Useful tip: with security torx screws, with the little nub in the centre, if you get a small flathead screwdriver to jam in there and wiggle a bit, that centre bit will snap off without much difficulty.
You should be able to use a regular Torx screwdriver bit after that.
Also great for tamper-resistant screws. Makes it harder for my patients to get screws out to make weapons / self injury implements or to get to the electrical wiring or create a ligature attachment point.
It’s not time stolen from you as the work needs to be done either way, but it’s money stolen from you as you’re either underpaid or paying too much for what you’re buying.
You are not only working to mentain a functional society, you are also working to constantly grow it (each year more stuff must be made, more money must be earned, more of everything) it and also to create a very big surplus for the rich. We also burn perfectly edible food, ruin perfectly wearable clothing and make electronic devices that intentionally break in a few years to get you to buy another one sooner just to get the 1% more money. If we didn’t do all that and they lived normal, non-luxury lives, everyone would have a lot more free time. If everyone worked only 20 hours a week, we’d make enough to sustain our society.
Also, most workers are so deeply alienated because they know that they aren’t working for themselves, they are working for someone else. Which is why most people simply stop giving a fuck at some point.
There is so much inefficiency because most who do the actual work don’t have much motivation to do a decent job, yet alone think about what they are doing because you simply get punished, or at least don’t get any reward, for thinking. And they people who (should) do the thinking often don’t have a clue as they live in a bubble.
And of course there is all the bullshit about shipping stuff across the world to do different stuff when it is completely unnecessesary…
Very often the work does not need to get done, the work uses up a poorly paid employee’s entire work day to squeeze out an extra fraction of a percent of profit.
You’re right about money, and employers are often stealing time as well.
I believe it was Marx who first observed that superfluous jobs, as well as unemployment, are inextricably linked to capitalism.
EDIT: Found a relevant Marx quote in Grundrisse:
Capital itself is the moving contradiction, [in] that it presses to reduce labour time to a minimum, while it posits labour time, on the other side, as sole measure and source of wealth. Hence it diminishes labour time in the necessary form so as to increase it in the superfluous form; hence posits the superfluous in growing measure as a condition – question of life or death – for the necessary.
See also Marcuse, 1969:
The absorption [i.e. disappearance] of unemployment and the maintenance of an adequate rate of profit would […] require the stimulation of demand on an ever larger scale, thereby stimulating the rat race of the competitive struggle for existence through the multiplication of waste, planned obsolescence, parasitic and stupid jobs and services.
Great quote. I’m sure people have been spying out bullshit jobs before the industrial revolution, too.
On call standing in the corner to present candied dates or wave palm fronds over the emperor was necessary only for the emperor to fool himself into thinking he was inherently more important than anyone else.
Fam, at my last job they had roughly 23h of activity for me per week. 17h of nothing to do and still having to stick around because i needed every penny to be able to pay my bills.
It is time stolen from you as well. You only need to work a fraction of the time you do in order to cover your wages, the rest of the day is free profit for the Capitalist.
You’re ignoring that what you output from your work needs to be… Outputted? So the issue is that you make less than you deserve for the amount of work that you do… If you make 25$/h and it wealth got redistributed so you would make 100$/h it doesn’t mean you could work 10h instead of 40h, your employer would still need you to 40h (or close to it, maybe you would be motivated by the increase in salary and work faster but that’s speculations) to achieve the same result.
If unemployment was at 75% and wealth redistribution happened to quadruple salaries then we could say “Instead of having 25% of the population working 40h/week at 25$/h, we’ll have 100% of the population working 10h/week at 100$/h so in the end the people that are working already will be making the same annual salary” but that’s not the case.
I work in a grocery store, and while I would still need to be in about 25-30 hours a week to ensure product is on the shelves a massive amount of my time at work is useless facing and looking busy after the first few hours of real work restocking. If I was paid fairly I could come in for about 3 hours every day and have everything that needed done done without spinning on a thumb all day just to barely make rent.
I’m not ignoring anything. Commodities trend towards being sold at their Value, and since Value comes from Labor and Natural Resources, Capitalists necessarily pay Workers less than the Value they create. Ie, if a Worker creates $500 in Value per day yet is paid 15 dollars an hour for their 10 hours, this means they have made $350 in Value purely for the Capitalist. With their 50 dollars in Value per Hour created, they cover their wages in a mere 3 hours, rather than 10. The excess 7 is “hidden” from the Worker, via calling the 15 dollars per hour a wage, despite it being purely for the Capitalist.
A similar process can be seen in Feudalism, though it was more distinct. In Feudalism, serfs covered rent, then produced for themselves. They were able to clearly see what has been taken. Capitalism advanced on this concept to obscure exploitation through the idea of wages, yet still they take profit via paying Workers less than the Value they create.
I recommend reading Wage Labor and Capital and following it up with Value, Price and Profit if you want further elaboration and proof of said concepts, and have a couple hours to spare.
