[dagw]

You either have to work for a living or you don’t

The words 'have to' are doing a lot of work in that statement. Some people 'have to' work to literally put food on the table, other people 'have to' work to able to making payments on their new yacht. The world is full of people who could probably live out the rest of their lives without working any more, but doing so would require drastic lifestyle changes they're not willing to make.

I personally think the metric should be something along the lines of how long would it take from losing all your income until you're homeless.

[nosianu]

> I personally think the metric should be something along the lines of how long would it take from losing all your income until you're homeless.

What income? Income from job, or from capital? A huge difference. Also a lot harder to lose the latter, gross incompetence or a revolution, while the former is much easier.

[dagw]

Yea, should have been clearer. Income from work (or unemployment benefits) in this case. Someone who works to essentially supplement their income, but could live off their capital, is in a very different position than someone for whom work is their only source of income or wealth.

[dgfitz]

The sentence works without those two words. “You either work for a living or you don’t.”

Now what?

[dagw]

Now it comes down to how you define 'for a living'. You still need to differentiate between people who work to survive, people who work to finance their aspirational lifestyle, and people who have all the money they could possibly need and still work because they either see it as a calling or they just seem to like working. Considering all these people in the same 'class' is far too simplistic.

[dgfitz]

Enh, to me it’s not, either you work or you don’t.

[dagw]

So someone on the edge of poverty, balancing two or three minimum wage jobs just to make ends meet, should be considered part of the same class as the CEO of Microsoft or Google? Hell most people on the Forbes list 'work' in at least some meaning of the word, even if many of them effectively work for themselves.

What about the trust fund kid working part time at an art gallery just because they like the scene and hanging out with artists? Same class?

And on the flip side, are pensioners, the unemployed, and people on permanent disability part of the same class as the dilettante children of billionaires?

[dgfitz]

Are we talking about the verb or an ideal? Either you work or you don’t.

[dagw]

Are we talking about the verb or an ideal?

We are talking about class, and if we should be making distinctions between groups of people who work for a living based on their wealth, income, and economic stability. I believe there is a fundamental class difference between people who work, but are rich enough to stop working whenever they want, those who can't quite stop working but are comfortable enough to easily go 6 month without a pay check, and people who are only a couple of missed pay checks away from literal homelessness.

[happymellon]

There was the articles on AI, that linked to how its used in Microsoft.

Satya Nadella doesn't read his emails, and doesn't write responses. He subscribes to podcasts and then gets them summarised by AI.

He turns up to the office and takes home obscene amounts of money for doing nothing except play with toys and pretend he's working.

They are "working", but they are actually just playing. And I think thats the problem with some of these comments, they aren't distinguishing between work and what is basically a hobby.

> What about the trust fund kid working part time at an art gallery just because they like the scene and hanging out with artists?

Its a hobby. They don't have to do it, and if they get fired for gross misconduct then they could find alternative things to pass the time.

[mantas]

Homeless or loose current house? Downsizing and/or moving to cheaper places could go a long way. Yet loosing current level of housing is what most people think want to avoid.

[dagw]

Either work, but homeless is more absolute. For some downsizing means moving into their car and for others it means moving into a 3000 sq ft house, with a smaller pool, in the third nicest neighbourhood in town. But yea, losing your house and being forced to drastically downsize against your will is no doubt traumatic in both cases.

[larrled]

“from losing all your income until you're homeless.”

I’m willing to bet you haven’t lived long enough to know that’s a more or less a proxy for old age. :) That aside, even homeless people acquire possessions over time. If you have a lot of homeless in your neighborhood, try to observe that. In my area, many homeless have semi functional motor homes. Are they legit homeless, or are they “homeless oligarchs”? I can watch any of the hundreds of YouTube channels devoted to “van life.” Is a 20 year old who skipped college which their family could have afforded, and is instead living in an $80k van and getting money from streaming a “legit homeless”? The world is not so black and white it will turn out in the long run.

[nradov]

Many of those semi-functional motorhomes are actually owned by a particular type of slumlord (vanlord) who rent them out to homeless people.

https://sanjosespotlight.com/san-jose-to-crack-down-on-rv-re...