Is modern life 'worth it'?

[MrsTroutfire]

Obviously, not an entirely 'serious' question as I doubt many people would want to live in the conditions our predecessors did 200 years ago with limited healthcare etc, and it's not likely that society will change anytime soon anyhow.

However, I drive a lot for my job and have a lot of time to endlessly ruminate over the universe. One thing that I always return to is the fact that as a society we work the majority of hours in a day, the majority of days in a week, the majority of weeks in a year, and the majority of years in our lives.

Then, in our mid/late 60s, with our youth decades behind us, we then finally get the freedom to spend our days as we wish, finances and health allowing. If you're male, the likelihood is that you'll probably have worked for over 40 years without a single month away from your work environment, as most people only get a few weeks leave each year and paternity leave still isn't really very common.

I'm pretty sure this was never planned and just evolved that way, but when you look around your place of work and think "this is the majority of my life" it's not a great thought!

Of course life was much tougher in previous centuries, but people were mainly trying to survive. Nowadays it seems like the main purpose of work is churning profit. Even with financial difficulties abound I don't know many people who literally have to worry about survival.

So I sometimes wonder what we actually spend our entire lives working for. No doubt, the machine would stop turning if a huge proportion of the population ceased to make and spend money, but in some ways it seems the system runs us nowadays rather than the reverse, in the sense that money was originally created as an alternative to barter, but is now the principle determinant of quality of life (health issues aside). For example, food may be plentiful, even going to waste, but that's no longer the issue as you'll still starve without the money to buy it (whilst I still appreciate that there has to be some alternative to bartering/swapping of physical goods and a currency is necessary).

It seems like we create new unnecessary technologies, and in turn a market which needs workers to populate it, and this keeps future generations in employment, but at the cost of moving ever further away from subsistence.

Of course people don't want to give up their OLED TV's, iPhones, game consoles, foreign holidays etc, and I don't either tbh. But then a part of me reflects that most people just seem happy to 'play the game' and are so involved in the various aspects of their lives that they don't consider that the biggest sacrifice most of us make is spending the vast majority of our life doing something that we don't really want to and which isn't ultimately necessary for survival in the truest sense.

I'm defo waffling now, but I'd love to be able to contrast our society against a parallel one where our focus has been on prioritising the bare essentials such as food and healthcare etc and people spend a much bigger percentage of their lives actually living them rather than sitting at a desk. Of course they wouldn't have all the gadgets and toys we have but they wouldn't know any different - hell, perhaps in a hundred years time when teleportation has become a thing, people will wonder how we stayed sane only leaving our country 1-2 times a year rather than daily!

"Modern life" means you can be born anywhere, and become anything.

(in Western societies obviously). I wouldn't change that for anything.

@fluffedupits not normal for a couple around the age currently of 55 to both have to work until 70 “at least”. That’s not “farming” that’s your choice to bear the cost of 5 children.

Interestingly, what you’re describing sounds like life in many developing countries, where people prioritise more basic needs. People there very often would prefer the freedom of choice, leisure time and quality of life that we have here.

Ps- have a look at Rousseau, and his ‘state of nature...’ people have been pondering this question for a long time!

It's amazing isn't it? We have had years of economic growth and rising productivity yet we pay more for basic shelter and we have to work longer and get less at the end. What's more, woe betide us getting ill or losing our jobs.

The whole point about the welfare state (over 40% of which is pensions, by the way) is that it is meant to increase the standard of living for everybody. Increased welfare is the whole point of economic growth.

In the 1940s John Maynard Keynes worked out that productivity should increase by 8 fold by now and, as result we could all work a 15 hour week and have plenty of time and money to enjoy our lives (surely the whole point of living?)

So what's happened? We have that increased productivity and where's all the money? Well £3trillion is tied up in domestic property and yet we have not enough homes and the rest is increasingly taken by the few; the masses now have to work more, not less.

What kind of a world have we all accepted?

As someone whose always hated working whatever job I do its never about not liking the work tasks in of themselves but that ball and chain feeling of being tied to a job. I hit burnout and find myself wishing I could just dissappear for 2 weeks and annual leave never feels enough for me. Don't know what would help to be honest but suspect more flexibility might

@motherloaded

"Modern life" means you can be born anywhere, and become anything.

