Dear Tom:
Thanks for your comments and for giving me the information re Gore, that I
had not read. It is interesting that he framed his comments re deficits:
"These are our deficits now: the time deficit in family life; the decency
> deficit in our common culture; the care deficit for our little ones and our
> elderly parents. Our families are loving but over-stretched.
I was rereading a previous post and found new meaning in this quote:"
Marx's suggestion that "the theft of somebody else's labor time" is a
miserable foundation to calculate our wealth - which we should measure by
disposable time not by labor time - is so much truer today than it was 150
years ago.
Sometimes the common sense of Marx is amazing to me.
Respectfully,
Thomas Lunde
----------
>From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Tom Walker)
>To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
>Subject: Re: Easing Transition to Cybereconomy
>Date: Sun, Jun 27, 1999, 1:35 AM
>
> Thomas Lunde wrote:
>
>>> 1. Reduce the length of the work-week (4 day)
>>
>>The problem with this idea and believe me, I spent a year arguing for as is
>>and did, Tom Walker. Most eloquently. Business is not going to buy it,
>>government is not going to legislate it and those who are working and
>>enjoying their paycheques are not going to support it.
>
> It's easy to be discouraged by the surface appearance of no movement on this
> issue. But this is a seismic issue and the tectonic plates are moving along
> quite nicely, thank you very much. Al Gore's presidential campaign obviously
> did some polling and conducted focus groups on the issue and guess what? The
> "time deficit" came out on top of their spinner scope as a hot-button item.
> Here's the punch line of Gore's announcement speech:
>
> "We have closed our budget deficit. But today, we find a deficit of even
> greater danger, one that only seems to deepen the harder we work, and the
> better we do.
>
> "These are our deficits now: the time deficit in family life; the decency
> deficit in our common culture; the care deficit for our little ones and our
> elderly parents. Our families are loving but over-stretched."
>
> In my debate with Jock Finlayson of the B.C. Business Council 82% of
> respondents (latest count) agreed that we would be better off with a
> four-day week. What impressed me about that margin was: 1. it continued to
> widen long after the initial announcement of the poll -- the earlier
> published result was 79% in favour. 2. the magazine is funded by a
> right-wing foundation and leans mildly to the libertarian right.
>
> Like I said: this is the seismic issue. When those plates let go, the earth
> is going to shake.
>
> "After all their idle sophistry, there is, thank God! no means of adding to
> the wealth of a nation but by adding to the facilities of living: so that
> wealth is liberty -- liberty to seek recreation -- liberty to enjoy life --
> liberty to improve the mind: it is disposable time, and nothing more."
> -- anonymous, The Source and Remedy of the National Difficulties, 1821.
> regards,
>
> Tom Walker
> http://www.vcn.bc.ca/timework/worksite.htm
>
