Our changing world of work and play

In olden days, artisans lived and worked in a seamless life of work and private existence, as did the peasants and yeomen of the land. Modern, industrial life has separated work from home life; work being a means to an end, a necessary evil.A few lucky individuals can do what they love to do and also make money from it — artists; hi-tech entrepreneurs, and the creative individuals come to mind. However, most people spend half their waking hours “earning a living” with little or no enjoyment derived from the activity.
In Europe, where I grew up, there was usually a road to semi-professionalism for those not inclined to go the academic route. It was apprenticeship; shop craft, usually a five-year internship with little pay and much menial work for the master. Afterwards, you had status, and usually steady work as a tradesman. However, technology has changed much of that privilege too. Printers, draughtsmen and many other trades have gone by the wayside, diminished in importance and remunerations;eliminated or sidelined by technology.
Even post-secondary education is no guarantee of an interesting and well-paying job, but it does give you more options.
In many ways, we have come full circle with the days of yore. Manual, repetitive factory type work is declining and more and more; education, skills and “meritocracy” determines ones status and earning capacity in life.
The day might well come again, when there will be two classes of citizens: patricians and plebeians; those who toil, and those who manage. Meritocracy care only if you can perform; and to do so, beyond the most menial tasks, you need brains and motivation –in that order. The egalitarian society might have been just a chimerical dream, and we will awaken to the brutal truth of the market economy.