(in Western societies obviously). I wouldn't change that for anything.

Lol. It really really does not mean that, at all.

I live the standard of living i have and would find it hard to give up much of it.

I think the way we work and are paid makes us detached from linking our effort to the reward. So my pay check goes into my bank as a number and then a few days later a series of direct debits whizz out for mortgage, water etc-all just numbers) and the end number is nearly zero again. I am sure getting physical money each week and paying it out in person would make me feel more connected to the reward for my effort.

I also think that effort/work dont correlate very well with earnings so that can leave you dissassociated with it all. The hardest i ever worked was a year prior to my employer being bought by private equity company and our ceo getting a massive pay out to stay for a year and then another pay out to leave. i got made redundant. I had basically worked my but off for another individual to get personally rich.

You gotta be in it to win it. Or live it.

Technology should make modern day life easier, theoretically office work should have been simplified by computers, the internet, programs and systems in such a way that office life finished at lunchtime for the day. Instead people work for hours upon hours, people choose to commute horrendously long journeys, people choose to accept 2 days per week freedom.

Madness when you actually sit back and look at it. Life should have become easier and stress free instead it seems to be worse.

All for what exactly?

Out of all possible ways of surviving, smallholding is one of the most difficult and time consuming.

This really.

It's easy to get carried away with the bucolic ideal, but the reality is that life has been pretty hard for ordinary people for all of our existence on earth.

While I don't think modern life is perfect, I don't want to swap it for a pre-industrial peasant's existence either.

@motherloaded

"Modern life" means you can be born anywhere, and become anything.

(in Western societies obviously). I wouldn't change that for anything.

Rubbish. Utter rubbish.

@hayley037 - agree that the idea of perpetual economic growth is a damaging one. Growth as measured by GDP etc simply isn't sustainable in perpetuity but god forbid we consider any other measures of a healthy, productive society.

Another interesting book for those who are into this sort of thing is Utopia for Realists by Rutger Bregman.

It's not true that modern life involves working long hours by historical standards: ourworldindata.org/working-more-than-ever

But that doesn't mean that we couldn't and shouldn't be benefitting from today's higher productivity by working (and consuming) less. I think we probably should, but it's a tricky coordination problem, especially combined with inequality.

@Alondra

You are wrong. Awfully wrong.

Never working class or middle class have had the kind of living standards we are enjoying today. Yes, we work. So did our parents/grandparents often for a pittance and without the same level of enjoyment. They couldn't afford holidays, great food, restaurants, universal health cover or education.

My parents worked very hard to give me an education and could only afford a restaurant once a year, and never a holiday abroad. My mom still washed most of clothes by hand, washing machines were still a luxury. She never knew what was to have a diswasher.

We've become so oblivious to the hardships to our parents and grandparents time that we think we've got it tough. Our generation is one of the most pampered one, I doubt our grandchildren will be able to say same.

The point is @Alondra that for many people (?mainly women, not sure tbh) those higher standards of living, washing machines, dishwashers, foreign holidays etc have not made people happier.

No one doubts that our standard of living is objectively higher than it ever has been at least in the West. Even the poorest people in the UK have 'more' than some of the wealthiest would have done 100 years ago. No one denies that.

The question is - has the ability to own more Stuff actually increased our fundamental wellbeing? And if not, why not? And how can we change society to address that issue?

The point is @Alondra that for many people (?mainly women, not sure tbh) those higher standards of living, washing machines, dishwashers, foreign holidays etc have not made people happier.

I’m not sure we can know this. Happiness wasn’t something people spent a lot of time measuring until recently.

@TheKeatingFive ok fair point, perhaps my point should have been phrased as a question as I don't have the facts at my fingertips But my understanding is that developed western countries with high levels of growth, productivity and rising living standards also tend to have high levels of mental health distress.

I acknowledge this can be a bit of a 'is it increasing or are we just better at spotting it?' issue though.

Why would you leave your community at the time of life where your health is going to decline and within a couple of years you'll likely have a limiting disability or be housebound, with no friends or clubs

Because most people’s health stays pretty good until their 80s. I have a friend who seems to think she’ll be too old to travel much past her 70th birthday, despite her parents taking far flung holidays well into their 80s.

