Why is everyone so busy?
Time poverty is a problem partly of perception and partly of distribution
THE predictions sounded like promises: in the future, working hours would be short and vacations long. “Our grandchildren”, reckoned John Maynard Keynes in 1930, would work around “three hours a day”—and probably only by choice. Economic progress and technological advances had already shrunk working hours considerably by his day, and there was no reason to believe this trend would not continue. Whizzy cars and ever more time-saving tools and appliances guaranteed more speed and less drudgery in all parts of life. Social psychologists began to fret: whatever would people do with all their free time?
This article appeared in the Christmas Specials section of the print edition under the headline “Why is everyone so busy?”
Christmas Specials
December 20th 2014- The rule of three
- The uses of history
- Conquistador of Metroland
- The flight of the turkey
- I will survive
- Perfidious America
- On the trail of Hernán Cortés
- The man who thought Gandhi a sissy
- Empire of the pig
- Ancient and modern mariners
- Why is everyone so busy?
- They also served
- The wild bunch
- Handicapped
- The baseball-card bubble
- Only fools and horses
- The loneliness of Tony Blair
From the December 20th 2014 edition
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