Why "No One" Wants to Work Anymore

right now there's this conception that nobody wants to work anymore many people quit their jobs in the great resignation that took place during covid and many businesses today are openly struggling to hire enough workers so it begs two questions a is it true that nobody wants to work anymore and B if so then what are they doing because we all need money right well what if I told you the answers to those questions could be different than what you might think what if I told you we could find the answers by weaving through a story involving the cost of living crisis private government and something that I call the information revolution if that sounds interesting to you then buckle up because I'm going to share with you some things that you probably already know some things that you probably don't know and some things that you definitely don't so let's begin this investigation into why no one wants to work anymore in the realm of the familiar in an area that you probably already do know on a first hand basis the cost of living crisis as everyone is aware by now the cost of living is much higher than it was even just five years ago but if we go back even further than that we can find some really interesting data which puts things into Stark perspective looking at this chart here together we can see that in 1999 the median pre-tax household income was forty four thousand dollars now to put that simply you can think of this number as the middle of the road income that a family would make before deducting taxes from their paycheck so that was forty four thousand dollars in 1999. now today in 20 1923 we can see that this number has grown to be about ninety thousand dollars so over 24 years or so the middle of the road family income has grown by about 104 or in other words it's basically doubled interesting so that sounds pretty good right I mean a doubling sounds like quite a bit more we should be pretty happy about that then well what if I told you that that's not actually the case because just looking at income isn't really that useful what we actually need to do is we need to pair it with how the cost of living has also changed over time so let's look at this chart which shows us one of those costs in particular and the cost in particular that we're looking at is the single biggest cost for most people and that is housing so if we look again back to 1999 we can see that the price of a benchmark home so you can think just like a standard kind of average home was about 150 000 now today in 2023 the cost of that same home is seven hundred and fourteen thousand dollars aha so that is a 380 percent increase or almost a quadrupling in value so when we compare the rise in income of a factor of about a 2X there to the rise in home values of a 4X there we can see that even though incomes have doubled since 1999 you are actually further behind than someone would have been 24 years ago in fact to make this point even more clear we can look at another chart which shows us that that same middle of the road family would have paid just under a quarter of every paycheck in order to be able to afford their mortgage in 1999 so in other words after paying for their mortgage they still had 75 percent of their paycheck to spend on whatever else they wanted to however today the same middle of the road family has to pay almost half their income to mortgage the exact same home this is a massive difference this is the cost of living crisis and while the data that I've just shared with you is from stats Canada because that is the country I live in in the environment that I'm most familiar with I'm quite certain that this is a global phenomenon but this begs the question because I mean hold on wait a second if we accept that there is a cost of living crisis right now if we accept that more money today can actually buy you less things than before then why would that contribute to people wanting to work less that seems counter-intuitive right that that doesn't make any sense shouldn't people want to work even more because they need much more money yes that is exactly correct but the secret is they are working just not in the way that you might think they are and not only are they working in this different way but they're also making a lot more money than people who are working in the traditional sense this is a hint to something that I hope should be very clear by the end of this video you see saying no one wants to work anymore is both a true and a false statement first let's start by going over that statement as true and then we can look at it from the side of false true no one wants to work anymore there are two major reasons why no one wants to work anymore in the traditional sense and the first reason piggybacks off what we just talked about the cost of living crisis and that's because no one wants to work anymore in the traditional sense because surprise surprise the incomes received from those jobs have not kept up with the pace of acceleration in the cost of living of things that we all need to buy to live and have a decent life now that first reason might be fairly obvious but the second reason though is something you might not be aware of or at least it might be something that you feel but haven't ever been able to put it into articulate words and make sense of it at least I know that was the case for me until I read this book private government by Elizabeth Anderson and interestingly actually this book is not a book it's a compilation of two lectures that Elizabeth Anderson gave at Princeton in 2014 I believe and she advances an idea here that put into words the exact feeling that I had when I worked in a large corporate environment and that's the idea that workplaces particularly large corporate or firm structured ones are actually communist dictatorships now that's a radical idea and at first there's probably a lot of mental objections that pop up in your head and it's also a little bit of an idea that's kind of hard to wrap your head around so we're going to go through this with baby steps kind of bit by bit here so we can see where she's coming from when she says that workplaces are essentially communist dictatorships so first of all we need to determine what she means by this what she means by government