I still don't know how to do hyperlinks
http://www.newstatesman.com/2013/12/right-be-lazy
It's pretty long and very detailed. The author did his research and my god did he want you to know it. I'd probably feel the same way if I'd spent hours reading through old texts, modern science books and Samuel Johnson.
I've read Rassalass, I know how much of a chore Johnson can be. I haven't read the dictionary yet, but I hear good things.
Anyway, I agree with Poole on this. Today we're expected to do more, always being more productive, always working. To stop is to die, or rather, to stop is to let other people swoop in and take our place.
That's the threat that employers dump on you these days. The last two jobs that I've had have used that on me. "Work harder, do more, do you know how many unemployed people are out there trying to take your place?"
That's not verbatim, but that is very much the culture that I've came from in my working life. Generally I've been earning minimum wage or just a little above it, meanwhile my workload seemed to increase daily. I've always been a proponent of the idea of minimum wage means minimum effort. If you pay somebody the bare minimum, then you have to expect that they're going to give you the bare minimum in return. If employers want people to go the extra mile, they should be willing to go first.
You would expect me to tell these employers to go to hell and storm out of there in a Malcolm Reynolds inspired feat of self-realising heroism.
on here, so you'll have to make do with me posting the whole thing in here.
Because I needed the money and I knew just how many unemployed people were clamouring for work. Desperate for it.
That destroyed me, both times I attempted it. I build myself up after one horrible job experience and then went tumbling head first into an exact same situation with somebody else.
So a lot like my sex-life, only not as creatively fulfilling and marginally less of a fire risk.
It's the same everywhere. Unemployed people are expected to jump through multiple hoops; going through pre-screening, screening, evaluation, scrutiny, post-screening, post holing, holy rolling, row-row-row boating, boat racing, race examination, exams, tests, another round of pre-screening, dance contest, bikini contest, a second round of screening before finally getting to the interview stage. And then they just give the job to one of their mates anyway.
Employers have the power, it's a buyers market. They're doing this crap because they can get away with it, not because it's good for their business.
Going off point for a bit. Why does every job application expect you to tell them your race? Who does that help? All it does is out potential employers as racists. If your success or failure at a job hinges on what race you are, your employer is racist. You're better off without them.
Why do we put ourselves through this? Nobody works themselves to death because they love it. We do it because we're scared. We're scared that we won't be able to pay our rent. We're scared that we won't be able to feed our children. Shit, we're afraid we won't be able to feed ourselves.
This is what's being hung over our heads. If we fail, if we're not productive enough, if we refuse to 'work hard and get on' as the Tories are so fond of saying, then we'll be out on the street with nothing. They're already cutting benefits, trying to impose harsher sanctions so that there's no safety net for when we leave the jobs that are killing us.
So employers start hiring more people on zero hour contracts, expecting work programme 'volunteers' to fill the gaps in their work force, expecting part time workers to do a full timers workload for half the money. And if you don't like it? You can be replaced.
This is a crisis that's been engineered by the people in power so they can keep us scared, so they can keep us working harder for less to increase their own profits.
Because that's the absolute bottom line here. More profit for the 'wealth creators,' the hoarders at the top of the pile with all the money and all the connections.
I don't think there's any easy answer. So long as people keep getting up every morning and going to jobs that they hate then this is only going to get worse.
It's a grim future ahead of us.