The Idler

Letter from the Editor: 1

Work Less, Produce More 08-09-00

On a recent trip to France on absinthe business, my fellow directors and I were enjoying a fine lunch with the directors of the company which is producing a new recipe for us. Our train was due to leave Paris at 5.30pm; in order to make this train, we needed to conclude our business by 5pm. We had a lot to sort out in the time available. My partner Gavin was anxious to return to the office in order to start the meeting. But our more laid back French counterparts wanted brandy, desert, cigars: all the delightfully time-wasting rituals that we have invented in order to spin out an enjoyable meal. M Selle, seated to my left, explained that in France they have a paradox about work, which goes: Travailler moins, produire plus. In other words, the less you work, the more you get done.

This idea, or conviction – immensely attractive to the Idler – that output is not directly related to hours-put-in has a bit of a tradition in France. The revolutionary labour activist Paul Lafargue was the indolent son-in-law of the more work-obsessed Karl Marx. Lafargue in fact satirised the Marxist pamphlet The Right to Work with his own, more radical, polemic, entitled Le Droit a la Paresse, or, The Right to Be Lazy. In this inspiring work, he noted that mills with shorter hours had a higher productivity than those which enslaved their labourers for 14 or even 16 hours a day.

This is a frightening concept to put to the test, because we as a nation are brought up to believe that hard work is virtuous, is almost, indeed, the only virtue, or at least the mother of virtues. It is only hard work, we are told, which will solve all our problems: school, job, relationship.

Having reflected on such subjects for a number of years, the “travailler moins, produire plus” theory makes perfect sense to me. Just think of the number of hours which are wasted during the normal working day in the office. How many of those hours are spent actually working, and how many in pointless meetings, staring at the computer, talking office politics with your co-workers, dawdling at the water cooler, having inane conversations about Big Brother with the person who happens to sit next to you because you have nothing else in common? Imagine how much time you’d have for doing nothing, for thinking, chatting, reading, drinking, staring, if it was possible to do the work in the actual time it takes.

Yet we all know of a few people who seem to get a lot done without enslaving themselves. They do a lot of lazing, but when they work, they work. This, I believe, is the idler’s way. It was certainly Dr Johnson’s way. He would do absolutely nothing for hours and days on end. But when he was up against it, he was capable of working with enormous concentration.

The fact is, work expands to fit the time available. If we knew we had only two hours, not four hours, to finish a certain job, then we would get it done – and often get it done better.

But we are frightened of this way of working. It scares us. We would rather be seen to be toling and get nothing done, than be considered to be lazy but achieve much.

All the above is really a preamble to introduce the Idler’s latest project: the Three By Three Campaign. This is the Idler’s Petition for the three hour day, three day week. You don’t have to do anything to join this campaign. For God’s sake don’t write to your MP or anything as absurdly effortful and wasteful as that. Just keep it in the back of your mind.

The other task for readers is to conduct some experiments of your own around the “produire plus, travailler moins” thesis. Try having a day where you work just for two hours, and monitor the results. Then send them to me at tom@idler.co.uk, with any other reflections on this theme.

Many thanks!

TOM HODGKINSON

Work less, produce more responses

Yes, but who are you producing more for? Not for yourself, or for society, but for your boss.

Work less, certainly, but I have no intention of producing more of anything until wealth is owned in common.

Of course I’m all in favour of producing more of what we want in as small a time as possible. I am greedy and selfish, as well as lazy. And I’m in favour of ensuring that the productive process is creative and satisfying (and entirely voluntary). I’m against employment, not work. Against useless toil not useful work, as William Morris put it.

We don’t own our creations. Our bosses do (or the State, or the bank, or whoever it is drawing rent, interest and profit from our work). We don’t even really have a say in what it is we create. We sell our energies to an employer through economic necessity, then we do what we’re told. We don’t create what we want or what we need, but what will sell.

Whoever thinks that we live in a democracy should ask themselves how much say we have in our life once we clock on at 9am.

