[hollerith]

Most people had to work as hard as they were able just to have enough to eat. When crops failed, the aristocrats forcibly took the food they needed (with the support of the legal system because they owned to land) with the result that some of the farmers starved.

[coldtea]

This best it represents specific times and places, under specific regimes, not some constant fact of working the land.

Working the land had tons of downtime - even back at medieval and ancient times. In fact, even hunter gatherers have been observe by ethnographers to just need 2-3 hours to get the food for the day.