What's Wrong with the Case AGAINST Shorter Working Time? V

5. Conclusion
They tell us sometimes that if we had only kept quiet, all these desirable things would have come about of themselves. I am reminded of the Greek clown who, having seen an archer bring down a flying bird, remarked, sagely: 'You might have saved your arrow, for the bird anyway would have been killed by the fall.' – Elizabeth Cady Stanton
So how does an archaic, incoherent and unauthenticated textbook homily succeed in discrediting contemporary efforts to move towards a shorter working week? As with the "magnificent fabric" in the story of the Emperor's new clothes, the counterintuitive, esoteric subtlety of the fallacy is said to be invisible to fools. The real message of the fallacy claim is "this is an issue of such dazzling complexity that it can only be comprehended by mathematically-rigorous adepts (and 'free-market' think-tank snake-oil salesmen). Keep your mouths shut and your noses to the grindstones, you fools. We're in charge here!"

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