Radical thinkers have proposed an inverse wage scale with the highest pay for necessary and very unattractive jobs like unclogging big sewer pipes (not your kitchen sink); tedious and difficult work (providing personal care for the elderly or paralyzed -- toileting, bathing, feeding, etc); and crushingly boring work, with lower pay going to jobs with intrinsic interest and status rewards like major league sports, surgery, and so on.

I do not foresee a time when we will actually see sanitation workers getting $15,000,000 a year for clearing those underground sewers, and brain surgeons and NFL players getting $20 an hour. But the principle is sound. I was really very well rewarded in therms of satisfaction for the best jobs I have had, and no amount of money was enough for the drag-ass, boring, tedious, pointless jobs I've had.

I do not foresee a time when we will actually see sanitation workers getting $15,000,000 a year for clearing those underground sewers, and brain surgeons and NFL players getting $20 an hour. But the principle is sound. I was really very well rewarded in therms of satisfaction for the best jobs I have had, and no amount of money was enough for the drag-ass, boring, tedious, pointless jobs I've had. — Bitter Crank

I definitely agree with you, but my intention was not to say, "Hey, lets compensate people according to a boredom scale", but rather, "Hey, look how much boredom and minutia mongering our economy is based on!". It is staggering how much boredom goes into the electrical system, the electronic components of any device, computers, construction, other utilities, manufacturing, transportation, and all the rest. It is just staggering amounts of boredom being spread around through the need to survive.

This economy is built on enormous, heaping gobs of boredom. Engineering team's inventions, formulas, schematics, leads to millions and billions of uninteresting jobs. I do not necessarily see it as anything amazing. With the small amount of enjoyment that the very few who CREATE technology receive, comes the HUGE amount of boredom that most will implement and maintain. And no, there are not enough artistic, literary, outright fun, educationally satisfying jobs to go around to cover the huge difference. The "good" from the output of jobs just gets counteracted by the "negative" of the boredom that is also created.

Look fun!!

Look fun!!

Look fun!!

Look fun!!

Look fun!!

Drudgery is often in the eye of the beholder. As a tradesman, I have put up my share of drywall. I hate putting up drywall. But I have worked alongside many who did not.

I am patient with other construction acts. Some colleagues shake their heads at my willingness to make sure each preparation is done. My form of life is intolerable in their view. It gets complicated in the world of actual production.

I am patient with other construction acts. Some colleagues shake their heads at my willingness to make sure each preparation is done. My form of life is intolerable in their view. It gets complicated in the world of actual production. — Valentinus

So what is your Boredom rate? a/h * hours per time period = B remember :D.

Maybe I am a bad example. I do several kinds of work in the same time period. I have to manage stuff while also making things. That is very different from playing a specific role in a warehouse or factory.

On the other hand, management is drudgery too.

Yeah, I am dodging your formula. I will think about it.

Yeah, I am dodging your formula. I will think about it. — Valentinus

Okay, I'll wait for it :D. If you want, add some more drudgery photos from drudgery jobs.

Just think of the tiniest, minutest, insignificant little part and then realize that someone had to manufacture that, inventory it, ship it, etc. It's mind bogging how much boredom is produced in the modern economy. We must find a way to measure this boredom output!

We must find a way to measure this boredom output! — schopenhauer1

Sounds like a colossal bore.

Most work is inevitably tedious, dull, dirty, difficult, and a damned drag. That is why they pay people. Nobody would do any of that crap for free.

Just add up the total hours reported by all the workers in the world. Multiply the total number of hours by .93. That's the boredom output. The remaining 7% of hours might be less than boring because some people like routine, and some people (usually liars, thieves, knaves, and scoundrels) are downright gleeful as they go about their work of ripping everybody off.

So yes, the total boredom output is soooo huge one can hardly grasp it.

