The Social Reorganization of Time

Personal Reflexive Statement

Good evening. I begin with the customary Association for Humanist Sociology (AHS) reflexive statement—a statement of my values and the relevant background about my life and work—intended to inform you of “where I am coming from” in addressing my topic. For purposes of tonight’s presentation, it is important that you know that, like many of you, I consider myself to be a Humanist Sociologist, especially in the sense that I strongly value social justice and human rights. As such, I attempt to advance these values within my scholarship, bringing attention to and new information about topics and problems, which I hope will be useful in achieving social justice and expanding human rights.

My sociological specialization falls somewhere within the subfield of work and economy. My research has focused on causes and consequences of contemporary changes in the nature, organization, and social relations of work. I attempt to explain how these changes relate to the production and reproduction of social inequality. Tonight’s talk synthesizes and builds upon ideas from selected presentations that I have given over the course of 15 AHS conferences as well as two articles published in our journal, Humanity and Society. Obviously, the AHS has made significant and long-term contributions to my intellectual growth, for which I am very thankful.

Tonight, I would like to consider the relationship between the social organization of time and the rapid expansion of global capitalism. I will describe how our time spent outside of employment, whether engaging in leisure or performing household and caretaking tasks, is being transferred back either into our employment and/or into activities in which we devote time as quasi employees to the completion of work-like tasks. Many of us experience this reorganization and transfer of time on a deeply personal level. We feel stress and anxiety from the rapid pace of our lives and our inability to keep up. We feel we have too many tasks and not enough available time in which to complete them. These feelings are not limited to a few stray individuals. The reorganization of our time should be understood as a widespread sociological phenomenon, a social problem, created by growth imperatives of the global economy that is unsustainable for workers, the economy, and the natural environment. I will conclude by suggesting some ways in which we might take back a portion of our time and slow down—for the good of humanity.

We have gathered here in Denver, CO, to participate in our 41st annual meeting of the Association for Humanist Sociology (AHS). I hope you have enjoyed the beautiful views of the Rocky Mountain Front Range. As you may have guessed from our conference theme, “Elevating Humanity: Pathways to Progressivism,” the mountains sometimes make me think about metaphors. One dominant mountain metaphor is associated with the achievement of success. It is a hypermasculine metaphor in which one climbs slowly and arduously, often through extreme weather, while carrying a heavy load and navigating around, over, and through treacherous obstacles. Although the climb to the top is lengthy and exhausting, the difficulty is all part of the journey to the top.

However, while periodically returning to this metaphor, I have noticed that the culture industry is no longer communicating this metaphor in the way that I had long remembered. To further explore this observation, I conducted a Google Images search of the phrase: “mountain of success.” I wanted to see how this metaphor is commonly represented within images on the Internet. As I suspected, I found that, unlike the success climbers that I recall from the past, images of today’s alpine ascenders do not focus on the climb at all but most often the celebration at the top of the mountain, with arms outstretched above their heads. Most images are individualistic, showing only one person proudly atop the mountain, as opposed to a team of climbers. Some images show people on mountain summits wearing business attire and carrying briefcases.

Several images contain the text of a famous quote from legendary football coach, Vince Lombardi: “Those at the top of the mountain did not fall there.” However, given the shortage of images of the climb, implied by Lombardi, one is most often left to guess how they got there. Judging from the way individuals appear in the images, as they stand by themselves victoriously, and especially applicable to those wearing suits and ties, one might assume that they no longer engage in an arduous climb but, instead, ascend effortlessly. Perhaps Lombardi’s quote is no longer relevant, and the people in the images drove speedily up the mountain in their sports utility vehicles or were transported to the summit by helicopters.

