Wednesday, July 27, 2022

Bill Mitchell — We should celebrate the ‘work from home’ phenomenon

My topic today is the issue of the ‘work from home’ phenomenon, which is one of the better things Covid has produced. I explain why. But I also realise a lot of commentators view the phenomenon negatively. Some on the Left allege it just means the ‘woke’ class have abandoned the low-paid workers to Covid, while those on the Right are aghast because they realise that, at least, some workers have more ‘control’ over their working lives. My view is that we should celebrate the fact that some workers are happier. I don’t accept the argument from the ‘Left’ commentators that every worker should be miserable if every worker cannot be happier....
Bill Mitchell – billy blog
We should celebrate the ‘work from home’ phenomenon
Bill Mitchell | Professor in Economics and Director of the Centre of Full Employment and Equity (CofFEE), at University of Newcastle, NSW, Australia

8 comments:

Peter Pan said...

Bill the hypocrite should work from home and reduce his carbon footprint.

Footsoldier said...

Why not a 3 day week?


I quit my job because of it.

Novelty at first and great that you didn’t have to sit on an old, cold and wet bus or train first thing in the morning. Dealing with the rush hours on the way back. After 2 years of it, I was using red lipstick to write redrum on the bathroom mirror.

The lucky ones are the people who enjoy what they do for a living. Everyone else might as well be in the matrix. Office, home doesn’t matter, if you don’t enjoy what you are doing, it is one big struggle that affects other parts of your life.

I’ve had 2 jobs that I loved doing and 20 years went by in a flash. Rest of my working life, time went backwards, as all I did was lock at a my watch. When you talk to people who are just about to retire their biggest fear is they don’t know how they are going to fill their day. Give it a year and they’ll be telling you there is not enough hours in the day.

3 day week is the sweet spot. I don’t know why the human race is in such a hurry and at full tilt all the time. Put everyone on a 3 day week. Humans will still get to where they are going so why the rush. It will just take a little bit longer that’s all. A 3 day week would be one giant health spa for humanity.

Education camps condition everybody for 40 hours. There’s no reason for it, apart from greed and profits for those who set up the education camps in the first place. I’ve yet to listen to a decent arguement why 40 hours is better than a 3 day week. All I hear is complete BS written on a flip chart that reflects a pie chart that is always in a race to be first.







Footsoldier said...

Education camps condition that you work 40 hours to be able to afford a box. In that box you have an alarm that tells you when you have to be awake and when you have to be asleep. Technology within the box repeats 24/7 for the rest of your existence what you can have if you work 40 hours a week. How you should think and live. It is so profound you can now even talk to the technology just so it can reassure you Just in case you are having second thoughts.

By the time the education camps have churned you through the grinder and you come out of the other side. Thanks, marvellous, great, super, love it, wonderful, of course, yes, Just point me in the right direction, I’ll sign up on the dotted line, What’s next, when’s the next conditioning test to test how dumb I’ve become, University to specialise in groupthink, no problem.

It’s so powerful we willingly push our children through the same grinder. Don’t even tell them the truth and lie to our own children. As we help them into their own box. Extraordinary behaviour when you think about it. Might of been better to have given our children the heads up instead of asking how they are feeling every time we meet up for dinner. We know how they are feeling we have been through the grinder ourselves.

You never see a “sit down and tell them the truth about work ” chapter in those how to bring up a child books. Might actually have helped the trade unions and society and humanity as a whole if they did. It’s all about being the best and first at everything. From farting to singing to destroying the planet.

Just change the 40 to a 24. Get rid of any technology that is designed to tell you how to think. Get out of the box. Crime rates would plummet, NHS would be a different place entirely and rural areas that have always had a rough time of it would be booming. Just by changing a number from 40 to 24.

Wherever humanity was heading we would get there. At a walking pace instead of using high speed rail. What’s the rush ? Probably need to fix climate change first. If we had walked instead of using high speed rail we wouldn’t be in this predicament. Instead of pushing our children through the grinder and we had all pushed for a 3 day week instead. Things might be oh, so different.

Peter Pan said...

The 8 hour day, 40 hour week, was the result of labour struggles. Somehow they got dissuaded from asking for more. A 32 hour workweek has yet to be widely adopted.

Footsoldier said...

Update Matt:



At the moment the breeze is going to blow until mid August


https://seekingalpha.com/instablog/910351-robert-p-balan/5758899-us-gdp-day-keep-long-equity-positioning-core-and-scalpers-unhedged-anything-less-minus-2_5

Footsoldier said...

$ still struggling.


I can be wait to see if the rising repo rate has any effect on the $.



I asked him what Neil was saying about accounting wise it didn't make any sense.

He said the reason was that I had only calculated part of the total. The way to calculate all of the total to work out the effect is...



" Net money Supply. It is Fed Balance Sheet plus RRP versus Total Debt Issuance. "


So let's see what happens.








Peter Pan said...

Charles Payne: Second quarter data suggests we are in a depression, not a recession
https://youtu.be/SEKBaX72VWQ

Posted for entertainment purposes.

Calgacus said...

After 2 years of it, I was using red lipstick to write redrum on the bathroom mirror.

All play and no work makes Jack a dull boy.