Have you ever heard of 'hash numbers'? I once had a temp job adding up hash numbers for Cargill Incorporated, a giant ag. product company. The hash numbers were made up of item numbers, maybe a date, invoice number, tons loaded in the box car, one code for corn, another code for wheat, another for beans, and so on. One went through the shipping form and added up these arbitrary numbers. The total was supposed to agree with a number on another form. If it didn't, it meant that somewhere in the data an error was lurking. We were using 10 key adding machines with a paper tape. I did that 8 hours a day for 3 weeks. I think they decided that I wasn't good enough at this crucial job to keep on paying me. Merciful god, they let me go.

Now that was one meaningless, tedious, dull, fucking boring job! It's probably done by a computer now. As well it should be.

The two really horrible jobs here are the circuit board inspectors and the call center workers. The crew laying pipe and the guy doing something with the recycling bins have jobs that would be interesting to the right person. NOBODY likes inspecting circuit boards and NOBODY likes working in call centers. They do these jobs because it beats begging in the streets and living under a bridge.

I would enjoy using a power shovel to dig holes. What I would not enjoy is getting down in the mud and water on a January day when the temp. was -25F and one had to fix a broken water pipe. Not boring, though. Just horrible.

Not all bad jobs are boring. Many people would rather beg on the street and live under a bridge than drive a mass transit bus (considering what the passengers are like) even though the wages are not that bad. The job (the vehicles condition, the passengers, the regulation, the traffic) SUCKS!!!

my intention was not to say, "Hey, lets compensate people according to a boredom scale" — schopenhauer1

Why the hell not? Look, there is something that can be done about boredom. Assemblng parts doesn't have to be a factory version of Day of the Living Dead or Invasion of the Body Snatchers.

In fact, the whole economy should be based on quantity of boredom involved. — schopenhauer1

Never going to happen. Silly. Not even really necessary. What is needed is a way for every able-bodied person to have a job which is safe and which pays them enough for them, and their families, to live a decent life with decent housing in a reasonably safe neighborhood, good healthy food, health care, good education for their children, etc. etc. Let's do that. Then we can worry about boredom.

By the way, the photo of the construction workers installing piping in trenches shows them working in trenches which are steeper than allowed by OSHA. Collapsing excavations is a major cause of work injuries and depths and a bad way to die.

Back to boredom for a minute - As an adult, I worked at a Baskin Robins, as a warehouse worker, and as a cabinetmaker for 15 years before I went back to school and got my engineering degree. For the past 30 years I've worked as an engineer. Pay is better. Work is better. But at least 50% of the work I have done as an engineer is boring or worse. The difference is that I have enough control over my work to recognize that even the most valuable and rewarding work includes long periods of unpleasant work. Sanding is boring, but has to be done well and carefully to build attractive, well-built cabinets. Project management is the bedrock on which a successful engineering project is built. God I hate project management. Hate, hate, hate. But I never would have had a chance to have creative control over design projects without sucking it up and doing what was needed. Did I mention I hate project management.

What you said.

In fact, the whole economy should be based on quantity of boredom involved. — schopenhauer1

An interesting way to arrive at the same conclusion as empathy.

Never going to happen. Silly. Not even really necessary. What is needed is a way for every able-bodied person to have a job which is safe and which pays them enough for them, and their families, to live a decent life with decent housing in a reasonably safe neighborhood, good healthy food, health care, good education for their children, etc. etc. Let's do that. Then we can worry about boredom. — T Clark

:up: At least, that's how I feel about it.

I do not foresee a time when we will actually see sanitation workers getting $15,000,000 a year for clearing those underground sewers, and brain surgeons and NFL players getting $20 an hour. But the principle is sound — Bitter Crank

The principle is sound? I'm not sure I'll be able to afford the $15m garbage pick-up service, but I guess I could get affordable weekly brain surgeries by just waiting at the curb for the brain surgery truck to roll by.

So yes, the total boredom output is soooo huge one can hardly grasp it. — Bitter Crank

And there is the major point. The output of boredom is soooo huge and most of modern people's lives consist of this. I guess it's worth living because you get to go back to it every weekeday and do maintenance and some entertainment on the weekends. Yeah, life is not an Eden, who said it was. Yet, somehow it's meaningfulness abounds in its routines and the small amount novelty from the routines, and we should put more new people into the world to continue and experience this? Long live mechanical living! Survival, maintenance, entertainment, repeat. This is somehow worth experiencing. People have just got to experience it. Cultivate your flowers. Snap that widget into place. Rake the leaves. Pour the cement. Extrude the wire.

