Despite the fact that people believe in free market economics and supply and demand, sometimes companies basically force people to work 40 hours a week or not have a job at all. In Taiwan that might be 50 hours a week.
I know this post is a little vague, but I sometimes feel that corporations and efficiency are the modern form of slavery in the United States. This may apply to Canada, Australia, England, Ireland, and South Africa as well. I can only speak about the United States, Taiwan, and Germany. Those are the countries I have lived in.
You could probably keep yourself going for quite a while on very little cash in a small rural farm. But that would be quite the lifestyle choice.
What’s funny is, from my perspective, the people whose lifestyle more closely emulates that of a slave are those whose employers LIMIT their hours to part-time work, forcing them – assuming they are not interested in subsistence farming – to hold multiple jobs and please many masters for little benefit. They have nothing to depend on.
I would say the best option is to have a skill that is in high demand, which will allow you to work as you please. Maybe even work 20-30 hours a week to earn enough to live a middle class life.
I think it’s simple that as productivity improves, even though people can do more than then used to, employers will simply ramp up their expectations of the employee. It’s an employers market in the main.
But even in demand professionals often have to work insane hours, both to get to that point in their career and to work at that level.
But 40 hour workweeks are a luxury in some places, including Taiwan. On the other hand hunter gatherer societies would only do useful work for a few hours a day.
I would say the best option is to have a skill that is in high demand, which will allow you to work as you please. Maybe even work 20-30 hours a week to earn enough to live a middle class life.[/quote]
But than … working 40 hours a week won’t cut it … :no-no:
I have to add to the voices… if I worked only 40 hours a week, I would be on top of the world. 40 hours a week officially designates full-time employment in the US, but in reality, that is not the hours that businesses keep in the US, or most anywhere else, and most certainly not in Taiwan! I don’t know if that truly exists anymore outside of a few western European countries actually. I averaged 100 at an ad agency in the US, and here in a global corporation I’m clocking in what (by comparison) feels like an easy peasy 65. So, sorry, the times have changed, but people still say outdated things like 9 to 5, or rush “hour”. If you’re crying foul at 40 hours, I don’t know what to tell you.
You old hacks!
It’s always the same - some dude comes along and says “hey, maybe this ain’t right” and all the old hacks pile in to say “oooooo, its better than in MY day” “in my day we’d of LOVED to [insert daily reality]” like they never even saw the Life of Brian.
I’m with the OP, and the OP is right. In fact, up until you sign an employment contract you are free, assuming you don’t have to pay rent and you can live on fresh air and rain water. But, after you sign, you really do sign your freedom over for the amount of hours required. Actually there is a very long and complicated history involved until we get to the point where ‘liberty’ is something that people have the right to buy and sell, and yet more until we get to the point when that state of affairs become so normal. You sell yours. You sell your freedom for your wage. The 40 hour work week is indeed one of the modern forms of slavery.
I would say the best option is to have a skill that is in high demand, which will allow you to work as you please. Maybe even work 20-30 hours a week to earn enough to live a middle class life.[/quote]
But than … working 40 hours a week won’t cut it … :no-no:[/quote]
Actually there are medical professionals in the US that do temp work and choose to work 9 months out of the year. It can be done, but most professionals want a bigger house and a BMW or other luxury car.It is not that it can’t be done, but the desire for material goods is too much for most people.
I don’t want to be a dick, but the fact that you worked 100 hours a week seems to be a result of your choices. Not something you had to do. Plus, I really doubt that all of those 100 hours were productive. It sounds like you put in a lot of extra face time.
The advertising industry is notorious for long hours, particularly here in Taiwan. The 40 hour work week was one of the great achievements of western labour movements.
Now it is being rolled back in many countries.
What makes one a slave is either abject poverty OR the inability to save a good whack more than you earn. Other things like lack of job opportunities don’t help either, as in take it or leave it.
In this case it might be mainly his own desire for whatever; in the main, however, work is not really a choice is it? And when it isn’t a choice it is slavery, no?
[quote=“headhonchoII”]The 40 hour work week was one of the great achievements of western labour movements.
Now it is being rolled back in many countries. [/quote]
This, tragically, is true.
Again, one is not really free. When you are ‘free’ to chose virtually indefinite wage labour or destitution, how is it really a choice? Sure one can ‘earn’ your freedom (aka taking retirement) - but how good are you for much then, anyway?
[quote=“headhonchoII”]The 40 hour work week was one of the great achievements of western labour movements.
Now it is being rolled back in many countries.
What makes one a slave is either abject poverty OR the inability to save a good whack more than you earn.[/quote]
I would agree with that. 40 hours and the OP thinks it’s slavery??? Really???
Americans, and ever more people around the world, are very good at putting themselves into debt slavery. I know many people in the US making well into six figures. If they were to lose their jobs they’d be just a couple of missed mortgage payments from the streets. Amazing when you think about it.
I do think debt as a business model is encroaching nearly every aspect of life. Even software companies are moving towards a subscription model for their products. You NEVER own the software, you just pay a monthly service fee for its use.
There is no difference between 1 hour and 40 hours or 100 hours.
The point is that without the hour (s), the man can not live. Ergo, slavery.
I believe the OP was using the 40 hour week as a catch-all just like he uses ‘corporations’ when he might as well include all companies/employers.
Debt is indeed another form of slavery and one which is certainly not new.
