Doesn’t the economic benefits of a longer commute time offset the costs of these depressive symptoms?
there are so many:
- vehicle maintenance
- vehicle replacement
- fuel
- road repair
- healthcare
- fast food
there are soo many ways that a long commute supports the economy. it could be selfish to not commute in a motor vehicle for less than an hour each way.
This illustrates very well how broken our economic system is lol. What benefits “the economy” (GDP) is not what benefits real people/communities.
Those are no benefits but just examples for economically uneducated positions. Work is not an end in itself but just a tool. A broken window that is replaced by one miner, one glass producer and one craftsman has less value compared to an unbroken window and 3 persons with free time to create for example a new window.
Cars and car-centric lifestyles come with incredible economic cost.
So if I’m understanding correctly, your position is that spending money on vehicle maintenance, fuel, healthcare (presumably for treating the depression?) from a long commute is going to improve the economy by an amount greater than how much the “depressive symptoms” impact the economy?
Or in other words, it’s fine that there are more cases of depression because it benefits the economy. It hinges on the assumption that someone with depression is “bad for the economy” and that the economy matters more than peoples’ suffering. This is an inherently ableist and morally bankrupt perspective, as is usually the case when distilling everything down to a utilitarian equation.
