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In fact, I've heard people most likely worked less back in the olden days pf pre-industrial scarcity, or at least took entire seasons off when the crops they grew weren't expected to yield anything.
Yeah, I've thought similar.
Probably, the only real intensive labour times were sowing and harvest. Apart from that, I can't fathom what would possibly justify 40 hrs/week work times the rest of the year.
Well, the thing is almost everything had to be done by hand. So, the work never really ended. You had to cut wood for warmth and cooking, had to raise and slaughter animals and plant and harvest food, had to draw water from a well or creek to bathe and cook, had to wash your clothes on a washboard or rock in the creek, etc.
Oh well, I guess you're right about that.
I'm guessing farmers didn't waste their time not working when in low season, but rather did other stuff like making furniture, clothing, building, ropemaking, these sorts of manual labor. It's just a guess though, I'm no historian
That's a dangerously naive view of history.
It's true, though. As industrialization occured, people began to work more, as more profit could be made.
I guess I should say, dangerously reductive.
It's reductive, but not dangerously so. It calls into question why humans are working so many hours, and the answer is Capitalist profit.
I guess that's a matter of opinion. I think you're downplaying the negative aspects of pre-industrial life too much.
That's certainly not my intention, however the point must be confronted, why is it that working hours have not been reduced to, say, 4 hours daily, 5 days a week? Or 3 8 hour days? The answer lies in the fact that "standard living conditions" will always be regulated around maximizing time to work, minus time to survive and raise the next generation of workers, under Capitalism.
But that's not a unique feature of capitalism. Serfdom, even communism had it. The powerful will always seek to exploit the labor of the masses, under any economic system.
Why would it happen in Communism, mechanically? I'm not asking if it happened in AES states, but why.
As I said, The powerful will always seek to exploit the labor of the masses, under any economic system. It appears to be fundamental to human nature.
Note I'm not saying it's inevitable that it will happen, but I am saying it's inevitable that those in power will try.