why wouldn’t it be? i have access to unlimited music, unlimited tv shows, essentially unlimited entertainment, my choices of food are near unlimited, i have access to dentistry and medical assistance light years from where it was at, etcetcetc
What is the point of so much unlimited everything when we are limited ourselves? No one can “reap” all the benefits so what’s wrong with taking it easier?
Also, sometimes I think we would benefit from not having unlimited anything. It has also given way to so many shitty uninspired content, like profession yappers rambling on youtube/twich for hours, slop shows from companies that cancelled good ones cause they weren’t profitable enough, shitty cashgrab videogames cramming in as many dark patterns as possible etc.
Filtering the good stuff can be exhausting, and filtering the fake info is exhausting too. Is more really better or just different?
What is the point of so much unlimited everything when we are limited ourselves? No one can “reap” all the benefits so what’s wrong with taking it easier?
We do take it easier though, unfortunately the average person is unaware of how much more difficult life was 100 years ago so we can’t compare. I wouldn’t want to go back to even the 90’s, pre-fibre internet, slow computers, no spotify, I love listening to music so I had to wake up at 7am in the morning on Saturday to listen to the music TV show. I had to listen to the friggin radio man! It sucked!
Is more really better or just different?
We have different challenges living as kings and queens than we do before but we really are in a much better place than even 30 years ago, pre-smart phone, pre-computer, pre-wikipedia, pre-google
An example is obesity is now a bigger problem than hunger because we have access to so much cheap great tasting empty calories
But it’s certainly better to be obese than starving, you can stop being obese by simply working on yourself, can’t really do much about starvation if you’re poor and can only afford 1 meal every 2 days.
The other issue is the rise of social media and the infected spreading doomerism (see: this thread as an example), doomerism spreads faster than positivity, in the same way people prefer to read about bad things happening than good.
I have all that, too, and I am unemployed. Granted, there are some luxury things I can’t get or sometimes tight months and I pirate a lot, but I do still live a better life than kings of the 19th century without grinding myself down.
Also I already fell for the same trap the promise of “hard labour earns you stuff”, worked myself into two burnouts with no reward worth the consequences, so fuck it, I’m done. And you need to wake up. You’re not working for yourself and everything you strive for can get ripped from you by some unforseen shit. On their deathbed, no one ever regretted not having worked more.
You’re not working for yourself and everything you strive for can get ripped from you by some unforseen shit
The grind is not the grind for your boss, it’s for you, if you got hit by lifestyle inflation I can understand why you’re feeling ripped off.
Also I already fell for the same trap the promise of “hard labour earns you stuff”, worked myself into two burnouts with no reward worth the consequences
If you’re grinding for no reward then you should stop or move to a company that appreciates you
You also seem to have gotten half the memo, there are productivity nutters on linkedin who love working and love going all out 100% all day every day, but for the rest of us we generally have 2 goals:
Fuck You Money
FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early)
If you’re not really interested here’s a brief 1 minute video on it taken from a movie:
Shortly after 9/11 my company kicked me to the curb.
Six months earlier our division president had taken me to a congratulations lunch for a record breaking year. We were explosively growing and embarrassingly profitable. Over a bottle of fine wine we discussed my very bright future.
I have F U money, so if I lose my job unexpectedly I’ll be fine for the next 2 years and because I’ve got so much experience and skills in my industry it won’t take that long to find something else. I’m also happy because I’ve left 2 crappy workplaces for an amazing one with a great boss that appreciates the hard work I put in and that I’m grateful for every day
Next step after that is FIRE, this is a bit of an intro to it but there’s tons of info all over the net:
Again some people go to the extreme with this lifestyle and make their own food and live off grid but for most of us it’s just a matter of spend less than you earn, save/invest the rest
and once I’ve got my house paid off in a few years my average expenses per month will be down to pensioner levels while I earn 10x as much, as I do like working at that point the next goal is:
Barista FIRE is where the returns from your invested assets cover most, but not all of your living expenses, and you do work that you find enjoyable to make up for the difference and fund the rest of your lifestyle.
It is, because your boss gets a far bigger share from whatever worth you produce than you. If the grind was for yourself, you’d get the biggest share of profits you worked for.