and then after that we're going to determine what she means by the word private and then we're going to combine them too to arrive at what exactly a private government is and then from there we'll be able to understand what she means when she says workplaces are a form of communist dictator so let's talk about that term government now when we say government normally we think of a country right we connect it to this concept of a nation state and we think of this as the public sphere it's a place where there are things that are shared collectively by everyone but if we were to say private government that immediately kind of seems like a contradiction right because when we're talking about government generally we're talking about in the public sphere but when we say something's private isn't that the opposite of it isn't that the realm of the individual for example a public service like schools we may associate with the government with the public sphere and then a private company like Amazon we associate with the idea of the private individual basically we imagine at the point at which the public sphere ends the point at which government ends is the point at which the private sphere begins or the point of individual liberty begins right well the truth is sort of and kinda not really at all in some cases let me explain what I mean first of all government does not actually mean the nation state and it does not actually mean the public sphere that's not the definition of government and that's not the only place government exists it's just the most obvious example of government to us truthfully as Anderson says here government exists wherever some have the authority to issue orders to others backed by sanctions AKA punishments in one or more domains of life that's it that's the criteria of what a government is and by this definition it should be clear that governments yes they exist at the state level but not only there they exist in our families they exist in our schools and yes of course they also exist in our workplaces so using this definition we can definitely attach the concept of government to the workplace right I mean workplaces are generally set up with an organizational hierarchy so that your boss the person above you in the organizational hierarchy can issue you orders and if you disobey those orders they can sanction you AKA punish you and they can do this in at least one domain of your life in your work life but they can also sometimes even do that to some extent in your personal life as well that's definitely a form of government so I think we have conclusively established here that government definitely does exist in the workplace now what about the concept of private and what about the whole crazy concept of Communist dictatorship we'll get there one step at a time public as it pertains to government simply means that it is everyone's business it affects everyone and everyone should have some type of voice represented within it so an example of this is a democratic nation state that is a public government private on the other hand as it pertains to government means that it is none of your business or it's only a certain groups business its actions may or may not affect you and you probably don't have a voice within this form of government an example of this would again be a company like Amazon for example if I am a customer of Amazon they may affect my life because I'm using their products or services but I don't really get to have any say in how they conduct their business at least not at the level that high up employees would really it's none of my business and so the difference is me being a member of a nation-state I at least theoretically am able to represent my voice through electing representatives on my behalf which are supposed to go into the government and then serve based on the voices of the people so it's collectively everyone in the nation states business so by this logic we can also attach the term private to the workplace now if this still doesn't really click for you here's a bit more context from Miss Anderson you are subject to private government wherever one you are subordinate to authorities who can order you around and sanction you AKA punish you for not complying over some domain of your life and two the authorities treat it as none of your business across a wide range of cases what orders IT issues or why it sanctions you sounds exactly like the workplace right you are not a public member of this sphere it's very much a private thing where a lot of decisions don't really take you into account so again I think we've pretty conclusively shown here that the workplace is definitely a form of private government that's not even the spiciest part which we're about to get to now and that's that the workplace is not only a form of private government but the form of government that it takes is of a Communist dictatorship and that my friends is actually quite easy to prove and we can do that by asking a few simple questions what's a quality that we might ascribe to a communist government perhaps that government would own all the non-labor means of production so they would own properties they would own plants they would own equipment they would own intellectual property Etc so that's a quality that we would ascribe to Communism now what's a couple qualities that we might ascribe to a dictatorship probably that the government runs things through the means of central planning right meaning that either one single or a small group of very powerful individuals makes plans and carries out actions irrespective of what everybody else thinks and probably also that the leader of this form of government is either self-appointed meaning that they just decided they were going to be the leader or that leader was appointed by a very small group of the most powerful individuals now let's talk about the modern workplace to see how things compare in the modern workplace who owns all the non-labor means of production so think Office Buildings computers supplies patents all that kind of stuff who owns it well obviously the company right aka the private government hmm interesting so then by definition that would mean that it's communist let's keep going in the modern workplace how is the organization Run is it run