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Comment by cstanley | Hacker News Reader

So we can all play more video games: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/09/23/why-a...

"Most of the blame for the struggle of male, less-educated workers has been attributed to lingering weakness in the economy, particularly in male-dominated industries such as manufacturing. Yet in the new research, economists from Princeton, the University of Rochester and the University of Chicago say that an additional reason many of these young men - who don't have college degrees -- are rejecting work is that they have a better alternative: living at home and enjoying video games."

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> “When I play a game, I know if I have a few hours I will be rewarded,” he said. “With a job, it’s always been up in the air with the amount of work I put in and the reward.”

This is stunning to me. I know that among the world, we in the US sometimes have a different work ethic. But video games coming up in this discussion of rewards per time invested is mind-boggling.

> Happiness has gone up for this group, despite employment percentages having fallen, and the percentage living with parents going up

I've tried to summon some outrage here, but if they're really happier maybe it's not a bad thing. I'm surprised it doesn't cause more strife in their relationships with family. That's only hinted at in the article.

http://strikemag.org/bullshit-jobs/

There are definitely dead-end jobs that don't make you want to get out of bed in the morning. Maybe something like the CCC would help with the feeling of meaningful labor.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civilian_Conservation_Corps

I thought this was interesting from bullshit jobs:

"what does it say about our society that it seems to generate an extremely limited demand for talented poet-musicians, but an apparently infinite demand for specialists in corporate law? (Answer: if 1% of the population controls most of the disposable wealth, what we call “the market” reflects what they think is useful or important, not anybody else.)"

Same idea echoed in Throwing Rocks at the Google Bus by Douglas Rushkoff https://www.amazon.com/Throwing-Rocks-Google-Bus-Prosperity/...

The obvious missed answer to the question posed is "talented poet-musicians scale much better than corporate lawyers." It's like asking why we produce more coffee machines than mobile operating systems -- it's not because 1% of the population wants more coffee machines.

I initially thought the same thingabout happiness, but the problem isn't in their 20s while they're relatively healthy and have their whole lives ahead of them.

Will they still be happy and fulfilled bagging groceries for half a day and going home to play GTA12 on their MagicLeap...rather than going to the doctor for that weird shooting pain or the cough they couldn't shake after being sick half the summer?

Will they simply opt not to get married? What about having kids? Both would be hard to reconcile with such a life -not saying anyone must or should do those things, but some might feel differently at 35 or 40 and find it hard to switch gears.

I think this is already happening in Japan via the Japanese herbivore man...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herbivore_men

there are too many similarities between our economy and what Japan has already gone though, let's get ready for 0% rates for the next 20 years...

To convince yourself that you live in a perfect meritocracy where anyone who fails does so solely because of moral deficiency or laziness is the most dangerous delusion you could inflict upon yourself. The story of millennials playing video games in mom's basement conveniently fits that narrative of moral outrage.

In fact there is a growing group of people who, being force to work in sectors where they compete with overseas workers who are brutal exploited by ruthless dictatorships or, to a much lesser degree, have their work obsoleted by technology, realize they have no hope of a 'normal' life. No hope of home ownership, of giving their kids a better life via college and who look at an old age of likely homeless or at best extreme poverty.

If we continue to disregard the problem of lack of mobility and the inequalities the current economy is producing, it will be forcibly fixed for us in catastrophic ways and we will end up with political extremism that dwarfs the current election cycle.

> where they compete with overseas workers who are brutal exploited by ruthless dictatorships

Or, in the US at least, not even overseas workers, but prisoners who are able to do the same job for much less because their living costs are paid by taxpayers, not their "employers"

What else can they do? With the new wave of AI and automation there will be no jobs left for people with below average intelligence. You will need more and more researchers and programmers but not everyone can do those jobs.

> more researchers and programmers but not everyone can do those jobs.

Research is suited to fairly scientific minds but I think programming is totally something anyone who's interested can do.

Software development continues to modernize and become more accessible. If you're motivated, I'd say you can definitely do programming. And the best part is that it applies to virtually any existing job.

