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The Future of Success by Robert B. Reich. Alfred A. Knopf, 201 East 50th Street, New York, New York 10022. 2000. 289 pages. $26.
Reviewed by Lane JenningsThe Poverty of Affluence: Choosing Our Success
When Robert B. Reich noticed that work was costing him his personal life, he stepped down as U.S. secretary of labor to reflect on what "success" really means.
In The Future of Success, Robert Reich describes the symptoms of America's malaise and speculates on its root causes. He prescribes no comprehensive treatment but does offer readers a powerful stimulant.
This is a good news/bad news book. The good news is that new technologies, savvy marketing, and instant communications are cutting costs and widening choices for consumers everywhere. The bad news is that ever more "terrific deals" are playing havoc with practically every other aspect of human life--forcing workers, companies, investors, families, neighbors, and even governments into more frenzied activity, with diminished security and practically no hope of any lasting satisfaction.
As recently as the 1970s, Reich notes, the most familiar workplace was a highly structured factory or office staffed by specialists who could expect to stay where they were or advance through the ranks based on length of service and rising skill levels. But today, the speed with which new products come to market and the ease with which customers can switch to new suppliers who offer lower prices and/or improved features have disrupted the stability that promoted long-term commitments between workers and employers.
Companies today need active, eager, creative minds, and they offer high salaries and fringe benefits to get them. But there is little expectation among either employers or workers that those hired will stay long. At the same time, routine tasks, which now include not only most manual labor but also many service and administrative jobs, are seen as having relatively less value. Workers in these jobs get lower pay and fewer benefits, because they can be easily replaced.
Today's most rewarding (and best paid) jobs are high-pressure, high-risk positions that demand ceaseless attention, energy, and creativity. Time off (or even time out) is hard to find. Reich tells how his own life changed the day he first realized that he had become so absorbed in his duties as U.S. secretary of labor that he had little time or interest left for any other part of life--even his family. Reich's personal solution was to resign his Cabinet post and return to the calmer lifestyle of a university professor. But such an option is not always available, and, as Reich found, many regard the desire to ease up as a sign of personal weakness, or--in his own case--even a betrayal of public trust.
With both men and women now feverishly pursuing careers, more and more families are "outsourcing" household tasks like cooking and child rearing, then feeling both guilty and economically squeezed by the cost of paying for services they would gladly perform themselves if only they had the time. Neighborhood and community service groups, too, often languish for lack of willing and available volunteers. Bureaucratic public agencies and ill-paid, overworked service workers can seldom match the time and personal touch that family members, friends, and neighbors have traditionally brought to bear on long-term commitments, such as care for young children and feeble elders or cooperative efforts to clean up and maintain homes, streets, and public spaces.
We're not exactly in the "winner takes all" society that many social critics have recently lamented, but the winners are winning big. "The top 1% is doing magnificently; the top 5% is faring better than ever before; the top 20% is living quite comfortably. But each rung on the ladder is spaced more widely apart than before," Reich notes. "The middle has not progressed much, and those on the rungs below them are relatively worse off."
In his book's final section, Reich considers the personal and social choices facing Americans who hope to combine satisfying work and sustainable lives. His conclusions are not encouraging. For example, individual efforts at "voluntary simplicity" seldom succeed. One reason is that so many material comforts and benefits once deemed luxuries are now necessities of normal American life. Any family today that tries to live without TV, computers, automobiles, supermarkets, malls, or modern hospitals not only finds itself cut off from the cultural mainstream, but bears the onus of denying children or other dependents the benefits of these modern (and easily available) facilities. Moreover, breadwinners will likely find themselves working harder than ever to maintain tolerable levels of material comfort and health outside the high-tech infrastructure most Americans take for granted.
Public choices hold more promise, Reich believes, though he offers few detailed proposals of his own. Instead, he urges public debate and self-examination as the paths most likely to produce a shift in values and behavior without the excesses that often accompany government-imposed market controls or a faith-based "moral revolution."
Despite his book's title, Reich offers little overt speculation about the future. However, he persuasively clarifies the problems he perceives, backing his insights with relevant information, lively anecdotes, and credible statistics--all supported by a useful index and an extensive set of notes that offer both original sources and additional information.
This book deserves to be read and discussed widely. (In the March 2001 Future Survey, editor Michael Marien described the book as "beautifully written and from the heart, with fresh ideas on key aspects of the new economy and society. Clearly one of the FS 'Best Books' of 2001.") But futurists may be disappointed by the lack of scenarios to illustrate what alternative outcomes Reich believes might result from the debate he hopes to stimulate. Also, it would be useful if Reich offered his personal dream--or even nightmare--visions of how things could change. But this omission seems less an oversight than a deliberate device to ensure that readers treat this book as a resource rather than a guide.
About the Reviewer
Lane Jennings is research director of THE FUTURIST, production editor of Future Survey, and author of Virtual Futures.