I’m talking about a separate issue! Even if rich people don’t exist anymore, something that takes 500h work hours to accomplish will still take 500h to accomplish, you won’t suddenly have to work less.
Going off my example from earlier, the Workers would only need to work 3 hours to maintain their standard of living, the extra 7 hours are pocketed by the Capitalist for their enrichment alone.
Removing the wealth siphons reduces the amount of necessary work, as if you only need 3 hours to cover yourself without a Capitalist involved, you only need to work 3 hours.
Society overproduces vast amounts of goods and works far longer than necessary purely for Capitalist enrichment, not to cover themselves.
A lot of the work we do is effectively to satisfy the (constantly changing and growing) desires or the wealthy (or let’s say, the desires of the people who employ wage workers).
Simple example: labour productivity has grown with 70% since the 70s while real wages have stayed more or less the same. So that growth in output hasnt been going to workers. (The time that productivity increase could have freed up, is now used to produce stuff that the workers do not get to consume themselves).
Rich people disappear, wealth is redistributed, somehow you guys think that building a house will suddenly take less work hours than it does at the moment? No it won’t, construction workers will be paid more to work just as many hours building that house, they won’t suddenly work 20h/week.
Rich people disappear, wealth is redistributed, somehow you guys think that building a house will suddenly take less work hours than it does at the moment? No it won’t, construction workers will be paid more to work just as many hours building that house, they won’t suddenly work 20h/week.
Probably a bad example. The wealthy are the cause of fewer houses being built than are needed to maintain the surplus allowing reasonable pricing in the market. And it is being done primarily to extract more money from people without actually producing anything. So, that house would actually get built and probably to better standards than are currently seen with the efforts to maximize profit.
Holy fuck! That’s not the fucking point! The time to end up with a finished product is the fucking same no matter how much people are getting paid! Your screws and nails don’t go in any faster! You can’t type faster than your fastest typing speed! You can’t call more than one client at a time! You’re just paid more but the work isn’t accomplished faster!
You’re so blinded by rich people that you’re unable to analyze the rest of the issue!
Unemployment isn’t that high, people who don’t work at the moment don’t do so out of choice (because clearly unemployment isn’t the best way to pay rent!) and we’re talking about redistribution of wealth in all sectors, not just that one sector, so all wages would increase. You don’t end up with more workers suddenly wanting to work construction (which are already well paid jobs in most locations which doesn’t seem to help recruitment!), you still have the same unemployment rate and the same labor needs, you just redistributed wages in a more sensible way.
Hell, demand would probably increase in most sectors due to the general population having more money to spend instead of it being in the hands of so few people, that means more people required to make stuff without having more people to take those jobs!
Holy fuck! That’s not the fucking point! The time to end up with a finished product is the fucking same no matter how much people are getting paid! Your screws and nails don’t go in any faster! You can’t type faster than your fastest typing speed! You can’t call more than one client at a time! You’re just paid more but the work isn’t accomplished faster!
That’s really not correct. Like, what you are saying here:
Your screws and nails don’t go in any faster!
is literally contradictory to reality.
Automation and technological advances literally make work more productive. A carpenter getting a share of the value of their labor that is both keeping pace with inflation and productivity would mean that they can invest in newer tools and equipment that can allow them to accomplish more in a safer manner in a shorter time. They could, for example, purchase a cordless framing nailer and spare batteries, eliminating the need to setup a workplace generator and pneumatic compressor, which would need to be moved periodically as they work. It also eliminates the hose as a potential workplace tripping hazard. Assistive robotic exoskeletons increase carry capacity while reducing strain on joints, reducing likelihood of injury while increasing efficiency.
You can’t type faster than your fastest typing speed!
But you can automate repetitive tasks, allowing more to be done in the same amount of time. More resources allow one to invest in their own or others’ knowledge to accomplish that.
You can’t call more than one client at a time!
This is true. But how many calls or meetings really are needed and can’t be sorted via email or Slack?
You’re so blinded by rich people that you’re unable to analyze the rest of the issue!
I think that you may be projecting a bit here. I’m just tired of the bleeding of the working class that has been actively in progress in the West for the last half century at least. I’m happy to dig into the slews of data showing how and why people are worse off than their ancestors and where that money has been going (spoiler: the wealthy have been hoarding it and continue to insatiably claw back more via price gouging and wage theft).
it impairs the economy. More folks could hire people to do things. Remember there were milkmen and tv repair men at one point in time. You could hire someone to clean your house and they could hire someone to do their taxes. its amazing how an economy works when people have money to spend rather than hoard.
There were also icemen at one point. Then we invented refrigerators. Nobody seems to miss having a giant block of ice delivered to their house to keep the food we buy at the stores cold. But one thing I think a lot of people miss is appliances that didn’t need to be thrown away.
