Category: Leisure and Work
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My Grunt Jobs
Furniture mover in Santa Barbara; exterminator in West Los Angeles; grave digger in Culver City; factory worker in Venice, California; letter carrier and mail handler in Los Angeles; logger in Forks, Washington; tree planter in Oregon; taxi driver in Boston; plus assorted day jobs out of Manpower Temporary Services in Los Angeles, Santa Barbara and…
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In Praise of the Useless
A Substack short.
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Work, Money, Living, and Livelihood
Substack latest. Paul, Baruch, and Henry had the right idea.
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Marx and Work
Physical work is good for the soul if you are working for yourself and have time for other things. So I have long felt a certain sympathy for a famous passage from Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, The German Ideology (ed. C. J. Arthur, New York: International Publishers, 1970, p. 53): . . .…
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A Sane Populism is not an Anti-Intellectualism
Here is a statement that is not only extreme but also manifestly false: In fact, you could wipe society’s table clear of every writer, artist, actor, musician, professor, dancer, reporter, tastemaker, producer, influencer, teacher, lobbyist, politician, everyone on TV, everyone who doesn’t get their hands dirty, and our world would keep turning just fine. If…
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A Vocation, not a Job
Heading out the door for a walk, the wife invited me along. I told her I had too much to do, that the clock was running, the format sudden death, the time-control unknown. "But you're retired." I reminded her that philosophy is my vocation. One can be retired from the largely meaningless job of teaching…
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A Couple of Venice Characters I Met While Working for Manpower
Bill Keezer e-mails re: my Manpower post: I think it would be good for all young men somewhere in their early years to have to work for Manpower. It might give them more appreciation of what they have. It also might teach them something useful. I remember my various Manpower stints with some pleasure. I…
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Of E-Mail and Doing Nothing
I do appreciate e-mail, and I consider it rude not to respond; but lack of time and energy in synergy with congenital inefficiency conspire to make it difficult for me to answer everything. I am also temperamentally disinclined to acquiesce in mindless American hyper-kineticism, in accordance with the Italian saying: Dolce far niente Sweet to…
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Is Ora et Labora Enough? Or do Christians Need Leisure Too?
Paul J. Griffiths maintains a strikingly wrong-headed thesis in an article entitled, Ora et Labora: Christians Don't Need Leisure. The Latin translates as "Pray and Work.' The thesis is in the second paragraph: The deleterious effects of narcissism are evident in the work of many, Christian and otherwise, who advocate leisure as good for us,…
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The Dignity of Labor and Marxist Utopianism
This old man busted his hump for a solid three hours this morning shoveling a ton and a half of 3/4" Madison gold landscaping rock onto his property. I paid $91 for the rock and $45 to have it delivered. Here in the Sonoran desert water-wasting lawns are frowned upon; xeriscapes are de rigueur. The…
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Philosophy and Livelihood
Recently over the transom: I'm wondering, as a 17 year old early entrant to university who's looking for a direction in his life: how do you manage to make a living from what you do? Also, keep up the great work! I have been asked this question many times and have written several posts in…
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When the Government Does Everything for You, What Will You Do with Yourself?
It is simply a fact about human nature that few are able to make good use of free time, 'leisure' time. Provide them with it and they 'go to seed' in no time, following the path of least resistance ever downward. The classical concept of leisure. not to be confused with 'leisure,' as the former…
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SCOTUS Rules Against SEIU
Not all news is bad. I have nothing against unions as such. My father was a rank-and-file member, all his working life, of the Boilermakers' Union. SEIU, however, is a public-sector union, a horse of a different color. So what's the problem with public-sector unions? Briefly, this. You pay taxes. Some of your tax dollars…
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Cooperation and Competition
Liberals tend to oppose cooperation to competition, and vice versa, as if they excluded each other. "We need more cooperation and less competition." One frequently hears that from liberals. But competition is a form of cooperation. As such, it cannot be opposed to cooperation. One cannot oppose a species to its genus. Consider competitive games…