Have you ever heard of 'hash numbers'? I once had a temp job adding up hash numbers for Cargill Incorporated, a giant ag. product company. The hash numbers were made up of item numbers, maybe a date, invoice number, tons loaded in the box car, one code for corn, another code for wheat, another for beans, and so on. One went through the shipping form and added up these arbitrary numbers. The total was supposed to agree with a number on another form. If it didn't, it meant that somewhere in the data an error was lurking. We were using 10 key adding machines with a paper tape. I did that 8 hours a day for 3 weeks. I think they decided that I wasn't good enough at this crucial job to keep on paying me. Merciful god, they let me go.

Now that was one meaningless, tedious, dull, fucking boring job! It's probably done by a computer now. As well it should be. — Bitter Crank

But this is what I'm talking about, exactly. Modern economy is just a huge boredom generating monstrosity that we put more workers in by procreating them. Oh, and that computer program that may have taken over that job, was probably really boring to create for that computer programmer. It just got pushed up the chain, at least for the time it was programmed.

Never going to happen. Silly. Not even really necessary. What is needed is a way for every able-bodied person to have a job which is safe and which pays them enough for them, and their families, to live a decent life with decent housing in a reasonably safe neighborhood, good healthy food, health care, good education for their children, etc. etc. Let's do that. Then we can worry about boredom. — T Clark

OR, encourage people not to have children, realize that most of life consists of boring routine, and that the supply and demand of the modern economy is maddeningly self-defeating, as the satisfaction from any given output generates the dissatisfaction of large amounts of (so far) unquantified boredom.

An interesting way to arrive at the same conclusion as empathy. — fdrake

I simply want to quantify the amazing heaps of boredom that the modern economy produces, and add that as a factor of disutility into the economic equation- something economics does not take into account. Subjective value-theory doesn't capture it. Subjective boredom-theory will :).

@Bitter Crank@T Clark @Valentinus@fdrake

So I guess a question from this is, what does producing more output matter when the collateral damage is this heaping gobs of boredom?

As I said, its circular and self-defeating. And who cares about maintaining a lifestyle

pays them enough for them, and their families, to live a decent life with decent housing in a reasonably safe neighborhood, good healthy food, health care, good education for their children, etc. etc. Let's do that. Then we can worry about boredom. — T Clark

If this just means more boring healthy, safe lives? What is the point? You are losing as you are producing more output. It's as if ALL of what life means is being healthy and safe, and having some hobbies to tide you over in the free time. This is NOT worth living. Safe, healthy lives, of boring work, frustrating hours toiling, or dealing with management/hierarchies, a few hobbies, and vacation days does not mean, "Let's start reproducing more of this!" to me. This seems like a lot of routined, uninteresting days repeated infinitum for future generations to push along to the next generation, to push along, etc. etc. Meanwhile the boredom index keeps getting higher. The circular flow of boredom continues.

What you said. — Valentinus

I could tell from your posts that you and I share feelings about management.

OR, encourage people not to have children, realize that most of life consists of boring routine, and that the supply and demand of the modern economy is maddeningly self-defeating, as the satisfaction from any given output generates the dissatisfaction of large amounts of (so far) unquantified boredom. — schopenhauer1

We've all been through this argument with you before. Many of us don't share your feelings about life. I'm almost never bored. Actually, maybe never. I've done a lot of tedious work in my life, but in most cases I've known that the tedium is necessary in order to complete a job that is worth doing. I like life. I'm not afraid of boredom, cancer, dying, mean people, bad drivers, mosquitoes, ebola, "Two and a Half Men,"

If this just means more boring healthy, safe lives? What is the point? — schopenhauer1

This is about you, not most of us. You need to go get a life. I would have a lot more respect for your opinions on this subject if you would accept and acknowledge that others feel differently and your ideas of what is best don't apply to us.

