Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Anything to do with the traditional world of get a degree, get a job as well as its alternatives
liberty
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Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by liberty »

Let's here define work as "something you do to help others". By this definition work can be paid or non-paid, and not all "jobs" are work. Some jobs are pure BS jobs, they don't help anyone with anything. But if you do work, that provides value to others, that's actually a great thing to do. I feel that stop working (helping others) is kind of lazy, and a bad thing to do. I have "retired", I don't have a job anymore, but I work on projects to help others (and myself - I'm scratching my own itch, and making things that also help myself). If I don't do any work, I feel a bit bad. I have a shitload of work capacity, and it's kinda bad to not use it to help others.

What do you think?

AxelHeyst
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by AxelHeyst »

Thinking that capacity implies obligation (I can work 12hrs/day therefore I ought to), which I'm inferring from your post, is a bad idea. Riggerjack said this a while ago, better than how I just rephrased it.

Nothing wrong with helping other people. A statement that not helping other people is bad is a pretty... sparse? ethical framework. Going to run into practical issues pretty quickly with that I think.

Victor Frankl wrote that humans find meaning in experience, creation, and ensuring unavoidable suffering with dignity. Is he wrong? Or ... Are we talking about different levels of systems here? Meaning source vs ethical statements. Hm.

By use of the word good and bad are you meaning it in the ethical sense? Or existential experience sense? Or something else?

I like to wrote essays for fun. Sometimes it helps people (let's say). But that's not why I do it. Is my essay writing still good? Or does intent matter?

Does anyone truly stop helping other people? I mean, you gotta be a total piece of shit to have figured out how to literally help no one by any of your actions. Is this really a serious concern, then?

If this basically just boils down to " hey, retiring to a life of video games and beer and complete self centeredness is a bad way to live a life" then, well, um, yeah.

mathiverse
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by mathiverse »

It isn't morally bad to decide not to work if you don't have to. Individuals aren't obligated to reach their full potential or use their full working capacity whether retired or not.

It can be useful to work (inclusive of unpaid and paid work) even if you don't have to. One needs some ways to: pass the time, meet with others, find fulfillment, etc and oftentimes those things might be work in the sense that you described. A lot of activity in the world that is interesting could be called work, a lot of activity in the world that is fulfilling could be called work, sometimes people pay you for things you are doing for free and it's okay to take the money.

OutOfTheBlue
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by OutOfTheBlue »

Hi Liberty,

To be sure, work is a loaded word.

I am a little confused, because in your post, you make a new definition, for the sake of the discussion (work is "something you do to help others"), but then you go on and use the words "work", "work capacity" "working", "job" (and "retirement", "not doing any work") mostly in the traditional sense, plus assigning labels to them (work is good, not working is lazy, bad).

Another recent post of yours was on this topic, so here's what I think:

Could you clarify where you come from with this?

Because I sense this is not a purely theoretical question.

Are you personally on the fence about pursuing FIRE/ERE because you feel that working is inherently a good thing and conversely not working is something that one should avoid?

Is this how you really define work? If so, what other ways are there to help others, while scratching your own itch, besides work? And is this notion one that you share with your social environment (as in a work ethic with possibly religious overtones)?

liberty
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by liberty »

AxelHeyst wrote:
Sat May 28, 2022 8:07 am
Thinking that capacity implies obligation (I can work 12hrs/day therefore I ought to), which I'm inferring from your post, is a bad idea. Riggerjack said this a while ago, better than how I just rephrased it.
No obligation, I'm just talking about what's good to do, that you are doing something good by working. By working 12h/day, you might get burned out and probably do worse work in the long term, but this depends on the type of work.

