End-stage Capitalism's Meal Break

I recently came across one of the most ridiculous headlines I have seen in a world full of ridiculous headlines: “Americans are holding onto devices longer than ever and it’s costing the economy.” It is one of several assertions I have seen recently about consumer behaviour that underlines how utterly broken our social structure has become.

The idea that Americans holding onto their smart phones for an average of 29 months, instead of the 22 months that they had in 2016, is hurting the economy is completely obscene, yet bizarrely true. In a world where paper plates and plastic bottles are consumed by the billions because throwing them out is simply easier than washing dishes, we are so completely reliant on a disposable culture that we’ve lost sight of any sense of rationality.

Our businesses depend not on selling a product once, but on selling it over and over again. Where we used to be able to buy a copy of a computer game and play it forever, most now require subscriptions or pepper us with ads. It’s gotten to the point where BMW even tried selling a subscription to its heated seats, but found that, alas, that was jumping the subscription shark. The heated seats were obviously already present in the car; paying for the right to press a button was an absurdity that could not be overcome.

There is an expectation from the corporate universe and the spokespeople we refer to as the traditional media that we exist as people — as consumers — for the sole purpose of spending as much money as possible while getting as little as possible out of the expenditure. They call it maximising profit, but that is a bizarrely genteel way of expressing the reality of the situation.

In a world where vacations are often squeezed into meaninglessness — Americans do not have guaranteed vacation — a wonderful sounding slap in the face has been spreading for the past few years. The term “micro-retirement,” attributed primarily to Gen Z, refers to taking time off, often by temporarily quitting a job, as a “way to avoid burnout.” In other words, a vacation.

In the US, the annual two week standard for vacation is convention, not law. There is no standardised national legal requirement to provide vacation. Canada has some baseline vacations, but it is only generous here when compared to the Americans. With a bar that low, it is hard not to exceed it. Most of Africa, South America, Oceania, Europe — including Russia — and some of Asia has more minimum time off than we do.

If we want to avoid burnout, perhaps the solution is to require all employers to provide all employees with actual time off in sufficient quantities. Novel idea.

Many employers, though, are largely going in the opposite direction. Another trend that is being attacked has been dubbed “quiet nourishing.” That boils down to the rebellious act of eating while at work. Starvation wages must be intended to be literal.

Which all leads to another recent trend: “quiet quitting” which is the idea that employees only do what is required of them. Say what?

If we take the overall narrative of these combined concepts, what we learn is:

• that the younger generation is apparently holding onto devices as long as they work instead of always throwing money at the latest update — and that this lack of waste is causing the economy to collapse;

• that they must quit their jobs in order to get enough vacation to recover;

• that eating at many workplaces is a cardinal sin; and

• that following the specifications of a job is required is considered quitting.

If you are going to do a job, you should do it to the best of your ability, but the requirements should be properly defined, up-front. Going above and beyond, rather than defining the scope of the work for what is actually expected, has become the minimum that everyone is expected to meet. The social supports to get them there, though, have quietly quit.

Everyone is constantly expected to do more with less, and the result is widespread burnout, workplace dissatisfaction, social dysfunction, and an ownership class that has so vastly much wealth that it is now estimated that the wealthiest 1/1000th of one percent of the world’s population own more than the poorest four billion humans.

But it is so much worse. Not only do the 60,000 richest people on earth have more than the poorest 4,000,000,000, they have three times as much.

These people take their micro-retirements every week while quiet-nourishing on their private yachts. They are quiet-quitting their obligations to society, and taking everyone’s assets, liberty, and dignity with them along the way.

If they are not going to put their vast resources into improving the quality of life for those that allowed them to gain that wealth, then the obscenely rich serve no useful purpose in society. They offer no genuine value and must be taxed out of their very existence. Working people should be able to keep their old devices, do their jobs, eat, and take a vacation without being accused of undermining the economy.

It is time for the obscenely rich to take a shot at going above and beyond — before we collectively mandate it into their job description.