We've all been through this argument with you before. Many of us don't share your feelings about life. I'm almost never bored. Actually, maybe never. I've done a lot of tedious work in my life, but in most cases I've known that the tedium is necessary in order to complete a job that is worth doing. — T Clark

Right, so while doing boring work, you live in the ethereal Platonic realm and Buddhist nirvana nothingness, in your mind, thus allowing your physical body to detach and do its tedious task :roll:.

This is about you, not most of us. You need to go get a life. I would have a lot more respect for your opinions on this subject if you would accept and acknowledge that others feel differently and your ideas of what is best don't apply to us. — T Clark

AHH, and here is the major conceit. This is EXACTLY what I can say about the decision to create a new child.

AHH, and here is the major conceit. This is EXACTLY what I can say about the decision to create a new child. — schopenhauer1

I accept and acknowledge that you feel differently about this than I, and many others, do. I agree that my ideas of what is best don't apply to you. So, what's the problem?

I accept and acknowledge that you feel differently about this than I, and many others, do. I agree that my ideas of what is best don't apply to you. So, what's the problem? — T Clark

If we play out our two scenarios:

My Belief: I think the world is not worth starting for someone else.
Consequence: No new person is born. No one actually exists to "be deprived" of any goods of life. No collateral damage will ensue, of a person who might think life was not worth living. More importantly, whatever the child's attitude, no child will exist that will experience suffering, period.

Your belief: You think the world is worth starting for someone else.
Consequence: A new person is born. Collateral damage may ensue, of a person who might think life was not worth living (counter to your intention). More importantly, whatever the child's attitude, suffering will incur for an actual person.

My belief leads to no collateral damage, yours will. This is all because you assume someone should live a whole lifetime from a belief you had about the world. Yours has real negative consequences for someone else, all based on your view of life at the time of procreation. Mine will not result in any negative consequences (a lifetime chances of experiencing them in fact).

Oh there is also the ridiculous notion that "getting paid" solves the problem of work-boredom. The assumption is that pay gets rid of the problem, because we overlook our subjective state of the actual work itself because we will get to use the money received towards goods and services. This doesn't actually get rid of the boredom, it is just a culturally-accepted practice that we should overlook our disinterest in a task at hand for a later reward. Getting rid of the work itself, would be actually solving the problem of work-boredom. Or course this will not happen. But somehow people NEED to be born to experience the phenomenon of work :rofl: . People just have to be made so they can work to make output, so that people can entertain themselves and live so they can work to make output so that people can entertain themselves and live so they can work to make output....

Oh right, and the six "goods" of life are the REAL reasons behind this lunacy circularity (accomplishment, relationships, learning, flow-states, physical pleasure, aesthetic pleasure). That is it, people just NEEEEED to experience these things by living, and going through the circularity. Work-boredom is just the necessary vehicle to allow for these six goods to be experienced.. WAHOOOO!!! Yay, I get to spend most of my life in quiet work-boredom because I can feel physical pleasure and the accomplishment of stuff, and whoaa..friends and stuff too?? Wow life sure is meaningful Mister!! Maybe one day I can spout off a lot of mathematical equations and pouring over Wittgenstein minutia on a philosophy forum too! :cheer: . I mean that's better than drinking ebola infested water out of a puddle scrounging for garbage in a garbage heap!! Clean, safe, living environment is all that is needed.. followed by our "capacities' to allow our goods to flourish!!! YAAAYY!!!!!

this just means more boring — schopenhauer1

More boring is not just... more boring, it became unsustainable at least 4.5 billion people ago. Capitalism is predicated on expansion: expanding extraction and production, expanding markets, expanding volume of business activity, expanding profits, expansion expansion expansion. The regime of constant growth has been in place for quite a long time, now--several centuries--and the climate crisis, plastic in the oceans, too much population, and so forth are all a consequence.

The recognition that the world is unsustainable is profoundly alienating. We are stuck with the world in this unsustainable situation until natural forces intervene (which will be ghastly). It makes everything that is done a pointless nightmarish treadmill.

