[ExI] future of proletariat, was: RE: future of slavery

[BillK]

On Tue, Apr 9, 2013 at 6:31 PM, spike wrote:
<snip>
> The whole business model of a 9 to 5 from 20 to 65 could be dumped,
> knowledge and skills become currency, and most of us could have an actual
> life.  People could work as much or as little as their needs demand.  Then
> conservation would be a form of freedom.  Wacky excess consumerism would
> decline and people had a direct negative feedback loop: every goofy thing
> you buy costs you actual time, rather than money.  Reasoning: now if we hold
> a 9 to 5, we have generally plenty of money, so there is no need to refrain
> from just buying anything we can afford.  But if we work only enough to
> cover our needs, we pay closer attention to what we buy, waste less,
> increase efficiency, the employer wins, the prole wins, the environment
> wins, and this constitutes a very rare example in which I see no losers
> anywhere in that scenario.
>
>

There are disadvantages to this working life style.
<http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2013/04/welcome-to-the-micro-gig-no-job-is-too-small/274843/>
Quote:
If you get sick, you could be missing out on seven jobs, not just one
or two. And forget about personal days or holidays. Billing and tax
preparation get much more complicated with dozens of invoices per
month. Financial planning becomes untenable. And with such small-scale
jobs, an employer's obligation is less enforceable. No one's going to
court over a $42 unpaid fee.
As we rush forward into this hyper-efficient economy, we're actually
sliding back to certain aspects of the 19th century, where workers had
few rights and no protections.
-----------

Slashdot also has a discussion running on this.
<http://news.slashdot.org/story/13/04/10/1649244/micro-gig-sites-undermining-workers-rights?>


BillK