Comment 80368

By Undustrial (registered) - website | Posted September 03, 2012 at 00:22:45

Some really good, deep thoughts here. Definitely going to keep an eye out for "I Am Thinking of My Darling".

People who like their jobs stay in them, the rest switch, or just skip work altogether. A kind of low grade potlatch unfolds, with people helping themselves or being freely offered food drink and clothing. Scarcity ceases, and catastrophe seems imminent to the city managers who must maintain the infrastructure.

This paragraph/concept really caught my attention, especially the notion of an end to "scarcity". There are certainly both utopian and catastrophic possibilities here, and some interesting insights into our society. Though "the happies" don't really exist, they're a metaphor for any number of possible reasons a sizable chunk of the population could start questioning their participation in the economy - drugs, spirituality, revolutionary politics or personal comfort/well-being, all of which did erupt two decades later in the sixties.

What if people stopped doing jobs they didn't want to do? More importantly, why do so many people have obviously awful, unrewarding and largely useless jobs? We're the most productive society in history, per hour worked, so how come we work so much?

"Today, the notion of progress in a single line without goal or limit seems perhaps the most parochial notion of a very parochial century." — Lewis Mumford

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