like a free market where every individual gets to throw their hat in the ring and the market collectively decides what's best and what actions to take or is it more like the plans and decisions and everything is kind of decided by either one individual or a group of the most powerful individuals AKA centrally planned well generally companies are run by the board of directors and the executive class so by definition that would be centrally planned right finally the official leader of this organization is this individual democratically elected by everyone who kind of makes up this organization or were they either self-appointed or appointed by an oligarchy meaning a small group of the most powerful individuals within the organizational hierarchy well it's uh well yep I mean that that would be the the latter it's uh either self-appointed or appointed by the oligarchy so um yeah that would uh yeah that would suggest um it's a dictatorship we're we're uh we're unfortunately looking at a Communist dictatorship here now you know why corporate workplaces suck to be in seriously though I when I worked in a large corporate environment I always felt these things and I kind of felt crazy for for feeling them because I couldn't articulate them in this way until I read this book and everything just clicked for me that yes that exactly describes what's going on here and why it does not feel like a good place for someone to be in I knew I had to get myself out of this situation if I ever wanted to be able to lead a purposeful and fulfilling life and so I did no one wants to live under a Communist dictatorship so why would anyone want to work under one people do not want to work in a traditional sense because a it doesn't pay enough and B it sucks if only the second of those two things was true if it only sucked to do I I don't think it would be that big of a deal I mean our parents generation worked in that type of environment but the difference was they had the potential to actually build a decent life doing so that potential does not exist in the same form today so then okay that kind of brings us to part three of this whole thing which is that if we've established the affirmative people do not want to work in the traditional sense then it begs the question what the hell are they doing in some cases I think the answer is well actually they're working just not in the way that you might think this brings me to the false version of the statement no one wants to work anymore yes they actually do just not in the way that you think and this brings me to yet another discussion of the information revolution you see it's no coincidence that something that's been called the Great resignation took place during this crazy moment in time that I think of as the information revolution I'm not going to go into great deal on the information revolution in this video because I've already been doing it in my past few months so if you want more context about it you can watch the information revolution playlist that I've put together but basically in a nutshell I think it is the biggest change to happen to the workplace or the biggest opportunity to take advantage of in the changing workplace since the Industrial Revolution and people using it today are becoming self-governing self-sufficient Sovereign individuals who are leading fulfilling lives and making a lot of money in the process that's what I'm doing that's what the tick talker you swiped up on today is doing that's what the instagramer you watch the story of today is doing that's what the person you're simping to on only fans is doing it's the person Drop Shipping You the product that you just bought on Amazon it's also the person writing the top 10 places to visit in Italy this Summer's blog that you just read it's even the anonymous account that you follow on Twitter for memes or for updates on the markets many of the things we interact with today on a daily basis are provided to us by people who are participating in the information revolution whether you realize it or whether they realize it and because of that there is a lot of money to be made the best part is these are often not organizations they are usually just one single individual who is governing themselves who is sustaining themselves who is fulfilling themselves at least I know that is the case for me and many many individuals have realized this they've realized the power of this very special moment in time and they are taking advantage of it or they're in the process of doing so it's true they do not want to work in the traditional sense of the word they want to work in the new way of working because a the pay is potentially incredible as a byproduct of helping other people and this protects you it insulates you from risks that are outside of your control like cost of living crises and B because there's no Communist dictatorship here there's just a relatively free market and Sovereign individuals within it and see because it directly leads to your own self-actualization something which I will explain more in a future video but it basically allows you to climb your very own version of Maslow's hierarchy of needs it allows you a path to reach the full expression of yourself on this very Earth which for me personally and I'm kind of weird and crazy but in my case it means being able to attempt to answer something that I call the one Big Y which is the biggest question of all at least in my mind which is why are we here what is the meaning of life what is the true construction of the universe and what is our role in it but before I get there I have a few more problems to solve in my own life and if I can I would like to help a few more people along the way who are like a past version of myself and so with all that said I hope you now see both the true and the false behind the statement no one wants to work anymore these longer form episodes are now on Spotify if you'd prefer to listen to them that way and I am also sharing my extended thoughts on a wide variety of subjects on Twitter if you'd like to follow along there I hope you have a great rest of your week

Channel: Stephen Antonioni

Views: 143,436

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Id: 25eLRjc9lBU

Length: 24min 34sec (1474 seconds)

Published: Wed Aug 30 2023