[Pants-of-dog]

We could just give the fabulous machine from the OP a really badass AI and give it the means of production, and see if Iain M. Banks’ Culture would actually work.

[QatzelOk]

The average number of hours worked per week has been declining over time.


https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/annu ... per-worker

No it hasn't. Look at your chart more carefully. It's the number of hours worked per worker that has been declining.

But so many people have become workers in the last century, that no one has time to raise kids or form communities anymore. My grandmother had more free time because my Grandfather (and father) were able to make enough money to raise an entire family on normal job wages. She also had more "free time" because her eyeballs weren't glued to a TV screen when she wasn't busy doing something.

Today, all we distracted worker-bees can do is build skewed narratives from graphs we can't read properly. But we can't raise kids properly because we don't have time to form communities.

[Julian658]

No it hasn't. Look at your chart more carefully. It's the number of hours worked per worker that has been declining.

But so many people have become workers in the last century, that no one has time to raise kids or form communities anymore. My grandmother had more free time because my Grandfather (and father) were able to make enough money to raise an entire family on normal job wages. She also had more "free time" because her eyeballs weren't glued to a TV screen when she wasn't busy doing something.

Today, all we distracted worker-bees can do is build skewed narratives from graphs we can't read properly. But we can't raise kids properly because we don't have time to form communities.

You can measure as hours per week or per day or per year. The issue is that the hours per week has been declining.

Table 1
Estimated Average Weekly Hours Worked in Manufacturing, 1830-1890

Year Weeks Report Aldrich Report
1830 69.1
1840 67.1
1850 65.5
1860 62.0
1870 61.1
1880


Table 2
Estimated Average Weekly Hours Worked, 1900-1988
Year
GreisAll Workers
1900 59.6*
1904 57.9
1909 56.8
1914 55.1
1919 50.8
1924 51.1
1929 50.6
1934 34.4
1940 37.6
1944 44.2
1947 39.2
1950 38.7
1953 38.6
1958 37.8
1960 41.0
1963 41.6
1968 41.7 4
1970 41.1
1973 40.6
1978 41.3
1980 39.8
1988


https://eh.net/encyclopedia/hours-of-wo ... s-history/

[late]

The issue is that the hours per week has been declining.

The issue, as I see it, is a lot has changed since 1988, which is what they are using. That's over 30 freaking years old.

The number of hours worked, by family, went up by nearly 300% from the 1960s to the big crash.

That's wives moving into the workplace, people working 2 and 3 jobs, and an increase in overtime work.

[Tainari88]

The context was pretty grim if you know why most immigrants came to the USA. And it gets grimmer when you find out what they were asked to do to make a living.

And that these "European Christians" basically lived off genocide and pillaging almost up the present - provides the missing context of our empty historical memory.


My grandmother had more free time, and a more independent mind than my parents or my own generation. My generation, and even moreso the current ones, work all day and buy things all weekend and have very undeveloped human interaction skills. "Today's values" means very little as a way of justifying the deterioration of human societies.

And what do you mean by "today's viewpoint?" That we should consider today's trends "the best values ever?" I don't, and am acutally more interested in judging social behavior from all periods using universal values. That's why the genocides of the First Nations, for me, guaranteed that whatever "state" arose would be a Nazi-like one with a fake history and plastic commercial culture.

I just have to do this for this answer Q gave!

[Julian658]

The issue, as I see it, is a lot has changed since 1988, which is what they are using. That's over 30 freaking years old.

The number of hours worked, by family, went up by nearly 300% from the 1960s to the big crash.

That's wives moving into the workplace, people working 2 and 3 jobs, and an increase in overtime work.

Annual average working hours per week of all employees in the United States from 2017 to 2020
Hours of work
2020 34.6
2019 34.4
2018 34.5
2017 34.4

https://www.statista.com/statistics/261 ... in-the-us/

Women joining the work force double the size of those seeking work, A much larger supply of workers than positions available. That should cause a reduction in wages for all -------and it did!!

And you are correct: A woman and man working in a house is double the hours, but the lifestyle went up.

[late]

Annual average working hours per week of all employees in the United States from 2017 to 2020
Hours of work
2020 34.6
2019 34.4
2018 34.5
2017 34.4

https://www.statista.com/statistics/261 ... in-the-us/

Women joining the work force double the size of those seeking work, A much larger supply of workers than positions available. That should cause a reduction in wages for all -------and it did!!

And you are correct: A woman and man working in a house is double the hours, but the lifestyle went up.

The last time you tried this gag you used a discontinued metric. They likely stopped using it because it stopped working.

This time you were using obsolete data.

Now you are ignoring the basic point. As relative income declined, there has been a significant increase in the number of hours worked, esp. among blue collar families.

Without knowing if they did things like adjusting for people working more than one job, among other things, we can't know how relevant that is. An additional problem is that the 2008 crash changed the economy.

[Julian658]

The last time you tried this gag you used a discontinued metric. They likely stopped using it because it stopped working.

This time you were using obsolete data.

Now you are ignoring the basic point. As relative income declined, there has been a significant increase in the number of hours worked, esp. among blue collar families.

Without knowing if they did things like adjusting for people working more than one job, among other things, we can't know how relevant that is. An additional problem is that the 2008 crash changed the economy.

I do not disagree. I posted the data to another poster than claimed his grandmother had plenty of leisure time and worked less hours. The fact is that in the old days the hours worked per week were greater.

The productivity of workers is much greater and the pay has lagged behind big time. I have no disagreements with that. The low wages are likely due to an expanded work force due to immigration and the entry of women to the work face.

BTW, my son in law is self employed and the CEO of a small company he founded. He works 70 hours a week. If he was employed by someone he would work 40 hours.

[QatzelOk]

...The number of hours worked, by family, went up by nearly 300% from the 1960s to the big crash.

That's wives moving into the workplace, people working 2 and 3 jobs, and an increase in overtime work.

Exactly. Julian658 is just pulling numbers out of his esophagus.

And if you calculated the "number of hours spent with family and friends" of the last generation... you would find a huge crash in "the things that make life worth living."

Bowling Alone can give you some background into this.

And Five Filters can give you some background as to why you never hear about the destruction of community or social capital in commercial media. This crucial information is "filtered out" by the structure and logic of profit-making.

[late]

Exactly. Julian658 is just pulling numbers out of his esophagus.

Wrong orifice.

I agree with your sources more than I disagree.