Accommodations Increase Productivity
But capitalists don't actually want that.
One may assume, from the title, that the author is approaching this topic from a capitalist standpoint. Increased productivity is the proclaimed goal of the capitalist class upon its workers. This is only true to a point, however, because a true increase in productivity and efficiency requires healthy, happy, safe, and comfortable workers, but this is antithetical to the true capitalist goal of maximizing short-term profits, which requires overworked and underpaid workers.
It costs time and money, in the short term, to create a safe and suitable work environment for all workers. Capitalists cannot abide by that because it will affect their bottom line for the fiscal year, which is far more important to them than any theoretical future gains that would arise from equitability and a happily engaged workforce.
What if we removed the profit motive? Workers perform the labor, the products are distributed equitably to all people, and the capitalist-owning class has no power over the production of goods and services not created or served by their own hands. Labor should not be owned, but be rewarding in and of itself, for the commodities produced provide a benefit for the workers and the people.
People enjoy taking part in meaningful work. Given enough free time, humans seek ways to better themselves and contribute to society in a more meaningful way. The lockdown at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic is a prime example of how all those who had the privilege to stay home from work began learning new skills and taking up new hobbies.
Productivity is an inherent function of human nature. We are a very social species who deeply rely on each other in a large-scale, communal way. Contributing to your community is essential to proper development in humans.
But capitalism is constantly shrinking the boundaries of those you should consider community: your parents until you have children, and certainly not your neighbors. No multigenerational households; children are expected to move out on their own for no other reason than that is the American culture. The value of romantic partners supersedes friendship and community.
Capitalism doesn’t want you to trust other people or to value them the way you should. It is a system inherently antithetical to the concept of community as it puts individualism above all else. Personal, individual success is the only success that matters to any one individual within a capitalist system.
Profit is a tool of exploitation. It is money that the workers’ earned through their labor that is not being given to them. Profit-seekers’ only goal is to extract profit, which means squeezing a worker for all they’re worth. Labor is abundant, and so workers are viewed as disposable as any other temporary corporate asset. You, the worker, are forced to find work, even when there is none to be done, even when companies won’t appropriately staff their operations. But housing, healthcare, food, water, and basic necessities of survival are not guaranteed, so workers often have to take jobs they hate or cannot do without harming their wellbeing or cannot do adequately without accommodation.
These kinds of workers are churned through the system pretty quickly. One job to the next, unable to keep steady work because they won’t be adequately accommodated or don’t find fulfillment in their jobs. I’m one of these kinds of workers, as an autistic person. Companies see our shortcomings and call the whole person a loss, rather than cooperate with us so we can do the work.
When people are met where they are, where they function at their best, then they will perform at their best.
There are two reasons that companies refuse to provide reasonable accommodations - whether that be a chair for cashiers or working from home for jobs that can be done remotely or shorter work weeks - for their employees. The first, as mentioned, is their bottom line, but chairs would barely make a dent in the budget, and wouldn’t it be cheaper if they didn’t have to rent office space?
It is a mechanism of control. Burnt out workers don’t riot or unionize, they believe, and mostly they are correct. Corporate executives are aware of how dire the situation is for the lower and middle classes right now. They simply do not care about anyone but themselves, not even other rich assholes.
They know the climate crisis is real and they are simply hoping it benefits them by wiping out the impoverished. In the case of nuclear war, they will choose only the most able-bodied and weak-willed of the plebes to serve them in their bunkers.
Workers are alienated from the means of production - the machines, the software, the tools - because rarely do we have any ownership of the work we produce. However, as capitalism slides further into its inevitable collapse, the real bourgeoisie who hold the money at the top of the economic food chain, the billionaires, also become more and more alienated from the means of production.
The top of the corporate ladder has become so far removed from the factories that produce their goods that they often simply don’t know or understand how their goods are made. They make ludicrous decisions that harm their own company simply from plain, willful ignorance.
I’m sure Elon Musk came to mind as an example, but I also want you to consider companies who fired a significant amount of staff for underdeveloped AI tools and now their product is simply worse because of it.
This is clearly an unstable and unsustainable way to organize a society, and an objectively unethical and immoral one. People are not disposable assets for an algorithm or person to chew through and spit out. Meaningful labor is what humans have evolved for, not standing at a cash register or sitting in an office sending emails.
A free society is when all people have the comfort and stability to pursue meaningful work without the pressure of earning enough to survive. This can only be achieved through socialism.