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by toyg 3884 days ago
Complete feudalism had 0% unemployment. Best system ever!

Honestly, I'm a bit tired of the "create jobs!" mantra. Jobs for job-numbers' sake has little point, in practice it's just further enslaving the population.

The government has an incentive in keeping unemployment down and cut spending, so it forces people to work shitty jobs by taking away subsidies, which in turn drives down salaries and only helps high-manpower low-skill enterprises like burger-flipping. Is that good for society as a whole?

People working two jobs (great for employment numbers!) are not bettering themselves, they're just producing more surplus for owners, often not even by choice. It doesn't really matter if you have 0% unemployment but everyone is forced to do stuff they don't like in order to survive.
1 comments
marknutter 3884 days ago
Nobody is forced to work any job, at least not here in the U.S. No more than a lion is "forced" to hunt and kill antelope.
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toyg 3884 days ago
A vegetarian lion could technically survive. A human being needs food (which he cannot grow anywhere, due to property laws) and shelter (which he cannot build anywhere, due to property laws). Does the US government hand out free food and shelter for all?

If not, you are forced to work. You can choose what to work on, but that's about it. Even something as passive as investing capital or extracting rent requires some work. Being homeless is a full-time job asking others for money.

Whenever you'll get free food and free shelter (we can argue about clothes), then you won't be forced to work.

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marknutter 3883 days ago
> Whenever you'll get free food and free shelter (we can argue about clothes), then you won't be forced to work.

And to provide that, others will be forced to work. So no matter what we end up with some people being "forced to work", which I don't agree is even a thing. Even if you could just live off the land you'd be "forced" to work a hell of a lot harder to survive than you would getting any minimum wage job. You are perhaps underestimating how bad life sucked before modern society took root.

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