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Culture War Roundup for the week of March 18, 2024

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People work 60 hours a week instead of 40.

A few of them, sure? 5.6% of workers averaged 60 hours or more last year, according to BLS. People who worked under 15 hours a week were nearly as common.

You might be in a bit of a bubble. There's a lot of variation between industries (full time mining, quarrying, and gas workers average 48.3 hours, so you know there's a lot of 60 hour stretches; my mother quit her veterinary career after a decade or so because the local "60+ hours or don't bother" jobs available were too much with a kid), and variation between companies and subsectors within an industry (I'm told the AAA game developer work ethos is something like "you can sleep when you retire"?). Perhaps you're in one of the worst of those?

They live minimalist spartan lifestyles to not spend money. It’s a bank number, nothing real.

And yeah, I empathize with this. People were shocked when "The Millionaire Next Door" talked about how many people with 7-figure net worth were driving 20 year old beat-up cars, but that's a goal I started aiming for! I still remember my mom trying to explain to toddler-me that Happy Meals were too expensive right now (soon after she quit her job, my dad lost his...), and enjoying fewer luxuries now seems like a more than worthwhile price to pay for never having to do that with my own kids later. But again, is this the median American, or are we in cultural bubbles? People have spent more on restaurants than on groceries for most of the past decade. Even when my parents found stable new careers it was a treat to visit a buffet every couple weeks.