From: egnilges@phoenix.Princeton.EDU (Ed Nilges)
Subject: Re: Why do Americans get so little vacation time?
Originator: news@nimaster
Organization: Princeton University
Distribution: usa
Date: Mon, 31 Aug 1992 15:51:36 GMT


In article <1992Aug29.040217.2456@weyrich.UUCP> tnet.com!weyrich!orville writes:
>>
>>> >If I wanted to live in a European country I would move to Europe. 
>>> 
>>> NOT yourself.  The EEC would not make it easy for you to work in Europe.
>
>Probably.  But beside the point.

Hmph?  As defined by old Orville?  Explain.
>
>>> >a month of vacation I would look for another job.
>>> 
>>> Well, the fact that you're a dull chap who does not know how to have a
>>> good time is not, in itself, an argument.
>
>Only that I have my own ways of pursuing happiness and would prefer that
>you leave the free market alone so that I can continue to pursue my
>happiness. If someone else wnats to argue for political action to
>destroy another chunk of the free market, I have just as much right to  
>argue to preserve it.

'Deed you do, Orville.  But you are deluded about the "flea" market, in
my opinion.  Far from being free, it's under control of the big boys.
Furthermore, it has its numerous failures, of which the current
triple-dip recession is one big example, and the fact that the
government's response to Hurricane Andrew was delayed by the need to
kowtow to the "free" market (and wait for private bids for the
installation of temporary plastic sheeting) is one small example.

Even more perniciously, this slavishly ideological devotion, in the
teeth of human needs, to the free market is beginning to appear to be a
mutation of Stalinist thinking.  Let me explain.  As it became clear in
the Thirties that Communism was not going to bring about an earthly
paradise, its initial idealism rapidly mutated into a blind insistence
on collectivist and Marxist solutions, and an equally blind search for
reasons other than Communism for the obvious failures of Communism.

Whereas postmodern capitalism of course eschews the "first order"
features of Marxism, its historical explanations and call for a
dictatorship of the proletariat, it preserves the "second order"
ideological dogmatism of Communism, its insistence that ITS solution,
the free market, will work in the teeth of evidence to the contrary.
Thus:


     *  The response to Hurricane Andrew is delayed by an absurd
        regulation that the installation of plastic sheeting as
        temporary roofing must be contracted-out

     *  In a recent edition of Byte, Jerry Pournelle makes the
        ridiculous claim that increasing government regulation
        is the reason for the lack of an increase in white-collar
        productivity, in spite of massive introduction of personal
        computers into the workplace.  He does this in the teeth
        of the facts: that since Reagan's election in 1980, policy-
        makers have been deregulating and cutting reporting 
        requirements with a vengeance, sometimes (as in air safety)
        with deadly results.

     *  In one and the same recent edition of the Wall Street Journal,
        a staff reporter describes how Rich Miller destroyed Wang
        Labs by treating its minicomputer business as a cash cow and
        ignoring his own technicians' calls for developing PC connec-
        tivity tools, and a book reviewer makes the claim that Rich
        Miller "free market" behavior is what's needed in universities.
        The reviewer praises the government's vicious lawsuit against
        Ivy League universities on the basis of a lie: that antitrust
        law applies to nonprofits.  The lawsuit has further degraded
        the ability of poor students to get a quality education.

>
>My  idea  of a good time? International Folk Dancing or American Folk
>Dancing. Great way to spend an evening. Go to a "coffee house" and listen
>to some folk/jazz/blues/country. But it's hard to find a non-smoking
>coffee-house, however and I have allergies. 
>
>You may find these dull, however :-)

On the contrary, Orville.  But isn't such dancing a waste of time and
indeed the Devil's workshop when you could be writing More Code?  :-)
>
>Maybe we need a mass movement to petition the government to force
>employers to sponsor Folk Dancing  for a month each year? Just kidding.

Employers often find on their own that providing their people with
recreational opportunities results in a happier and more productive
workforce.  However, the employers able to do this in the absence of
government regulation are those employers with a technological or
commercial edge, and such "edges" are remarkably evanescent.  Thus, Bell
Northern Research Mountain View was able to sponsor a health spa and
recreation club for its employees in the early eighties when its major
products were in demand, but these opportunities declined precisely as
BNR and its parent Northern Telecom failed to keep up with the
technology.  Pullman-Standard was able to be a sugar daddy as long as
Pullman cars were in demand on the railways.