Risking your health isn’t worth having your boss profiting most off of your work.
why do you americans always go to healthcare but don’t even look at my name
So you can afford a few streaming services and have access to a supermarket?
do you need me to spell out every single major technological leap in the last 100 years for you or can type a few words in a search engine which searches all the worlds information and brings you results instantly?
edit: would also like to point how just how much tech and innovation is involved in “a few streaming services” and supermarkets
this was 30 years ago! 1989!
The overall takeaway is that much of America’s greatness lies in the ordinary.
“He toured New York City, he saw the Statue of Liberty, Trump Tower — he wasn’t impressed,” Mack said. “He saw NASA. Again, no big deal. But it was a grocery store that made him realize that communism is a lie.”
I’d like to thank people like Nikola Tesla who grinded for electricity:
Tesla’s workday typically began around 9 AM and extended until 6 PM, during which he immersed himself in the realms of electricity and mechanics. Known for his relentless work ethic, he often returned to his projects late into the night, sometimes working until 3 AM. He reflected his commitment to solitary pursuits that often led to groundbreaking discoveries.
Interestingly, Tesla avoided lunch entirely, believing that excessive eating stifled creativity. He remarked, “Why overburden the bodies that serve us?” This philosophy extended to his critique of societal eating habits, as he noted in an interview, “People eat too much and exercise too little.”
and all those who grind away at places like Netflix to provide incredible services ‘that are common now’
Also like to thank the Shuji Nakamura who invented the Blue LED:
Nakamura continued to develop the blue LED on his own and in 1993 succeeded in making the device.[13][12]
And he worked 12 hour days 7 days a week for over a year:
This comment is confusing to me because here it seems that you redefine the “grind” to mean being creative and productive with your work when the OP is rather clearly expressing that people do it as a means to increase their wealth specifically. A quick Google search suggested that although Tesla did make a lot of money off of his work, he didn’t use that money to live a lavish lifestyle but instead used it to fund more projects that he was interested it and by he time he died he was pretty much broke. He wasn’t a capitalist and wasn’t fueled by the idea of making a large fortune. Going back to OP’s context of the work “grind”, I think it’s accurate to say Tesla did not “grind for electricity”.
I was going to mention the moving of the goalposts but I think you’ve done that nicely.
I’m sure the inventors made bank. I shudder to think how many of those workers in this technological age are earning minimum wage.
No matter how hard you grind, minimum wage is minimum wage and inflation is inflation.
One goes up every year. The other does not.
As to how I’m personally exploited? Well I live in Australia where massive tax breaks are given to wealthy property investors which allow them gentrify entire urban areas. Wealthy politicians own multiple properties which only incentivises them further.
The people that grew up in those areas are priced out of their own market. There is a massive housing crisis down here in Australia and it’s all a result of rampant capitalism.
OP is rather clearly expressing that people do it as a means to increase their wealth specifically
Good for them?
he didn’t use that money to live a lavish lifestyle but instead used it to fund more projects that he was interested it
Good for him?
Nobody holds a gun to your head and forces you to buy a lambo, if you want to FIRE or become a power lifter or do something else go for it
It’s ultimately about effort, easiest example is people who spend 2 minutes a day on Duolingo and expect to become fluent in their chosen language and those who grind it out and spend hours a day working on it because they want it.
You may not necessarily enjoy it but you do it, it goes back to discipline etc last post here
Yup, and you do so through the pain and suffering of billions of those less fortunate than you who slave away to provide you that quality of life that you deny to them.
believe it or not the system has also improved the lives of billions of people:
Two centuries ago, the majority of the world population was extremely poor. Back then, it was widely believed that widespread poverty was inevitable. But this turned out to be wrong. Economic growth is possible, and poverty can decline. The world has made immense progress against extreme poverty.
Really any cursory glance at how the World Bank defines “extreme poverty” and the cause of “poverty reduction” reveals this for the farce that it is. The World bank defines “Extreme poverty” as earning less then $3 a day.
Around 2 billion people on this planet remain subsistence farmers. They grow food, that they then eat, they may sell some food to buy things but for the most part these people do not really make any money. When subsistence farmers are forced off their farms to look for a work, they suddenly become wage earners and are removed from “poverty”.
