We’ll always be working this hard until we demand better
Technology will continue to give us more work instead of more time... if we let it.
As AI tools become a workplace staple, I’ve been thinking about how often we’re told tech will give us more freedom, only to find ourselves with more on our plate. Let’s dig in.
We’ll always be working this hard until we demand better
Technology will continue to give us more work instead of more time… if we let it.
As part of recent cost-cutting and layoffs restructuring, my employer has begun making AI tools available internally to employees. My coworkers have been sharing excited messages in Slack as they discover new things they can do faster and easier than before.
I don’t want to be a spoil-sport, so I’ve kept my cynicism to myself. But the truth is, the only positive impact these new tools will bring is to the company’s bottom line. Employee jobs will temporarily get easier until they’re expected to do more. They’ll be given more obligations to fill their newfound free time. More responsibility will be put on their shoulders. In reality, nothing has changed for the employee – they still work the same hours for the same pay.
This is something Paul Lafargue pointed out as early as 1883 during industrialisation – advances in machinery meant people didn’t need to work as much to produce the same amount. But their hours never changed to reflect this; instead, the goalpost was moved.
During a 1979 interview filmed for a PBS special, a computer salesman spoke about the impact computers could have on business and productivity. He believed computers would finally make a three-day workweek possible. We know how that turned out.
Economist John Maynard Keynes predicted in 1930 that we’d be working 15-hour workweeks within a century. Well, we’ve still got about five years to prove him right.
The way things are continuing is unsustainable. Companies are competing against one another for their share of the market, squeezing labour from employees in exchange for as little pay as possible. It’s pointless. It’s a dog chasing its own tail. It’s Sisyphean.
Why are we still caught up in their game?
Meaningful change will require systemic intervention at multiple levels (economic, political, social, cultural), and it’s not something we can tackle on our own. But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try.
What can we do?
We can start by challenging hustle culture, by detaching productivity from the idea that it’s inherently virtuous. You gain nothing by participating in a who-can-be-more-exhausted competition. Productivity should only be considered beneficial if it improves our wellbeing.
We can actively seek out and support alternative business models like cooperatives, non-profits or other socially-responsible businesses that prioritise worker well-being and sustainability over purely maximising profits.
We can organise on a local and national level for things like shorter working weeks, employee protections, fairer sharing of company earnings and for Universal Basic Income!
Finally, we can take care of each other. Reciprocal care is what’s going to get us all through tough times – and all of us will experience tough times at some point in our lives. It’s on each of us to do what we can with what we have wherever we are.
It’s hard not to feel hopeless when I think about how many opportunities there have been for our working culture to not be this way. As a disabled person, it’s really hard to find true work/life balance, because expectations of modern workplaces are so numerous and so demanding. And it negatively impacts all of us. Imagine the amount of freedom you’d have if your basic needs were met and you didn’t have to trade the best hours of your day for your survival.
It shouldn’t be a radical idea to prioritise leisure over maximising profit.
If we want to work less and live better, we can’t wait for permission – we have to organise, push for policy change, build alternatives and reclaim leisure as a right. Every act of defiance and care chips away at the system.
This week, try to find a new way to add more leisure to your life. I'll do the same and report back. ☀️
Snails against the machine
Small ways we’re taking back control of our world
This is not a time for media literacy or historical knowledge to be held hostage by institutions bending the knee to authoritarianism and fear.
When Columbia University cancelled her popular course on race, identity and international relations, Karen Attiah decided to move it online under the killer name Resistance Summer School.
She writes about the experience on her own Substack:
I wanted to use that opportunity to build a course I never had when I was an international affairs student studying human rights and media at SIPA—one that examined how constructs of race and identity are formed, and how mass media has historically shaped our understanding of race and the global order. I knew that race and identity were rarely taught in international affairs schools—or many journalism schools, for that matter. And I rarely had the opportunity to learn from a professor who looked like me.
Enrolment for the pilot course is now closed, but there’s a waitlist for fall 2025 enrolment and a place to send donations.
Have a personal rebellion to share? I’d love to hear it!
Shiny things from the curio cabinet
Things I’m noticing, loving or want to share
It’s my birthday this week. 🥳 Maybe it’s not a surprise, but I don’t do much for my birthdays.
I do set aside some money throughout the year to get a lil treat on my birthday, but this year I feel like saving that money instead, so I want to find another way to make the day feel special.
It’s a bit too warm to bake myself a cake, so maybe I’ll just spend the afternoon in a hammock drinking some homemade cold brew. 🌴🍹
Do you have any no-spend ways you like to celebrate special occasions?
Join the crawl 🐌
Connect and share how you’re taking back control
Want to share something from your life or just say hi? Feel free to leave a comment. 👇
Not subscribed yet? Sign up for free to get new posts delivered to your inbox and support my work along the way. 👇