Why Do We Work?

Hosted and Produced by Vanessa Hill ✌️

And hey, thank YOU for watching and learning! This was fun. We should do it again sometime.

[thesavantart]

I don't like how everybody thinks and how the world works, it has made me depressed.

[camilohiche]

This is the very question I ask myself every morning of the week.

[extradelux]

that tourist is a bit of a hypocrite. He's calling out the fisherman for relaxing on the beach while the tourist is actually on vacation smh

[sensibleb]

I'm a server administrator who has been looking for work for almost a year now. Financial stress is an obvious issue, but so is the social stigma of being _"unemployed"_ (translated as: lazy, unintelligent, unworthy). The hardest part for me has been the feeling that I'm not contributing anything to anyone. I began volunteering at an animal shelter a couple months ago and discovered that I would happily clean litter boxes and walk dogs every day, regardless of whether I was being paid or not. Now, if I could walk dogs AND have money for a restaurant meal now and then, I'd be set.

[luisfreire]

To feed the system and be silently oppressed by it

[ozdergekko]

Work always was painful to me, starting from high school, university time, working as a research scientist, and everything that came after this. Excruciatingly painful to psychiatric disorders originating in my childhood.

10 years after my first diagnosis (clinical depression) I got my final diagnosis and have to take 4 (5) medications. With 54 I got temporary disability pension for 2 years.
After this, I got granted permanent disability pension and this was the biggest relief and the single biggest leap towards regaining a relatively "normal" emotional state.

So, work? Not for me.

[Moonbeam]

I wish it was like in "Star Trek" where we didn't have to worry about money, and just had the things we needed for free.

[jebuskryst]

As an archaeologist, I would work for free if I had three square meals a day and roof over my head.

[Limomon]

Ha. This Story abut the tourist and the fisher.
We just had that today in school.
I believe it's originally from Germany, where it's called "Anekdote zur Senkung der Arbeitsmoral" meaning "Anecdote to lower the working morale".
But there's actually a second anecdote with the same tourist and fisher, but a few years later, the fisher and his boat are lying in the sand.
He now is too old to go fishing, lost his family and home and is living from the church and the cents that tourists give him.
Fittingly this one is called "Anekdote zur Erhöhung der Arebitsmoral" meaning "Anecdote to raise the working morale".

[Nerdburger]

Would be a dream to wake up when you like, eat healthy at home, time to get fit and you would get to enjoy your life, travel and explore, would be amazing!!

[foalspreshow]

Having clinical depression, nothing motivates me to work anymore. It's really difficult

[phizicks]

My saying is "if you find a job you love doing, you'll never work a day in your life"... unfortunately it's the company/management that stuff that up and you have to keep changing companies.

[Kaneanite]

Adam Smith was right, I am inherently lazy if it wasn't for the motivation of money I would just sit around watching YouTube videos and playing games all day.

[-pROvAK]

We work because society forces us to. We work because we are told from birth that this is our purpose, and this is how we will spend our life. We work so the men who told us this is what we must do can sit back and grow fatty. Our degenerative social constructs have deluded the masses into believing you should feel 'fulfilled' from your job, from your money. But looking down at the cold, hard, facts, you were tricked.

Yup, those that came before us ruined all the world had to offer. It's a shame we must now waste our lives, toiling away for years and receiving minuscule, negligible amounts of 'wealth'. Each and every one of you out there who feels like they are fulfilled from their work; you're just a pawn. You fell for it hook, line, and sinker. Capitalism is the hammer, and our malleable society is the crooked nail. The saddest part is, it's far, far too late to do anything about this. We will work. And we will die. Purpose has been taken from human life, so that the few may live well. For how intelligent human beings are, they designed one of the most flawed social systems imaginable. In the correct form of society, human beings as a species work together to build happiness, purpose, well being, and an enjoyable life worth living.

Now? Now there's nothing. Humans, for how intelligent and complex they are, have completely and utterly failed. We've destroyed any chance of a society that works together, and instead we battle over money and land. And for the everyman, your life is a 9-5, and for the lucky few, a .45 through the temple as seen by the extremely rapid increase in suicide throughout the world. This is what our world has brought us to, these are the facts. I wish so much I could reach out and change how this all works, but as stated previously, it's far too late. All we can do is enjoy the short lived happiness that every so often gleams through the darkness. I hope someday, I too find a ray of light.

[dragonskunkstudio]

We need a reward system that is not monetary where you get points for doing a genuine kindness. And redeemed for things we shouldn't have to pay for like food and rent and all those things they don't need money for in Star Trek.

[BrandonSchleifer]

I don't actually need to work to survive - I was unemployed for two years after university - I love my job because it gives my life purpose, I work hard because I want to climb the career ladder, and I care about my paycheck because I'm saving money so I can get my own place. Purpose, mastery, and autonomy. Very insightful video.

[mikegb]

Working and having a job are not the same thing. But thanks for the video. It's super relevant to my life right now.

I just retired in 2016 from my job after 20 years because I hated having to spend most of my waking hours doing what my employer wanted with little regard for my own interests. I went from making a salary of about $70, 000/year to retirement pay of about $26, 000/year – and it was totally worth it.

Now, I’m 47 years old and I need to figure out what to do with my free time for the rest of my life. I could live a life of leisure but I’ve seen in others that that is the path to mental and physical deterioration, so as tempting as it is, I know it’s a bad choice. So, I’m going to choose to work but not have a job. I just finished my first semester in a computer science degree as a half-time student. The half-time pace gives a good balance of mental stimulation without too much stress. After this degree (and hopefully a master’s degree if I can handle it), I’ll still have a few decades of life to explore interesting things to do with computers: robotics, artificial intelligence, modeling in public policy and economics, etc.

[cornkopp]

If I didn't have to work I would play videogames, surf da net, and travel.

[shaq]

I love my job and actually look forward to Mondays :) It does have the downside of keeping you up at night thinking about work or waking you up too early cuz you dreamt about work and can't stop thinking about it when you get woken up :(

[bignate]

This question inevitably had me change my major. It was brought up in an engineering class, and the teacher assumed most if not all of the students were the tourist, I identify more with the fisherman though, I then realised how much time and effort I would have to put into my career, in mechanical engineering, in a field I was just satisfied with. I then switched to Computer Science major, hoping to freelance.