America’s fever of workaholism is finally breaking
It&#x27;s interesting the comments here are about (a) dead-end jobs where they don&#x27;t care about you (b) poverty and such (c) jobs one only tolerates vs self-realization.<p>The article however is about the upper-middle class men. So, these arguments are really irrelevant to them (except maybe the caring bit, but I doubt career-oriented people are unaware of how little companies care about them - they can, after all switch, companies). In tech, I&#x27;ve met tons of people who work a lot because they like it and people who could have obviously retired (startup exits) but keep working anyway, in not-so-glamorous jobs, some even as ICs with all the attendant BS.<p>Apparently less people identify with work and want to work, for a reason that Atlantic fails to tease out. Atlantic claims it&#x27;s better this way but I&#x27;m not so sure. Better for whom? I&#x27;m not even certain it&#x27;s better for the upper-middle class men themselves - would they get some better ways to self-actualize instead? Not a given. It&#x27;s unlikely better for the economy, or for anyone else really.<p>Everyone has different preferences. Based on those they get different outcomes.
I actually have also met, and read on HN tons of people in tech who kinda resent people who work a lot because it makes them look bad. But many cannot admit this to others (or themselves) so they invent all kinds of justifications about how it&#x27;s bad for people to work hard for an uncaring company not being a founder, or how it&#x27;s better to have kids or go surfing and be a balanced person, or whatever. And really this outcome of getting more done is bad and maybe even fake and they are not better than me!<p>It&#x27;s like the books about athletes, where they always emphasize that people who realize their genetic potential are the ones who love the grind and train a ton in a structured way (practicing serves, reading chess books, doing drills, whatever it is). If you don&#x27;t like the boring repetitive training, and don&#x27;t force yourself, you won&#x27;t get as good. Then you can either say &quot;well, I am not as good at training so I&#x27;m not going to get good at this sport, it&#x27;s my fault only, and that&#x27;s ok&quot;. Or you can come up with some excuses or devalue others&#x27; outcomes.<p>This article is just the latter &quot;oh I was too lazy to practice serves so I never got good at tennis, but all those tennis players kept practicing even after making a bunch of money. Well now they are stopping and it makes me feel better, so I conclude it&#x27;s better for society&quot;