"Nevertheless, doctors in many areas are in short supply and it's incredibly hard to become a doctor."
At least in my country both of these things are caused by doctor's unions lobbying to limit student intake to the point where lots of perfectly capable people simply can't get admitted. It has got to the point where many go study abroad in other EU countries.
Anyway, even if everyone in the workforce was capable of the 5% hard work, companies could still fire lots of people, enough to give us universal basic income or third world war. Everyone in the workforce will be affected at that point.
Yep, despite all the talk of young people being "digital natives", installing apps from Android/iOS app store, taking pictures and chatting with friends doesn't teach you much that is valuable for office work.
PC gaming and specifically modding is what I can thank for much of my computer proficiency, but even that is easy these days with Steam and its workshops for many games.
It's not the realities, but people's choices. One can live in rural area and limit driving to the absolute minimum necessary, and build a small house heated using renewables rather than a big house heated with fossil fuels. Similarly, lots of city people increase their carbon footprint through excess consumption and travel.
I guess ecological rural living may not be easy if you enjoy lots of social activities. For an introvert like me it wouldn't be a problem.
> One can live in rural area and limit driving to the absolute minimum necessary, and build a small house heated using renewables rather than a big house heated with fossil fuels
You’re still consuming massive resources in transporting materials to a low-density location. Unless you’re living completely off the land, de-densifying is far more impactful. (Consider how much land alone would be converted from nature to human use by spreading out the populations of New York and Los Angeles.)
Higher property taxes for less dense areas might make sense for suburbs of big cities, but not beyond that. In the countryside road and other infrastructure is required for agriculture, if some people also choose to live there (and that way reduce prices in cities) it's a win-win.
This is definitely the case in Finland too. Somehow there's a chronic shortage of doctors, but only minimum increase in number of students, something which government could easily control through funding. Meanwhile lots of other university degrees have become less and less valuable, because too many students graduate.
Doctors's simply have the strongest association/union to preserve their privilege. No wonder why they easily earn way more than your average senior software engineer, lawyer or whatever around here. After the first few years from graduation, many of them go work in private sector where there's generally less stress, and 3-4 day workweeks are pretty common too, as they can afford it. Not a bad deal at all.
Here it has got to the point where young Finns pay money to go study in poorer countries like Latvia and Romania, because it's too hard to get in medical school here.
The big picture is that social media and smartphones reduce social interactions, and lower their quality. Just look at all the kids and teenagers that are glued to their smartphones all the time.
Obviously there are exceptions to the rule, like people living in middle of nowhere, or who have otherwise trouble finding like-minded friends offline.
Yeah, if I had my own seat in small office with my teammates like pre-COVID, I would probably visit the office at least 3 days a week. But what we have instead is a massive open office full of flex desks. There is absolutely nothing attractive about the whole place, not even fancy coffee machines. I would just waste 30 mins of my life getting there.
Sometimes forcing a person out of their comfort zone is the best thing that can happen to them. In fact, nearly all good things that have happened in my life have required me to exit my comfort zone, which for a long time was playing games alone at home. Sometimes it has happened voluntarily, sometimes due to government (conscription) or social pressure (going to study in another city, because that's what you are supposed to do). In all cases, the outcome was good. My social skills improved, I got education, a job, wife, children, nice travel experiences.
To be honest if I were to become a hermit, I would go live in middle of a forest. Then one can be alone AND enjoy fresh air & nature with no people around. At this point lots of rural places have adequate internet connection for remote work & any entertainment needs.
Cities are kind of pointless if you don't enjoy participating in live activities with other people. Just worse housing at higher price.
Most humans have historically lived in some kind of community - be it a city, a town, or a village, the point is the same: a community can provide more services that a single person living in the forest can't.
I actually think we survived in communities/cities for longer. We lost our rough traits (ie: lots of hair, thick skin, etc...) compared to the rest of apes. So we must have been inside homes for a very long time.
That only really applies to cold climates at best.
Here's the theatrical trailer of Ten Canoes (2006) by Rolf de Heer with modern actors, many of whom are a generation or less from living traditionally without permanent homes, long houses or anything westerners would consider as "inside", retelling a story from their oral history.
Gang crime is primarily a symptom of poverty, inequality and lack of opportunities. Many rich Western European countries had very little gang crime, at least until they decided to create a new class of working poor from exploited migrants. Nordic countries in particular would have a super low crime rate, had migration been handled better.
At least in my country both of these things are caused by doctor's unions lobbying to limit student intake to the point where lots of perfectly capable people simply can't get admitted. It has got to the point where many go study abroad in other EU countries.
Anyway, even if everyone in the workforce was capable of the 5% hard work, companies could still fire lots of people, enough to give us universal basic income or third world war. Everyone in the workforce will be affected at that point.