Economics of Human Energy

Thoughts about how money and human energy relate

At present most work is useless or worse and we should simply get rid of it.

Bob Black • The Abolition of Work

“Infinite-minded leaders understand that “best” is not a permanent state. Instead, they strive to be “better.” “Better” suggests a journey of constant improvement and makes us feel like we are being invited to contribute our talents and energies to make progress in that journey.”

-Simon Sinek

Constant improvement, gains of energy via better efficiency

Forty percent of the workforce are white-collar workers, most of whom have some of the most tedious and idiotic jobs ever concocted.

Bob Black • The Abolition of Work

Keeping a good thing going is hard, and if you have the skills to do it, it kinda makes sense to focus your use of those skills in domains that are more rewarding. This creates “missing markets” that are only served by thankless volunteers who are suckers for pain.

writing a facebook status in 2024

This feels extremely profound. We end up creating broken systems sustained by masochists.

Creativity needs time to bloom

In practice, a startup nonprofit has several important distinctions from traditional nonprofits: 1) it begins with a large goal and works backwards to identify incremental steps to achieve that goal, 2) it has an iterative, experimental mindset, and 3) it is an internet first organization.

marklutter.com • Startup Nonprofits

interesting framing. I’d been focused on the concept of eliminating the distinction between for-profit and non-profit, but this is an alternative way to examine the same problem, looking like it could have similar outcomes.

In the US, this began with the launch of TikTok.

Jonah Peretti • The Anti-SNARF Manifesto

this began well before TikTok.

It was always there from the time we networked the first computers together, because it’s the flaw with the economy first and foremost.

1. Energy Production: This involves how the brain cells, or neurons, produce energy. Neurons are highly active cells that require a constant supply of energy. This energy is primarily produced through oxidative phosphorylation, a process similar to what happens in other body cells, where glucose and oxygen are used to produce ATP (adenosine... See more

Anne-Laure Le Cunff • Neuroenergetics: Your Brain’s Energy Budgeting System

What gives us energy? Can use feelings to gain a better understanding of what increases our individual energy levels.

By the simplification-as-collapse theory, good futures, ones worth working for, are by definition going to be too complex to be legible before we’ve actually lived through them. If you tell your story in a powerful, inspiring, coherent way that millions resonate with, and cannot see in what way your story invisibly features degrowth and collapse,... See more

every story is a degrowth story

Ok, I think I see where he’s going. But I think there’s also a possibility of a counter narrative that can re-write the degrowth one in terms of growth.