The modern phenomenon of nonsense jobs

[regexcellent]

according to your reasoning, CEOs have become 1000% more productive than the average worker since 1950 and their productivity, relative to the average worker, has increased nearly twofold from the year 2000.

Correct. The value of what you produce is literally what people pay you for it.

[C0ckney]

Correct. The value of what you produce is literally what people pay you for it.

could you then explain the process by which this massive increase in CEO productivity, relative to the average worker, has happened?

[pchang]

I have more leisure time and more things. C0ckney and Oncle Boris are just losers!

[C0ckney]

I have more leisure time and more things. C0ckney and Oncle Boris are just losers!

when the revolution comes, you will be first against the wall!

[Ben Kenobi]

Didn't the revolution already succeed? Last I checked the Brits lost.

[Ben Kenobi]

instead of a real choice between more leisure and more things, which advancing techology should afford us.

Perhaps Britain should invest in technology and enter the first world?

[regexcellent]

could you then explain the process by which this massive increase in CEO productivity, relative to the average worker, has happened?

No, but I know that it has happened simply by the fact that they are paid more.

[Felch]

The thing with so-called bull**** jobs is that they do make life better. Somebody who's got a relative skill advantage can take over tasks that would frustrate or irritate other people. So if you don't want to express your dog's anal gland, you don't have to. If you don't want to paint your house or change your brake pads, hire somebody who has a lot of experience to do it for you. You just have to find your own thing that you do well to pay for it.

Basically life today is better than it was in 1930, and it's because we're working more than 15 hours a week. Service economies rule.

[Lorizael]

Correct. The value of what you produce is literally what people pay you for it.

This is only true in a general, idealized case. It's very easy to show that this model breaks down in specific situations. For example, if two employees do the same work and receive the same pay, but only one of them asks for a raise, is the one who gets the raise doing more valuable work? Or say I blackmail my boss into giving me a raise. Has the value of what I produced suddenly increased?

Examples such as these don't prevent the general rule from being good enough most of the time, but they illustrate that we need to be careful before accepting the simplest model of economics. It's extremely possible that there can be systemic flaws in a particular industry that consistently skew wages, in much the same way as the examples above. In fact, we know that prices can be "wrong" on a large scale. The most basic example? The minimum wage.

[AAAAAAAAH!]

i think the author dismisses this point too easily. it's fairly clear that people have chosen and do choose to have more things over working less. the really interesting question is why. we are bombarded on a daily basis with advertisements and messages, both overt and covert, telling us about things which can make our lives better in some way. products are promoted as giving the purchaser or user one or more of the following: ease, 'cool', social acceptance and advancement, sexual success; in short happiness. no other message, be it political, social, moral or religious is given to us all with such force and consistency as the one to buy, buy buy. this is why, for example, 3-5 year olds can recognise brand logos and names (google it, if you don't know what i'm talking about).



the real genius of the consumer society is that it isn't compulsory. anyone, if they so choose, can, to a greater or lesser extent, opt out. so in a sense we all freely choose to participate in the consumer society. however, it's very important to recognise and think about the environment in which those choices are made. there are serious costs to not participating, both practical and social (hence why i'm posting this on a computer, in an urban setting, instead of living in a shack in the hills - well that and the fact that i couldn't do that because someone else owns the land - but that's another thread right there), and for this reason, very few people choose to opt out entirely. this combination of practicalities, social pressure and the idea, implanted from a very early age, that more things equals happiness, means that our choices are reduced to which baubles or trinkets we buy; instead of a real choice between more leisure and more things, which advancing techology should afford us.

A lot of the extra money has actually gone into health care and education. People will expend a lot of resources to extend their existence and to attempt to make their children better off.

[Kidlicious]

Correct. The value of what you produce is literally what people pay you for it.

No. If people paid you for the value of what you produce they wouldn't make profit, and there would be no incentive to hire you.

[AAAAAAAAH!]

No. If people paid you for the value of what you produce they wouldn't make profit, and there would be no incentive to hire you.

Profit is the reward for the productivity of hiring people.

[Kidlicious]

Profit is the reward for the productivity of hiring people.

No. If you do your own hiring you can increase your profit but at a cost.

[Sava]

Profit is theft.

[Kidlicious]

Profit is theft.

Profit is the same as consumer surplus.