The Federal Writers’ Project fueled the cultural ferment of the New Deal era | Hacker News Reader

The Federal Writers’ Project fueled the cultural ferment of the New Deal era

jacobinmag.com

34 pointsacsillag23 comments

With so many unfilled positions - in restaurants, retail, construction, etc. - is yet another government program really the answer? There's plenty of opportunity in the free market to be had. This reads like an ode to a more romantic time, as misguided as even that might be.

You'd rather a promising writer serve dishes than write? Would you say that about someone who could code?

How about both? I’m not being glib but it’s not like you can’t have a blue collar job and write during your downtime. Especially if it is your passion.

You’re far more likely to hire a bunch of “writers” who don’t want to do work they consider beneath them than to give the next Hemingway who is stuck at McDonald’s their big chance.

Hard to write if you're working 80 hours a week at a restaurant. Yes, that is a realistic amount of time for someone at a restaurant to work before you say "just work part time and survive on $200 a week".

Lots of prolific writers composed their early works while working menial jobs. It's hardly a barrier to entry for people with something worthwhile to contribute and if anything it's become easier to publish and find an audience rather than harder.

If there is demand for their product they won't have to worry about having to enrolling in such government programs. The same goes for anyone in any discipline.

Yes, I'd rather a skilled writer or artist make art than serve food, build homes, or work retail.

What about someone who is unskilled at art but skilled at navigating the federal job application process?

Program? No. Law(s), maybe.

Basic minimum: prorated benefits. Pick a cutoff point for full time (say 20 hours) and every hour for a worker under that is pro-rated at their fraction out of "FULLTIME" hours a week for the pay period.

Taxes == Benefits: Government does PTO, medical, etc; make everything EASIER FOR BUSINESSES, no more worrying about these things other than over the tops they aren't required to provide. Make those easy too for Paid time off and any other multiplicate benefit a flat multiplier if they want N% the standard rate.

The biggest sticking point for some workers revolves around time. Be that work-life balance (partly fixed by some the above), unpredictable hours, or hours that no one wants. It needs to be easier for the workers to have a __viable career__ as a whatever, not just be a cog in a machine that is summoned like a slave at the business' behest.

Work/Life balance might include kids or anything else outside of work that's important. Where it doesn't really matter there's an obvious answer. Where it does, like public service, maybe they need workers with careers covering that slot; who expect to regularly work that shift on a predictable schedule.

There should also be a formally allowed process for schedules. If it's specified in the primary worker contract as a fixed base schedule that's one thing. If it isn't then the employee should be able to decline, as a contractor that refuses the offered hours, with no other detriment (obviously non-take home pay, but no other penalty).

You couldn't get the new deal up now if you had a trillion dollers behind you. Literally, some state would refuse to accept both sides of the deal: Yes, we want the dam construction but no, you can't send what we consider intellectual "undesirables" to write songs about it.

Actually, I doubt you can get the states to accept money for construction projects like the TVA and the grand coolee dam because they'd be hugely unpopular with some voting segment in the state.

IF you replace dams by something more current, I wonder if you can "new deal" replacing Gas peakers and the like with Solar and Wind, and building new homes to replace ageing house stocks, and re-planting forests, and the like. Maybe you can.

(I did some make-work on a youth employment scheme in 1978 which was amazing, but was a giant boondoggle to take me off unemployment lists: I went to the seaside in Scotland 70 times doing water quality sampling, and the government paid for my gumboots. I then went to university. The school of hard knocks was pretty kind to me, fish-and-chips and pub-lunches included and I kept the wellington boots: can't share footwear, government health regulations)

Edit the New Deal photographers had their work severely censored. There was a post a while back about how we assume they're documenting the poverty-life, but it was a whitewashed documentary.

"And yet it was built and defended, with the still-unpopular argument that writers are in fact people, and they need to eat, too."

I understand "freelance writer," or "professional writer" as definitions - but in the age of social media, is it accurate to still think of "writers" writ large as a contiguous defined class of special people separate from the general public?

Yes and no. Just like software, it's a craft and people that practice get better. Go meet a struggling writer and you'll see that for yourself. They produce, it's good stuff, and worse people get the good gigs by roll of the dice. Supporting people like that is great.

>”the still-unpopular argument that writers are in fact people, and they need to eat, too."

I hate hate hate this kind of sophistry. I really wish English had a concise word to describe this kind of underhanded rhetoric.

I don’t think the federal government should be employing writers simply to employ people who write. Therefore, I do not think writers are people, and furthermore, they do not deserve to eat.

No, it effectively sapped the cultural foment of the era. Instead of stirring up revolt, writers were employed by the government. And they were employed to make people all feel more connected, in that government's name. As if it were all a giant advertisement for the power of government in people's lives, restoring people's faith in the government.

It's all part of how FDR saved capitalism through strident nationalism. Did it work because or in spite of cutting the capitalists out of the solution?

Low-value post on my part but I'm pretty sure that's supposed to be foment, not ferment.

If only we had a Federal Editors' Project right about now.

No it’s ferment. It can also be used to describe something that’s intensely active or roiling. Sort of like how juice or malt starts to bubble and foam as yeast works on it.

Heh, there's some overlap between the terms but foment is likely the right one. For others curious:

> When change is a brewin', remember: to ferment is to cause a chemical change to food or drink, like turning grapes into wine, but to foment is to stir up trouble, like turning a group of people into an angry mob. [1]

[1] vocabulary.com/articles/chooseyourwords/ferment-foment/

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