
Ask HN: Why are we more productive, have more workers, but still working more? - benrmatthews
A trio of articles have appeared in my feed over the last week, all pointing to how we really don&#x27;t need to work so much (see the New Yorker&#x27;s &quot;You Really Don&#x27;t Need To Work So Much&quot; and &quot;No Time&quot;, or the NY Times&#x27; &quot;Overwhelmed&quot;).<p>Most of the articles centre on Keynses&#x27;s “Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren” essay, which predicted that we&#x27;d only be working 3 hours a day or 15 hours a week due to technology, automation and the rise of GDP.<p>This might go against startup and high-tech culture, where working long hours seems to be the norm, but is anyone working on tackling this problem?<p>How can we achieve a sustainable living on just 3 hours work a day? Is Tim Ferriss&#x27; 4 hour work week achievable for everyone, or even close to that?<p>Tackling this problem would change the world and technology must be one of the factors in addressing this problem. Why hasn&#x27;t this been solved yet?
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Mz
Over the years, I have thought a lot about work and money. IIRC, about 2/3s of
lottery winners are bankrupt within five years. I suspect part of the reason
for that is because in modern culture, most people spend their waking hours in
one of two modes: 1) Working (aka earning money) or 2) Consuming (aka spending
money). When people win the lottery, a lot of them quit their jobs. They now
have an extra 40+ hours per week that they need to somehow occupy themselves.
They think of themselves as "rich," so they spend those hours consuming
(spending money) instead of engaging in low cost/creative hobbies, like
cooking, gardening, sewing, etc.

As our income has gone up, one of the side effects is that we want bigger
homes, more clothes, etc etc etc. If you tried to recreate the lifestyle of,
say, 1950s America, with a modest home and home cooked meals (etc), you could
probably drastically reduce the number of hours needed to support yourself --
assuming you could find ways to fill your time that didn't involve pissing
away the money you do have.

Most people do not have that kind of self discipline. That isn't something
policy will create. That isn't something an app will create. There are ways to
shape policy to make more small scale, affordable housing available. But, for
the most part, making this happen on a large scale and not just for the
occasional quirky individual (as it currently happens) would involve somehow
radically altering the world's culture.

As much as I think it would be awesome if people in the world generally had
more free time hand-in-hand with more financial security, I have significant
reservations about the wisdom of attempting to convince people to do what it
would take to make this happen. That tends to be in the
morality/religion/ethics/culture area and that is very dangerous ground to
tread. Historically, it has tended to be the domain of religious figures, many
of whom ended up dead at a young age via methods like crucifixion or being
burnt at the stake.

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insoluble
As long as there is a significant portion of society willing to work 6+ hours
a day, the remainder of society will have to live up to comparable conditions.
The reason is because in a capitalist economic system, the gatekeepers of
wealth will push up the prices of rent, loans, and other heavy-to-enter
spheres, making the 6+ hours of work a requirement for basic sustainable
living. When I say _sustainable_ here, I am including the ever-increasing
educational, technological, and other requirements for obtaining worthwhile
employment. Sure, you could live in a hut without electricity or running
water, but nobody is going to hire you; and this required level of "decency"
grows with time.

Put another way, there is an ever-increasing "tax" being placed on society
from those who exploit the masses. Increased production efficiency allows the
bourgeoisie to increase this societal tax ever more.

~~~
atomical
Someone who lives in a hut would have to be smart about it.

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dorfuss
This is actually not Keynes, it was originally Lenin who predicted that in the
future people will live like we do on retirement, because machines would do
everything for us.

You have to always measure the productiveness agains the goods you want to
get. Today we are incredible efficient in getting the goods that would consume
90% of your time 100 years ago. But once we satisfied those needs, new
appetites arose, so we now not only want shoes and bread, but also iPhones and
intercontinental flights.

I'd look at some of the religious communities, like ultra-Orthodox in Israel,
who are able to live for the whole month on very modest welfare, supporting
large families of about 10 children. But no car, no phone, no Internet, no
plasma, no fancy vacations, games, gym memberships, Starbucks or online
shopping etc.

We are incredibly good at inventing new needs.

[http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/](http://www.mrmoneymustache.com/)

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nekopa
I would say that it is because we don't reap the benefits of our own work. Our
employers do. If you owned a business and had the option of letting me work 3
hours or take a 10 times increase in profits what would you do?

And say you are a good guy, and let me work 3 hours, how would you deal with a
competitor who is making 10 times the profit your company is with the same
numbers of people and payroll?

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tdylan
We're working _a lot_ less. [http://ourworldindata.org/data/economic-
development-work-sta...](http://ourworldindata.org/data/economic-development-
work-standard-of-living/working-hours/)

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rajacombinator
It probably has a lot to do with centrally planned economies (eg the Fed) and
kleptocratic govts misallocating vast swathes of the labor and investment
pools into nonproductive sectors of society, like banking, accounting, law,
govt agencies, and other forms of regulatory capture. The number of people
engaged in productive work has shrunk dramatically and they are supporting an
ever expanding parasite class. Atlas's burden is increasing.

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zhte415
Rent, as in, the economic concept.

