Keys and Keyholes

Reading Response: In Praise of Idleness by Bertrand Russell

Which would you say is the better use of one's time - idleness or hard work? Most people would say hard work, after all, "Idle hands are the Devil's playground." But when people are working hard all day long, nearly everyday of the week, how are they to have time to do anything else? Either they are working or are exhausted from working. And what about those who are unemployed because of the hard workers "taking" all of the available jobs and accomplishing all of the necessary tasks? Society ends up with a large exhausted population, a large poor population, and a small wealthy, idle population.

Russell's solution to this problem was to more evenly distribute the jobs among the people. By cutting hours to four hours a day, more people would be able to be employed. Also, one would have more free time to be able to pursue whatever he wished, while also receiving the satisfaction (and salary) of hard work. Implementing this plan in society was not as much a part of Russell's desire as it was to shake up the perspectives of his readers. He was writing in the midst of the Great Depression - many people were unemployed and were feeling like they were not doing their "duty" as Americans, or even as humans, because they were not working. Russell wanted his readers to realize that idleness was just as beneficial to people as was hard work. After all, without time spent in pursuing one's own interests, great works of literature may never have been written, electricity may never have been harnessed, and people may have never gotten off the ground...or flown to the moon, for that matter.