Not surprisingly, many of the mountain of success Google images related in some way to jobs and workplaces. In addition to mountain metaphors, it is not difficult to locate other workplace-related metaphors, which, rather than emphasizing lengthy amounts of time and large amounts of effort in accomplishing goals, accentuate speed. For example, employers no longer interview and hire folks; rather they “onboard them,” get them “up to speed,” and “seamlessly transition” them into their jobs. Many of us learn not only from the language of metaphors but experience firsthand that speed, or its flip side, time minimization, has become highly valued within the economic realms of our culture. As workers, many of us become dependent on the calendars on our computers and smartphones for up-to-the-minute reminders about obligations and tasks too numerous for us to recall by memory alone. It should be no wonder why a recent Staples television advertisement, which showed employees quickly and easily accomplishing difficult aspects of their jobs with the help of a magical “easy button,” was so well received.

However, efforts to minimize time spent on task completion are by no means limited to the workplace. For instance, we can purchase “smart home” technologies that reduce the time we devote to manually turning off light switches, electronic devices, and home appliances. To save time accessing information, such as news and weather, the Amazon corporation has made it possible for us to verbally instruct a voice-enabled and voice recognition–enabled device named “Alexa” to access the Internet, locate, and broadcast content to us. Alexa and other similar devices represent an advance over previous methods of digital time minimization, as they reduce the time it takes to locate this media content ourselves by opening apps on our smartphones or by using remote controls to operate our televisions and other electronic devices. Alexa also enables us to minimize time spent shopping online, as we can place orders from Amazon.com with simple voice commands. We see in this example—and it is by no means the only example—that time minimization has become dominant and pervasive not only at work but also at home and within our leisure time.

One might assume that, in striving to reduce time spent in task completion at work and home, we hope to make more time for leisure. However, and perhaps paradoxically, we can also locate many examples in which we minimize the time it takes to engage in leisure. For instance, social media is used as a substitute for the time it takes to meet and interact with our friends and families within a physical location. Regarding exercise, for those who want to stay healthy but do not have much time to work out, a smartphone application allows the opportunity to stay in shape with a “seven-minute workout.” When communicating with others, many of us prefer texting over talking on our phones. We can even take shortcuts to form romantic relationships because it is now commonplace to meet and date online. It is no wonder that with all that we are seemingly obligated to accomplish at work, within our homes, and even in our leisure time, it can be difficult to keep up. How can we better understand these developments?

Bauerlein and Jeffery (2011), in their article entitled “All Work and No Pay: The Great Speedup,” discussed the recent jobless recovery following the “Great Recession.” They argued that, while financial markets recovered and corporate profits returned to previous levels, employment lagged behind. The authors claim that this is no coincidence, as corporations strategically employ fewer people who work longer hours to maximize productivity while minimizing the labor costs. However, to understand the essence of this speedup in greater detail, we must view it not merely as the latest fad within corporate culture but as an imperative of global capitalism.

Social Reorganization of Time and Work Discipline

In his work, “Time, Work Discipline, and Industrial Capitalism,” historian E. P Thompson (1967) described changes in what he called, “time discipline,” the cultural rules and expectations that shape our view of time. Prior to the industrial revolution, agricultural societies relied on nature to regulate their work time. For example, farmers arose with the sun, worked until it became excessively hot in the afternoon, and returned to the task in the evening until dark. This changed when the industrial revolution ushered in “clock time,” which represented a significant shift in collective perceptions of time. It allowed business owners and governments to impose a synchronic time discipline on the population of workers and on the population in general. Time clocks became particularly important for workers who were required to “clock in” and “clock out” of their shifts.

I believe we are seeing a reorganization of time discipline in the current economy, one that is similar to that described by Thompson, in that it maximizes time spent engaged in employment or otherwise productive activities that contribute to the maximization of profit and the growth of the global economy. And, just as the invention of clocks was important to the enforcement of time discipline at work, the invention of computers and other digital devices, such as smartphones, has been important contributions to more recent, but no less revolutionary, changes in time discipline.

