It was interesting reading this after having finished reading Bertrand Russell's, "In Praise of Idleness." [1]
It always struck me as odd that the ghost of the Protestant Ethic is still haunting us to this day. There are plenty of reasons why we can and should work less and still enjoy the benefits of a decent, modern life. And in spite of our advances there is a pervasive belief that we should work more.
I think this will be a very good thing and I'm interested to see how it turns out for Switzerland.
It always struck me as odd that the ghost of the Protestant Ethic is still haunting us to this day
Why is that odd? A strong work ethic has historically led to if not happiness, at least success & progress on a national scale. It is only natural that it would then be selected for.
> There are plenty of reasons why we can and should work less and still enjoy the benefits of a decent, modern life.
Or work more, but do so because you love your work, not to cover for some basic need. If I could retire next week, I'd probably work a little less, but wouldn't stop.
>> There are plenty of reasons why we can and should work less and still enjoy the benefits of a decent, modern life.
>Or work more, but do so because you love your work, not to cover for some basic need. If I could retire next week, I'd probably work a little less, but wouldn't stop.
If you read the essay I linked to, Bertrand Russell makes this very point. It's not that we should work less and be completely unproductive, but rather that we should work less so that we may better utilize our time to pursue those interests and lines of research that satisfy our curiosity.
I used some downtime I had a while ago during a job search to pursue such avenues. I don't think I've ever had a more productive period. As I was unconstrained by profit motivations I was free to think ideas I would have otherwise dismissed due to a lack of time and energy.
If I could retire next week, i'd still work on projects (heck maybe even the kind of project i'm doing at work now) but i'd also spend more time with my table saw.
It always struck me as odd that the ghost of the Protestant Ethic is still haunting us to this day. There are plenty of reasons why we can and should work less and still enjoy the benefits of a decent, modern life. And in spite of our advances there is a pervasive belief that we should work more.
I think this will be a very good thing and I'm interested to see how it turns out for Switzerland.
[1] http://www.zpub.com/notes/idle.html