Have we forgotten the real value of labour?

The information age in combination with #AI is continuing the trend of the last 124+ years of degrading the value of #labour in search of economic #productivity (and for some people, an ego boost). The major difference is that now knowledge workers are at the fore-front, with software developers - if not the engineers at least the harbingers of the information age - already squarely in the sights of AI developers. If the AI messiahs are to be believed the same goes fo accountants, lawyers (and most of the professions that were in short supply and thought to represent 'a good education and a good job' when I was choosing my university degree back in 2002). Plumbers and Doctors still seem safe.

The information age and changing worker demographics brought with it the concept of ‘digital nomadism’ and the 21st Century Career. COVID gave the rest of the western working world a glimpse of remote and more agile ways of working that has been the norm for me for nearly a decade. Now we have more flexibility in the work-force than ever before, yet the current highly ranked corporate employers are still losing 1/4 of their workforce every year and generational work preferences are changing again (but maybe not as much as you think).

However, none of this is new to purviewers of philosophy, because the paradox of labour and productivity?was foretold nearly?200 years ago by Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel, a German philosopher. His story still has value for all of us today. If you don't have time for the full read - skip to the final paragraph for the moral of the story.

Hegel provides an argument that humans are social, political and cultural beings motivated (unknowingly or not) to participate in society on three levels – familiar, civic/market and state/government. This is counter to the view of?John Stuart Mills and Adam Smith that we are first and foremost Homoeconomicus – selfish, perfectly rational individuals motivated to provide labour in return for a salary bound by a contract. Regardless of our motivations, the main way most of us participate in civil society is still through our provision of labour to produce services and products deemed useful by the market. This is equally as true now as it was in the 19th century when Hegel was prolific.

Hegel used the story of the Lord and the Labourer to demonstrates how participation in the labour market impacts upon our ability as individuals to become fully human and fully aware – able to recognise ourselves as individuals and simultaneously as an integral part of society. He also uses the story to warn us of the dangers of the abstraction of labour, particularly through the use of ‘tools’ (in todays terms, think computers, AI etc).

In the story, the Labourer is able to quantify and realise his contribution to society by transforming natural resources (including time) into produce (commodities and services) that are sold on the market. The labourer achieves awareness of his own boundless capability for creativity and productivity, even if he does not own the produce created or if it was done to satisfy individual needs (to generate income).?In contrast, the Lord is lacking self-actualisation because he has not contributed a part of himself to the development of the produce that society values, and yet he has generated an income (profit) from it. Freelancers and self-employed folk not being very common in the 19th century, the work of almost all labourers was performed for the Lord, who sold it and kept the profit.

As a result of the labourers’ efforts, the commodities that he produces and then sells become the method by which he is recognised by others. This process simultaneously alienates the individuals’ identity from his true-self, whilst granting him an identity amongst society.

Fast forward a 100 odd years and "Evening good sir, hows your mother?" has become "So, what do you do?".

The labourer in Hegels story becomes a member of a community, known for produce of a certain type and perhaps of a certain quality. Furthermore, the labourer recognises the illusion of self-sustenance and understands his mutual dependence upon the produce of the community, thereby confirming the social motivations to cooperate with the community. Unless your a banker, and the numbers you deal with and the corporate culture you work in de-humanize you to the reality of your role in society and community.

Labour then is not an instinct, but a social construct where the individual acquires skills necessary for work only by learning universal laws of work, a kind of practical education which instils in people the spirit of cooperation. Therefore?the ability to contribute, to provide labour, to produce, and to see what we produce sold on the market is integral to the integration of our identities into the identity of the community/society and vice versa.

Now add to this that Hegel identified that the particularization of labour and separation of it from nature through the use of tools decreases the value of labour by the same proportion as it increases productivity. His intention was to show that the industrial revolution and the factories it created would lead to increasing levels of worker dissatisfaction, disillusionment and disconnection from society. Seems like he might have been proven more than a little correct in the last 100 or so years.

So, what is the forgotten value of labour? What is the moral of the story? Unsurprisingly its got nothing to do with money. Without a connection between nature, our work and our community, we are bereft of the understanding that provides of our place in society, our contribution to the greater good and as a result, we are likely to be fairly unhappy in our life and work. This can be exemplified in the relatively recent resurgence in the production of boutique, tailor-made, and bespoke artefacts or the sacrifice of job security for impact, autonomy and passion in the workplace.

This post relied heavily on Paul Ashton’s ‘Legacy of Hegal’ Seminar?at the University of Melbourne for the interpretation of Hegal. Analysis and application to job/life satisfaction, generalisations and associataed errors are purely the authors.