Schwaub (2017), founder and executive director of the World Economic Forum, has described a shift in time, as it relates to not one, but no less than four, industrial revolutions. According to Schwaub, the first industrial revolution developed water and steam power to mechanize production. The second used electric power to create mass production. The third used electronics and information technology to automate production. A fourth industrial revolution is building on the third and consists of a digital revolution that began during the middle of the twentieth century. It is characterized by a fusion of technologies that is blurring the lines between the physical, digital, and biological spheres. Schwaub states that the speed of current breakthroughs has no historical precedent and that the Fourth Industrial Revolution is evolving exponentially rather than at a linear pace. Moreover, it transforms entire systems of production, management, and governance.

While I believe Schwaub’s conception of industrial revolutions is useful, we should also understand the Fourth Industrial Revolution as one in which the pace of global capitalism along with its growth imperative is accompanied by a greater pace of production and consumption on the part of the world’s workforce. Following Thompson, we can also learn more about this era of revolutionary change by examining the social reorganization of time, and how changes in time discipline are used to both discipline the workforce and maximize productivity.

I propose a framework for understanding the social reorganization of time that includes three different types of labor time. The first type of labor time is time spent in employment or “productive labor” time. The second is “reproductive labor” time, which refers to time spent tending to household chores required to maintain daily life, as well as bearing and caring for children, which maintains the next generation (Nakano Glenn 1992). Marx and Engels first used the concepts of production and reproduction to distinguish activities that take place in production versus activities that take place outside of production, but which enable production on both a daily and generational basis.

The third type of labor time is what I will refer to as “consumptive labor” time. I have used the term consumptive labor to describe an act of consuming but which also requires a work-like task on the part of consumers before, during, or after purchasing a good or service (Koeber 2011). While there are many forms of consumptive labor, self-service is the most obvious example, as many of us not only pump our own fuel but shop and bank online or use self-checkout in grocery and retail stores. Business organizations use consumptive labor to lower the cost of production by designing into the labor process a work-like role for consumers. Subsequently, in their consumption of goods and services, consumers also perform a portion of necessary productive labor, which either is concurrently performed by paid employees (e.g., self-checkout at retail stores) or has historically been performed by employees before being shifted to the consumer (e.g., pumping one’s own fuel). However, unlike employees, consumers perform consumptive labor without an employment contract that provides monetary compensation in exchange for work. For example, a person ordering a beverage within a fast-food establishment will often receive a cup and be required to fill it with ice and dispense the beverage before drinking it. The customer is not paid or employed to do this but cannot drink the beverage without first completing these tasks.

In addition to the three types of labor time—productive, reproductive, and consumptive—a fourth category of time must figure into an explanation of the contemporary social reorganization of time: “leisure” time or that portion of time that remains after performing productive, reproductive, and consumptive labor. In pop culture, we often refer to this kind of time as “free time.”

While a management perspective describes the “Great Speedup” in terms of some natural or neutral progression of technological revolutions, as the account of Schwaub exemplifies, a more critical labor process perspective suggests that other forces are at work, namely the imperatives of capitalism. Marx long ago pointed out a central contradiction in capitalism. Businesses profit by minimizing the cost of labor but also by maximizing the sale of commodities. Paradoxically, to grow the economy, the same workers who are paid as little as possible are also the population of consumers required to continuously increase their consumption. Obviously, workers cannot purchase ever more while being paid less and less. In this regard, we can view the history of capitalism, at least in part, in terms of how it attempts to overcome this contradiction.

The current social reorganization of time, what Bauerlein and Jeffery (2011) refer to as the Great Speedup, can be understood as a response by large corporations to overcome limitations in the amount of profit that can be derived, given current levels of production, consumption, and other cultural limitations (e.g., labor laws). In the United States, this response is characterized by a lengthening of the workday made possible by a reduction in the time spent performing household and childcare tasks (i.e., reproductive labor) and time spent in leisure. It is also accomplished by strategically embedding productive work into our consumption, as we consume to complete housework and childcare or as we consume in our leisure time. Thus, corporations profit and grow by extending the workday, both within and away from the workplace and from work done by both monetarily compensated employees and as unpaid consumers engaging in reproductive labor and leisure. Let us further examine how this occurs by examining each of the four types of time.

