Not Suitable for Work

When it comes to work, is less more? Bertrand Russell wrote that ‘immense harm is caused by the belief that work is virtuous’. In more recent times, organisations from Microsoft to the Wellcome Trust have experimented with a four-day week, and advocates argue that shorter working weeks will solve everything from unemployment to the gender pay gap. We discuss whether work is making us bad citizens and unhappy humans.

Speakers
Ödül Bozkurt
Senior Lecturer and Director of the Future of Work Hub, University of Sussex
Brian O’Connor
Professor of Philosophy, University College Dublin
Judy Wajcman
Anthony Giddens Professor of Sociology, LSE

Chair
Sarah Fine
Fellow, Forum for Philosophy & Senior Lecturer in Philosophy at King’s College London

Recorded on 6 March 2021 as part of the LSE Festival: Shaping the Post-COVID World