Posted on 02/25/2019 6:28:14 PM PST by daniel1212
For the college-educated elite, work has morphed into a religious identity—promising identity, transcendence, and community, but failing to deliver...
In his 1930 essay “Economic Possibilities for Our Grandchildren,” the economist John Maynard Keynes predicted a 15-hour workweek in the 21st century, creating the equivalent of a five-day weekend... In a 1957 article in The New York Times, the writer Erik Barnouw predicted that, as work became easier, our identity would be defined by our hobbies, or our family life...
These post-work predictions weren’t entirely wrong. By some counts, Americans work much less than they used to. The average work year has shrunk by more than 200 hours. But those figures don’t tell the whole story. Rich, college-educated people—especially men—work more than they did many decades ago...
No large country in the world as productive as the United States averages more hours of work a year. And the gap between the U.S. and other countries is growing...In 1980, the highest-earning men actually worked fewer hours per week than middle-class and low-income men, according to a survey by the Minneapolis Fed. But that’s changed. By 2005, the richest 10 percent of married men had the longest average workweek. ...
Perhaps long hours are part of an arms race for status and income among the moneyed elite. Or maybe the logic here isn’t economic at all. It’s emotional—even spiritual. The best-educated and highest-earning Americans, who can have whatever they want, have chosen the office for the same reason that devout Christians attend church on Sundays: It’s where they feel most themselves. “For many of today’s rich there is no such thing as ‘leisure’; in the classic sense—work is their play,” the economist Robert Frank wrote. “Building wealth to them is a creative process, and the closest thing they have to fun.”..
(Excerpt) Read more at theatlantic.com ...
Oh. I know. No kids. It’s positively spooky
I like that. Thanks.
-PJ
I enjoy working. I want to work until I literally drop dead. I don’t ever want to retire.
“Half a week off made me and the wife crazy trying to stay entertained.”
Apparently you have never learned to just relax and enjoy life.
No large country in the world as productive as the United States
i’m “retired”, but i still “work” ... i enjoy working, contributing my skills to help others, keeping my knowledge and skills up to date, maintaining sociability, keeping mind and body active, and picking up a small amount of extra money (compared to my former corporate salaries) ...
“I’m the rich uncle”
ditto ...
We were young and dancing as fast as we could.
I used to work forty hours as a tech rep, maintain five acres and run a part time used furniture business involving going to two or three auctions a week, hauling a load back and putting it on display and helping my wife run the store. I took a little time off to sleep and eat but not much. Saturday was my day off from the regular job but it was the busiest day at the store so Sunday was the only day I got any time off and I worked some on Sundays. I actually enjoyed it but eventually had to close it because my wife could not take the strain any longer and she had far more time to relax than I ever did. I realized later than I should have given up the tech rep job and enlarged the business. Then I could have hired some help.
Scratch that. We’re #7 behind Luxembourg, Switzerland, Macau, Norway, Iceland, Ireland, and Qatar.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal)_per_capita
I have worked an eighty hour week for years and then one week off as a hospital pharmacist. Prior to this in my oilfield days it was 14 days on or 28 days on (I was working offshore rigs) and then 14 or 28 days off. I loved it. On my days off my wife and I did anything we wanted to do.
Me = retired now and just teach kids how to fly. It is a pretty good gig.
That is good. I usually pray that God will bring me to the people or them to me that He would have me minster to, to help to be saved, or otherwise help.... Availability is more needed than great ability. Thanks be to God in Christ.
Now hear this: Air Force raises enlistee age limit from 27 to 39 - Air Force - Stripes. Under federal law, the oldest recruit any military branch can enlist is 42. But that's still a long way from our age.
Me, too. For a long time, i had a lot of free time, and found I wasn’t very good at filling it with productive, healthy activities. Now, I work more, and have one main hobby, that’s actually related to my job. The rest of the time I’m sleeping.
As a Navy radioman, my favorite watch schedule was
the 2-2-2-80. It involved a ‘double back’ where you’d work 16 hours a day a few times, a few 8 hour days, then be off for 80 hours.
I didn’t, either, but I did learn to smoke weed and drink beer. Some people need the structure of work.
gross domestic product per capita at nominal values
This map renames each US state with a country generating the same GDP
Yes, as a norm, which is what I am referring to, not that one cannot be single, as I am, and even Christ and Paul (not that I am fit to be named in their company) were, but as in their days that is not to be the norm.
And if you died as a servant of Christ, you get (a privilege) to serve Him forever (and yet rest).
And there shall be no more curse: but the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it; and his servants shall serve him: And they shall see his face; and his name shall be in their foreheads. (Revelation 22:3-4)
Work is part of our purpose, whether that work is taking care of our children or doing ‘office duty.’ I’m happy to trade off with my wife when her salary exceeds mine (i’m a cis male in a heterosexual relationship for those DU people reading - actually it is called ‘matrimony’ in our particular case.)
We have traded off ‘careers’ several times. Once a person reaches 30 it is fairly unlikely one can become ‘successful.’ Since I am unlikely to ever be ‘successful’(I’m too ‘old’)) I’d rather spend my efforts taking care of my children so they may become reverent and ‘successful.’
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