
The Shut-In Economy (2015) - ASipos
https://medium.com/matter/the-shut-in-economy-ec3ec1294816
======
SnacksOnAPlane
Does anyone else actually enjoy going to the grocery store or walking to a
local place to pick up food? What, exactly, are people doing that gives them
so little free time that this is necessary? And why aren't people talking to
each other?

I seriously don't understand the mentality that working all the time is good
for you. I find that I figure out solutions to problems I'm having not by
banging my head against them all the time, but from relaxing, walking,
running, biking, shopping, reading books, and all the other "non-productive"
things that normal people do.

Is Silicon Valley really like this? It sounds more like a dystopia than a
utopia.

~~~
Aaargh20318
> Does anyone else actually enjoy going to the grocery store or walking to a
> local place to pick up food?

No, I hate it. Supermarkets especially are a horrible place, they are way too
crowded and I don't like being in situations like that. I will cycle to the
grocery store and if I see there's a long line for checkout I'll reverse
course and try at a later time in the hope there's less people.

I do my grocery shopping stormtrooper-style. I'll be in and out in as little
time as possible (think 3-5 minutes for a typical shopping trip).

> What, exactly, are people doing that gives them so little free time that
> this is necessary?

Stuff in grocery stores costs money, you get money by having a job.

> I seriously don't understand the mentality that working all the time is good
> for you.

And yet you claim not to understand why people hate doing more work ?

~~~
SnacksOnAPlane
Well, there you go. You just explained why you don't like going out; it's
because you don't like being in situations with lots of people around.

I'm personally not like that (used to be, but with a lot of effort, got over
it), but it's good to see someone else's perspective.

~~~
kazagistar
I think the other reason was more important... People see chores as work, and
have more enjoyable things they could be doing.

~~~
SnacksOnAPlane
There's a certain zen in being able to enjoy doing your chores. I think
learning to change yourself so you don't dread chores is important self-work.

------
cousin_it
A couple months ago I asked this question on Reddit:

 _> Does anyone have ideas how to write a utopia that would fulfill people's
need to be needed by each other, rather than just their material needs?_

And got an amazing response from user "fubo":

 _> Cross OKCupid with TaskRabbit: the AI tells you what favors to do for
people to get you to love each other._

I wish the internet would grow into something like that, instead of making
people more isolated under the guise of "social", "sharing" etc.

~~~
jordanb
That transactional view of love is exactly the sort of technomyopia I would
expect from the HN crowd.

~~~
TeMPOraL
So why are you here? To laugh at people looking for solutions to problems
using well-defined means, as opposed to continuing in the usual ambiguous,
gut-feeling-driven thinking?

I for one like this kind of "technomyopia", because it works off a framework
that lets humans eventually figure things out.

~~~
zaptheimpaler
I get where you're coming from. Its just that technology is not the right
framework to attack all problems. The app OP mentioned is essentially a tool
to track trading favors between people - its not anywhere close to "love". In
fact the addiction to tech, social media, smartphones etc. is making us spend
less real face-face time with people (well-documented), so I would say its
precisely the wrong tool to use.

Not saying we should give up, but this is a social problem, better analyzed
with more apt tools like social science. Relationships grow with time &
investment in interacting with someone else - given that, no amount of "apps"
or tech magic can make a fundamental difference.

