Reading Assignment #10-The Theory of the Leisure Class

A.
Overall, I did not find this article to be interesting, but one or two points did peak my interest.

I found it interesting how the author points out that productive labor is the lower classes means of acquiring goods. It is pretty interesting in my opinion how lower class and leisure class differ on what types of jobs are successful- the leisure or upper class wants to have ownership jobs while the lower class is more than fine having production type jobs underneath an owner.

One final thing I found interesting was the reading pointed out that it has been traditional belief of the leisure class that women should prepare the luxury foods for leisure class men to enjoy, while lower class citizens do not think this way.

I found this interesting because in today's day and age, that really is not a pragmatic way to think of things- more and more, women are working prominent roles in businesses and to an extent, there seems to be somewhat of a role reversal, as more and more than ever there are stay-at-home men.

That part of the article piqued my interest because it made me think how much our traditional beliefs are changing. I really do feel like people, especially leisure class people, are less and less attributing these types of descriptions to women.

B.

1. Why do we attribute certain behaviors to certain classes? Why is it typical according to traditional practice that women produce the food and men consume it, as is show to be prevalent in the article surrounding the leisure or upper class?
2. Why is it that working classes interests lie mostly within the industrial employments? Why do they accept the industrial employments while the leisure class rarely does so?
3. How did the two categories in modern economic institutions come about- the pecuniary and the industrial employments?

C.
This article described traditional beliefs and practices of the leisure class versus the working, or in many cases, the lower class.

The first few pages we had to read talked about how productive labor is the lower class's ordinary means of acquiring goods and this is especially true when a community is at an agricultural stage of industry.

These lower classes also tend to not be lazy and do no avoid labor in any way because labor is their accepted way of life and they take pride in efficiently working since doing so is all they truly know.

Then the author discusses the superior class's ideals, which includes not accepting the thought of being inferior. The superior class does not like having to report to a master and doing traditional labor is a debasing practice to many in the superior class. Also, for these types of individuals to be satisfied, it is not sufficient to just have wealth and power--> they must be able to buy material stuff so as others can witness their wealth.

On the second group of pages, the author writes about the ideal of the superior class that men should consume what women produce. This is a traditional belief (a belief that I believe is changing), especially when it comes to preparing luxury food for the luxury working men to consume. Thus, a signal of being in the upper class for many is being able to consume luxury foods at the hands of women.

On the final set of pages, the authors explains how there are two categories in the modern economic employment world: the pecuniary and the industrial. The pecuniary refer to ownership positions and industrial refers to production-type work.

The leisure class employment interests lie almost solely within the pecuniary employments. The working class can indeed fit into the pecuniary employments, but the majority of the time, they strive for the working/industrial class of employments.

A key note the author shared was that the way to enter into the leisure class is by being having a pecuniary employment. This reason behind this is because as the author writes, the pecuniary employments are the "captains of industry."