My parents weren’t housebound until the youngest of them was 95 and that’s not particularly unusual.

I acknowledge this can be a bit of a 'is it increasing or are we just better at spotting it?' issue though.

Well quite. And tbh, I don’t think MH gets much of a look in when people are simply struggling to survive.

Are we as happy as we objectively should be? I’m not sure.

Are our lives (on balance) more pleasant than our ancestors? Yes, for sure.

YANBU. Life is too short. I feel extremely privileged that I don’t have to work and have the freedom to spend my time exactly as I please.

I completely agree, would rather be a hunter gatherer and actually share in the fruit of my labour, have a symbiotic community to belong in and feel a sense of purpose and fulfilment.

@irregularegular

It's not true that modern life involves working long hours by historical standards: ourworldindata.org/working-more-than-ever

But that doesn't mean that we couldn't and shouldn't be benefitting from today's higher productivity by working (and consuming) less. I think we probably should, but it's a tricky coordination problem, especially combined with inequality.

I agree that we may work less hours, however the fact that in most western countries two parents need to work full time to support a family and have their own home when this could have been achieved with one wage a few decades ago is a frustration for many.

As TinyGlassOwl says, even though our lives are more comfortable, and we have more stuff, for many people this doesn't equate to real purpose or meaning or a sense of their place in the world.

And maybe we're not supposed to achieve that, I dunno - I just find it strange that we are supposed to #liveyourbestlife whilst slaving away in an office for 40 years.

And no, I'm not advocating going back to the dark ages, I fully accept that technology and modern medicine has done wonders. However there are many of us who feel a bit lost in all the expectations of the modern world, and the relentless march of progress - and yearn for something simpler.

However, that is often looked down upon as unambitious or lazy or not living up to your potential etc etc.

I had no dishwasher for twenty years plus and I am a lot happier as a consequence of having a dishwasher.

Unfortunately we’ve got ourselves into a position where even the basics cost a fortune, so people have to work themselves into the ground to make ends meet. I don’t dislike my job, but I’d rather not have to go to work. I don’t know many people who want to work.

If more of us had the attitude of work to live instead of live to work the machine would probably gradually change. What’s the worst that could happen if we don’t log on at 9pm and send that email. Give less fucks is what I say.

I completely agree, would rather be a hunter gatherer and actually share in the fruit of my labour, have a symbiotic community to belong in and feel a sense of purpose and fulfilment.

I find this a bizarre statement. You have absolutely no idea of the realities of living as a hunger/gatherer. None of us do.

@LibertyMole me too 🤣 Love my dishwasher!

A modern washing machine makes me very much less unhappy than I would be having to hand wash everything, or boil up the copper and use the mangle. I have briefly lived where we had to collect water from the river, then process it so it was safe to ingest. I also appreciate having a fridge so I don't have to shop every other day because otherwise, everything will have gone off.

I am not bothered about pish cars and swanky TV, and don't spend my money on them - I have basic models, and there are some things I don't have at all.

But I am very certain that my washing machine, fridge and vacuum make me far happier than handwashing, food going off quickly and beating carpets would make me.

I also suspect that unhappiness is nothing new. Emma Bovary and Anna Karenina may have been fictional, but their laudanum habits weren't concocted out of thin air. And they were privileged. Many working class women would have been deeply unhappy and worried about how to feed their family just that day, let alone luxuries such as clothing and footwear. We just don't know asch about it, because so many were illiterate, so had no voice, and were too busy just surviving to gave had time to record their misery - before they died of starvation or tuberculosis.

People have always been miserable. We're more aware of it now, is all. And I'd rather be unhappy with modern conveniences than shivering in the poorhouse.

@TheKeatingFive

I completely agree, would rather be a hunter gatherer and actually share in the fruit of my labour, have a symbiotic community to belong in and feel a sense of purpose and fulfilment.

I find this a bizarre statement. You have absolutely no idea of the realities of living as a hunger/gatherer. None of us do.

There is a vast amount of anthropological research that paints a picture of what the lives of hunter/gatherers were like. That picture appeals to me more than my current reality. You don't have to agree, but, you know, people do have different opinions on things...