/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.3665564]

Why aren't you part of the anti-work movement, /lit/?

http://theanarchistlibrary.org/library/Bob_Black__The_Abolition_of_Work.html

[Anonymous No.3665574]

but how will I eat?

[Anonymous No.3665580]

>>3665574
like any bottom feeder you'll feed off the refuse of the productive.

[Anonymous No.3665582]

>>3665574
soup is good food

[Anonymous No.3665584]

>>3665564

There is no such thing as anti-work. If you stop working, I am supporting you, so somebody is working at the end of the day. Free riders still walk on the roads built by my taxes, receive medical attention in clinics paid by my taxes, and enjoy many of the comforts afforded by my effort.

So, er, nope.

[Anonymous No.3665605]

Fuck Bob Black, and fuck Neo-Luddites.

Read this, niggers.

http://www.deepleafproductions.com/wilsonlibrary/texts/raw-RICH.html

[Anonymous No.3665634]

>>3665605

Wow, that sucks at so many levels.

[Anonymous No.3665673]

>>3665584
Evil timeline Biff Tannen is my idol.

[Anonymous No.3665685]

>>3665634
What levels exactly?

[Anonymous No.3665701]

>>3665605
yea - that article sucks alright. Some governments want unempoyment at high levels so that employers can pay employees fuckall because there will will always be someone else that will do the same job for less.

[Anonymous No.3665712]

>>3665685

To start with, the author is clearly alien to basic economic thought. Then, he takes Friedman out of context. Later, he makes bold assumptions without backing them (like governments intentionally hitting the brakes on growth). And, overall, if the writing would be more subtle and academic, it would not come as paranoid as it does right now.

[Anonymous No.3665813]

>>3665712
Well when he wasn't talking economics he wrote things like Sex, Drugs and Magick: A Journey Beyond Limits and got high with Timothy Leary.

[Anonymous No.3665925]

Won't there come a point in the future where we simply run out of jobs because the populace keeps growing while more and more things are becoming automatised?

[Anonymous No.3665937]

>>3665712
>he makes bold assumptions without backing them (like governments intentionally hitting the brakes on growth

If you study even basic macroeconomics you'd see this happens all the time. All govt's do it, to mitigate the down cycles of world economy.

[Anonymous No.3665942]

>>3665925
>populace keeps growing more and more
Hate to break it to you Malthus but it isn't the parts of the world that "work" as we think of it that are growing in population.

[Anonymous No.3665951]

>>3665942
>malthus
I'm not saying we won't be able to provide for them, I'm saying that at some point you can't find jobs for everyone anymore while the economy is still capable of supporting them, leading to higher unemployment.

[Anonymous No.3665972]

>>3665951
A certain amount of unemployment is actually desirable in modern economies, see NAIRU for reference.
And really population scares is just something the more gullible politicals buy into as a result of their ideological beliefs. There's a reason why outsourcing even something as relatively simple as programming to non-western states is no longer seen as desirable in the vast majority of cases.

[Anonymous No.3666002]

>>3665937

Son, I AM macroeconomics. One thing is that it happens. Another is not backing up that assertion with data.

[Anonymous No.3666039]

>>3665584
Confirmed for not reading the article. Bob Black's conception of work differs greatly from just 'productive activity'.

[Anonymous No.3666059]

Invent a bunch of robots to do all the work for us, and we'll still find more work to do. Folks want to feel useful.

[Anonymous No.3666074]

The problem we are dealing with is the Problem of Plenty: It is a problem that our generation will be the first to confront directly. There are many buzzwords: "post-employment", "post-scarcity", "oversupply", the point is that humanity, with its ever increasing efficiencies and technological adaptations, is rapidly reaching the point where there will be a surplus of everything.

Look at books, since this is a /lit/ board. Is any book scarce? is there any form of text that is not readily available to anyone on earth, for very little, or no money? and what is more important, with very little investment in materials or energy? What about movies? Music? Games? Software? Information? Education?

All the energy and effort, all the materials and manpower that were once used to create and transport and store and maintain these commodities has been shifted to other enterprises, and the products of these enterprises are also becoming cheaper, better, more easily available and more varied.