Were I to be as pessimistic as you, my route would be through contemplation of the unsustainable future. I just don't see a way of our species, and quite a few other species as well, making it through to the other side. "It was good while it lasted" is one response. A less sanguine response is that if it is not good in the future, then it wasn't good in the past either. What looked like great progress was actually a great disaster.

I just don't see a way of our species, and quite a few other species as well, making it through to the other side. "It was good while it lasted" is one response. A less sanguine response is that if it is not good in the future, then it wasn't good in the past either. What looked like great progress was actually a great disaster. — Bitter Crank

Agreed. But, we are looking from two different angles. You are talking about ecological disaster, which very well might be inevitable. What about the idea about "progress" to begin with? We have people like Michael Faraday, Boltzman, Volta, Ampere, Watts, Boyle, etc. We have the person who invented the transistor, the microprocessor, (or teams of people). "Progress" happens when individuals who are minutia-inclined and intelligent work with materials and get outcomes that "make stuff happen" with them. Entrepeneurs finance this and bring it to market as usable products (using other engineers). This creates really boring jobs, that create outputs so people can pay for them and use them in their spare time.

Bitter, I would like to make a series where I interview all the greatest minutia-mongerers and boredom-braggadoccios alive and ask them, how their mind works.. What is it like to monger all that minutia so well, and what they think of the consequence of bringing it to a production setting whereby millions of boring minutia-mongering (but uncreative) jobs come about as a result of their initial creativity. Because that is what progress is.. the incremental push of more mongering of minutia from ideas that came before and applying it to some materials in the present, experimenting and getting a result that "does stuff". The consequence is the collateral damage of environmental degradation. Perhaps, more minutia mongerers can progress our way out of it, most likely not. But the collateral damage of environmental degredation is not my focus, but how and why the minutia mongering continues, and the collateral damage of work-boredom, rather.

Also, I'm trying to convey that the six "goods" that life is supposed to be experienced for, and the experience of having to overcome challenges (like work-boredom) just don't make sense in the first place.. Hence my critique on the inane circularity of work to make output, to entertain and live, to work to make output.. etc. There is just our restless wills which need stuff to happen. Minutia monger progress is just the latest version of this...It is restlessness personified. The goods are not that good, but we cherish them enough that we need more people to experience the circularity of our lifestyle.

Can someone address the economic absurdity of this thread? If you increase pay for boring jobs, you'll just incentivize people to learn to endure boringness and we'll have or best and brightest watching paint dry and our dumbass thrill seekers will be operating on the brains of those who instituted this new economic model for minimum wage.

Can someone address the economic absurdity of this thread? If you increase pay for boring jobs, you'll just incentivize people to learn to endure boringness and we'll have or best and brightest watching paint dry and our dumbass thrill seekers will be operating on the brains of those who instituted this new economic model for minimum wage. — Hanover

I did not mean for the thread to be about paying people based on boredom. Rather, I want to quantify boredom in some way (like we try to quantify subjective-value in current economic models when making demand curves), to show how much boredom-disutility is actually created with all this "progress". Oh you created a new widget that needs new jobs! Great, how much boredom-disutility is now going to come of this? In other words, the economy should really be measured in terms of how much boredom-output we are generating, not just product/service/wage/work output. What are outputs except the things that are ENJOYED by people? How much dis-enjoyment comes out of all that "satisfaction" from the outputs themselves?

But, we are looking from two different angles. You are talking about ecological disaster, which very well might be inevitable. What about the idea about "progress" to begin with? ... This creates really boring jobs, that create outputs so people can pay for them and use them in their spare time. — schopenhauer1

minutia-mongerers and boredom-braggadocios — schopenhauer1

Whatever turns you off! Whatever makes one wish for the death of the last human... Ecological collapse, progress on a stick, extruded ennui, minutia mongers, boredom braggadocios, or titan of tedium...

If we're doomed anyway (many think we are) we might as well enjoy the show. Throwing in the towel, leaning back against a tree, and just observing might actually have some salvific power. Ceasing to strive, is, after all, the opposite of what has gotten us to our sad state of ourselves being bored to tears by technological production even as we breed our way to a more complex destruction.