Here are a few quotes from the video's interesting thoughts:

According to Gorz and surveys conducted in Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, and the United Kingdom, people, mostly under the age of 40, no longer want to be identified with their work (and this was back in the 1990s). These people say that they are no longer ready to dedicate their lives to any work or even their profession. They believe that their work must first and foremost be interesting, it must give them an opportunity to express themselves, be useful to society, and have meaning. If it is meaningless, not useful to society, and not interesting, then it is a means of survival, and it is necessary to change jobs as often as possible, otherwise it will lead to general stupidity.

This, in turn, indicates that today's youth want to have the opportunity to constantly learn, to change jobs when they are no longer interesting or not interesting enough, and ultimately to find a job that will have a mission, individual contribution, and individual creativity.

But here is an interesting thing. If we continue to live in a system like the one we have now, which is more capitalist and not at all socialist, there is a danger of a final fragmentation of society, since the types of work that are both pleasant and profitable are few, for this reason, at the top there will be an aristocracy of workers - interesting, highly qualified, responsible, creative people, and on the other side there will be a large crowd of low-qualified people who will be busy satisfying the needs of those with well-paid and interesting jobs.

Therefore, as a solution, Gorz proposes to redistribute this interesting work among the largest possible number of people, for which it is necessary to reduce working hours and give everyone the opportunity to receive long-term and continuing education.

And to achieve this, it is first necessary to fight to "advance the idea" within organizations or trade unions. Using the example of women in the Federal Republic of Germany, Gorz reminds us of the irresistible pressure they exerted on the ruling political forces and their acceptance of the idea that work is not only paid work, that there are other forms of activity, enriching and socially effective, which are carried out only outside the sphere of paid work. Therefore, such an opportunity should be provided to people, especially since today the reduction of working hours does not necessarily lead to a reduction in income.

This is perhaps hindered by the endless reminders of being competitive, the need to withstand competition with different countries, etc.

That is why Gorz suggests, first of all, a transition from workers' unions to citizens' unions, the goal of which should be the protection of the rights of a person not as a seller of labor, but as a citizen and a person involved in public life.

The entire interview is here.

(Translation & picture by utopiana.am)