Episode 19: "Are You Lazy or is it Your Job?" with John Tamny

Sunday evening comes around and you wish the weekend had just one more day. You are just not feeling it. Monday morning, whether you'll be sitting at a desk or outside on the construction site looks to be a drag. You wonder if you're lazy, or is it something else? According to John Tamny, it's something else. John, the editor of Real Clear Markets and the policy director at Freedom Works, spoke with me on The Bill Walton Show about his soon to be released book "The End of Work." "It's not laziness." John believes "it's that you're in the wrong job." There's a lot hand wringing by policy gurus that technology and automation will kill off millions of jobs. Instead, John observes that many more millions of jobs will be created by productivity enhancing technologies and economic growth. Yes, there will be fewer manufacturing and truck driving jobs, but the new jobs created will be far more interesting and engaging. In the movie The Graduate, the magic word was "plastics." Today it's "robots." If you're sick of your job, technology is your friend, not your enemy. Technology driven economic growth is driving an explosion of work choices that make employment seem less like work. Doubtful? Look at some of the careers that were non-existent in the less wealthy world of the past: video gamers, Instagram influencers, dog walkers and policy wonks (one of which John would admit to being). "The historical reality is that a rising tide really does lift all boats. As the U.S. and global economy continues to grow, more and more people will get the chance to pursue the kind of work that most matches their skills, excites their passions, and elevates their unique intelligence." John reminds us, "people pining away for the good old days forget that most people worked long, brutal hours in steel mills and mines." Robust economic growth frees us up from the burden of jobs that require little skill, are not satisfying and leave most people facing Monday as a day of dread. As robots replace humans in certain types of jobs, new, impossible-to-foresee jobs will be created, and less and less people will be going to work. Instead, they'll be pursing their passions. Please listen in on my conversation with John Tamny about the end of work. This is a man who understands the future of human flourishing.