[Anonymous No.3666075]

>>3666074
Food, clothing, manufactured goods that used to cost the average laborer most of his salary now can be purchased for less than thirty percent of that same paycheck. Housing, transportation, energy and health care are the highest percentages now. And the recent housing oversupply caused a crash in prices in that component of more than fifty percent in some markets. Communications is now a trivial expense when just calling the next county used to cost an hours pay for five minutes time.

The trend is down for the prices of everything.
Unfortunately this is reflected in the price of human labor, so the trend is stagnant in wages and hiring as well. In fact, the places where prices are rising, such as education, healthcare, legal services, etc, a lot is due to the fact that these industries, along with governement, are heavily overstaffed and over-administered.

The future looks sort of like this: A human-administered, fully automated manufacturing sector in both the old and new world. A technical/professional sector employing five percent of the population. The third world engaged in low-skill service, packaging and manufacturing. Agriculture becoming even more automated than it is currently. A twenty five percent employment share in local state and federal government and education, and about fifty percent of the population on stipends and at leisure. Their main duty to consume and to vote in elections.

[Anonymous No.3666094]

>>3666059
>Folks want to feel useful.

Read, think, debate, shitpost, consume media entertainment

Even if automization renders vast swathes of work obsolete you're still going to need a small minority of overseers and what about scientists etc who carry out original work?

I don't believe full automisation of every task would ever happen to the point where 'no-one' would have to work.

[risky cat !EyoS5AWf4c No.3666112]

>>3666094
robot overzeerz ah?
duh
duh

[Anonymous No.3666113]

>>3665937
>If you study even basic macroeconomics you'd see this happens all the time
this is not what macroeconomic field investigates, you fucking moron

[Anonymous No.3666121]

>>3666074
>Problem of Plenty
you gotta be kidding me, nigger
or wait, are you worrying here about the ever riched and narrower 0,1% not knowing what to do with their bloodbucks?

[Anonymous No.3666123]

>>3666113
Oh dear. There a few courses on Macroeconomics on corsera, perhaps you should take one? I recommend 'Microeconomics Principles by José J. Vázquez-Cognet'.

[Anonymous No.3666133]

>>3666075
>The trend is down for the prices of everything
>The future looks sort of like this:
You are such a handwaving, magical thinking buffoon. Let me guess, you are both a neoliberal and a Robot "Singularity" Jesus believer.

[Anonymous No.3666134]

>>3666123
I recommend you actually read an actual textbook before you open your yapper.

[Anonymous No.3666142]

>>3666123
That was probably the worst suggestion you could ever make.

[Anonymous No.3666151]

>>3666123
>boasts about macro knowledge
>the only "course" he can recommend is micro
get a load of this tool

[Anonymous No.3666172]

>>3666039

Confirmed faggot. I read it and my opinion stands. Another issue is that you (a) suck that guy's cock and have lost gag reflex, and (b) understand shit about how the economy works.

Seriously, I won't always be here to educate you. Snap up.

[Anonymous No.3666178]

>>3665564
>anti-work movement

HAHAHAAHHAHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

[Anonymous No.3666187]

B-but how will they work to achieve their goals?

[Anonymous No.3666231]

>>3666121
>>3666133
Nope. conservative republican. It's just that the trends seem to me to be inevitable.

the poorest people in America live better, eat better and have access to better everything than the very richest had a hundred years ago. They live the lives of magical wizard people, better than the kings of empires, compared to the lives of the average person of two hundred years ago. And while incomes are widely divergent, quality of life isn't really: Bill Gates eats the same food, uses the same transportation on the same roads, makes calls on the same phones, accesses the same internet on the same comouters and watches the same movies and plays the saem games as the poorest faggot in his mom's basement.

Bill's house costs more, and he wears more expensive clothes, but in every way that counts, the one percent is living just like the lowest of the 99%. You can say they have better healthcare, better transportation, whatever, but the difference is marginal compared to the incredible divide in terms of quality, quantity and availability that existed a hundred years ago.

