Thinking about jobs
Since I was born, the planet has invented 6 billion jobs.
Technology is said to threaten the replacement of human labor, yet, somehow we’ve found useful activities for a rapidly growing population.
Coordinated without a coordinator, people go to work each day, often doing something that’s only vaguely related to their own sustenance. We show up and create value for strangers we might never meet. And somehow, all that effort comes together in just the right way. And then we do it all again tomorrow.
And, once someone achieves success and probably doesn’t have to do a job to feed their family, they not only show up to work some more, they often put in even more time and emotional energy than we’d expect.
It’s a system, a largely invisible one. Sometimes, we notice it when it creates inequities, unwelcome side effects and dead ends. But we often fail to notice that it has rebuilt our culture from the ground up, redefining how we spend our days and where we might find meaning.
We shouldn’t take it for granted, not if we want to make it better.
