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Why Do We Work So Hard? (1843magazine.com)
An anonymous reader points us to a fascinating piece at The Economist that tries to explain the elements that drive people to work so hard: Working effectively at a good job builds up our identity and esteem in the eyes of others. We cheer each other on, we share in (and quietly regret) the successes of our friends, we lose touch with people beyond our network. Spending our leisure time with other professional strivers buttresses the notion that hard work is part of the good life and that the sacrifices it entails are those that a decent person makes. This is what a class with a strong sense of identity does: it effortlessly recasts the group's distinguishing vices as virtues. This reminds me of an article by Om Malik, veteran reporter and founder of the GigaOm news outlet, who wrote this when announcing his retirement. From his piece: "I relate to Jeter's desire to find life outside of work. Living a 24-hour news life has come at a personal cost. I still wake in middle of the night to check the stream to see if something is breaking, worrying whether I missed some news. It is a unique type of addiction that only a few can understand, and it is time for me to opt out of this non-stop news life."
Only because you're really ignorant, but hiding that from yourself. There is an imbalance in the earnings from labor and those from equity that isn't justified by anything except social and corporate structures. In truth work beyond the real level of achievement adequate to fuel leisure only fuels the class divide supporting the ultra-rich, and dupes the poorer into believing they need it for their own security. Puritan ethic is "work is good", but said another way "arbeit macht frei" - the implication is the same.
Funny, as one born in a communist country, I can tell you don't know shit about socialism/communism and how they worked.
The rulling class, elected by the free will of the people (yeah, right), was supposed to think for the unwashed workers and peasants. The unwashed had to work as hard as they could in order for the whole society to be able to beat back the class enemy (capitalism). Wehn that happened and socialism/communism would rule the world, we would all live in paradise where everybody would work according to their abilities (rulling class thinking, workers working) and everybody would get a share according to their needs (rulling class a bigger one as they have to be free of troubles in order to guide the society, working class enough to be able to work another day).
It's the same message every rulling class is promoting to the unwashed: work your ass off so we (as in we, the rulling class, not in we, as a country) would have enough to live happily ever after.