> The likes of Steve Pinker may argue that living standards continue to trend upwards across the board, but it seems like people are just becoming more and more time-poor (happy to be proven wrong on this point).

Hours per day Americans spent on leisure and sports is not trending down: https://data.bls.gov/timeseries/TUU10101AA01013585

On average it's higher now than in the early 2000s (annual survey begins in 2003). Source: https://www.bls.gov/tus/ ("ATUS Tables")

Thanks for the link.

I see also this, in wikipedia:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_time#Trends_over_time

It's probable that the hours have just displaced to poorer countries. Presumably the BLS data, nor the wiki graphic, have data that includes developing and underdeveloped nations.

Edit: I found a book on the topic for anyone interested

https://www.ilo.org/wcmsp5/groups/public/@dgreports/@dcomm/@...

Edit: Page 44 in the above link shows an increase in working hours in the US (note that the 4 of the 5 other western countries compared have continued to trend down, but also have strong social welfare and working policy)

The ILO studies ends in 2000 and shows a slight increase in the US near the end. Here's what happened after 2000: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AVHWPEUSA065NRUG

(Note that it's not clear if decreases in worked hours are actually desirable. Some people believe many part-timers would want to work more if they could.)

The graphs for other countries are interesting too. India is in favor of the argument that hours are going up in 'poorer' countries, Brazil against. Though unemployment appears chronically worse in Brazil vs India (pre-covid)

India - significant increase https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AVHWPEINA065NRUG https://tradingeconomics.com/india/unemployment-rate

Brazil - significant drop https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/AVHWPEBRA065NRUG https://tradingeconomics.com/brazil/unemployment-rate

Yeah, given the dips corresponding to tech crash and financial crisis, it could be more an effect of underemployment, rather than more leisure time, or less overwork. Given the relatively weak social welfare policy in the US (amongst developed nations), that would match with the narrative of social unrest in lower income brackets in recent years.

Try to avoid fitting the data to your narrative.

more hours worked = slavery

less hours worked = underemployment

Are there any measures at all that would convince you that the overall the world is better than it used to be?

> Try to avoid fitting the data to your narrative.

I made a post above that addresses your plaint I believe. I'm not being disingenuous here, I'm trying to make sense of the data. Obviously hours worked (on average), is not separable from employment figures.

> Are there any measures at all that would convince you that the overall the world is better than it used to be?

I think it's troublesome to look at economic indicators alone and make a hedonic judgement. Because when someone says, 'The world is better', I immediately think they are saying, people are 'happier'. Globalisation and technological advancement have increased the world population, as well as per-capita quality of life, and GDP. So perhaps in that 'positive-utilitarian' sense, the world is better in aggregate.

However, let's take the Chinese. They have bided their time, and now have a quality of life far exceeding their forebears. However, they can now ask for higher wages, and the value of the currency has increased, and they were losing the lower-end of the manufacturing market.. so the government found a population they could put to work for nothing - I'm sure you know what I'm talking about here.

Currently I don't see incentives for these low substinence-wage jobs going away, so I don't see how data about per-capita improvements make the reality of sweat-shops disappear. If I could see global policy shifting towards the direction of human rights, and meaningful enforcement of those human rights, that would convince me the world hasn't just reached a plateau, but can actually uplift the very bottom rung of the population.

EDIT: If there was one measure that would convince me, it would be a trend in reduction in forced-labour and sustenance-wage labour. But I couldn't find data that captures this quantity changing over time, as it's not something that could be easily surveyed, or would likely be under-reported.

> Subsistence wages are set by the value of the "outside option" for workers in undeveloped countries, which is subsistence farming. As a country develops, labor productivity increases and wages rise, until companies are willing to switch to lower productivity but cheaper workers. This cycle ends once the supply of subsistence wage workers runs out.

As I've said in my original post, this just means that labor force is now sourced from another country. Subsistence wages are just the minimum you can possibly pay someone, and I don't see how this will stop being a thing unless governments across the board make it so. Happy to be proven wrong about this.

