Re: <nettime> The bane of (over) work

[John Preston <wcerfgba@riseup.net>]

On 2019-05-06 16:30, Patrice Riemens wrote:
> Aloha,
> 
> Recent article in the NYT, with a title in the on-line edition much
> more funky (and apt) than in the print one: "Women Did Everything
> Right. Then Work Got ‘Greedy'’ (vs "Longer work hours widen gender
> gap")
> 
> https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/26/upshot/women-long-hours-greedy-professions.html
> 
> (funky illustration too, btw)
> 
> The article is about "how America’s obsession with long hours has
> widened the gender gap". An utmost concerning issue and also a
> classroom grade instance of 'Kaliyuga' (aka 'verschlimbesseren' in the
> former GDR) in case you need one.
> 
> Aside from the gender pay gap gone even worse than before I learned
> two things: the moniker 'greedy professions' to describe the more edgy
> - and egregious - trades spawned by neo-liberalism (in finance, law,
> accountancy etc), but mostly that the phenomenon of excessively paid,
> mandatory overwork is a phenomenon of the past two decades only. With
> hindsight, this should come as no surprise.
> 
> It comes even less as a surprise since mandatory overwork, this time
> scantily - if at all - paid has long been the bane of the
> cultural/artistic/voluntary sector. And it encroaches more and more in
> other, all other, professions: a kind of pincer movement driven both
> by the 'idealistic' as well as the 'materialistic' sectors.
> 
> In both, it is all about a certain 'culture' (I surely wouldn't call
> it an 'ethic') where all strands in the (hyper)modern world to come
> together: individualism, deregulation, religious disaffection,
> flexibility-precarity, to name a few, come together, and almost always
> helped and abetted by peer pressure on the work-floor (or its current
> equivalent).
> 
> Excess being the curse of our time, there has been a lot of
> discussions about possible tax measures to reign its most visible
> aspect, disproportionate earnings. It should be possible in theory -
> it has been done before - even though the outlook is pessimistic (and
> never mind curbing disproportionate wealth). Now I am wondering if the
> same sort of measures could be envisaged in terms of working time.
> 
> Not long after the introduction of the law limiting the work week to
> 35 hours in France, the Paris police irrupted in a boardroom and
> arrested directors for illicit overwork. This incident (never
> repeated) caused endless guffaws in France and abroad, especially in
> the 'Anglo' realm. However I always thought that it was entirely
> appropriate, and that laws limiting working time should not only apply
> to the salariat, to protect it against exploitation, but possibly even
> more so to the managerial and directorial classes, as they set both
> the example and the norms.
> 
> What does come as a surprise to me is that this approach has not been
> discussed more - but maybe I have missed something.
> 
> Cheers from Oslo, p+2D!
> 
> 
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I have seen some coverage over the last few months about China's 996
culture https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system . Scary
stuff.
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