If, within the confines of the present social system, individuals manage to find themselves a niche in which to be creative and avoid employment, then I support and salute them. But I continue to campaign for full unemployment. Stuart Watkins, swatkins@medicom.co.uk

Work Less, Produce More 08-09-00

On a recent trip to France on absinthe business, my fellow directors and I were enjoying a fine lunch with the directors of the company which is producing a new recipe for us. Our train was due to leave Paris at 5.30pm; in order to make this train, we needed to conclude our business by 5pm. We had a lot to sort out in the time available. My partner Gavin was anxious to return to the office in order to start the meeting. But our more laid back French counterparts wanted brandy, desert, cigars: all the delightfully time-wasting rituals that we have invented in order to spin out an enjoyable meal. M Selle, seated to my left, explained that in France they have a paradox about work, which goes: Travailler moins, produire plus. In other words, the less you work, the more you get done.

This idea, or conviction – immensely attractive to the Idler – that output is not directly related to hours-put-in has a bit of a tradition in France. The revolutionary labour activist Paul Lafargue was the indolent son-in-law of the more work-obsessed Karl Marx. Lafargue in fact satirised the Marxist pamphlet The Right to Work with his own, more radical, polemic, entitled Le Droit a la Paresse, or, The Right to Be Lazy. In this inspiring work, he noted that mills with shorter hours had a higher productivity than those which enslaved their labourers for 14 or even 16 hours a day.

This is a frightening concept to put to the test, because we as a nation are brought up to believe that hard work is virtuous, is almost, indeed, the only virtue, or at least the mother of virtues. It is only hard work, we are told, which will solve all our problems: school, job, relationship.

Having reflected on such subjects for a number of years, the “travailler moins, produire plus” theory makes perfect sense to me. Just think of the number of hours which are wasted during the normal working day in the office. How many of those hours are spent actually working, and how many in pointless meetings, staring at the computer, talking office politics with your co-workers, dawdling at the water cooler, having inane conversations about Big Brother with the person who happens to sit next to you because you have nothing else in common? Imagine how much time you’d have for doing nothing, for thinking, chatting, reading, drinking, staring, if it was possible to do the work in the actual time it takes.

Yet we all know of a few people who seem to get a lot done without enslaving themselves. They do a lot of lazing, but when they work, they work. This, I believe, is the idler’s way. It was certainly Dr Johnson’s way. He would do absolutely nothing for hours and days on end. But when he was up against it, he was capable of working with enormous concentration.

The fact is, work expands to fit the time available. If we knew we had only two hours, not four hours, to finish a certain job, then we would get it done – and often get it done better.

But we are frightened of this way of working. It scares us. We would rather be seen to be toling and get nothing done, than be considered to be lazy but achieve much.

All the above is really a preamble to introduce the Idler’s latest project: the Three By Three Campaign. This is the Idler’s Petition for the three hour day, three day week. You don’t have to do anything to join this campaign. For God’s sake don’t write to your MP or anything as absurdly effortful and wasteful as that. Just keep it in the back of your mind.

The other task for readers is to conduct some experiments of your own around the “produire plus, travailler moins” thesis. Try having a day where you work just for two hours, and monitor the results. Then send them to me at tom@idler.co.uk, with any other reflections on this theme.

Many thanks!

TOM HODGKINSON

Work less, produce more responses

Yes, but who are you producing more for? Not for yourself, or for society, but for your boss.

Work less, certainly, but I have no intention of producing more of anything until wealth is owned in common.

Of course I’m all in favour of producing more of what we want in as small a time as possible. I am greedy and selfish, as well as lazy. And I’m in favour of ensuring that the productive process is creative and satisfying (and entirely voluntary). I’m against employment, not work. Against useless toil not useful work, as William Morris put it.

We don’t own our creations. Our bosses do (or the State, or the bank, or whoever it is drawing rent, interest and profit from our work). We don’t even really have a say in what it is we create. We sell our energies to an employer through economic necessity, then we do what we’re told. We don’t create what we want or what we need, but what will sell.

Whoever thinks that we live in a democracy should ask themselves how much say we have in our life once we clock on at 9am.

If, within the confines of the present social system, individuals manage to find themselves a niche in which to be creative and avoid employment, then I support and salute them. But I continue to campaign for full unemployment. Stuart Watkins, swatkins@medicom.co.uk