Ok, but yeah. I want to work more than 15 hours a week. I genuinely love the challenge with what I do. 15 seems, oddly tiny? Where did this number come from?
This is a good response to that question, in case anyone wanted the q&a paired together. 15 would be the social average — some people might work more, some less, but that would be up to them. This is also presupposing a change in the way the economy effectively functions, in the sense that 15 hours would be the social average for necessary labor, and after that point you’d probably see tons of people participating in “unnecessary” labor out of interest. There’s an idea in socialist theory that basically says once you reach a point far enough along after capitalism you’d just start seeing a blurring of the lines between what’s defined as “work” (or as “a job”) and what’s defined as “a collective activity”, especially with regard to the arts, science, etc.
At the very least, a transition towards (eco)socialism will require a vast shortening of the workweek and a reduction in overall advertising/consumption, whether that mean a 15-hour week or a 20-hour week. The main point is that people are overworked, we can meet everyone’s needs feasibly with less hours anyway, and the over-emphasis on extraction and accumulation (which is in part fueled by a tediously long workweek) is having disastrous effects on the planet. We can both accomodate the needs of the planet AND expand the political horizons for the great majority of the population, but it will require the fundamental defeat of capitalism and the establishment of a new ecological workers’ democracy. It’s a big project, but so worth it in the long run.
The 15-hour week presupposes a change in the economy first. Obviously capitalism requires long hours for people to survive, but in terms of pure stats it’s not necessary for society to be working that much. There’s enough resources for everyone, and so much work is pointless bullshit that only exists to line the pockets of the rich. The ecosocialist project demands a new way of looking at and distributing work. Get rid of the bullshit jobs, divvy up the necessary jobs, and we’d free up people’s time immensely to engage in pursuits they actually want to do to contribute to society.
Also, food and housing and such would be guaranteed in an ecosocialist society anyway, so it goes beyond simply reorganizing work. People have a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and those will never be achieved for the great majority in a capitalist society.
These were really good additions so I wanted t add them onto the cumulative post
the whole point of capitalism is to maximize both the demand and the supply for a product, in many cases creating new avenues of consumption and production that didn’t exist prior. Huge amounts of resources and time are used up to synthesize unnecessary activities and products. Simplicity is the sharpest knife.
Isn’t the whole point of technological advancement and the growth of humanity so that we make less work for everybody with more than enough to go around? Isn’t the whole point of, say, increasing agricultural yield, so that we can feed more with less?
There are entire industries around products that do not need to exist and that are even a downgrade on the cheaper alternative but that exist solely to satisfy a manufactured need in capitalism. Instant pots, Tide Pods, digital faxes, Keurigs, that stupid ass juicer that required the juice already extracted and prepackaged to work. For a lot of these products their main goal isn’t to satisfy a need, cut in costs or time, or even improve anything. Their only goal is to sell more plastic. All those things would disappear and/or be replaced by superior alternatives meant to make people’s lives better, not just make profit for the oil industry.
