Stop Me Before I Vote Again

Fascinating questions, both at the original, and here, Al.

As someone who likes to get a job done fast and competently, I sometimes run up against my own impatience with the laziness of coworkers.

It takes some time to remind myself that their laziness is not only healthy, but sane. It's reasonable to drag feet for less than one is worth, or to slow down at the very material enforcement of the very idea of worth.

Identity and self, in our civilization, are price tags. Being "lazy" is a way of scribbling on the sticker at the price point.

That's hard for those of us who know in our heads that labor can reshape relations, but who by temperament and training are industrious.

Well said, Jack. The temperament and training for industriousness are, in some situations, the cops inside our heads. What happens when they want to start giving orders to others? Ugliness, at the very least.

There is also, for the sake of discursive thoroughness, a sweet spot to be reached. If we want bridges and roads, for example, or sewers, that labor needs to be supported.

"Identity and self, in our civilization,
have price tags."

" Being "lazy" is a way of scribbling on the sticker at the point of sale "

i like those lines jack...
well turned

sandy and i refer to a Chinaski effect

shirker or even slacker
i think
might be more sharply defined
and less fabulous terms
then lazy

-----------------
Al ya
20x30x30 looks like
a career's worth of socially necessary abstract labor time

SNALT
-----------------
speaking of socially necessary
many workaholics are OCD
they have a very bad
actual hours AH to SNALT ratio
----------------------------

jack who likes to get a job done fast and competently
might have a AH/SNALT > 1

a ticket to lots
of necessary job site impatience

Work is something I have thought about, taught about, and written about for about forty years. Plus I have been working since age twelve. A few years ago, I summed up what I have learned in a book of essays and short stories title In and Out of the Working Class. Capitalism creates all sorts of tensions around work,which some of you have touched upon above. Here though I relay an amusing story. I once suffered a bout of depression, and the shrink put me on paxil, a prozac-type drug. I read that one side effect of this drug was to allow you to focus intently on a task. One weekend, Karen took the kids to visit relatives. Home alone! I bought a pizza and some beer and settled in to watch basketball games. This was Friday night after work and a long commute home. Next day, I started to work. Cleaned the house, did many loads of laundry,and then sat down at my desk and began to prepare lectures, read, and write. I worked for hours,fueled by the paxil and coffee (another side effect of the drug for me was the capacity to drink coffee all day long with no upset stomach. I was in a kind of work trance, feeling like I could work til Monday. Then late in the night I stopped and said to myself, "what the fuck is wrong with you? The kids are away and you're working." I got up and cracked a six pack. Soon after, I stopped taking the paxil.I think I called in sick that Monday.

Medically actuated Stakhanovism! That's what I'd call iatrogenic illness. Thank all gods you came to your senses.

I desperately wanted to go to work when I was a kid. It seemed like a fast track to a position from which I could defend myself. I thought having money in my pocket and employers who needed me would grant some safety. Maybe the petit bourgeois true believers feel the same way? Who knows. I'm not sure I entirely believe the rugged individualist stories. Somehow or other they all built a business from the ground up; all work ten to fourteen hours a day, six or seven days a week; all treat their employees generously and all feel drenched in the milk of human compassion. It's just too pat. I'd find it more credible if I hadn't come across the same damn story so often, always used as a counter in a rhetorical contest with lefties. I could be overly suspicious. But there's a nagging something or other to the sameness.

After years of work, I cannot seriously entertain the idea of employing anyone on a wage basis. It makes me feel sick. Literally sick.

Work. As an employee, my diligence always seemed to lead to my being taken advantage of, and passive-aggressive resentment. So I'm much happier with my current freelance status.

Now, the Minister of Labor is pushing a bill to make retirement insurance compulsory. Well, that's not really it, because, as things are, federal law dictates that the self-employed pay for their own health and retirement coverage. But she wants to officially establish the premium rate, to be funneled where the ministry sees fit. Incentive to work harder, some might say. Or not work at all.

"After years of work, I cannot seriously entertain the idea of employing anyone on a wage basis. It makes me feel sick. Literally sick."

my small impolitic op

was most fun when the red ink exceeded my personal comp

as to wage payment ?

never troubled me..so long as my family biz lost money

" As an employee, my diligence always seemed to lead to my being taken advantage of, and passive-aggressive resentment. "

TAOed by co workers ?

.. middle or upper management ?

...owner/stock holders ?

"..I'm much happier with my current freelance status "

ahh yes
but are you of
the fee
for professional /artisan services class ?
the creative class?

or "just "
a proprietary producer ?

Freelancing in the professional/artisan services class can often command a higher wage rate—as compared to housecleaning or yard work. It doesn't really change the social relations: it doesn't eliminate working for assholes. It does mean you have some control over stepping away from the most intolerable, without losing all of your income. You can have better behavioral sinks, and more of them. That's about it, though, and of course there's no protection against Labor Ministers.

TAOed by co workers ?
.. middle or upper management ?
...owner/stock holders ?

