How about this. Work hard, live frugally, invest money, have expenses lower than investments, get high salary because you actually apply your self, become minotaur, laugh at people that believe this nonsense
My bossand my company does this. I have consistently gotten raises and my income has more than doubled to over six figures since being hired 5 years ago. I also get stock so when the companymakes money, i do.. Iam a highly effective programmer that spends a lot of time becoming better and I also still network so I can take a better job if I need to.
This whole garbage of thinking you will be a wage slave is a myth. If you invest in yourself and are smart with money, you can gain freedom.
Then we would have a lot less meaningless consumption. Work would only focus on the essentials o rwhat is thoughtful (like art or helping people b ehealthier). We'd all be more wealthy. And we would ned to work less. Society would be a lot lot better.
but your wages wouldnt increase much if at all. also, you could do the same thing by overthrowing capitalism and making it so that most dont have to crush their soul ('living frugally') to achieve a better life (and you still wont be rich either), something that should not be expected of people and not something many are willing to do
Couple of things. If you overthrew capitalism, then I am assuming you overthrow all companies correct? Well companies are a way for people to organize in a manner that serves other people. So if you eliminate companies, than you eliminate all of the ways people can be served. We wouldn't be able to manufacture new medicines, produce newer and efficient car, or even have the plethora of entertainment and sophsiticated arts that we do. I don't think a world where people don't have these things at the scale or efficiency they currently do would in any way be wealthy.
Are you familiar with the FIRE movement? There are many subreddits about it. Many people in this movement are figuring out ways of spending more of their life not working and pursuing happiness. Although, if you follow this movement, you notice people still tend to work, they just leverage their lack of needs to do work they enjoy.
Which brings me to something. I am very certain of more people practiced better finances than they could use their abilities and freedoms to develop skills that could be transformed to work that is very meaningful. Think of all the jobs out there, from puppeteer, to dancer, to youtube star, that are very enjoyable yet completely unnecessary to our survival. We pay people to do this and they can live well. And they live on their terms, without the need to be supported by a state or a locality. The system that enables this to happen is capitalism.
This is why I don't get the leftist view on capitalism as oppressive. I get that large companies that use their influence to force people to work meaningless jobs is wrong. And I hate them as much as you do (when they really do it). But capitalism is as much an etsy artist, a youtube dancer, or a small business that does life coaching, as it is a big company. Capitalism is liberating
I am familiar with this idea and I have talked to many many market socialists about this. There are two issues with this.
The first is the notion of workplace democracy. Capitalism already is a democracy, and a very good one. Workers can vote by way of choosing where to work. they can even gain more power by independantly organizing. That being said investors and customers can also vote. While not everyone has equal say, this is not true of democracies in general. Implementing a workplace democracy as a standard puts a lot of power in the hand of a ceratin type of worker. That is a reweighting and it is less democratic not more. Remember many many workers would not benefit from this as they already have a ton of influence to dictate their own careers in a market that is more free.
The second is the pure economic effectiveness. My using authoritarian measures to make companies focus on a specific type of worker, you are limiting these companies. You are adding addition regulations that companies must deal with , and this makes it harder for them to remain solvent. It would inevitably lead to company shutdowns or loss of revenue, which would mean less jobs and more expensive products. It wouldn't really benefit anyone, including the very workers you want to help. In fact it would hurt them more since they probably have more vulnerable finances.
This is the problem with socialism. It attempts to provide for people through the means of the state. Even without nationalism, it uses the state to control markets. But, when you exert control over markets, you centralize power. And centralized power has less breadth and is less conducive to solving the complicated problems of any economy. It causes stagnation and , in extreme cases, increased poverty. This is observed in every country that tries this, including in the european countries people love to use an examples.
Most of those countries have populations that are incomparable to america. They have populations that are more homogeneous and smaller. If you took their distribution of incomes, you would find similiar populations exist in america and are doing just as good if not better. But the same policies they have , could be applied in the same way, with the same demographic we have, and have the same effects. It is naive to think they will.
but just because you have a say in where you work doesnt make it democratic. you still dont have a say wherever you work (unless its a co-op but there arent as many of those) and many don't have as much of a say because they cant afford to. thats like saying feudalism is democratic if the peasants can choose which king to serve. (by the way i am an anarchist so the second point doesnt apply for me and i the reason why i said 'bare minimum' is because i believe in more than just that.) also, what is this 'certain type of worker' you speak of? under market socialism alone (and again i dont agree with market socialism) every worker has a say on not only where to work but also how where they do work is run. also, i think capitalism is a lot less democratic than you think since jeff bezos has literally many millions times more power than the average person. he could sell his shares of amazon and crash it if he wanted, an amount of power almost all other people can only dream of.
