personal ruin.

So they oppose any and all new building ferociously and cruelly. Scarcity is the only reason their house even has value!

Similarly, _they_ had to work nights and weekends, so why shouldn't other people? As they rise up the ladder this is what they select for.

So we have house prices ratcheting upwards, people working themselves to the bone to get in to the club of "homeowners" (a dubious word when you owe 90% of the home's value to the bank), and a strong incentive to make sure it keeps going that way.

It's true that presenteeism and wasted time at work are an issue, but ultimately there is a point where more time working means producing more (say 20 hours vs 10), and in a sector where results are hard to quantify people go for the easy thing to measure - hours where you butt was in the seat.

I mean, houses are pretty cheap to build. Habitat for Humanity does it for $50k. Imagine if you could work part time and build your own home? It would threaten people whose power comes from housing scarcity! Why, what if it turns out there's no inherent reason their house should cost 25 times the median income? Can't be having that! Better make it illegal to build homes (or demolish existing low-density ones) anywhere near a job.

The only homes that get built near high paying jobs now are over the wailing shrieks of existing rent-seekers (aka homeowners). The person who owns a home in Berkeley can vote, because they live in the area, but the person who would _like_ to live in Berkeley but commutes from Stockton has no voice. I'm hopeful that remote work will finally destroy their power, though with a decrease in tech incomes as well.

Housing scarcity is more about the cost of the land than the house itself. You're right that that a house can be built for $50k (not by most modern standards, but it can be done). But if you wanted that $50k house in SF bay area, suddenly it's on a piece of land worth $2 million.

Yeah, but these days you can build cheap, decent quality apartment buildings with 10-12-20 floors. Suddenly that piece of land can afford much higher population density.

Right - but if you have 50 people living in an apartment building on that land it becomes reasonable again.

This line of thinking can all be traced back down to American exceptionalism. We're raised to depend only on ourselves. We friendly to our neighbors, at least the ones we can see from the edge of our property line. But everyone else? Fuck 'em. This failure in community building is prevalent throughout American society, and we now have our current hyper-plutocracy as a result.

It's how the country was built. You went off with your wife and 2 kids in a wagon to go claim a piece of land the federal government gave you. It was massive, and there might not always be neighbors (or even a community) to help you out. The entities that grew and acquired power weren't the weak state governments, but nascent corporations. Not saying it's good or bad, it's just how America was.

Eh, I think it has a lot to do with how people discover a cartel can be a pretty handy thing. NIMBYism is all over the place; Ireland has terrible sprawl and ridicuously strict rules about maximum building height even in the absolute middle of the capital, which has no tall buildings and also an utterly unremarkable skyline.

If you look at the employment rate, you will see that only about 65% of working age people have a job. Any job.

https://tradingeconomics.com/united-states/employment-rate

Add in the huge number of OAPs and most developed nations have sub 50% of people working. A lot of the issues we have (from stress and mental health to inequality to the rise of extremism) can be linked to the fact that we have fewer and fewer people working harder and harder supporting more and more others.

We either need to find some ways to reverse this trend OR we need to embrace it. But if we are embracing it, we need to deal with the consequences (everything from access to healthcare to burnout to how we decide who has to work and how we compensate\reward them for doing so).

Right now, this is a massive social change that goes basically ignored. Whether people like Yang and Musk are right about automation and the rise of AI or not, change is upon us and we cannot keep ignoring it.

I don't think it's a quantity problem, it's an existential problem.

Why are we doing what we're doing?

When the best answer anyone can come up with is 'so that my kids get to have a good life', it's not enough.

It's average people living in a system that's designed to make them replaceable and eventually get rid of needing them completely.

Not get rid of them so that they can enjoy the human achievement of no longer needing to work, no, get rid of them so that somebody rich can then hire you as a wage slave to do whatever pleases them that day.

I wonder if this is just inevitable - it would explain the existence of the pyramids - why else would anyone build them, but because there were so many idle hands and a few bored ego-maniacs? Unless of course, aliens :)

In China, "996"(9am-9pm, 6 days a week)[0] is popular in tech companies, now more and more compnanies are adopting this work schedule, so employees have much fewer choices if they want a "normal" schedule. The administration did not enforece labour laws well in order to pursue economic interests. What makes it worse is that, as this work schedule becomes a trending, some companies and employees take it as granted.

[0]https://996.icu/#/en_US

I assume working less while still making the same annually would lower suicide rate. One of the main reasons people commit suicide is financial problems. Added free time is never unwanted and can be substituted for whatever the person desires. I personally think we’re burning out the younger generation with all the optimizations that have came with technology but at the same time continuing to expect more from people. I think we’re missing out on what benefits come to society when people are less overworked.

Well this didn't age well. We have now used the pandemic to force work into our homes, if anyone was even pretending it didn't follow them before all of this. That is of course only true for those who can still find work. Of course, the dynamic of job scarcity creates an even worse version of stockholm syndrome for those 'lucky' enough to continue to draw paychecks.

And there is also this related article that was discussed a lot here on HN last year: https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/02/religion-w...

I just refused a full-time offer because of this. Instead, I prefer to work few hours a day for my current contract and hope that things get better post-covid. Still, if anyone is looking for a Ruby contractor to give a hand in some project, reach out :)

Are you a freelancer?

In a couple of years I would like to start gradually scaling down the number of hours I work. But right now I am a salaried employee and I have no freelance experience, so I'm not sure whether that is the right avenue for me.

Any thoughts are appreciated.

My single advice would be to find a client (or clients) beforehand and start doing work for them before you drop your job.

Maybe it's just me, but the idea of retiring early and then travel the world is really strange to me. I'd rather spend my life seeking and working on the next ideal job, and the only time that I'll skip it is when I believe it's impossible to get the ideal job. For now, if you give me a BI/DE job I'd be happily to work at least 60 hours and keep improving my shits. In short, I'd rather die working.

But again I'm not against FIRE, because most of the time people don't get to do their ideal job (or even the top 5 ideal jobs), and in their shoes I'd rather just grab enough $$ and retire early. The point is, sadly, in modern society, many people are not really getting the chance to contribute to the society in a way both he/she and the society are satisfied with. This is very sad. The idea of Communism, at least part of it, is to make sure that each person out there gets the chance to fulfill their dreams and do their best, and this is really attracting.

The article starts with the assumption that the total amount of work in an economy is fixed and that the extra hours we make are make-work. I beg to differ. At least in high tech, we can improve a product or service as many times as we want. Each of these improvements can be from relatively minor to requiring years of research. The total work per year is how fast we move through these improvements. The free market forces this to be higher every year due to competition.

Lmfao. How naive can people be?

Do you honestly think capitalists don't know that when people have free time they start thinking about life, and when people start thinking about life, bad shit happens to capitalists?

I was trying to find a rational and intellectual way of explaining this very stark reality that I've consistently run across but... for now I'll just upvote this.

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