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A good sign that your boss is full of shit is when he promises you will "change the world".
Basically, this selling point is based on the relatively new American ideology that you are a unique and special creature and therefore deserve meaningful work that is valuable to the world. But coming from the technology sector – where such thought has penetrated the foundations to parody – it is guided by the legitimate reality that new technologies Is to bring change, even if it is not always for the better. Most of the time, however, it just seems to serve as a defense mechanism that technicians use to justify their own exorbitant salaries and lifestyles.
Which brings us to Elon Musk's recent announcement of what he is looking for in a worker:
Musk will go later to tweet that "if you like what you do, it does not (most often) give the impression of working," specifying that while ideal working hours vary from one person to another, what he is looking for is "about 80 hours supported, with peaks greater than 100 times".
For starters, the idea that it is useful to work with this type of hours is at best objectively questionable: an badysis conducted in 2014 by John Pencanvel, economist at Stanford, examined the data from the factories from the times of the First World War and a more recent literature to conclude that exceed 50 hours per week decreasing returns, and can effectively reduce production. Other studies – not to mention the federal government's health and wellness warnings – also suggest that working all the time is bad for you and your job. In fact, a CUNY review in 2017 of relevant datasets cites, in an approved manner, a 2005 study, which found that a 60-hour work week resulted in a 23% increase in the hazard rate in the workplace. working.
But musk is smart. He does not speak of this kind of efficiency. He talks about maximizing what he, the man with $ 24 billion, spends on his own workforce.
This is what he really thinks: I want to consolidate my heritage, and therefore my wealth and value for society, by changing the world through technology. To do this, I will need your help and for that I am ready to pay you a predetermined salary. But while you're here, I'm going to try to get you extra work by making you believe that you're changing the world too. And if you do not fear that, I will find someone else who will do it.
It's like any boss, really. The boss wants to make money by doing something and will pay you to help make it happen. But in this system, he will always try to pay you as little as possible, because it will allow him to keep more money. (Maybe he will reinvest in the company, will he just buy a boat? If it's a type of private equity, it's probably what latest). When this avenue is blocked due to a contract, he will try to get more for his money. by constantly blurring the line between "work" and "home" life. It will ask you to stay after normal working hours, to connect to your smartphone or simply to badign tasks that do not correspond to what you requested.
For all bosses, the ultimate dream is to make one of their workers believe that they are part of something bigger, that the project is worth it without having to give them ownership in the company. . Utopia is for the world, but the profits are for him.
It is a good question to ask what is meant by "changing the world". Greener transport via Tesla cars (and loading equipment) could help humans populate the world for a while without destroying the entire planet, which is nice and beneficial. But this probably also represents a sort of lame exit valve from capitalism's desire to consume global resources. Remarkably green technologies like this often seem more than ever to be designed to make you feel less guilty when driving, for example, at work. And although SpaceX is "cool" in a nerdy exploration style, it would seem that this is actually a tourism for the ultra-rich until it becomes (perhaps) a series. exhaust pods of an endangered planet. (Musk insisted that this is not the case.)
Now imagine what "change" to your personal world could mean. Can working fewer hours positively affect its quality? Can being able to devote more time in your limited life to other activities such as reading, writing, playing with your children, exploring the world, or perhaps just your own neighborhood, will improve your quality of life ? Probably! And yet, that's not what Musk is trying to sell its workforce potential, because it's not even the world in which he's trying to leverage his technological prowess to build. (Imagine yourself coming back in 1930 and telling someone about all the technological inventions we made, then watching their faces sag when you let them know how many hours again I have to work. If you had the opportunity to tell the legendary British economist John Maynard Keynes, it would be a misfortune.
Realistically, all that Musk will do in his lifetime by asking his help to make various technological objects will be less of a change for the world than for those who fought and died during the eight-hour workday. the 40-hour work week. , accomplished. You know, these people who are unionized or want to join one, the people that Musk has long ridiculed and who have been repeatedly accused of targeting reprisals – a.k.a. fight against the union. People like these have legitimately changed the material conditions of life in the world in a way that Musk, or any leader, will never change.
Most damning, so-called visionary minds like Musk's could never even dream of this kind of change.
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This article originally appeared on VICE US.
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