1.
We live in a world where the unspoken message is that we’d best be earning our air in some way, and “some way” should involve us making serious contributions to our nation’s economic growth.
If you aren’t helping the corporate bottom line, are you even a citizen?
You can take some time off from economic hustling if you’re in the business of producing the next generation of worker-hustlers, but bear in mind, even though the world and its brother want offspring from today’s front-line workers, they don’t want to contribute to the in-the-moment or long-term expenses that having children entails.
Policy makers, most of the world over, seem to want neither corporate nor government parental leave programs. Society demands that you procreate, but also that you carry all the costs.
It used to take a village, but now we’re all islands. If you think there’s some sexism buried in that economic oppression, you’re not wrong.
I’m starting to think “productivity” is a dirty word.
2.
Keeping the majority broke isn’t an accident of late-stage capitalism: people need to stop treating features like glitches. An undereducated population is the unethical politician’s dream, but an underfinanced one is the businessman’s happy place. Financial precariousness leads to a compliant workforce even in the face of unethical and immoral corporate behaviour.
We have to eat, we mostly like to live indoors, and we will sacrifice much to ensure things continue along those lines. Eventually, constantly ceding ground to our corporate overlords starts to feel like a good thing. There’s also the “we’ll draw a line in the sand soon” idea that does that rounds. It’s too bad that later never comes.
Even our “off hours” are filled with a sense of urgency: the idea that we need to be always productive has become a feature of our private lives as well. Not much in life is desultory these days. 1
Unfortunately, productivity at home is made harder by the much-loved managerial concept of employees being always available to connect with, regardless of what the schedule says or the time of day.
We have too many “shoulds” in our lives these days, and not nearly enough time and money. Too few are hoarding everything. It is unsustainable personally and societally. You can only squeeze people for so long.
3.
I’m on a disability pension and don’t work outside the home for money anymore, and I still feel like I’m falling behind from the moment I wake. The societal demands that I earn my air have deep roots, even though I’ve worked for years at removing them.
I’m trying to embrace the belief that our value is intrinsic.
Despite all the work I’ve done – I have a right to exist without validating that existence to others – I still feel a sense of guilt over not meeting the productivity requirements, though who they’ve been imposed by is a little unclear. What exactly I’m supposed to produce with my semi-broken and inconsistent brain is also unclear.
The productivity hum pushes me to keep my home sphere as neat, clean, and tidy as possible in order to offset any judgment that might arise when it’s found that I’m not an employed (and therefore productive) person who’s bringing home bacon.
I may not be growing the GDP, but my goodness, are my flat surfaces ever dust-free.
The societal pressure to justify my existence has been waning somewhat as I age: at fifty-six, I can now prevaricate and say “retired” when queried (Retired people don’t have to earn their air – we figure they’ve stockpiled it over their work life).
4.
A more interesting question than one about productivity is, when do you feel happiest? I think sometimes this is what people mean when they talk about productivity and work. We’ve tied being happy to being productive, probably not a good thing.
There’s no utility in sitting by the river and listening to nature as your dog sleeps by your side. It adds nothing to the economy, and it’s not particularly productive, and yet, it’s often the best part of the day.
I’m not stunningly productive with a book in my hands (except when I was in school and reading to write papers), but I am happy when I’m reading. I suppose one could consider me productive from the plant perspective if I’m reading indoors: I am producing CO2 as I sit and peruse, and that’s an input my houseplants enjoy.
Reading could be considered productive if the desired output is learning, but I’m not sure policymakers value building an educated and clever population as much as philosophers do.
I don’t feel particularly unproductive when I’m lost in the pages of a book, but I am in a happy state of mind. I suppose it comes down to what we decide has value. Are we here to produce, or are we just here? If it’s the latter, then justifying our time becomes irrelevant. 2
- Do we have private lives anymore? I’m not completely sure. ↩︎
- We have enough for everyone to live good lives. We have a greed problem. The cult of productivity hides it some. ↩︎
From Famine to Feast 