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Comment by zatel | Hacker News Reader

Many people I know aren't really afraid of catching the virus, they go out to bars, stores, and other places to meet people with abandon.

They don't want to go back to work because they have gotten to taste passive income (unemployment money) and don't want to have to go back to trading most of their time for less money then they can get for free by not going back.

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Let’s not paint with broad strokes. I’m sure the people who are too selfish to wear a mask or limit their activities in any way are also selfish enough to be ok with someone else paying their bills. But there’s also a lot of people who want to earn their keep and they want things back to normal so they can get back to work.

One of the more dangerous narratives in American politics is theory that social programs are bad because they breed leeches. So we’ve been cutting those to the bone. Now one of the scariest aspects of the pandemic in the US is how little to no social net exists for people who are down on their luck. If shit hits the fan , it could get really ugly for a lot of Americans.

I struggle to think of major social programs that we've cut at all, much less "to the bone."

There was a sea change in views on welfare in the 80s-90s[1], culminating with the Welfare Reform Act of 1996. Between means-testing, spending caps and staffing cuts, virtually all welfare programs have been decimated over the last 25 years.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_programs_in_the_United_...

Wow.. that's really cynical. Are you sure this article exclusively talk about people on unemployment benefits?

Anecdotal, but I've seen people in my social networks on unemployment say things to the effect of "If the government could afford to pay us this entire time to not work, then why should we go back?" Implying that the government has been withholding livable basic income from people this entire time, and coronavirus lockdowns have proved it.

I am aware of such people too. Their worldview is skewed. But that doesn't mean we should look down on them. Before knowing what I know now, I was extremely ignorant too. It's possible for anyone to fill that gap

I don't know how widespread it is, but I definitely have seen it in some of my social network. People who were previously making more than unemployment, but not much more than the new covid-doubled unemployment, are straight-up refusing to go to work, because why would you go to work for the same money?

Granted, these aren't high-flying careerists, given that "double unemployment" is more than or similar to what they were already making. But still. It's a rational response.

Discouraging people from working is a feature, not a bug.

The number one thing you can do to make free markets work better is reduce transaction costs. Generous unemployment benefits make it easier to hold out for the right job. In fact, we should start giving them to people who leave a job for any reason, not just the "good" ones.

Making people desperate is not just a human cost, but an assault on the proper workings of a market economy. Funneling people to suboptimal jobs is something that has to be resolved anyway, eventually. So it's not a gain for society.

It's a lot more complicated than that. Many of these people are chronically underpaid, the service industry in particular. Yes, of course they like the extra unemployment money, but I bet 95% would prefer to return to work and be paid a fair, livable wage, comparable to what they're receiving on unemployment.

Providing a monetary incentive to discourage behavior which is risky or leads to negative societal outcomes--i.e. performing non-essential work in a crowded workplace in the face of an uncontrolled pandemic--seems pretty reasonable, honestly.

Even of those still employed, many are starting to like their "work from home" lifestyle, and are perfectly happy to keep bringing up safety concerns if it means they get to spend more months in their pyjamas....

I've started going to the beach on nice afternoons and/or drinking beer on the job. Not looking forward to the office.

Unless you _really_ like your coworkers, or have a horrible work environment at home, if your job can be done remote its almost a universally better experience. I worked exclusively remote for 3 years, and I _never_ want to go back to working in the office full time.

I am pretty introverted (which is not exactly unique on this site I'm sure) and I genuinely like and miss many of my coworkers. Sure, I talk to them on zoom all the time, but that's not the same as having a social meal (or even coffee break) with them and shooting the shit about whatever.

Overall, I agree working remotely has been great for family time, saved a ton of time in commuting, saved some money, but even as an introvert, I'm not sure it's exactly "better" overall or not. I don't expect to go back to the office anytime soon and that's just fine with me, but it would be nice to add back some of the social experiences that are being lost right now (both inside and outside of work circles).

Yeah, I can see the argument that work at least in theory is a group of people who have (or had) similar interests. However work from home gives me so much more time flexibility that if I want to go to some meetup, I just would (Pre coronavirus).

Yeah, that's the tough thing to separate. How much am I missing social interactions of colleagues vs just social interactions outside my house in general.

In my case it helped to have physical zone which I was "at work" in. It allowed me to figure out what was work related and not. If I wanted to talk to them outside of that mental barrier, not about work, then I liked THEM, vs having to be paid to talk to them.

Humans often form "vetocracies" when it comes to anything that can be argued as safety related...

If anyone feels unsafe in the office, everyone will stay home... It doesn't take many people to start manipulating that effect.

Don’t know about that, my team was demonstrably productive and the idea of taking the subway into the office just because isn’t appealing. Of course I’ll do what I have to do, but they let me stay remote for the time being because I can’t imagine productively working with a mask on all day.

In standup, it’s visible that like nobody actually went in. It’s a developing situation. Point being, really, that there’s a lot more going on than a set of people preferring to remain on unemployment (which isn’t all that much)

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