[Anonymous No.3666249]

>>3665925
See post-scarcity economics

[Anonymous No.3666247]

>>3666231

you are being extremely naive.

the poorest people in america are homeless, often drug addicts or criminals, possibly victims of abuse and possibly mentally disturbed, but certainly unemployable

it would be more appropriate to say
"even the middle class in America live better, eat better and have access to better everything than the very richest had a hundred years ago"

>the one percent is living just like the lowest of the 99%.
>mfw I'm always ashamed of the ignorance of my fellow republicans

[Anonymous No.3666259]

>>3666134
He's entirely right. You clearly haven't taken any macroeconomics courses. Monetary policy would have been covered within the first few weeks. The motivation of any central bank raising the interest rate is to curb inflation which, in classical economic theory, is a byproduct of growth. Stagflation and the Austrian School complicate this picture; but even Volker wound up dramatically hiking the interest rates as one of the primary tools to fight inflation.

[Anonymous No.3666273]

>>3666231
>Nope. conservative republican.
That's a neoliberal

[Anonymous No.3666278]

What if I enjoy working? This retard seems to think that everyone hates work.

[Anonymous No.3666301]

I didn't read it but clearly someone has to 'work', unless he's advocating for some kind of anarcho-primitivism in which we have self-automated and repairing machines which provide and serve food, which would of course be ridiculous.

He should be advocating for anarcho-socialism/communitarianism/whathaveyou.

[Anonymous No.3666306]

>>3666247
We're not talking about people with mental diseases, or addicts or career criminals and mental deficients when we talk about the people at any point in the economic scale, but yeah, I'll still say that even a mentally ill, drug addicted criminal lives better now than most of the richest people in society did a hundred years ago. and the homeless drug addict crazy person of 1913? lucky to make it through the first winter.

and I satnd behind my statement on the similarities of poverty and wealth in terms of actual access to the benefits of society.

Bill Gates and Warren Buffet aren't getting better video games and movies and music and books than anyone else. Their cars use the same gas, pizza hut delivers the same pizza, their iphones don't have special magic apps.

Wealth makes a lot of difference sure; but the differences are becoming more and more trivial in their impacts on everyday life. The rolex worth a hundred thousand dollars keeps the same time as the Casio I got for twenty. That's the point. If i get my lobster from Red Lobster or have my chef prepare it, the difference is a very subtle one compared to the guy a hundred years ago having a lobster and everybody else eating oatmeal.

[Anonymous No.3666324]

>>3666306
>homeless drug addict crazy person of 1913
likely to have similar problems as someone today, and believe it or not the same institutions that preserve homeless people existed back then as they do now. Such hospices existed even in 1813. Hell, when you are so ignorant of the history society you are best not saying anything at all.

>Bill Gates and Warren Buffet aren't getting better video games and movies and music and books than anyone else. Their cars use the same gas, pizza hut delivers the same pizza, their iphones don't have special magic apps.
you cite luxuries as your example. holy shit you are retarded. The poorest people in america do not have video games, movies, cars, iphones, etc. Are you retarded? Not a rhetorical question at this point.
>watches
>lobster
you need to volunteer at a homeless center. you are living a very, very sheltered life

[Anonymous No.3666366]

>>3666306
>the differences are becoming more and more trivial in their impacts on everyday life. The rolex worth a hundred thousand dollars keeps the same time as the Casio I got for twenty. That's the point. If i get my lobster from Red Lobster or have my chef prepare it, the difference is a very subtle one

Yeah dawg all the bitches dig a run down shack in a shanty town as opposed to a luxury apartment in LA. Wealth will help a man score any chick he wants, probably it's main advantage.

[Anonymous No.3666385]

>>3666306
mmmm I love oatmeal :)

[Anonymous No.3666393]

>>3666324
>>3666324
You make a good point actually. I doubt I've read more than fifty books out of the hundreds you've probably read on the subject, but the ones I have read are in pretty close agreement.

and yes, absolutely, the poorest people in the united states have video games, iphones, televisions and laptops. A lot of them even have cars. I spend a lot of time with the very poorest peopel in America, and I can garauntee that they do not, in fact, lack these "luxuries" and while they don't get to Red Lobster more than a couple times a month, they do go. I volunteer at a battered women's shelter and aI've helped out in several homeless shelters and worked with section 8 for years. Yes, the poor in America have xboxes. They have (small) flatscreens, broadband and netflix. They are not sleeping under bridges. Just visit and twenty people you know who are receiving food stamps or state assistance and look around their houses. It's not me that's deluded here. And I'm not one of those that resents their getting them either, They certainly get little enough, and they're welcome to it. the point is, it IS enough. For iphones and netflix accounts certainly.

