Work is not only central to our lives but also to the functioning of our capitalist system. It dictates where we spend most of our time and what we focus on doing every day. Though work has been found beneficial for socialisation and integration, it also exerts great pressure on the planet via the ways it is tied to overproduction and overconsumption. Work-related stress and illnesses, together with increased precarity at work, have also become an increasing feature of modern economies. Whilst there is an urgent need to transition jobs in harmful sectors towards green and social ones and reduce working hours (with no loss of pay) across the board, rethinking our relationship with work and reclaiming it from the productivist and growth-centric capitalist logic remains a central task to ensure the wellbeing of both workers and the planet.
The problems with (over)work
According to the International Labour Organisation (ILO), between 2000 and 2016, long working hours have increased the number of deaths from heart disease and stroke by 42% and 19% respectively. The UK’s Health and Safety Executive revealed that stress, depression and anxiety were the number one cause of mental-related ill health at work in 2022-2023, with workload being a significant driver behind these issues. The conclusion we can draw from these findings is straightforward: as a society, we have a problem with overwork.
First, to set the context, let’s look at the ways overwork operates from a systemic standpoint. As a system, capitalism relies on the creation of so-called surplus value to keep its relentless engine of growth going, a phenomenon also known as capitalist accumulation. One of capitalism’s genius evils is its ability to encroach on our lives by squeezing as much value as it can from our labour. Capitalism does so in two main related ways: by extending working time and by increasing work pressures or rhythms. If working time has significantly reduced up to the 1980’s thanks to the collective bargaining efforts by trade unions, it has not continued its descent since then, despite rises in labour productivity observed during this period. These gains were and still are mainly essentially translated into financial value for the owners of capital – the wealthiest in society – or to boost further production instead of turning into free time for workers. As the saying goes, indeed, “time is money” under capitalism. Over the last decade, the rise of new digital technologies has also resulted in an increasing blurring of the boundaries between life and work. The worker is expected to be connected and reachable at all times. In addition, new forms of work precarity, such as in-work poverty, underemployment, lack of stable or permanent employment, the rise in gig economy work, mean that work – or the lack thereof – is a constant source of concern and worry in people’s lives
And what about the planet? In environmental circles, overconsumption and overproduction are both cited as the real drivers behind climate change and the looming collapse of our ecosystems. Seen through the capitalist lens, the creation of surplus value in the form of profit is only possible through the so-called ‘appropriation’ of natural resources (for free), together with the exploitation of workers. On the other side, all the essential life-supporting activities – (including care and household work, cooking, cleaning, etc.) constitute the category of ‘socially reproductive’ work. If these are left outside the labour market, under capitalism, it is precisely because they contribute to making wage labour more productive (e.g. all this time spent on preparing us for work is not paid for) and therefore serve capitalist interests.
Only through this perspective can one truly grasp the importance of changing the nature of work – what gets produced, which activities get paid and valued, and how much time we spend working – in order to challenge the exploitation and destruction at the heart of our planetary crisis. The crises of work and the disastrous state of our planet’s ecosystems are deeply intertwined and at the root of the capitalist mode of production.
The productivist mindset – rest is political
Capitalism is only possible to sustain in the long-run as a system if it gets the passive buy-in of workers. In 1905, German sociologist Max Weber wrote the Protestant Ethic in which he explains how Protestant values and Calvinist Protestantism in particular, contributed to the advent of modern capitalism by promoting hard working and seeking value through it. Such work ethic is still very much alive today – especially in more individualistic societies where the lack of communal life has given way to the centrality of work.
It is also no coincidence that, amidst an overall climate of economic insecurity, we witness the strengthening of productivist values. Social media content tends to assign moral virtue to being constantly ‘on’ and link our sense of achievement to our productivity. Despite publicly rejecting these values, we – consciously or not – embrace parts of them. Those of us active in the environmental movement are also particularly prone to adopt an emergency mindset in our work because of our planetary crises’ ticking time bomb. But all these patterns are problematic as they reward productivism over rest and spending time outside of work, all the while sustaining a system that is destroying the very foundations of life on Earth.
In recent years, the concept of burnout has been heavily popularised together with an increasing number of cases. Whilst the World Health Organisation (WHO) exclusively views burnout as a workplace phenomenon1, other accounts proceeded to expend definitions of burnout to activism or connect it to the overwhelming buzz and pressures of modern life.
Not only does this ‘productivity mindset’ prevent us from valuing rest and idleness which are good for the planet, given its low environmental footprint, but they are also a major distraction from the bigger picture. Caring about problems like climate change or social inequality, as well as taking time to engage in meaningful forms of political action or community work that are not necessarily considered ‘productive’, which means these activities are often overlooked, unpaid or not prioritised. But there is no coincidence – these features are indeed central to capitalism’s capacity to keep reproducing itself and remain the prevailing mode of production by exploiting people materially and subjecting them mentally to capitalist values.
Reclaiming work from the capitalist logic
So, what are the ways out? Our relationship to work must be fundamentally different if we are to build the post-growth and wellbeing economy that can get us out of these crises. Such a process implies deconstructing the value we attach to work and productivity, all the while supporting the variety of forms and patterns of work that benefit both workers and the planet. To bring our production and consumption within planetary boundaries, we must both reduce working time across the board and deliver a just transition from harmful sectors towards green and socially meaningful ones. For instance, joining and actively engaging in trade union structures are essential steps one could take towards making these changes.
In practice, it means we must actively promote fewer working hours (with no loss of pay), given its environmental and wellbeing benefits. These efforts must also be complemented with reshaping our relationship to work and truly enabling emancipation and freedom from wage labour by ensuring that time outside work is both available and rewarded. At the policy level, this could include the introduction of a four-day week (with no loss of pay), universal basic income (to release pressure from wage work) and well-funded social welfare systems with the provision of free services like childcare, education and transport.
Both the labour and environmental movements must work hand-in-hand to achieve these transitions by challenging the present wage-based value system and posing clear ecological limits when shaping the contours of a new waged-work structure beneficial for both the environment and workers. Such a system would not be oriented towards driving capitalist growth but encourage us to spend time on activities that matter and for what we will.