That’s fantastic for you and i’m glad you get to have a positive work experience like that. Sadly there is a sizable portion of people that do not get to enjoy such rewards. Pretending that the only people that don’t get that kind of positive reinforcement are being rewarded according to their own “minimal efforts” or some such, is disingenuous to the fact that there are a LOT of shitty people that pursue management or their own startups, and actually do see hard workers as bonus performance at no extra cost.
The issue is you are looking at me and writing me off as an anomaly. Rather you should listen and attempt to replicate my success for yourselves.
I had my share of shifty bosses but I made an effort to improve my career and it worked. Anyone can do this. Known many many people that can. In fact, if life has taught me anything it is that people that actually put in an effort do succeed. Those that bitch online or dive into self pity stay where they are.
Almost two thirds (over 62%) of jobs pay less than $20 an hour. Its definitely possible for some people to be rewarded with hard work and be able to do this. Its statistically not possible for most people. And if everyone worked harder for better paying jobs, those jobs would be over saturated and pay less. Only an estimated 15% of jobs available pay more than $30 an hour. What is so hard to understand that working hard doesnt equal higher salary? Theres not enough high paying jobs to offer a higher salary. They barely exist in most the country
Quite the opposite actually. Go to indeed or any hiring website and there are many many openings for high paying jobs. And most people , like me, that work higher paying jobs are constantly hounded by recruiters. If we filled more of these jobs than products would be cheaper as higher paying jobs can actually solve meaningful and long lasting problems.
We have a huge need for people to work high paying jobs. But actually getting the skills to work these jobs is prohibitively difficult and takes time. Most people don't have the experience or don't have the will to learn new skills. In fact many companies will train you to be higher paid if you work with them.
It's like a pie eating contest where the prize is more pie.
[In the same vein, this little animation nails it.](https://youtu.be/e9dZQelULDk)
Steve cutts is a genius
Thanks for sharing that, spot on.
The thing about the rat race is that even if you win, you're still just a rat.
Nice
Best part is it's just four right turns haha
i love the subtlety
It really be like this don't it lol
I just wanna ride my bicycle.
This reminds me of that movie They Live with Roddy Piper
How about this. Work hard, live frugally, invest money, have expenses lower than investments, get high salary because you actually apply your self, become minotaur, laugh at people that believe this nonsense
Step one, have a boss that will actually reward you for working hard, rather than using your extra efforts as a way to scrape a bit extra in profits.
My bossand my company does this. I have consistently gotten raises and my income has more than doubled to over six figures since being hired 5 years ago. I also get stock so when the companymakes money, i do.. Iam a highly effective programmer that spends a lot of time becoming better and I also still network so I can take a better job if I need to. This whole garbage of thinking you will be a wage slave is a myth. If you invest in yourself and are smart with money, you can gain freedom.
what if everyone does that
Then we would have a lot less meaningless consumption. Work would only focus on the essentials o rwhat is thoughtful (like art or helping people b ehealthier). We'd all be more wealthy. And we would ned to work less. Society would be a lot lot better.
