Valuing labor

[Rukh]

I watched a video quite a long time ago now, and again just recently:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRVdiHu1VCc

In the video, Mr. Mike Rowe talks about a few things. If you've seen it, it's a humerous piece but also eye opening and thought provoking. I would strongly suggest watching it if you haven't, it's entertaining and not too long. (and other things at TED, it's an awesome concept)

Basically he talks about breaking down misconceptions. Primarily in this case, about labor. He points out that in the US, we wage war on labor in a variety of ways, and he wanted to break down some fundamental concepts. The biggest one being that labor oriented jobs suck. He was able to point at that most people who have this sort of job are in fact pretty happy.

He also points out that some people doing purely labor oriented jobs end up making a ton of money by doing it. I kind of think this distracts from his overall point though for a few reasons. The biggest one is we NEED people doing labor-oriented jobs. One of his biggest points is that innovation is nothing without imitation. What he means is that people can innovate all they want, but you need people willing to make the product a reality. Steve Jobs might have hosted a team to come up with the iPhone, but we wouldn't ever have it as a product without the assembly lines in China.

The fact is, we need people who empty garbage cans, work on assembly lines, take fast food orders etc. All these jobs are important to a functioning society, and yet we constantly are on the assault against them.

This comes from a variety of angles too. It comes from constantly pushing higher education. That you are worth less if you don't get super educated. That "rednecks" and "blue collar workers" are beneath the educated elite. That definitely is unhelpful thinking.

It also comes from capitalists too, constantly looking down on "the poors" Constantly picking out inflammatory cases to attack. Oh my god how dare we make internet access cheap and easy, you're taking away the motivation for the rich to be rich! No, I really don't think you are. How are you provide public healthcare so people can LIVE on labor-focused menial jobs that we need to exist?! Being healthy is a luxury for the rich! blah blah.

The fact is, we drastically undervalue labor in this country on all sides of the political spectrum. Labor is important, it is vital even. We need to get back to that. Education is great, but education is only great for people who want to go in to fields that need it. We need to value technical jobs and labor jobs just as greatly and stop acting like a kid farted in church if they say they'd rather go to work out of high-school instead of college.

It comes from media bigtime. We constantly value people who do very little work, but have "glamerous jobs" entertaining us with music or sports. We idolize them, even though we could live perfectly fine without them. We tell people that this is good, and if you're not making tons of money either doing this or shitting on people in business, well you're just not very interesting nor important.

We also need to work on our public welfare and make a society where people can lead a plenty comfortable life even if they're working a job that doesn't pay a ton. The US is by far the richest country in the world, yet we treat people with lower paying jobs like absolute shit. Why? Why don't we work on that? We can afford it, trust me. Why can't we make a system where all citizens are comfortable and where it's ok if you're working as a janitor. You're doing an important task, and you should be valued. Thank you janitors, thank you trash picker upers, thank you assembly line workers, and thank you fast-food workers. We don't think you're shit because you can't afford a mazerati.

[Daelak]

I watched a video quite a long time ago now, and again just recently:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRVdiHu1VCc

In the video, Mr. Mike Rowe talks about a few things. If you've seen it, it's a humerous piece but also eye opening and thought provoking. I would strongly suggest watching it if you haven't, it's entertaining and not too long. (and other things at TED, it's an awesome concept)

Basically he talks about breaking down misconceptions. Primarily in this case, about labor. He points out that in the US, we wage war on labor in a variety of ways, and he wanted to break down some fundamental concepts. The biggest one being that labor oriented jobs suck. He was able to point at that most people who have this sort of job are in fact pretty happy.

He also points out that some people doing purely labor oriented jobs end up making a ton of money by doing it. I kind of think this distracts from his overall point though for a few reasons. The biggest one is we NEED people doing labor-oriented jobs. One of his biggest points is that innovation is nothing without imitation. What he means is that people can innovate all they want, but you need people willing to make the product a reality. Steve Jobs might have hosted a team to come up with the iPhone, but we wouldn't ever have it as a product without the assembly lines in China.

The fact is, we need people who empty garbage cans, work on assembly lines, take fast food orders etc. All these jobs are important to a functioning society, and yet we constantly are on the assault against them.

This comes from a variety of angles too. It comes from constantly pushing higher education. That you are worth less if you don't get super educated. That "rednecks" and "blue collar workers" are beneath the educated elite. That definitely is unhelpful thinking.

It also comes from capitalists too, constantly looking down on "the poors" Constantly picking out inflammatory cases to attack. Oh my god how dare we make internet access cheap and easy, you're taking away the motivation for the rich to be rich! No, I really don't think you are. How are you provide public healthcare so people can LIVE on labor-focused menial jobs that we need to exist?! Being healthy is a luxury for the rich! blah blah.

The fact is, we drastically undervalue labor in this country on all sides of the political spectrum. Labor is important, it is vital even. We need to get back to that. Education is great, but education is only great for people who want to go in to fields that need it. We need to value technical jobs and labor jobs just as greatly and stop acting like a kid farted in church if they say they'd rather go to work out of high-school instead of college.

It comes from media bigtime. We constantly value people who do very little work, but have "glamerous jobs" entertaining us with music or sports. We idolize them, even though we could live perfectly fine without them. We tell people that this is good, and if you're not making tons of money either doing this or shitting on people in business, well you're just not very interesting nor important.

We also need to work on our public welfare and make a society where people can lead a plenty comfortable life even if they're working a job that doesn't pay a ton. The US is by far the richest country in the world, yet we treat people with lower paying jobs like absolute shit. Why? Why don't we work on that? We can afford it, trust me. Why can't we make a system where all citizens are comfortable and where it's ok if you're working as a janitor. You're doing an important task, and you should be valued. Thank you janitors, thank you trash picker upers, thank you assembly line workers, and thank you fast-food workers. We don't think you're shit because you can't afford a mazerati.

The war against labor has been fought for decades. The tide is turning though.

[Cronch]

It's definitely true that labor-oriented jobs are critical for a functioning society, but something to keep in mind is that the simplest of these jobs are rapidly being filled by robotics. I would say that this is the biggest reason that even those that want a labor-oriented job should pursue higher education. Eventually more advanced robots will be developed that are capable of the more complex labor jobs, so those jobs will become more and more scarce for people to fill. It's a slow process for sure, but it is definitely happening.