I mean in an ethical sense. As a hedonist I want as much pleasure (and as little pain) as possible in the world. I think it's ethical to improve the overall amount of pleasure. If you work with something you hate doing, that might maybe be better for the overall happiness to not work at all. But if the work is not a net pain, if it provides more pleasure than pain in total, I think it's better to work than to not work. It's ethical to do work, but no obligation.
AxelHeyst wrote:
Sat May 28, 2022 8:07 am
I like to wrote essays for fun. Sometimes it helps people (let's say). But that's not why I do it. Is my essay writing still good? Or does intent matter?
Intent doesn't matter.
AxelHeyst wrote:
Sat May 28, 2022 8:07 am
Does anyone truly stop helping other people? I mean, you gotta be a total piece of shit to have figured out how to literally help no one by any of your actions. Is this really a serious concern, then?
Of course almost all people help with some actions. If you are FI, you help others by providing capital, for example. The question is if you can help more, by using your work capacity. It's better for society if ones work capacity is used.
AxelHeyst wrote:
Sat May 28, 2022 8:07 am
If this basically just boils down to " hey, retiring to a life of video games and beer and complete self centeredness is a bad way to live a life" then, well, um, yeah.
It has nothing to do with that. I mean from an ethical point of view. I should have made that clearer.

OutOfTheBlue
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by OutOfTheBlue »

Sorry, I should have searched a little your past postings. I just found that you are already FI. Are you having second thoughts?

I don't think the answer can be found in a universal or absolute morality/ethics.

The chapter on the Morality trap in "How I found freedom in an unfree world" by Harry Brown could be a thought-provoking read for you.

No matter how we approach the subject, we always wind up at the same place: No one can decide for you what is moral. So no matter what it may be, you are living by a personal morality. The question is whether or not you're acting deliberately to make it the morality that will bring you the kind of life you want for yourself.

liberty
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by liberty »

Hi @OutOfTheBlue.

There are different definitions of work. I wanted to define it for this particular thread to make sure no one read is at "doing things to make money". With "work" I here mean "helping others". With "work capacity" I mean "capacity to help others". By "job" I mean "doing something to earn money". I had a job before, I came 40 hours per week in because I wanted to earn money. But that job was to a high degree also "work" since my work was helpful to others.

I love FI, but I don't think that "stop working" is a good thing for the society. FI is good for me. I can do only work that helps others, and that I also enjoy doing myself. I can wake up without an alarm clock, work on what I want, finish a task whenever I want etc. Also FI can enable people to take a lot more risk: FI-people can for startups and use their own work as "capital" instead of going to venture capitalists.
Is this how you really define work? If so, what other ways are there to help others, while scratching your own itch, besides work? And is this notion one that you share with your social environment (as in a work ethic with possibly religious overtones)?
Investing is one way to help others that not necessarily is "work". Let's say you buy an index fund and just holds that. It helps others (by providing capital), but you don't do anything, and then it's not "work". Well, I haven't discussed this before. The "religious overtones" is pure hedonism: Get as much pleasure and as little pain as possible in the world.

OutOfTheBlue
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by OutOfTheBlue »

Thanks for the clarifications.

This is the good thing with being FI. You decide what you want to do on your own terms.

You don't work just because you have to, according to external rules. You can decide to continue working and set your own rules or have a big say.

On a personal level (because I insist this is a question of personal morality, there is no higher moral ground), I am afraid the notion that I came into this world to help others through work (and work alone), and that I should express my individuality and community belonging primarily through work is alien to me.

Work is just a sea in the ocean of meaningful human activity.

EDIT: Apologies for the many postings.

AxelHeyst
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by AxelHeyst »

Yep, with those clarifications, I think pretty similarly to you liberty. For me, I take great pleasure in 'productive engagement' of various sorts, and anything that brings benefit to others feels extra good. I think most humans are wired this way, more or less. It's all just a matter of dialing in how much, of what sort, with whom, etc to find our personal sweet spots.

Whether or not helping others should be consciously centralized when deciding what to do next Tuesday...? I'm reminded of that line, 'dont ask what the world needs more of, ask what makes you come alive. Because what the world needs is more people who are coming alive'. (David Whyte maybe?)