~~~
nitrogen
It was probbably a joke, but such an app could be incredibly valuable to those
who were perpetually ostracized in their youth and never learned how to
interact. Simple things like, "Thank him for this," or, "Tell her she's really
good at that," might not even occur to some people who were never exposed to
anyone who demonstrated those things.

~~~
beaconstudios
it would certainly be a good cue system for people with mild
autism/aspbergers, or social difficulties.

------
ExpendableGuy
Worth noting -- two of the startups mentioned in this article, Homejoy and
Washio, are closed.

Also, services that delivery groceries, cooked meals, or laundry/drycleaning
are not new -- they were just given a facelift for a different consumer base.
An article like this failing to mention that is a pretty big oversight imho --
it even trends into "back in my day..." territory.

If anything, this new economy is correcting for the car-dependent "convenience
economy" that was implemented over the past 30 years or so. The milkman was
replaced by milk in every corner store. Diners and luncheonettes were replaced
by take out and carry away. Catalogs were replaced by "big box" stores.

It reminds me of the comparison of "head stuck in a newspaper" to "head stuck
to a smartphone." Some people try and argue the latter is more egregious, but
why?

------
robynsmith
I started reading this and experienced deja vu. After a few minutes, I
realized I read and thought heavily about this before.

Previous discussion:

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9265817](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9265817)

------
FussyZeus
I never considered myself either a social butterfly or an outdoors person in
any capacity beyond an occasional bike ride, but compared to a lot of SF
dwellers, apparently I am. I cannot imagine paying such exorbitant sums to
live in a tiny ass apartment and have all my worldly needs delivered to my
door so I can sit and do whatever until the next time I _had_ to leave my
house.

This existence sounds awful and I don't know how people not only manage to do
it, but aspire to it.

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _This existence sounds awful and I don 't know how people not only manage to
> do it, but aspire to it._

Grass looks greener on the other side, I guess. I definitely wouldn't be fine
spending shit ton of money for small apartments, but that's unrelated to being
"shut in", which is something I find more and more appealing. I guess between
spending most of my days in an open-office workplace and an active
relationship, I'm just getting tired of _other people_. I find myself dreaming
more and more often about a week away from human interruptions. Just me, pen,
a notebook, stack of books and a laptop with good Internet connection. I have
a lot of thoughts to sort through that I can't because there are other people
around me, and I can't focus.

------
noonespecial
The article was mostly about the class lines being draw between the providers
and receivers of these services. I agree that this is very important
(especially politically) right at this very moment but I think it misses the
long view. Eventually this stuff will be done by automation.

If this trend continues unabated, a large part of the population is likely to
go full Wall-E, especially as the tech moves the services down-market. That
seems like a far more interesting conundrum than a few rich and privileged
folks trying to bring back Victorian era house-help with their mobile phones.

------
projektir
This is a subject worth talking about, but the article is a bit all over the
place.

I'm not going to be easily convinced that chores are a blessed thing. I do
think chores will eventually die out because their value is fairly low:
they're mostly repetitive tasks that don't require much skill. Ask women from
the time before the vacuum cleaner and the washing machine how they feel about
the awesomeness of chores.

If you want to know why something happens, look at incentives. Real ones, not
the ones that you think should be true. Too often people have an ideal person
in their head, and they assume all must act and think that way, so anyone who
disagrees cannot really voice their opinion. Then a new solution comes out and
a bunch of people rush to it. Or a new president. That demand was always
there, it just was not allowed to be heard. If you don't want to hear it, it
will catch you off guard.

People work a lot. People are protective of their time. People don't want to
socialize. People are forced to earn income through part time jobs. People
don't like those other people over there. In my experience, rarely does anyone
really care to know why, they just announce a judgment to make themselves feel
better and move on.

I don't think this Shut-In Economy development _drives_ inequality. Rather,
it's a consequence of it, and one of the examples of why inequality is bad, no
matter how "objectively" well the less well off are doing. For the shut-in
class, and for the serving class... and for those below.

In a more fair society, elimination of chores would be driven by either shared
work or automation, and it will benefit all, so we wouldn't be complaining
about it and calling the beneficiaries entitled. But it would take a
fundamental rejection of this style of economic affairs to get there.

------
FullMtlAlcoholc
While the article certainly does highlight some disturbing trends, it reads
like a hit piece against Silicon Valley. It focuses on a very narrow slice of
the population that uses these apps.

It appears she didn't visit a co-working facility or even a coffeeshop as
research. That would go against her narrative of the anti-social, nerdy shut-
in. She also neglects to talk about the costs of commuting, namely that the
longer the drive one has, the more likely they are to have higher levels of
obesity, cholesterol, pain, fatigue and anxiety. For those with mid to low
incomes, commutes can eat up 9% of one's income. They are also adding to
gridlock and pollution.

The article only looks at a small cross-section of what appears to be anti She
declines to write about the benefits of being a remote worker. The digital
nomad movement is the diametric opposite of a shut-in. Parents of newborn
children who work remote now get to be around their children instead of
shuttling them off to daycare. These services sound awesome. I don't like
doing dishes, washing my clothes, or cleaning my apartment. I don't see any
virtue in doing mindless labor that I personally find annoying at best. If I
want to do something repetitive that doesn't require higher cognitive
abilities, I exercise. It has the benefit of clearing my head/bringing
mindfulness. Isn't that the point of technology?

I, personally, have cut down drastically on driving. I am no longer adding to
gridlock or spewing pollution into the air. I'm much healthier since I cook
for myself more often and I exercise more. I love the flexibility it gives my
life. I don't have to take a vacation day for mundane errands like going to
the doctor, going to court, picking up a friend or relative from the airport,
etc. I've more hobbies and explored more interests in one year of remote work
than I did the previous 10 years. The greatest benefit is that it makes me
MORE social. I get to see the people who are important to me in life the most
and not spend most of my social time with people who I' am lukewarm about. I
just didn't have any energy or motivation to do anything but veg out in front
of the TV when I drove home through LA traffic from work.

The one downside I was that I found myself consuming more cable
news/infotainment. This raised my level of righteous indignation and more and
more of my conversations started to become intense debates with my positions
formed by emotional responses. However, I fixed this by not watching as much
Bloomberg and avoided media intended to cause outrage.

As a number of these services will be automated in the future, her conclusion
that we are headed towards a stratified society with on-demand workers being
reduced to servants in the Guilted Era is just flat out wrong. I am fearful of
the future stratification of society, but that's due to people being displaced
from work and not the issues

------
beaconstudios
so in summary, a place noted for a high concentration of tech-oriented
introverts is full of people who like to be by themselves?