The tendency, especially marked in the current recession, is to
gradually destroy fringe benefits in the teeth of their secondary
benefit to the employer because increasing competitition means that the
employer who DOESN'T offer good bennies beats the employer who does.
Eventually, it does indeed make sense to look to government, not to
"force employers to sponsor flok dancing", but to enforce wage, hours
and benefits legislation that HELPS business by forcing unethical
employers to treat their employees better.

>
>Actually, IMHO Disney World (and Disney Land) have always been one of the 
>best quality amusement parks and are a dynamite value -- if only there
>weren't so many other people that thought the same way :-)

My mileage differs.  Disney forces a fantasy upon people and tells
people that if their lives do not adhere to this (white Northern
European) fantasy, they are deficient.  Of course, Disney's nature films
are great and at times they do try to get outside the white bread
envelope.  But their major productions, which they continually recycle,
force a destructive fantasy upon people.  Item: Cinderella: as a
recovering Magic Prince, I find Disney's retelling of this story sexist.
Also, Disney's work consists of a series of subtle binary oppositions
(good sister/wicked sister, Spin/Marty, cute and cuddly child/evil
adult) which tend to do people's thinking for them.  Give me Bugs Bunny
any day! :-)

>>> 
>>
>>What ever happened to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness"?
>
>
>1) Some people enjoy their work. [I do, as long as it is in a smoke-free
>environment].

Orville, I used to "enjoy" cranking out assembler code and smoking
Camels, and when forced to work in a smokeless environment my enjoyment
was destroyed and my productivity went to zilch.  I chose to start a
heavy workout program that has diminished my smoking down to one or two
cigarettes a week at parties and to become less of a compulsive coder;
but on your account of freedom the coworkers who complained back in '79
about my smoke were interfering with my sacred liberty.  To say that a
smoker's rights are inferior to those of the nonsmoker is, ON YOUR
ACCOUNT, false, for it is to make a moral judgement on the smoker
(involving mean old government in the case of smoke-free workplace
laws.)

Your libertarianism treats "enjoyment" as a clearcut and nonambiguous
sort of thing whereas the reality is that there is pain (underlying or
deferred) in the most pleasureable activities and pleasure in the most
painful (such as an Outward Bound vacation.)  My "enjoyment" of working
16 hours straight smoking Camels and developing powerful and efficient
assembler routines was real; but so was its pain, whether my own
exhaustion and trashed lungs, or the loneliness of the lady who is as a
result of this "enjoyment" my ex-wife.


     I NEED PERFECTION BUT WHEN I IMPLEMENT IT HALF OF EVERYONE DIES

                   - Jenny Holzer, I AM A MAN, stainless steel and LED
                     construction, 1978, San Francisco Museum of Modern
                     Art


>
>6) If I am *GOOD* I can write my own ticket to get whatever vacation
>I wish. If I am not that good yet, then the best thing that I can do is to
>increase the diversity and frequency of my work experience 
>("If you want to increase your success, then increase the rate at which
>you experience your mistakes"). In other words, get another job.

Ah yes, the bourgeois legend.  Fact is that GOOD engineers end up on the
trashpile more often than not if they don't grow into managers.  If they
are so dull and boring as to prefer creating things to lying and
manipulating people, then words like "doesn't see the Big Picture" start
appearing on their performance reviews.  And, of course, if your skills
in unix are not associated with a penis, 90% of potential employers
won't believe that you're "good."

>My ambition in life is to make enough money to be able to afford a 
>mountain cottage and to get enough experience to be in sufficient demand that
>I can telecommute from that cottage. 

I wish you the best, I sincerely do.  However, one lesson I have learned
from Outward Bound is that if Kant's test of the categorical imperative
is applied to the countless men of my generation who want to work so
that eventually they can telecommute from the mountains or the shores of
some wild sea, their goals are seen to be destructive.  You see, the
pristine wilderness you'd like to telecommute from is like Heisenberg's
elementary particle or the old philosopher's wheeze about the unobserved
tree falling in the wilderness; your telecommuting presence in the
mountains changes and degrades the mountains.  If you're on the power
grid (and you may need to be in order to power that fancy computer), then
the power company is going to want you to have plenty of neighbors,
polluting your water and disturbing your serenity, to justify its
investment in adding your cabin to the grid.  If you're NOT on the grid,
where are you going to dispose of your toxic byproducts from the large
storage batteries that power your stuff?  

No, the wilderness is best witnessed by folks with a minimal amount of
equipment who come in and leave, cleaning up after themselves.  The huge
amount of garbage created by Hurrican Andrew is a testament to the
misery that can result if a large number of romantic souls attain that
"pristine, natural" dream of a house by the sea-side AND a high-paying
job.  Kant's test, "what if everybody did this?" is failed by people who
share your dream.