Discussion: what would you do in a post-work society?
Discussion: what would you do in a post-work society?
Very much inspired by the recent post about what anti work actually means. If you were free from the “work or starve” paradigm, what would you do with your time? No wrong answers.
Personally, I would like to spend more time outside cultivating food and fiber. (Fiber here meaning growing flax for linen, raising angora rabbits or even goats or sheep for their fiber, etc. I am big into textiles)
This is a goal I pursue even now, because my current job is high paying and 4 days a week and I want to use that relative privilege to gain skills that help my communities. Speaking of, I’m also a big fan of community organising, which is another thing I’d want to keep doing post-work.
But like I said, no wrong answers! You don’t have to have a plan for how you’d serve your community. Some of us wouldn’t. And most of us don’t have the time to even think of what we could do for our communities. For that last case, I hope this discussion can be inspiring!
Spend time picking up trash. I also have a job that's only 4 days a week. My first summer I had it I dedicated my 3rd day off to hiking and picking up trash along the parking spots and trails. Unfortunately I now fill that time with domestic stuff around the house and going to my many medical appointments as I've developed health issues. But how I wish to be able to spend a day or two a week just trying to make some sort of dent in the endless trash that's buried in the dirt along our roads and waterways.
I would make art, music and painting, and clothes I guess. Maybe write. Play at and run TTRPG events/groups. I would take care of animals, pets or otherwise. I would hang out with friends more and go out to meet new people. Talk about life and try to figure the deepest parts out, instead of figuring out how to just survive.
I think I’d also like to get into organising parties, and DJing.
But most of all, I think I’d just follow my desires without fear. Not really worried there should be an end to anything I do, that all should aid me in earning money to survive or have a better life.
Just live more free I guess.
Now in a post-capitalist (but not post-work/post-scarcity) society, I’d likely do a lot of the same, in my free time. But if human labor is still necessary for society to function and exist, I’d like to spend my necessary labor either working in some sort of construction or cleaning.
What I already do under the work or starve paradigm, teach children in the early years of life.
My current job is low paying and high stress, I do it because it’s important, rewarding, and enjoyable at times. If I could remove the wage concerns I’d be happier.
Me too! Except I teach middle school (11-14 year olds). I'd love to see how this ideology impacts classroom expectations in a practical way. That and probably would do some volunteering in a large garden or electrical engineering.
oh man, this is a great question. i'd rest, first and foremost, for kind of a long while. i'm chronically exhausted right now. then, when my body starts to feel like it can do things again i'd love to grow food, write poems, play music, hike, explore, and interact with people over shared food and conversation.
i cant even rest when im out of work, so maybe finally fucking rest?
after paying off the debt to mine and my partner's physical and psychological health?
i'd take back up community organising. and music. i'd like to curate a library (of books and things) and run it as a community centre. i'd facilitate book clubs and popular education, give lectures, join research groups, and take up writing again. i'd design and run tabletop games and games clubs.
more materially, whatever oddjobs need done, and whatever my neighbours need help with. i have a lot of varied experience with 'disability'; having experience in social work, having multiple disabilities myself, and taking care of people with them. i'd use my techn(olog)ical and mechanical experience to fix stuff, and to design, install, maintain and programme community infrastructure. i'd like to join a rewilding initiative and help to keep the local environment clean.
and i'd lean in hard on whatever hyperfixations strike me that month. (and maybe really have something to show for it.)
I was a much more interesting person as a kid. Around 13-15. I lived in a tent one year. I contributed to a Linux distribution. I learned guitar and scheitholt and harmonica and wrote songs. I swam in the lake. I experimented with technology. I fell asleep under the stars. I played basketball in the dirt. I didn't wear shoes.
So ... that.
Make things and fix things. I already do a lot of projects in my free time - I write science fiction, I paint, I photobash art, I do woodworking, furniture restoration, metalworking, repair ewaste to give away, and grow plants. I'd just do a lot more of all that with a bit less life stress around work. If that's not enough, I've been looking at volunteering with the recycling center, and I'd love to go for more hikes with family (currently I only get out on weekends and that's unfortunately rare, especially with everyone's conflicting schedules and levels of energy).
Initially, I think I'd spend time trying to reverse the damage that I've allowed capitalism to do to my body. The only time in my life I've ever lost a significant amount of weight is when I was unemployed about ten years ago. I'd work on my body, clean my house, and work on developing software that interests me instead of what interested my various employers. What a lovely thought. ❤️
I would do the same as I currently do. Maintain the internet.
Hiking, collect plants and turn them into useful stuff, repair things, garden, raise animals. Exchange stuff with my neighbors. Much like I'm doing now.
Fundamental research
I quit work at 35, am now 58. I own my own little cottage in a quite rural town and have enough income from investments in decades past to pay local taxes. I don't get any form of welfare. My place has dozens of fruit trees and my parter loves veg gardening and cooking stuff she grows. For a time I lived in an apartment in the city, didn't need a car and had access to everything close by, before that, we lived off grid in a little cottage in the bush for a decade.
That's the point, I now do what ever I want. Today I am shitposting here while taking a break from reading a book on the history of my local area that I walked to ky library to get.
I have always been frugal and things I'm interested don't need much money. I don't have kids because of ecological reasons.
I wish I'd quit work earlier.
I mean initially I'd try to undo the mental conditioning 15 years in the job market has done to me. I guess after that really try to establish healthy habits, and try to make games or stories. Something to make people happy.
Enjoy human interaction and create art (probably stories).
Spend 2-3 hours a day working out. I want to be that 90 year old who runs marathons.
I would make things out of wood and learn metal working.
I would make a point to learn new things. History, physics, math, languages, etc.
Maybe take up growing my own food and raise chickens.
Hope that people still make good stuff to watch
Travel differently. Right now I try to use the fastest way to my destination because I only have limited time. But instead just stopping in places on the way or taking slower neans if transportation like hitchhiking would be great
I very much suspect we will never have to work "zero hours a week", but 20 hrs/week seems just doable. So there would still be work to do. The rest of the time will be for recreational purposes. Like, connecting to other people, and stuff.
I mean when I hear post-work I think Star Trek. Which might not be THAT far off. Like centuries sure, but that’s nothing in perspective. But yeah, us? The best we can “hope” for is meaningful, non-alienated work, with dignity, that doesn’t occupy most of our week. Which sounds pretty great to me tbh, I don’t need Star Trek.
There are certain fields, like the trades, that will always need a human. But I'd love to only work 20-30 hours. Spending my remaining time playing games and cultivating my yard
Probably, but we most certainly can afford to have miniumum basic services using some form of UBI or mix it with some public housing and other forms of direct material support. There is also nothing wrong with actual work for the most part and we absolutly can provide benefits to people that are willing to take on some tasks. Right now most rich countries have unemployment benefits already, which cover a lot of that.
Either I’d build my own solarpunk automated hydroponic farm with a smol herd of alpacas. Other than that maybe I’d make some video games without worrying about making it profitable like people do today