Chasing stoke, from a place of being a well grounded, centered, self aware, mature, whole human adult, is likely (inevitably?) To lead to the benefit of others.

I think. Just some musings. My backstory is I tried really hard for twelve years to help people (sustainability professional) and I think I mostly just tuckered myself out. My method could have used some improvement, for sure.

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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by jacob »

With the OP definition of "work = activity that helps others", it's definitely positive to extend that definition to "anti-work = activity that hurts others". This would put drinking beer and playing video games somewhere slightly above 0. Whereas a lot of jobs, indeed a large fraction of the economy, would actually classify as anti-work since people make their paycheck creating problems that other workers have to solve.

This of course just kicks the philosophical can one level down. For example, if you're selling tobacco, are you helping those who want to smoke or are you hurting them by eventually making them sick but in turn helping people who are employed at the cancer ward as a secondary effect ... and so on.

Another angle is the Robinson Crusoe angle. If Crusoe works really hard in order to be self-reliant while his work obviously doesn't help others, does that mean his life on a remote island is meaningless?

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Sclass
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by Sclass »

When I still officially worked I felt that I was working to make our investors rich.

I was helping them. They got my human capital at kind of a flat rate determined by market pressures set by my sell out peers. I’m very happy not to help them anymore.

After building the business from six employees to a couple of hundred I really hated to hear the rank and file talk about the founders. “Production workers are the business, without us those eggheads wouldn’t have anything.” It was kind of sickening realizing I created the job that fed their kids, paid their health insurance, paid for their hourly Cheeto breaks, paid their mortgages and financed their new car they got right after they landed the job. They were really a bitter entitled lot. If you counted their overtime they weren’t making much less than the white collar employees who created their job out of thin air.

So I don’t like helping the investors. I don’t like supporting the ingrate rank and file. I’m happy I haven’t contributed to social programs like Social Security and Medicaire since I quit. I love work as long as it is my work - that I own.
OutOfTheBlue wrote:
Sat May 28, 2022 9:34 am
This is the good thing with being FI. You decide what you want to do on your own terms.

You don't work just because you have to, according to external rules.
I tried to operate this way at the end of my career. FI did a lot but it was a step short of bliss. Quitting was kind of a nuclear option. As long as I worked there I still had to sit there listening to management’s unreasonable demands and accompanying intimidation. Didn’t matter if I didn’t technically need the job. I don’t think I was scared of them like the other employees. It was more like they annoyed and pissed me off with their bully management style. Quitting was the only solution.

7Wannabe5
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by 7Wannabe5 »

Disappointment Panda just dropped by. We had margaritas and he told me all about it: problems never fucking go away- they just improve. Warren Buffett’s got money problems; the drunk hobo down at Kwick- E Mart’s got money problems. Buffett’s just got better money problems than the hobo. All of life’s like this.
- The Subtle Art of Not Giving a Fuck - Mark Manson

So, we’re wired to always approach life like a problem, and to only get happiness by solving problems. Sometimes when it seems like we’ve run out of our own problems*, we’re stuck with only having other people’s problems to solve towards happy feelings. Sometimes we try to find happiness by solving other people’s problems even when we do have some major problems of our own. Sometimes other people’s problems are easier. Sometimes we fear that other people’s problems will spill over into being our problems if we don’t help. Sometimes we recognize that we are part of a social system and helping other people with their problems may help everybody, including ourselves. Sometimes a six year old is vomiting on the floor in front of you, and helping is reflexive.

*But this is never true. For instance, even if you have 100 million saved, you might still suck at karaoke. There’s always going to be something you still suck at.