Being moved from a subsistence farmer to a 12 hrs a day sweatshop slave is not poverty reduction. The real term for it is much more enlightening: proletarianization.
thanks! i live an incredibly high quality life thanks to the system that exploits me, i literally live a better life than kings did 150 years ago
Is that supposed to be a flex?
why wouldn’t it be? i have access to unlimited music, unlimited tv shows, essentially unlimited entertainment, my choices of food are near unlimited, i have access to dentistry and medical assistance light years from where it was at, etcetcetc
What is the point of so much unlimited everything when we are limited ourselves? No one can “reap” all the benefits so what’s wrong with taking it easier?
Also, sometimes I think we would benefit from not having unlimited anything. It has also given way to so many shitty uninspired content, like profession yappers rambling on youtube/twich for hours, slop shows from companies that cancelled good ones cause they weren’t profitable enough, shitty cashgrab videogames cramming in as many dark patterns as possible etc. Filtering the good stuff can be exhausting, and filtering the fake info is exhausting too. Is more really better or just different?
I’m not complaining about medicine tho.
We do take it easier though, unfortunately the average person is unaware of how much more difficult life was 100 years ago so we can’t compare. I wouldn’t want to go back to even the 90’s, pre-fibre internet, slow computers, no spotify, I love listening to music so I had to wake up at 7am in the morning on Saturday to listen to the music TV show. I had to listen to the friggin radio man! It sucked!
We have different challenges living as kings and queens than we do before but we really are in a much better place than even 30 years ago, pre-smart phone, pre-computer, pre-wikipedia, pre-google
An example is obesity is now a bigger problem than hunger because we have access to so much cheap great tasting empty calories
But it’s certainly better to be obese than starving, you can stop being obese by simply working on yourself, can’t really do much about starvation if you’re poor and can only afford 1 meal every 2 days.
The other issue is the rise of social media and the infected spreading doomerism (see: this thread as an example), doomerism spreads faster than positivity, in the same way people prefer to read about bad things happening than good.
I have all that, too, and I am unemployed. Granted, there are some luxury things I can’t get or sometimes tight months and I pirate a lot, but I do still live a better life than kings of the 19th century without grinding myself down.
Also I already fell for the same trap the promise of “hard labour earns you stuff”, worked myself into two burnouts with no reward worth the consequences, so fuck it, I’m done. And you need to wake up. You’re not working for yourself and everything you strive for can get ripped from you by some unforseen shit. On their deathbed, no one ever regretted not having worked more.
The grind is not the grind for your boss, it’s for you, if you got hit by lifestyle inflation I can understand why you’re feeling ripped off.
If you’re grinding for no reward then you should stop or move to a company that appreciates you
You also seem to have gotten half the memo, there are productivity nutters on linkedin who love working and love going all out 100% all day every day, but for the rest of us we generally have 2 goals:
Fuck You Money
FIRE (Financial Independence Retire Early)
If you’re not really interested here’s a brief 1 minute video on it taken from a movie:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGC9FY65HBo
If you’re interested:
https://jlcollinsnh.com/2011/06/06/why-you-need-f-you-money/
I have F U money, so if I lose my job unexpectedly I’ll be fine for the next 2 years and because I’ve got so much experience and skills in my industry it won’t take that long to find something else. I’m also happy because I’ve left 2 crappy workplaces for an amazing one with a great boss that appreciates the hard work I put in and that I’m grateful for every day
Next step after that is FIRE, this is a bit of an intro to it but there’s tons of info all over the net:
https://www.mrmoneymustache.com/2013/02/22/getting-rich-from-zero-to-hero-in-one-blog-post/
Again some people go to the extreme with this lifestyle and make their own food and live off grid but for most of us it’s just a matter of spend less than you earn, save/invest the rest
and once I’ve got my house paid off in a few years my average expenses per month will be down to pensioner levels while I earn 10x as much, as I do like working at that point the next goal is:
:)
It is, because your boss gets a far bigger share from whatever worth you produce than you. If the grind was for yourself, you’d get the biggest share of profits you worked for.
Risking your health isn’t worth having your boss profiting most off of your work.
