What a tremendous interview. Not just that it was an important topic but the authority and ease of communication Eberstadt brings was captivating. The last five or ten minutes on his backstory was fascinating.
FIshing up in Alaska for as many years as I did, I have been aware of the eroding American work ethic for more than a decade. A longliner is nothing like a pleasure cruise and most Americans weren't interested in 18 hour days or seven day work weeks. It wasn't a question of compensation so much as it was quality of life. Hard to blame them. I like the work and I loved the lifestyle. Six figures in in eight months with thirty days spent steaming between Alaska and Seattle made a lot of sense to me in my twenties. Especially when you aren't paying for rent, insurance, or groceries. so everything you make after taxes goes straight into your pocket.
Of course there were downsides too. One of our deckhands lost a chunk of his skull when a stray hook caught his eye socket on its way into the crucifier and I had to help our gear rigger look for his thumb an hour after waking up one night because it was pinched off between a couple rails. Not bad considering an average of three ships would sink each B season up there and all I saw were a few hairy injuries. Fights were a normal occurrence and broke out so frequently you just kind of moved around them if you weren't immediately involved -work first after all, fuck around time came off the clock. Any of those could be deal breakers but they weren't. Wasn't even the distance or lack of contact. It was the fact the hours and tempo of the purely physical activity was so demanding that it could push you to your breaking point. 30-40 hour offloads with no sleep and only half hour breaks every eight hours, or having to wake up in the middle of your sleep shift and beat frozen ice off the hull and deck with rubber mallets because the weight was threatening the disposition of the ship, that was the shit that broke people. If you didn't enjoy working then every minute of every day was just pure misery.
I don't blame people who don't want to fish like its 1960 anymore. Its sort of insane really, which is why the only Americans who do it are desperate or a little nuts.
Every President since Nixon has moved mercantile and industry over seas while pushing STEM, research, and analysis domestically. Its a good strategy and it pays off. Money isn't in making shit, its in conceiving the shit that could be made. That was why all of those Soviet five year plans failed so terrifically, because it doesn't matter how much you produce what matters is what your production is contributing toward. What glory the USSR can claim never came from their competition with the West but when they were pursuing aspirations -which culminated in the space race. Competition lends itself to greater efficiency because it gives you hard constraints, tangible metrics, that you have to encompass, but competition does not exist for its own sake. Its all about what we are competing for that gives the struggle meaning.
Scarcity is the first law of economics, it is the lynchpin which holds every economic theory together, and we are moving toward a future where scarcity will not be a constraint so much as variable. Automation over the next century will make workforce participation just shy of voluntary. Just as capitalism was the evolution of trade and barter incorporating medium of exchange, it is going to have to change again to encompass a world where work and sustenance are no longer bound.
And this is a good thing.
It is the dreamers, and philosophers, and tinkerers who ultimately push our species further from the primordial puddles we spawned from. And you don't need a lot of them. Most people are useless, always have been. Work force participation figures are only half the story. Productivity is what needs to be assessed and our productivity is tremendous compared to a century ago. . .Compared to a decade ago. If there is a problem it is that our culture is shifting from one of creativity and daring toward a distinct lack of curiosity and unrestrained consumerism. Complacency is the real killer, not leisure.
Holy wow, Matt Welch--this interview was amazing! After 20-odd years teaching in the K-12 system, my mind is going in 500 different directions right now (okay maybe not that many, but you catch my drift). This has given me so many new threads to follow. Thank you!
This was, for me, the first episode with Matt flying solo as it were, more of these please.
As someone who is off work recovering from an operation, two weeks in and I’m bored out of my skull. How on earth do people who have never worked stay the right side of sane?
Matt, this is one of the best 5th column podcasts so far, it was astonishing and interesting from start to finish. It’s one of the few I’ve wanted to listen to again because there was so much well presented information. Your questions to Nicholas Eberstadt were thoughtful and intelligent- there was a lot to digest. It would be ideal if as many people as possible had the opportunity to hear this as well. Thanks for what you do. You do it well.
So here's a question I don't think you guys fully addressed -- what the heck are all these people doing? I get that a lot are on long term disability, but they can't all be, right? Are their parents supporting them? Spouses or girlfriends? Are they working under the table or in a gray/black market?
The Cato Institute's 'New Challenges to the Free Economy' event this week featured this jaw-dropping clip, which is not extracted out of context of the full version of Adam Posen's (head of the Peterson Institute) remarks. Posen's visceral disregard for vulnerable blue collar workers lacks even a hint of human compassion for those impacted. Blood chilling. https://twitter.com/matthewstoller/status/1578130142655905816?s=20&t=qbYSR5endPc_rdgAHPjITA
Everytime I think "Matt, why don't you ask [x]?" you ask it a moment later. You leave almost no stone unturned.