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Jean
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by Jean »

@Sclass
This remind me of when i realized that winning the lottery could probably afford one to get in orbit around mars and survive there for a while.

zbigi
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by zbigi »

Sclass wrote:
Sat May 28, 2022 3:12 pm
It was kind of sickening realizing I created the job that fed their kids (...)
I am assuming you worked as engineer there? If that's the case, weren't it the investors who really created all the jobs? They hired you to do your white collar part, and the "ingrates" to do blue collar work. But it was investors/founders really who took the initiative at the very beginning and who created this money-making (and job-providing) machine out of nothing. Of course, it doesn't make the blue collar grumbling you mentioned right, I'm just curious if you agree with my perspective.

liberty
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by liberty »

jacob wrote:
Sat May 28, 2022 12:11 pm
Another angle is the Robinson Crusoe angle. If Crusoe works really hard in order to be self-reliant while his work obviously doesn't help others, does that mean his life on a remote island is meaningless?
I will not say it's meaningless if it gives him more overall happiness. If his life is net-positive (more pleasure than pain), it would be good for the overall happiness that he keeps himself alive. What he does is not work based on my definition here. Maybe it would make sense to include the person himself in "work"-definition (helping others or yourself), but then things like masturbation would also be "work", and that is probably to stretch it too far (literally).

mathiverse
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by mathiverse »

zbigi wrote:
Sat May 28, 2022 3:40 pm
I am assuming you worked as engineer there?
Where I work as a software engineer, engineers are regularly the folks to propose work areas that result in hiring. Thus, an engineer would have created the new positions even if credit must also be given to investors and owners and other parts of the environment that allowed the proposal to be turned into a team of new hires. Without the engineer, the proposal may not have happened, so they were a critical part of the positions being created.

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Sclass
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by Sclass »

@zbigi - My case may be a little different than what you’re used to.

It was my startup. I was “the engineer.” Among other things. Small business requires a lot of roles for each person. Not quite the same as being “the engineer” at Hewlett-Packard.

So when I say I created the jobs, I created the actual job. I even assembled the first workstations from IKEA furniture. I created the dehumanizing automated machinery to ensure the hourlies did their jobs according to advertised specs. We had a rebellion years in but the new manufacturing department reprogrammed the machinery to make the job more lively. Out of my hands by then. So the workers kind of forgot the origin of their daily grind. Me.

The investors, heirs to an banking dynasty, paid. But they created nothing. Money alone cannot create a masterpiece. Actually the matriarch of the investors is famous for curating and donating a huge collection of classical world antiquities to a big museum in the Bay Area. That was her expertise. Buying other people’s masterpieces.

Saying they created the jobs is about as absurd as saying they sold our product. Yes they owned a company that sold precision metrology gear. But sales was done by our master salesman. He created sales.

So no I don’t agree with your perspective. Not that it’s wrong because you are probably thinking of a business like Google or GE. This was a small startup that I spun up with my friends. By the time I left the line workers didn’t even know I was the same SClass on the patent plaques in the lobby. Actually nobody looked at them except the cleaners.

I guess it was less like a mega corp than it was a little diner. The cook and proprietor has the responsibility for creating roles like the busboy, waitress and receptionist. Even though he’s “just a cook.” The investor is the small town banker lending out money for interest on savings accounts.

Toska2
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by Toska2 »

Movement is good for the body. What it looks like; play or work, depends on the observer. Play or work can be good or bad depending on situation and realm (individual or social).

So imo: Be Aware and Do Something.

candide
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by candide »

This thread has a lot of examples of the thinking that leads me to prefer to use the term "job" instead of "work" when I am making critiques.

Aaron Swartz wrote:
Hard work isn’t supposed to be pleasant, we’re told. But in fact it’s probably the most enjoyable thing I do. Not only does a tough problem completely absorb you while you’re trying to solve it, but afterwards you feel wonderful having accomplished something so serious.
I too love work, especially when I have autonomy of when and how I execute the work, but work is not all we do when we are on the job. I think of the problem as the job-system, which is located within the larger problems of exploitation and extreme inequality.

WFJ
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Re: Work is good (and to not work is bad?)

Post by WFJ »

Maybe watch "The Obsolete Man" from Twilight Zone.

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