{"id":324851,"date":"2017-09-06T18:07:33","date_gmt":"2017-09-06T17:07:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/the-drudgery-of-modern-work\/"},"modified":"2017-09-06T18:07:33","modified_gmt":"2017-09-06T17:07:33","slug":"the-drudgery-of-modern-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/newswire\/the-drudgery-of-modern-work\/","title":{"rendered":"The Drudgery of Modern Work"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>\n<p>A bitter irony of modern life is just when computers and robots should give people more time for creativity and relaxation, the opposite is often the case for many, a continued life of drudgery, as Lawrence Davidson observes.<\/p>\n<p>By Lawrence Davidson<\/p>\n<p>We have just celebrated Labor Day weekend (September 2, 3, 4) in the United States, the very heartland of capitalism. Apropos of the holiday, I happened to have run across a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.smallbizlabs.com\/2016\/07\/satisfaction-with-traditional-jobs-hits-10-year-high-but-still-well-below-independent-worker-satisfa.html\">July 2016 survey<\/a> with the original paradoxical title, \u201cJob Satisfaction Hits a 10-Year High \u2013\u00a0But It\u2019s Still Below 50%.\u201d<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_24467\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/plugins\/lazy-load\/images\/1x1.trans.gif\" data-lazy-src=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-300x225.jpg\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-24467\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-1028x771.jpg 1028w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-160x120.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\"\/><noscript><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-24467\" src=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-1028x771.jpg 1028w, https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/09\/FANUC_6-axis_welding_robots-160x120.jpg 160w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\"\/><\/noscript><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-caption-text\">A robotic welder in a factory.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>What the survey reports is that \u201cjust under half (49.6%) of U.S. workers surveyed reported they are satisfied with their jobs.\u201d These are workers in \u201ctraditional jobs,\u201d which are typically eight-hour-a-day employment at conventional job sites. The report then compares this \u201cjust under half\u201d rate to the reported job satisfaction of \u201cindependent\u201d workers \u2013 those self-employed or working in an autonomous or semi-autonomous way. The reported satisfaction level of these \u201cindependent\u201d workers was 65 percent.<\/p>\n<p>The first number is downright depressing and the second is not very impressive. Also, consider what the report attributed the improvement (compared to say, 40 percent satisfaction in 2010 for traditional jobs) of the low satisfaction numbers to: \u201ca decline in layoffs, stronger wage growth and expanding job opportunities [expanding labor market].\u201d None of these factors addresses what ought to be one of the major, and obvious, goals of work \u2013 the fulfillment, as far as possible, of individual human potential. Or, to state it another way, providing avenues for the individual to \u201cbe all he or she can be.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Economic_history_of_the_world\">conventional definition <\/a>of an economy is a system of \u201cproduction, distribution and consumption of goods and services.\u201d Historically, this definition of the way human beings produce and apportion both the necessities and accessories of life has proven incomplete, because it makes no reference to the psychological human need for being creative through labor.<\/p>\n<p>This psychological need for realizing one\u2019s potential in this fashion might not have&#8230;<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p> <a href=\"https:\/\/consortiumnews.com\/2017\/09\/05\/the-drudgery-of-modern-work\/\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A bitter irony of modern life is just when computers and robots should give people more time for creativity and relaxation, the opposite is often the case for many, a continued life of drudgery, as Lawrence Davidson observes. By Lawrence Davidson We have just celebrated Labor Day weekend (September 2, 3, 4) in the United [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2524,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[519],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-324851","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-newswire"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324851","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2524"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=324851"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324851\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=324851"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=324851"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=324851"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}