You hypothesize that the populist movement are a response to these changes, but go point by point in that their proposed solutions have been demonstrated as ineffectual.
The only thing you seem to have missed was the effects of global trade on these issues. I'm a globalist, so I prefer if we can demonstrate it has no impact, but it seems like a stone left unturned.
Would more men be in the labor force if the steel plant their father and grandfather worked at were still open?
Also am very glad they touched on UBI. I’m a deep skeptic for exactly this reason. I think we have enough evidence that unconditional payments to not work will cause more people than you think to not work. I do support EITC expansion or some form of a pro employment low wage subsidy for people in line bottom quintile of earners. Seems like the right balance of caring about poverty and not creating a large permanent couch class.
This was a really thought-provoking, compact little episode. I want to listen to it again at least once & read NE’s book. But I do have some fairly well-formed thoughts about teen jobs & the repercussions of losing them:
- Most teen jobs are in retail or hospitality (or something with an analogous skillset). It’s more than just showing up on time & being part of a team. You have to talk to strangers in person, and answer the phone. You figure out the things that are worth making a fuss about (not many) & the ones that are going to blow over, whether you’re on board or not (most of them). You learn diplomacy, and it’s termination point (judgment).
- Retail & hospitality is where sheltered teens used to go to interact with people from different backgrounds from them. Even in the most homogeneous white bread area, the kids are at least going to have to work with people who are older than them. Sometimes, if the planets align, people who are a *lot* older. It’s a good thing. It’s good to be exposed to outside thoughts/ideas/culture/opinions, and it’s even good to hear people say things that you really do not approve of but you’re working with this person for six hours tomorrow & actually, it costs you nothing to be simply cordial.
What a tremendous interview. Not just that it was an important topic but the authority and ease of communication Eberstadt brings was captivating. The last five or ten minutes on his backstory was fascinating.
I am not overly concerned by any of this.
FIshing up in Alaska for as many years as I did, I have been aware of the eroding American work ethic for more than a decade. A longliner is nothing like a pleasure cruise and most Americans weren't interested in 18 hour days or seven day work weeks. It wasn't a question of compensation so much as it was quality of life. Hard to blame them. I like the work and I loved the lifestyle. Six figures in in eight months with thirty days spent steaming between Alaska and Seattle made a lot of sense to me in my twenties. Especially when you aren't paying for rent, insurance, or groceries. so everything you make after taxes goes straight into your pocket.
Of course there were downsides too. One of our deckhands lost a chunk of his skull when a stray hook caught his eye socket on its way into the crucifier and I had to help our gear rigger look for his thumb an hour after waking up one night because it was pinched off between a couple rails. Not bad considering an average of three ships would sink each B season up there and all I saw were a few hairy injuries. Fights were a normal occurrence and broke out so frequently you just kind of moved around them if you weren't immediately involved -work first after all, fuck around time came off the clock. Any of those could be deal breakers but they weren't. Wasn't even the distance or lack of contact. It was the fact the hours and tempo of the purely physical activity was so demanding that it could push you to your breaking point. 30-40 hour offloads with no sleep and only half hour breaks every eight hours, or having to wake up in the middle of your sleep shift and beat frozen ice off the hull and deck with rubber mallets because the weight was threatening the disposition of the ship, that was the shit that broke people. If you didn't enjoy working then every minute of every day was just pure misery.
I don't blame people who don't want to fish like its 1960 anymore. Its sort of insane really, which is why the only Americans who do it are desperate or a little nuts.
Every President since Nixon has moved mercantile and industry over seas while pushing STEM, research, and analysis domestically. Its a good strategy and it pays off. Money isn't in making shit, its in conceiving the shit that could be made. That was why all of those Soviet five year plans failed so terrifically, because it doesn't matter how much you produce what matters is what your production is contributing toward. What glory the USSR can claim never came from their competition with the West but when they were pursuing aspirations -which culminated in the space race. Competition lends itself to greater efficiency because it gives you hard constraints, tangible metrics, that you have to encompass, but competition does not exist for its own sake. Its all about what we are competing for that gives the struggle meaning.
Scarcity is the first law of economics, it is the lynchpin which holds every economic theory together, and we are moving toward a future where scarcity will not be a constraint so much as variable. Automation over the next century will make workforce participation just shy of voluntary. Just as capitalism was the evolution of trade and barter incorporating medium of exchange, it is going to have to change again to encompass a world where work and sustenance are no longer bound.
