MedwedianPresident Posted August 2, 2018 Share Posted August 2, 2018 How important are the (working) poor to our society?What do a cleaning lady, a supermarket cashier, a temporary worker and a hospital janitor have in common?They do jobs nobody wants to do.They buy and consume things nobody wants to buy and consume (second-hand clothes, low-quality food, used cars and electronics).They use services nobody else wants to use (watching soap operas on TV, spending holidays in motels and youth hostels).They allow society to spend money in an alturistic way without being outright beggars (by claiming state support and consuming surplus money).They occupy housing nobody wants to occupy.But wait, I know some middle-class or even rich people who do one or more of the afromentioned things. How can you say this?There are only few middle-class or rich people doing the above. And they all do this because of their personal beliefs. They wear cheap clothes because they deem them to be the most comfortable ones and use second-hand cars or buy used laptops because they want to do the environment a favor by decreasing production need. Poor and working poor people do the aforementioned things because they need to, having no other choices due to their low financial, cultural and social capital.While this may sound nonsensical, consider the fact that low-quality goods, jobs and services are not always created "on purpose" to target the poor but often as by-products of high-quality goods, jobs and services. Every pig carcass contains fatty or tough yet edible meat that can satisfy one's hunger. Every baker needs somebody to oil the oven. Every busy doctor, engineer or lawyer needs somebody to clean his home while he and his wife are working and the kids are in school. Everybody who wants to take a walk in the park needs somebody to collect the leaves. Every exclusive penthouse building has at least one crappy, small, oddly-shaped, damp and dark apartment nobody wants to have. Every good car becomes worthless after ten or twenty years, still working and driving swiftly and reliably but showing honorable scratches and indentations. Every famous screenwriter will start his career producing proletarian plays.While universities are becoming more and more cramped, vocational schools training for lowly-paid, repetitive, "ordinary" jobs are being closed due to lack of interest.As long as robots will not replace menial jobs and replicators will not allow everybody to magically materialize every desired item or food, the problem will persist. The poor have no other choice than to mitigate its implications by consuming what others might consider waste - in contrast, many academics rather stay unemployed for years than taking up simple jobs and gourmets go hungry for a day instead of eating fast food. It's all a question of personal mindset and values, of hereditary factors and upbringing.The middle class is expanding in some countries. In short metaphorical form: servants are now demanding servants by themselves. Fewer and fewer people are there to serve more and more people.It might sound inhumane, capitalist and ignorant, but the poor, and especially the working poor are and have always been the backbone of our society. They are not the waste of the society but the cleaners and janitors of the society, taking care of its waste.In my opinion, not only the theory that the middle class must expand indefinitely, ultimately absorbing the lower classes is wrong but also the downfall of the middle class in countries like America is a natural symptom of its oversize.What do you think? Please discuss in a civil and polite way. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest Posted August 2, 2018 Share Posted August 2, 2018 Alright, anyone wanna take bets on how long before this thread is locked for 2.2b? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bill Phil Posted August 2, 2018 Share Posted August 2, 2018 28 minutes ago, Aperture Science said: Alright, anyone wanna take bets on how long before this thread is locked for 2.2b? I'll take that bet. 500 funds. I say it closes in less than a day. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LordFerret Posted August 2, 2018 Share Posted August 2, 2018 Matthew 26:11 and as well Mark 14:7 Or in other words, you won't always have me around to pay for you. This sword has many edges... choose yours carefully. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tater Posted August 2, 2018 Share Posted August 2, 2018 I bet 300 quatloos on @Bill Phil's answer! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HebaruSan Posted August 2, 2018 Share Posted August 2, 2018 People are ends, not means. If you start by asking what value another person has to you, you may end very badly if your answer is, "None." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nuke Posted August 2, 2018 Share Posted August 2, 2018 bums are actually a lot more effitient than rich people. they create a lot less entropy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mad Rocket Scientist Posted August 3, 2018 Share Posted August 3, 2018 I'll put 20 pieces of eight on it being closed in a day. But in the spirit of good faith, I'll take a shot at this without being political or (too) ideological. A priori: Existence is better than non-existence. All consciousnesses (for lack of a better word), and thus humans, are equal and their experiences and emotions are equally meaningful. All consciousnesses have the right to do what personally fulfills them, if that does not interfere with other's ability to do the same. Therefore, all consciousnesses have a moral obligation to try to maximize the number of free (as defined above) consciousnesses that will ever exist. In short, the principles of optimistic nihilism. As to your topic: as long as people must work doing something they do not enjoy for a significant fraction of their lives to have the freedom to do what they want with the remaining time, they will not be free. Some people are lucky enough to have their work align with what they enjoy, but as you state in your post: these are "jobs nobody wants to do." I think the question is not: How much value do people doing these jobs provide to society, but: How can we make it so no one ever has to do them? There are many solutions to this problem, robots, AI, but to try to keep this post near-ish to on topic, this is one of the reasons I love spaceflight. In addition to representing some of our highest ideals as a species and being awe-inspiring, it offers both the possibility for one of the best ways of minimizing existential risk, and a truly post-scarcity economy. The history of humanity is one of overall improvement in quality of life and ability to do what fulfills us, through technology, government, and systems for distributing wealth, and I feel obliged to contribute to that however I can. Obviously, take this with a grain of salt. I don't pretend to fully know how economics or governments work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
adsii1970 Posted August 3, 2018 Share Posted August 3, 2018 3 minutes ago, Mad Rocket Scientist said: How can we make it so no one ever has to do them? The answer is already here. Automation. Robotics. But the problem becomes in the dangers of becoming too dependent upon our new mechanical slaves. At some point in the future, the slave will become the master. It will be inevitable. And also the basis for some great science fiction authors of the past century. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Chel Posted August 3, 2018 Share Posted August 3, 2018 2.2b violation? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vanamonde Posted August 3, 2018 Share Posted August 3, 2018 Politics on the forum, guys. Never ends well. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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