[Anonymous No.3666402]

>>3666366
The number of people living in shacks in shanty towns is probably close to one thousandth of a percent. Have you ever been in a shanty town?

[Anonymous No.3666413]

>>3666393

Yall are talking about different things, but this post is more important. Yes, there are people in America who are so poor that they do not have Xboxes and sleep under bridges, but the vast majority of the poor in America are the working poor, who have plenty of "luxuries", just nothing worth living for.

[Anonymous No.3666422]

>>3666324
>existed back then as they do now.
Uh no. Mental Institutions in the past were far, far worse than they are today. Not only in terms of the views on patients but also on their actual treatments.

[Anonymous No.3666432]

>>3666402

>on lit

>can't into hyperbole

[Anonymous No.3666437]

>>3666413
>just nothing worth living for.
Shit join the club.
Or as Drew Carey put it, the nearest bar.

[Anonymous No.3666441]

>>3666278
what do you do?

[Anonymous No.3666449]

>>3666413
That's one I can't answer to. Just about every poor person I know has at least one family member working, and working hard usually. As far as having nothing worth living for, I doubt it was much different in the past.

[Anonymous No.3666452]

>>3666278
I don't like making other people rich. I enjoy working with my hands, but only for myself as a hobby. It's still work

[Anonymous No.3666489]

>>3666452

most people would not count masturbating as work

[Anonymous No.3666532]

>>3666324
I'm European, but here all that is keeping people homeless is their wanting to be homeless. You just have to ask and you get housing and welfare. If you're crazy you get help and guidance and people to take care of you. Is it so much worse in the States?

I'm not generally an optimist, but from a historical point of view, life here is paradise. I could chug a fifth of scotch right now and run out naked and slicing myself up in the streets and within an hour I will be in a clean bed with good people trying to help me and I could be a Jewish black transfaggot while doing it if I were so inclined. Life is pretty utopian compared to a 100 years ago where it would be a privilege not having to go outside to take a shit.

[Anonymous No.3666567]

>>3666532

Oh, a fellow Finn.

[Anonymous No.3666569]

>>3666532
It's bascially the same here: a few hoops to jump through is all. Doesn't mean it's fun, though: a "poverty industry" has sprung up to take the money from people who make bad decisions, such as renting a couch for fifty bucks a month.

I think the trend is in that direction too: the very concept of fat poor people would have been laughed at in the 1890s. That's when you might have had to walk home in a flour barrel if you got drunk and got robbed, because the pants you were wearing would have cost you two weeks pay.

[Anonymous No.3668957]

>>3666567
Do they even have black people in Finland?

[Anonymous No.3668961]

>>3666569
>such as renting a couch for fifty bucks a month.
Actually lolled.

[Anonymous No.3668963]

>Nor am I promoting the managed time-disciplined safety-valve called “leisure”; far from it. Leisure is nonwork for the sake of work. Leisure is the time spent recovering from work and in the frenzied but hopeless attempt to forget about work. Many people return from vacation so beat that they look forward to returning to work so they can rest up. The main difference between work and leisure is that work at least you get paid for your alienation and enervation.

This guy never read Josef Pieper's "Leisure: The Basis of Culture"
please, everyone, read this book

[Anonymous No.3669910]

>>3668963
He probably merely has a different concept of it.

[Anonymous No.3670183]

anti-work, huh.

so how does that work

[Anonymous No.3670194]

>>3666413
>just nothing worth living for.

so they're like everyone else i take it

who knew

[Anonymous No.3672627]

How does one have something to live for? I don't get it.

[Anonymous No.3672629]

I'd rather be a Morlock than an Eloi.

[Anonymous No.3672645]

>>3672629
Good. Back to work.