Bertrand Russell - In Praise of Idleness pt 2 of 4

This is the morality of the Slave State, applied in circumstances
totally unlike those in which it arose. No wonder the result has been
disastrous. Let us take an illustration. Suppose that, at a given
moment, a certain number of people are engaged in the manufacture of
pins. They make as many pins as the world needs, working (say) eight
hours a day. Someone makes an invention by which the same number of
men can make twice as many pins as before. But the world does not
need twice as many pins: pins are already so cheap that hardly any
more will be bought at a lower price. In a sensible world, everybody
concerned in the manufacture of pins would take to working four hours
instead of eight, and everything else would go on as before. But in
the actual world this would be thought demoralizing. The men still
work eight hours, there are too many pins, some employers go
bankrupt, and half the men previously concerned in making pins are
thrown out of work. There is, in the end, just as much leisure as on
the other plan, but half the men are totally idle while half are
still overworked. In this way, it is insured that the unavoidable
leisure shall cause misery all round instead of being a universal
source of happiness.

Can anything more insane be imagined?
The idea that the poor should have leisure has always been shocking
to the rich. In England, in the early nineteenth century, fifteen
hours was the ordinary day's work for a man; children sometimes did
as much, and very commonly did twelve hours a day. When meddlesome
busybodies suggested that perhaps these hours were rather long, they
were told that work kept adults from drink and children from
mischief. When I was a child, shortly after urban workingmen had
acquired the vote, certain public holidays were established by law,
to the great indignation of the upper classes. I remember hearing an
old Duchess say: "What do the poor want with holidays? They ought to
work." People nowadays are less frank, but the sentiment persists,
and is the source of much of our economic confusion.
Let us, for a moment, consider the ethics of work frankly, without
superstition. Every human being, of necessity, consumes, in the
course of his life, a certain amount of the produce of human labor.
Assuming, as we may, that labor is on the whole disagreeable, it is
unjust that a man should consume more than he produces. Of course he
may provide services rather than commodities, like a medical man, for
example; but he should provide something in return for his board and
lodging. To this extent, the duty of work must be admitted, but to
this extent only.

I shall not dwell upon the fact that, in all modern societies outside
the USSR, many people escape even this minimum amount of work, namely
all those who inherit money and all those who marry money. I do not
think the fact that these people are allowed to be idle is nearly so
harmful as the fact that wage-earners are expected to overwork or
starve.

If the ordinary wage-earner worked four hours a day, there would be
enough for everybody, and no unemployment - assuming a certain very
moderate amount of sensible organization. This idea shocks the well-
to-do, because they are convinced that the poor would not know how to
use so much leisure. In America, men often work long hours even when
they are already well off; such men, naturally, are indignant at the
idea of leisure for wage-earners, except as the grim punishment of
unemployment; in fact, they dislike leisure even for their sons.

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Tags:

• bertrand
• russell
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• work
• capitalism
• socialism

[bagoodtube]

pure energy , what a man

[FeelingFreshSon]

It saddens me that people have such blind faith in the morality of work. I'm no economist, but I'm almost positive that the endless junk we seem to produce does more harm than good. I'm still looking into the viability of Russell's outlook though. :P

[RookofIvory]

"Can anything more insane be imagined?" 79 years later, organized capital is still without an answer.

[stuqua]

The morality of the slave state has penetrated like a cancer to very nearly the last corner of the globe.

[ari1234a]

t0ktok Why You do this ???

[BreakingTheBanality]

good ideas, thanks