Douglas_Knight comments on Doing your good deed for the day - Less Wrong

115 Post author: Yvain 27 October 2009 12:45AM

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Comment author: Nanani 29 October 2009 12:17:08AM 3 points [-]

I didn't mention it, but other replies did: They'd stop working earlier on bad days instead, so the leisure time total would not decrease (well, assuming roughly equal numbers of good and bad days, with median days being the most common.) Also, its quality would likely improve as well given the financial boost of making more profits on the good days.

Comment author: Kaj_Sotala 29 October 2009 03:27:38PM *  5 points [-]

They'd stop working earlier on bad days instead, so the leisure time total would not decrease (well, assuming roughly equal numbers of good and bad days, with median days being the most common.)

This assumes that the effect of leisure time on well-being is merely a function of the amount of leisure time you have. That seems unwarranted: you can't simply take a long break and then spend the next year working with no leisure time at all, even if that gave you an equal amount of leisure time as a scenario where you distributed it more evenly. Likewise, it seems intuitively plausible to me that if you

a) take the day off early as a result of having made a lot of money

b) take the day off late after you've worked through a bad day and gotten a feeling of deserving that time off instead of quitting early and not accomplishing anything

your subjectively experienced leisure time quality ends up being higher than if you'd distribute the leisure time otherwise. (At least for some people - admittedly, I think I'd myself feel better if I did things the way you propose.)

Comment author: Douglas_Knight 30 October 2009 02:13:46AM 2 points [-]

I don't have any examples, but I think your hypothetical is a common problem and that a lot of leisure is degraded by guilt, and a lot of fake work is done out of guilt. But I think another effect is working with the cab drivers, possibly in addition.