What is odd to me is hearing people talk as if somehow a job is supposed to be intrinsically enjoyable or enriching. Paid labor is and always has been a subservient role that pays exactly the minimum that the market allows for the circumstances.

Labor is the next option above slavery and indenture, and now that slavery and indenture are frowned upon, labor has absorbed that space as well.

If you want to have some control of your environment and destiny, you must be an independent agent, a contractor, entrepreneur, or consultant. A tradesman. You have special skills and expertise, your own tools, and a portfolio of masterpieces at the least.

There is nothing new in this space of human endeavour, it is as it has been, and I suspect will continue to be, for better or for worse. Sacrificing your agency for subservience is going to make you feel at the mercy of your “betters”. If you don’t want that, don’t do that. Labor law and other conventions have made it a little better, but the fundamental relationship is still master and servant.

> Labor is the next option above slavery and indenture, and now that slavery and indenture are frowned upon, labor has absorbed that space as well.

If we go down this path, what can I say that doesn’t get my account banned and my speech suppressed for what what I would suggest doing to people with your opinion?

We don’t have to go down that path, it’s the path we’re already on.

It’s not the way I think it -should be- but it is the way that it is. The incentive alignment keeps it at that local minima, and every attempt to move it to a new one so far has introduced so many perverse incentives that it ultimately causes the regression or even complete failure of the economies it is implemented in.

I don’t know what the answer is that maximises human happiness and minimises human misery, but I suspect it lies well outside of the paradigm of conventional market economics.

Within the dominant paradigm, It’s all a matter of risk management. With employment, you are paying your employer with your surplus value to handle the risks that you feel powerless to manage. Market risks, capital risks.

In exchange, you accept risks that your opinions and comfort won’t be prioritised, and in some cases even your physical well being.

In effect, you are betting against yourself being able to balance those risks against the risks posed by pursuing profitability.

The ability to manage risks is intersectional with your ability to manage discomfort and privation. When you run out of money, the house wins by default.

That’s why the foundational step for anyone should be to do whatever they must to obtain a safe fallback position. A place to be. A safety net. This is what enables risk accommodation. Without taking risk, there will be no advancement. If you don’t have a fallback plan, a safe spawn point, do everything in your power to create one, at least for your children.