So you can afford a few streaming services and have access to a supermarket?
If you live in a society that cares about its citizens you also have free healthcare.
That’s a very low bar to clear dude.
I have all of those and still feel exploited as fuck by this capatilist bullshit.
why do you americans always go to healthcare but don’t even look at my name
do you need me to spell out every single major technological leap in the last 100 years for you or can type a few words in a search engine which searches all the worlds information and brings you results instantly?
edit: would also like to point how just how much tech and innovation is involved in “a few streaming services” and supermarkets
this was 30 years ago! 1989!
https://www.houstonpublicmedia.org/articles/shows/houston-matters/2020/02/21/361467/boris-yelstins-1989-visit-to-a-houston-grocery-store-is-now-an-opera/
supermarkets were only invented 100 years ago!
First, I’m Australian.
Second, even very poor people like myself have access to those. They are common now.
I am still exploited by capitalism and I feel it every day.
I’d like to thank people like Nikola Tesla who grinded for electricity:
and all those who grind away at places like Netflix to provide incredible services ‘that are common now’
Also like to thank the Shuji Nakamura who invented the Blue LED:
And he worked 12 hour days 7 days a week for over a year:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AF8d72mA41M
Without him LCD screens wouldn’t be possible (which are common now).
How are you exploited by capitalism?
This comment is confusing to me because here it seems that you redefine the “grind” to mean being creative and productive with your work when the OP is rather clearly expressing that people do it as a means to increase their wealth specifically. A quick Google search suggested that although Tesla did make a lot of money off of his work, he didn’t use that money to live a lavish lifestyle but instead used it to fund more projects that he was interested it and by he time he died he was pretty much broke. He wasn’t a capitalist and wasn’t fueled by the idea of making a large fortune. Going back to OP’s context of the work “grind”, I think it’s accurate to say Tesla did not “grind for electricity”.
Thank you.
I was going to mention the moving of the goalposts but I think you’ve done that nicely.
I’m sure the inventors made bank. I shudder to think how many of those workers in this technological age are earning minimum wage.
No matter how hard you grind, minimum wage is minimum wage and inflation is inflation.
One goes up every year. The other does not.
As to how I’m personally exploited? Well I live in Australia where massive tax breaks are given to wealthy property investors which allow them gentrify entire urban areas. Wealthy politicians own multiple properties which only incentivises them further.
The people that grew up in those areas are priced out of their own market. There is a massive housing crisis down here in Australia and it’s all a result of rampant capitalism.
Good for them?
Good for him?
Nobody holds a gun to your head and forces you to buy a lambo, if you want to FIRE or become a power lifter or do something else go for it
It’s ultimately about effort, easiest example is people who spend 2 minutes a day on Duolingo and expect to become fluent in their chosen language and those who grind it out and spend hours a day working on it because they want it.
You may not necessarily enjoy it but you do it, it goes back to discipline etc last post here
Some guy in 2175 is laughing at you
why would some guy in 2175 be laughing at me?
edit: if you could put more effort into your posts beyond 1 vague and shitty line that’d be appreciated
k
Did kings have to grind?
And yet you sound like a basement dweller who has a special sock
Yup, and you do so through the pain and suffering of billions of those less fortunate than you who slave away to provide you that quality of life that you deny to them.
i live a fine life actually
🤣
believe it or not the system has also improved the lives of billions of people:
https://ourworldindata.org/extreme-poverty-in-brief
wow incredible😀
Really any cursory glance at how the World Bank defines “extreme poverty” and the cause of “poverty reduction” reveals this for the farce that it is. The World bank defines “Extreme poverty” as earning less then $3 a day.
Around 2 billion people on this planet remain subsistence farmers. They grow food, that they then eat, they may sell some food to buy things but for the most part these people do not really make any money. When subsistence farmers are forced off their farms to look for a work, they suddenly become wage earners and are removed from “poverty”.
Being moved from a subsistence farmer to a 12 hrs a day sweatshop slave is not poverty reduction. The real term for it is much more enlightening: proletarianization.
It’s great that poverty seems to decline. However, have you ever wondered what caused/causes poverty on the first place?
Spoiler alert: it’s not caused by people that are not grinding enough