I never bothered to assess the full extent to which the owners may have been screwing me and didn't stick around long enough make me as jaded as the coworkers who knew I'd do what they wouldn't and the supervisor who learned to come to me first. I've no doubt that their slackness balanced with the company's screwing them. Though I find it unlikely that some wouldn't have been let go by now, whether they "deserved it" or not.

but are you of
the fee
for professional /artisan services class ?
the creative class?
or "just "
a proprietary producer ?

The former two. Everything I create is sold one-time good-deal. If I ever had to chase royalties around, I'd probably sour on things toot-sweet.

And to clarify something else: the aforementioned labor minister has a pretty hefty fee in mind irrespective of income. If taken up as proposed, her suggested contribution would rival the average monthly rent, though I can't speak for cities like Munich and Hamburg.

Her argument has been framed in a way that presents it as a solution to freelancers not working enough to be in but the lowest tax bracket, as if that, in and of itself, should be illegal.

Meanwhile, the lucky labor class can count on the retirement age being raised incrementally until the retirement age is death.

It's hard for me to hold a grudge against slackers. They're pacing themselves.

It does mean you have some control over stepping away from the most intolerable, without losing all of your income.

Absolutely. Not everyone can be so lucky unfortunately; to be one's own union, so to speak. To say "No thanks", even while thinking "FU".

to be one's own union, so to speak. To say "No thanks", even while thinking "FU".

Owen and I have discussed the desirability of that at length. Even in the Worker's Paradise, there's a need for protection against work.

One observation to add to this. I've noticed in recent years, employees beginning, where possible, to take some of their time back, in a somewhat passive-aggressive, "backdoor" kind of way. It's a heartening development. Memorial Day weekend seems to begin on, say Thursday afternoon, which makes Thursday the half day before the holiday starts, which is now on Friday. Ditto July 4th and Labor Day.

And the holiday season? Fughettaboutit. Christmas seems to come earlier and earlier, such that people spends most of the month of December inebriated at either their own company parties, their clients', or at various other "obligations." And the week between Christmas and New Years shuts down.

I realize my observation applies probably mostly to white-collar, "professional" work. Doesn't make it any less inspiring though.

I also wonder how much foot-dragging there is among blue collars these days, how many "sick strikes." How much, "Well, the shift is over in a half hour; maybe I'll just get to that tomorrow."

One of my own, more delicious, ways of taking my time back: Midweek/midway movies. I particularly enjoy "sneaking out" to politcally radical pictures when possble. Adds the the subversive pleasure. Plus, usually plenty of seats available....

One problem for many workers is that machines or some sort of assembly line structure make it hard to hide, that is to steal some free time. A line cook on a busy line can't stop. Nor an auto worker in a modern, lean production plant. A desk clerk at a national park hotel is so busy that he or she often misses lunch. Management can monitor the key strokes of secretaries. Not all workers have sick days and they need the money and can't start holidays early. The room attendants at the Sheraton in Albuerque have to do 27 riims a day. No time to rest. Farm workers, etc., etc. Work really does such for most human beings.

My has this down

Slack is constantly squeezed out
The assembly line was contrived precisely to remove work pace form the job variables of a direct producer

The ability to observe count and record evaluation grows rapidly with
The cyberization of task monitoring

One grave weakness of Orwell he seems to have leaped from china ski factotum jobs to free lance
Even Winston smith
Is a cubicle troll
But the pace and quality monitor seems to end with the morning toe touching

Tax on heads is the ultimo extractor
I once proposed a human capital tax based like a house tax on assessed
Market worth

Clean nasty and if the reward for non payment is horrifying ....

I and my business went bankrupt in 2000 De facto no legal declarations
I lived about ten years burdened with many private and one public
would be extractors some after spuriously claimed but serious money

The cash economy becomes a miracle under these conditions
And the systems blind spots like a Saharan oasis

As a totalitarian it restored my sense of invincible liberty

Recall death washes away all personal obligations
On the snide from creditors becomes a triumph
So long as your obligations are yours only
And your creditors sizable corporations and government treasuries
It's the ones you hang around other folks necks that get to you

Alas

A slacker is indeed burden shifting at most job sites

"I'd find it more credible if I hadn't come across the same damn story so often, always used as a counter in a rhetorical contest with lefties. I could be overly suspicious."

To me, it's not a question of credibility, it's a question of relevance.

The chain of logic seems to run something like

I'm doing well, and I work six ten hour days a week. In fact, I'm doing well because I work six ten hour days a week.

Therefore

Anybody who works six ten hour days a week will do well.

Therefore

If you aren't doing well, it's because you made the choice not to work six ten hour days a week.

That chain of therefores is ridiculous. The fact that you know one guy who succeeded by doing something doesn't prove that everybody who acts like that one guy will be exactly as successful. It's clear you don't inevitably become Paris Hilton by acting like Paris Hilton, and it seems just as likely you won't become hardworking business owner guy even if you do act like him.

For example, maybe you're a waitress and your boss doesn't want to give you more hours. Maybe "well, you should quit and open a small business" is not even slightly helpful advice.