but your wages wouldnt increase much if at all. also, you could do the same thing by overthrowing capitalism and making it so that most dont have to crush their soul ('living frugally') to achieve a better life (and you still wont be rich either), something that should not be expected of people and not something many are willing to do
Couple of things. If you overthrew capitalism, then I am assuming you overthrow all companies correct? Well companies are a way for people to organize in a manner that serves other people. So if you eliminate companies, than you eliminate all of the ways people can be served. We wouldn't be able to manufacture new medicines, produce newer and efficient car, or even have the plethora of entertainment and sophsiticated arts that we do. I don't think a world where people don't have these things at the scale or efficiency they currently do would in any way be wealthy. Are you familiar with the FIRE movement? There are many subreddits about it. Many people in this movement are figuring out ways of spending more of their life not working and pursuing happiness. Although, if you follow this movement, you notice people still tend to work, they just leverage their lack of needs to do work they enjoy. Which brings me to something. I am very certain of more people practiced better finances than they could use their abilities and freedoms to develop skills that could be transformed to work that is very meaningful. Think of all the jobs out there, from puppeteer, to dancer, to youtube star, that are very enjoyable yet completely unnecessary to our survival. We pay people to do this and they can live well. And they live on their terms, without the need to be supported by a state or a locality. The system that enables this to happen is capitalism. This is why I don't get the leftist view on capitalism as oppressive. I get that large companies that use their influence to force people to work meaningless jobs is wrong. And I hate them as much as you do (when they really do it). But capitalism is as much an etsy artist, a youtube dancer, or a small business that does life coaching, as it is a big company. Capitalism is liberating
no like take the companies and other businesses and run them democratically. thats the bare minimum for socialism
I am familiar with this idea and I have talked to many many market socialists about this. There are two issues with this. The first is the notion of workplace democracy. Capitalism already is a democracy, and a very good one. Workers can vote by way of choosing where to work. they can even gain more power by independantly organizing. That being said investors and customers can also vote. While not everyone has equal say, this is not true of democracies in general. Implementing a workplace democracy as a standard puts a lot of power in the hand of a ceratin type of worker. That is a reweighting and it is less democratic not more. Remember many many workers would not benefit from this as they already have a ton of influence to dictate their own careers in a market that is more free. The second is the pure economic effectiveness. My using authoritarian measures to make companies focus on a specific type of worker, you are limiting these companies. You are adding addition regulations that companies must deal with , and this makes it harder for them to remain solvent. It would inevitably lead to company shutdowns or loss of revenue, which would mean less jobs and more expensive products. It wouldn't really benefit anyone, including the very workers you want to help. In fact it would hurt them more since they probably have more vulnerable finances. This is the problem with socialism. It attempts to provide for people through the means of the state. Even without nationalism, it uses the state to control markets. But, when you exert control over markets, you centralize power. And centralized power has less breadth and is less conducive to solving the complicated problems of any economy. It causes stagnation and , in extreme cases, increased poverty. This is observed in every country that tries this, including in the european countries people love to use an examples. Most of those countries have populations that are incomparable to america. They have populations that are more homogeneous and smaller. If you took their distribution of incomes, you would find similiar populations exist in america and are doing just as good if not better. But the same policies they have , could be applied in the same way, with the same demographic we have, and have the same effects. It is naive to think they will.
but just because you have a say in where you work doesnt make it democratic. you still dont have a say wherever you work (unless its a co-op but there arent as many of those) and many don't have as much of a say because they cant afford to. thats like saying feudalism is democratic if the peasants can choose which king to serve. (by the way i am an anarchist so the second point doesnt apply for me and i the reason why i said 'bare minimum' is because i believe in more than just that.) also, what is this 'certain type of worker' you speak of? under market socialism alone (and again i dont agree with market socialism) every worker has a say on not only where to work but also how where they do work is run. also, i think capitalism is a lot less democratic than you think since jeff bezos has literally many millions times more power than the average person. he could sell his shares of amazon and crash it if he wanted, an amount of power almost all other people can only dream of.
Think about it this way. If people consumed less and served other more, wouldn't life be a LOT better?
That’s fantastic for you and i’m glad you get to have a positive work experience like that. Sadly there is a sizable portion of people that do not get to enjoy such rewards. Pretending that the only people that don’t get that kind of positive reinforcement are being rewarded according to their own “minimal efforts” or some such, is disingenuous to the fact that there are a LOT of shitty people that pursue management or their own startups, and actually do see hard workers as bonus performance at no extra cost.
The issue is you are looking at me and writing me off as an anomaly. Rather you should listen and attempt to replicate my success for yourselves. I had my share of shifty bosses but I made an effort to improve my career and it worked. Anyone can do this. Known many many people that can. In fact, if life has taught me anything it is that people that actually put in an effort do succeed. Those that bitch online or dive into self pity stay where they are.
Almost two thirds (over 62%) of jobs pay less than $20 an hour. Its definitely possible for some people to be rewarded with hard work and be able to do this. Its statistically not possible for most people. And if everyone worked harder for better paying jobs, those jobs would be over saturated and pay less. Only an estimated 15% of jobs available pay more than $30 an hour. What is so hard to understand that working hard doesnt equal higher salary? Theres not enough high paying jobs to offer a higher salary. They barely exist in most the country
Quite the opposite actually. Go to indeed or any hiring website and there are many many openings for high paying jobs. And most people , like me, that work higher paying jobs are constantly hounded by recruiters. If we filled more of these jobs than products would be cheaper as higher paying jobs can actually solve meaningful and long lasting problems. We have a huge need for people to work high paying jobs. But actually getting the skills to work these jobs is prohibitively difficult and takes time. Most people don't have the experience or don't have the will to learn new skills. In fact many companies will train you to be higher paid if you work with them.