For once companies could downsize not because they want to fire people but because there is an excess of jobs. There are many many businesses that produce in excess (take the clothing sector for instance) or others that have already hired beyond sustainability (software and tech). Many governments also have programs to hire in excess for non-required roles to reduce unemployment. There is so much room for optimization but realistically with other effects like average number of kids per family decreasing some degree of automatization beyond what we have now and some change in people’s lifestyles will be required too.
some may fall into rampant consumerism even more, but some (hopefully many) will come out of it because they have money and time for decent hobbies actually. so instead of buying tons of easily consumable crap stuff of every kind to pass whatever little time they have, instead they will focus on buying less but more decent of the stuff they are really interested in.
So people who have a piece of crap car wouldn’t replace it? People who don’t have a car wouldn’t get one? People who rent wouldn’t want to buy a house? People who never went on vacation wouldn’t want to travel? People who have a phone that barely works wouldn’t get a newer model? People wouldn’t start eating actual food instead of eating the cheapest stuff they can find? People wouldn’t get new clothes, a new TV, new appliances that actually work properly, go to the restaurant…
Wealth redistribution means people can now afford to live a comfortable life, that means them getting what they need to be comfortable.
Cars and phones? %90 percent of people already has one of those. Better income will mean people only moving to better quality ones and the production shifting in that direction rather than accommodating a large economic range as it is now. Homes? There are probably enough homes for everyone, maybe even excess. It is just that richer people own more and rent them out. So no net change in required number of constructions. Clothing? You must be kidding, it is produced in so much excess that it can probably support double the existing population. And again if people get better pay, they will mostly move towards higher quality and not necessarily more of the same quality. Same thing with food, you said it yourself. Production of crap stuff will just be shifted towards production of better quality stuff that people can afford.
It is only people who are at the very bottom like homeless or extremely poor whose consumption will substantially increase with a better economic situation but there can be enough room for accommodating that with better optimized processes and more automation. So much of the stuff you have counted is produced in excess and goes to waste that I am sure even that would be enough to meet increased demand if regulated properly.
You’re the one who can only think in relation to what the middle class is living now and not what the vast majority of the population in the world is living. Look at developing countries, we can see exactly what the transition looks like when people with little means finally have some wealth going their way and if you think there aren’t people living in bad socioeconomic conditions in your own country then I invite you to get your head out of your ass for a sec and look around you, unless you live in Monte Carlo your peers are struggling, close to 80% of US citizens live paycheck to paycheck!
Fun fact: There are plenty of times a screw that looks like a Philips head is also compatible with a square drive. I’ve mostly seen this on electrical outlets and Ikea furniture.
I don’t know why Robertson/square drives aren’t more common. They’re stable and they resist stripping and rounding.
Robertson is the proto-torxs. It is a vast improvement over Phillips but has a tendency to snap the head off due to the increased amount of torque you can apply. Torxs maintains the amount of torque that a Robertson can apply, but adds some material back to the head giving it a little extra strength.
It’s really unfortunate that the greed of Robertson and Ford got in the way of such a vastly superior design.
Phillips strips way, way easier than Torx. Stripping generally happens when a screwdriver cams out, or pops out of the screw. Here are some excerpts from Wikipedia of Torx vs Phillips.
The hexalobular socket screw drive, often referred to by the original proprietary brand name Torx ( /ˈtɔːrks/) or by the alternative generic name star drive, uses a star-shaped recess in the fastener with six rounded points. It was designed to permit increased torque transfer from the driver to the bit compared to other drive systems. The drive was developed in 1967[44] by Camcar Textron.[45] Torx is very popular in the automotive and electronics industries because of resistance to cam out, and extended bit life, as well as reduced operator fatigue by minimizing the need to bear down on the drive tool to prevent cam out.
And Philips on the other hand:
The Phillips screwdriver design has a tendency to cam out during operation due to angled contact surfaces which create an axial force pushing the driver out of the recess as torque is applied. Despite popular belief,[2] there is no clear evidence that this was a deliberate design feature. When the original patent application was filed in 1933, the inventors described the key objectives as providing a screw head recess that (a) may be produced by a simple punching operation and which (b) is adapted for firm engagement with a driving tool with “no tendency of the driver to cam out”.
I’m not sure about Allen. It doesn’t cam out very much, but it does still strip a lot easier than Torx. Probably due to the smaller contact points.
And with the hex/Allen, it’s the small contact points as well as the smaller volume of material that needs to be deformed or removed before slippage can occur, as well as the angle of force on the contact point.
With a hex, the contact point and direction are such that the tool is effectively trying to scrape off material at an angle, and if/when it succeeds even a little bit, it’s now much more prone to fail.
With a Torx, the contact area might still be small, but it’s being applied to the lobe in a more perpendicular direction, so rather than a scraping failure, it’s more of a force that is pushing directly against steel instead of scraping. Not that it can’t fail, but the route to failure is significantly less likely.
Yeah, it was made with torque in mind (like, it’s in the name lol). For smaller screws using an impact, you can expect to break the screw before you strip the torx on top. And by smaller I don’t mean tiny, more like M4, M5
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