Whatever happened to diminishing marginal utility of money?
It’s probably not about money, but about status. There is never enough status, by definition, for an average person. Feminists taught women that having a job is high status, and taking care of children is low status.
(Of course there are also other reasons to prefer job, not only status. People may like their jobs, or at least enjoy the sense of financial security or social opportunities that jobs provide.)
Maybe jobs today are actually quite easy and pleasant, and we just have a cultural taboo against admitting it. I mean, I was surprised when I asked some people about what would they do if they luckily became millionaires and never had to go to work again. Many people responded that without a job, life would be boring. (What, they can’t imagine a time-consuming hobby?) So it seems like to some degree people today have jobs to avoid boredom or existential anxiety; and they ask money only because they need to pay their expenses, and as a status symbol. This would explain why so many different jobs have similar working times and similar salaries.
Agreed that status is part of the explanation, and the recent devaluing of parenting effort vs. job effort is certainly contributory.
I’m not sure how to weigh your statement that jobs are now “easy and pleasant” (certainly they’re physically less demanding and safer than in the past) with the prevalence of chronic stress and so on. Certainly your millionaire example is weak evidence that jobs are some combination of fun and statusful, though it has the same status-quo caveats as people thinking of the upside of death. Also note the great stress and unhappiness coming from being laid off or otherwise unemployed, even among well-off people with adequate savings.
But notice also that past aristocrats were able to amuse themselves perfectly well without what we now recognize as a job, with some combination of socializing and deep immersion in hobbies. We have many people now with similar levels of wealth, yet they don’t tend to evolve in that direction. Status, rather than fun, seems to be the more important factor here.
Another thought is that perhaps work has become more gameified than in the past through the same evolutionary pattern that produces superstimulus foods. This is much more possible in office work than in for example agriculture where the pattern of tasks is set by uncaring nature at a very deep level.
“I suppose it is because nearly all children go to school nowadays and have things arranged for them that they seem so forlornly unable to produce their own ideas.” ~Agatha Christie
Maybe the modern aristocrats unable to enjoy their life without work are victims of the school system. They spend years learning that you have to participate in some structured activity in the morning, and then you have to waste your time in the evening. As opposed to doing something meaningful in a relaxed manner all the time.
It’s probably not about money, but about status. There is never enough status, by definition, for an average person. Feminists taught women that having a job is high status, and taking care of children is low status.
(Of course there are also other reasons to prefer job, not only status. People may like their jobs, or at least enjoy the sense of financial security or social opportunities that jobs provide.)
Maybe jobs today are actually quite easy and pleasant, and we just have a cultural taboo against admitting it. I mean, I was surprised when I asked some people about what would they do if they luckily became millionaires and never had to go to work again. Many people responded that without a job, life would be boring. (What, they can’t imagine a time-consuming hobby?) So it seems like to some degree people today have jobs to avoid boredom or existential anxiety; and they ask money only because they need to pay their expenses, and as a status symbol. This would explain why so many different jobs have similar working times and similar salaries.
Agreed that status is part of the explanation, and the recent devaluing of parenting effort vs. job effort is certainly contributory.
I’m not sure how to weigh your statement that jobs are now “easy and pleasant” (certainly they’re physically less demanding and safer than in the past) with the prevalence of chronic stress and so on. Certainly your millionaire example is weak evidence that jobs are some combination of fun and statusful, though it has the same status-quo caveats as people thinking of the upside of death. Also note the great stress and unhappiness coming from being laid off or otherwise unemployed, even among well-off people with adequate savings.
But notice also that past aristocrats were able to amuse themselves perfectly well without what we now recognize as a job, with some combination of socializing and deep immersion in hobbies. We have many people now with similar levels of wealth, yet they don’t tend to evolve in that direction. Status, rather than fun, seems to be the more important factor here.
Another thought is that perhaps work has become more gameified than in the past through the same evolutionary pattern that produces superstimulus foods. This is much more possible in office work than in for example agriculture where the pattern of tasks is set by uncaring nature at a very deep level.
“I suppose it is because nearly all children go to school nowadays and have things arranged for them that they seem so forlornly unable to produce their own ideas.” ~Agatha Christie
Maybe the modern aristocrats unable to enjoy their life without work are victims of the school system. They spend years learning that you have to participate in some structured activity in the morning, and then you have to waste your time in the evening. As opposed to doing something meaningful in a relaxed manner all the time.