It's easy to think so if you've been programming for a while, but try to teach programming to kids (or adults) and realize this really does depend on some inherent ability and/or interest (and this is even with a self-selected group who chose to go to a programming course).

You probably can get most everyone programming at a basic level, like we did with reading and writing, by requiring it at a primary school level.

However, a lot of these people will be about as useful as professional programmers as the average person is as a professional author.

Some people cannot think analyticalally enough to maintain the state of a program in their head. This is why freshman CS classes can see retention rates in the single digits. You adapt your brain doing it over a long enough time, and when you start doing it early in life you evolve your brain to suit the task, but for anyone who lacks the critical thinking and logic to think programatically the later in life you are the less likely to be able to ever internalize it you get.

Make art, educate themselves, read books - but the reward mechanisms of those activities are much less stimulating than those of video games.

I respectfully disagree that they are less stimulating. Those things are stimulating at a deeper and I think more grounded level.

Yeah, less stimulating is a bit vague. I was thinking of the effects that playing video games has on the reward center of your brain - the creation of dopamine... more related to addiction than outright stimulation I suppose.

I also think art can include things like being a chef, barista, baker, barber, and brewer, distiller, wine maker; not just the things we typically call art. Things that are in more demand than paintings.

Except all those jobs are going away with the automation revolution. You can't have an economy based off the equivalent of getting carriage rides in central park where its just a frivolous humor to experience human powered food production or a haircut done by a barber.

Don't think automation will get rid of these jobs - have you seen the cronut? Don't think a computer would have been able to derive that creation... (not sarcastic)

Also, as we create more time, we'll have to spend it on these luxurious that currently seem frivolous.

Art is already very linked to these alcohol-related jobs :-)

I'd like to see an AI fix my plumbing. I'd say programming will be automated sooner than that is

How could one design economically productive outputs from a video game like playing experience?

Thinking something like Ender's game meets Uber drivers...

Already happening: WoW gold farmers.

He obviously means something that is productive to the real world

Why? Video game economies are already bigger than many real world nations. If enough of us live in the video game world, game labor has value.

Protein folding games. Path finding.

Image recognition and other dataset-labelling tasks that can be used to train better AI models.

Natural language translation. Duolingo doesn't look much like a typical video game, but it does have gamifying elements.

Yes, I don't know who in their right minds is thinking basic income will work out well for society based on the predilections of the masses.

Most people do. not. like. to. work. Period.

But work is good for society. Idle hands are the devil's tools after all, and where one finds high unemployment, they are almost certain to find crime, drugs, gangs, single mothers, and most everything else that reasonable people consider a step backwards in civilized society.

Now what's the other side of that coin? Young ambitious hackers that browse HN will have more leeway to easily start startups living in their parents' basements. That's a good thing, and honestly sounds very appealling even to me now (minus the parents and the basement though).

However, you have to do what is best for the most people, and while a few percent will benefit and be able to further contribute, the majority will flounder and sink into degeneracy.

That's the problem with utopian thinking. Reality and human nature always get in the way.

where one finds high unemployment, they are almost certain to find crime, drugs, gangs, single mothers

This is because of poverty, not idle hands.

Nope. Look at the history of big housing projects in the days of generous welfare payments. Food, clothing, shelter, and some spending money were provided. Huge crime rate.

> "generous welfare payments"

Welfare programs in the past may be relatively generous compared to today, but I'd be interested to know when this golden era of welfare payments was, which era did you have in mind?

Also, it takes more than money alone to make people happy. It's possible to be financially comfortable but still live in a ugly, uninspiring place with very little that's enjoyable to do. I'd much rather be poor in an interesting/beautiful place like Venice than comfortably well off in a cultural wasteland.

http://www.nytimes.com/1991/01/13/magazine/four-generations-...

So, to cut a long story short, you're pointing to the early 1960s as a point of generous welfare payments, yes?

If so, what factors do you believe contributed to the gang culture and drug use outlined in that story? Do you believe decent welfare payments were the cause? An enabling factor? A coincidence?

Look at Scandinavia. Generous welfare, not exactly known for high crime.

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