And this is a good thing.
It is the dreamers, and philosophers, and tinkerers who ultimately push our species further from the primordial puddles we spawned from. And you don't need a lot of them. Most people are useless, always have been. Work force participation figures are only half the story. Productivity is what needs to be assessed and our productivity is tremendous compared to a century ago. . .Compared to a decade ago. If there is a problem it is that our culture is shifting from one of creativity and daring toward a distinct lack of curiosity and unrestrained consumerism. Complacency is the real killer, not leisure.
"Oh my garden"
Matt, I'm sincerely grateful that I was able to listen to this one with my kid in the car without my wife getting mad at me.
Matt doing his best Russ Roberts impression was pretty darn good!
Holy wow, Matt Welch--this interview was amazing! After 20-odd years teaching in the K-12 system, my mind is going in 500 different directions right now (okay maybe not that many, but you catch my drift). This has given me so many new threads to follow. Thank you!
Matt, you mentioned the credentialing morass...imagine if you had to pay thousands of dollars to learn to run the fryer in a kitchen.
It would not surprise me if a reg like that is cooking throughout the government in concert with the shady training schools.
This was, for me, the first episode with Matt flying solo as it were, more of these please.
As someone who is off work recovering from an operation, two weeks in and I’m bored out of my skull. How on earth do people who have never worked stay the right side of sane?
I know you touched on criminal records, but I wonder how many of these guys are employed in black market enterprises.
Matt, this is one of the best 5th column podcasts so far, it was astonishing and interesting from start to finish. It’s one of the few I’ve wanted to listen to again because there was so much well presented information. Your questions to Nicholas Eberstadt were thoughtful and intelligent- there was a lot to digest. It would be ideal if as many people as possible had the opportunity to hear this as well. Thanks for what you do. You do it well.
So here's a question I don't think you guys fully addressed -- what the heck are all these people doing? I get that a lot are on long term disability, but they can't all be, right? Are their parents supporting them? Spouses or girlfriends? Are they working under the table or in a gray/black market?
Men gotta work.
The Cato Institute's 'New Challenges to the Free Economy' event this week featured this jaw-dropping clip, which is not extracted out of context of the full version of Adam Posen's (head of the Peterson Institute) remarks. Posen's visceral disregard for vulnerable blue collar workers lacks even a hint of human compassion for those impacted. Blood chilling. https://twitter.com/matthewstoller/status/1578130142655905816?s=20&t=qbYSR5endPc_rdgAHPjITA
Just read your Reason piece and now can't wait to listen to this. Also reminds me of these polls about people worried about boys in the US:
https://twitter.com/mattyglesias/status/1576357701130801153
This is a really great interview.
Everytime I think "Matt, why don't you ask [x]?" you ask it a moment later. You leave almost no stone unturned.
You hypothesize that the populist movement are a response to these changes, but go point by point in that their proposed solutions have been demonstrated as ineffectual.
The only thing you seem to have missed was the effects of global trade on these issues. I'm a globalist, so I prefer if we can demonstrate it has no impact, but it seems like a stone left unturned.
Would more men be in the labor force if the steel plant their father and grandfather worked at were still open?
Also am very glad they touched on UBI. I’m a deep skeptic for exactly this reason. I think we have enough evidence that unconditional payments to not work will cause more people than you think to not work. I do support EITC expansion or some form of a pro employment low wage subsidy for people in line bottom quintile of earners. Seems like the right balance of caring about poverty and not creating a large permanent couch class.
This was a really thought-provoking, compact little episode. I want to listen to it again at least once & read NE’s book. But I do have some fairly well-formed thoughts about teen jobs & the repercussions of losing them:
- Most teen jobs are in retail or hospitality (or something with an analogous skillset). It’s more than just showing up on time & being part of a team. You have to talk to strangers in person, and answer the phone. You figure out the things that are worth making a fuss about (not many) & the ones that are going to blow over, whether you’re on board or not (most of them). You learn diplomacy, and it’s termination point (judgment).
- Retail & hospitality is where sheltered teens used to go to interact with people from different backgrounds from them. Even in the most homogeneous white bread area, the kids are at least going to have to work with people who are older than them. Sometimes, if the planets align, people who are a *lot* older. It’s a good thing. It’s good to be exposed to outside thoughts/ideas/culture/opinions, and it’s even good to hear people say things that you really do not approve of but you’re working with this person for six hours tomorrow & actually, it costs you nothing to be simply cordial.