Subsistence wages are set by the value of the "outside option" for workers in undeveloped countries, which is subsistence farming. As a country develops, labor productivity increases and wages rise, until companies are willing to switch to lower productivity but cheaper workers. This cycle ends once the supply of subsistence wage workers runs out.

Not sure if I follow your thought process, are you suggesting that people in developing and underdeveloped nations used to have more leisure time in the past than they do now?

My thought process is that there are large populations in developing nations are so trapped in debt they can do nothing but work all their waking hours, and they would not be paid money that would permit increasing their value as a human resource.

This is a phenomenon that is happening right now, today. It's effectively the same as slavery... I'm not saying 'it used to be better', but I'm not buying the line that globalisation has removed people from being 'overworked', or being effectively slaves. Nor do I believe it ever could, without some form of government intervention.

The simple truth is, if there's a place in the world where it is possible to pay someone only to work, and nothing else, there will be a company willing to exploit that, and there will always be a country willing to exploit its population to get an economic leg-up. Even the most high-minded bleeding-heart left liberals are still unwilling to pay a few bucks extra for something that is manufactured on 'living wages'.

> if there's a place in the world where it is possible to pay someone only to work

that place is _everywhere_ on planet earth. Calling the need for somebody to work 'effective slavery' is wrong. Slavery is involuntary. work is voluntary.

You might have misread me, but I could have been clearer.

A distinction can be drawn between someone who has the benefit of a wage where they can save money, and without. If the options are, work somewhere that pays just enough to live, or perish - it's not really an option.

Let's say that someone who, in an alternate universe would have the aptitude to work as a Software Engineer in Silicon Valley, happened to be born in the poorest province in a developing nation, and the only options available were work day and night, with enough pay for food and lodging, no internet access. Is that the same as someone born in Europe, has public education, access to the internet, uses the library, becomes a developer, gets hired by FAANG... etc?

You're ignoring the reality that the alternative to having a bad job is not having a job at all. People work on their own farm and grow their own food. Nobody is forcing them off their farms. When they decide to work they do so voluntarily because nobody can take farming away from them.

You're not going to solve sweatshops by taking away people's agency. You get rid of them by providing viable alternatives.

> People work on their own farm and grow their own food.

This seems to be ignoring reality. If you're born in a locality without options to grow your own food, or don't have a farm to inherit, these aren't actually options.

And actually, a lot of poor people have been forced off their lands, when lucrative commercial interests have swayed law-makers and bureaucrats. Property rights aren't quite the same in poorer countries.

> You're not going to solve sweatshops by taking away people's agency.

Obviously.

> You get rid of them by providing viable alternatives.

I'm not sure how this fantasy become reality without protectionist government intervention, or the whole world deciding they won't buy cheaper socks because they aren't certified fair trade. I'm pretty certain which one of those two is more likely though.

> If we follow this pattern, once every country has lifted itself up by the bootstraps, the end-game would not be some poorer nations providing the subsistence-wage labour, but the poor population of each country providing subsistence-wage labour.

Nah, it's too politically unsafe to hire cheap in your own backyard and there'll always be country-level wage gaps on the bottom end, I'm just glad they're (slowly) reducing. No need attempting to run the simulation to a hypothetical end because there either is no end or it's unpredictable (could just as easily be a rise in extreme protectionist tariffs to discourage offshoring thereby re-widening the gap).

> Nah, it's too politically unsafe to hire cheap in your own backyard

There's two options, hire overseas at a lower labor cost (lower currency/lower minimum wage), or lower the minimum wage or currency of your own economy. If the labour costs of the rest of the world increase as their economy develops, it will make sense to employ locally again.

So subsistence wage moves from overseas, back local again... and why pay more than the subsistence wage if there's no government to compel you to do so?

Edit: Keep in mind, the US is a western democracy, and the largest economy, but has plenty of people living on subsistence wages.

> could just as easily be a rise in extreme protectionist tariffs to discourage offshoring thereby re-widening the gap

Protectionism may not re-widen the gap. Many populations starve because all their arable land is used for overseas exports.