The title may sound a bit absurd. But how many of us don't work with blood, sweat and tears? Time studies take place at workplaces. The aim is to get the most out of the worker in the shortest possible time as often as possible. If the worker cannot live up to this, even if only by a few percent, she is ashamed to death. In the end, many people get sick from this.
And there are rules and penalties for more and more people to sacrifice their health for productivity. Employment agencies and the insurance fund's staff bow under rules they must follow. School staff, heroes of care and those who work in care as well. It stresses them and it stresses their users.
Unhealthy working life
Every year, 30–50 people die in work-related accidents in Sweden. 700 die from work stress every year. Work-related diseases, on the other hand, still account for around 3000 premature deaths annually. Many who commit suicide have previously been bullied at their workplace. ( The Swedish Work Environment Authority ) Statistics from Försäkringskassan show that in December 2022, 42 people were on sick leave of at least two weeks due to stress. Twelve years ago, in the early 591s, the corresponding figure was roughly 2010 people. ( TT ) Austerity gives at the same time not increased productivity.
The iron-clad wage law
If someone gets sick, it is a full-time job to follow all the rules. Ideally, a sick or unemployed person should get well or get a job through death insurance. Many times it is the most diligent who get sick. Then they will be ashamed for the rest of their lives because they gave everything to the work until the body or the soul gave way.
Rules exist for you to apply for the toughest job you can get. It leads according to the iron-clad wage law to jobs becoming tougher for everyone due to competition. Before, there was an unemployment fund that aimed to put the right person in the right place. If skills were lacking, society would assist with labor market training in the event that study funds could not be obtained. In some cases, labor market education was a supplement to komvuks and university. At the same time, there was a well-developed public sector to meet all of society's needs but also to secure good conditions for wage earners so that the unemployed would not have to bend and bow to private employers. The result was that we had an industry and economy among the very best in the world.
Our highest wish is to buy a TV where the commercial messages will make us want to shop more so that we need to work more. Today's wage slavery is well portrayed in the documentary "The happy worker".
The stress of the young and strong
Everywhere we see pictures of the young, strong, beautiful people who love to sweat hard in the gym and not indulge in anything useless unnecessarily. When there are elections, it is unnatural for the exhausted people to vote for better working conditions, livable wages and a decent welfare. Instead, you're ruining the party for everyone else if you suggest the idea that we could vote for cheap, good, beautiful housing for everyone. You're ruining the party if you're not normal, successful, happy and well-to-do continuously. The only right thing to do is to vote and get others to vote to work ever harder for less pay in the sweat of their brow. Shame on the one who has not given the last percent of his energy and of what he has produced to the government.
The gaps shine
The other side of the idealization of the toil of the low and middle income earners is that this goes to feed the great abundance of the small elite. One's asset is another's liability. At the beginning of 2023, 5 Swedes owned
According to the information on Dagens PS in 2023, the five wealthiest Swedes owned a combined fortune that exceeds the sum of over five million other Swedes. The decade before that, 61.5% of the total wealth generated in Sweden had gone to the wealthiest percent. At the same time, the least wealthy 50 percent had acquired no wealth at all.
The richest ten percent owned 2022 according to the Swedish Tax Agency 73% of all assets in the popular, tax-advantaged share accounts of the ISK type. In 2019, the Swedish private individual had the second highest indebtedness in a comparison between some European countries according to SCB. It was SEK 427/person. With a population that year of 000 million, that meant a total national, private debt of 10 kroner. All of these debts are someone else's assets in the bank.
The consequence is the abundance of the small peak
When the government does not create money, may money be created by the people kept poor. Then the people can borrow. When the people borrow, the banks create the money they lend. High rents on apartments cause more people to borrow, above all to buy their own accommodation. When the tax is too low and the banks instead of the state create money, we cannot afford schools, healthcare, care, the environment, the climate, technological development, pharmaceutical research, welfare, pensions and railways because the rich need more luxury yachts and swimming pools. The question is whether we can afford to work without a state, expansive fiscal policy as the early 1900th century labor thinkers said?
Until that the cuts began in the 1970s we had an effective society that looked after the conditions and well-being of low- and middle-income earners. Since neoliberalism began to be introduced from the 1970s, we work harder and harder to make the very richest people better off. Assembly line workers must produce more and more per day without wages rising at nearly the same rate.
It says the blog post was written in 2022. Is that right?
Yes, but updated afterwards so it is current.