Productive Labor Time

More than 100 year ago, Frederick Taylor’s Principles of Scientific Management (1913) led to an imposition of “Taylorism” (also known as Scientific Management) across manufacturing workplaces. Taylor described the principles as follows (pp. 36-37):

First. They develop a science for each element of a man’s work, which replaces the old rule-of” thumb method.

Second. They scientifically select and then train, teach, and develop the workman, whereas in the past he chose his own work and trained himself as best he could.

Third. They heartily cooperate with the men so as to insure all of the work being done in accordance with the principles of the science which has been developed.

Fourth. There is an almost equal division of the work and the responsibility between the management and the workmen. The management takes over all work for which they are better fitted than the workmen, while in the past almost all of the work and the greater part of the responsibility were thrown upon the men.

It is important to note the significance of Taylorism because it does not necessarily lengthen the workday but can be used to maximize efficiency and productivity while eliminating breaks and buffers within a given quantity of labor time. As we shall see, when applied to other areas of social life, such as the performance of reproductive labor and/or leisure, Taylorism can be used to minimize time spent in those activities through the “routinization” of tasks (Leidner 1993), thereby freeing up portions of previously unavailable time, which could subsequently be added to the workday. Regarding consumptive labor, business organizations can also apply the principles of Taylorism to identify tasks within the production process that could potentially be completed by unpaid consumers rather than employees.

The extent to which the implementation of Taylorism, when applied outside of the workplace, is making possible a longer workday is an empirical question and worthy of further research. However, we do know that, in any case, workers in the United States labor longer hours than most of their foreign counterparts. According to Sweet and Meiksins (2013:105-6), in 2011, U.S. workers labored an average of 54 more hours per year than Japanese workers and 214 hours more per year (nearly 5.5 weeks) than French workers. Moreover, long hours are not limited to salaried professionals working overtime, as many put in long hours across multiple minimum- or low-wage jobs in order to make ends meet. We also know that the current generation of workers in the United States, especially women, works longer hours than did previous generations. For instance, between 1975 and 2009, among dual-earner married couples, wives doubled the number of hours spent working, from 13 to nearly 26 hours per week. And this was not due to a decline in husbands’ hours, which also increased, albeit slightly, during the same time period (Sweet and Meiksins 2013). In comparison to 1970, the average couple in 2009 put in more than 10 additional hours per week.

Reproductive Labor Time

Scholars of reproductive labor (e.g., Nakano Glenn 1992) have described how capitalism benefits from a portion of labor that is performed without a wage but which is necessary to reproduce the labor force on both a daily and generational basis. Historically, women have performed reproductive labor, the completion of housework, and childcare, more so than men. However, in many countries within the global north, such as the United States, women have also joined the employed workforce, thereby reducing the time, after leaving their jobs, to complete housework and childcare. This is what Arlie Hochschild (1989) famously termed the “second shift.” As women entered the labor force, many households attempted to close the gap between the time available following the end of the workday and time needed to complete housework and caretaking. This has been accomplished, in part, by hiring and paying individuals or businesses to prepare meals, complete work within the house, and care for children. Hochschild (2013) has noted the prevalence of this phenomenon, along with the problems it has caused, in her recent book entitled, The Outsourced Self.

Interestingly, sometimes it is possible for capital to simultaneously profit from a combination of productive and reproductive labor. For instance, Glazer (1993) described “work transfer” as a management strategy minimizing the cost of labor by requiring women to perform work in the delivery of services. For example, health-care organizations have long sought to cut costs by requiring patients’ family members, most often female family members, to administer health care following the discharge of patients. This caretaking enabled hospitals to reduce the length of hospital stays and the cost of labor by utilizing a patient’s family member as a caregiver, administering health care without being hired or paid as a hospital employee. Here the lines between productive labor time and reproductive labor time become blurred. Therefore, I have proposed a third distinctive type of labor time, which consists of the time spent performing consumptive labor.

Consumptive Labor Time

While consumptive labor can blur the distinction between productive and reproductive labor, as described by Glazer, it also blurs the distinction between production and consumption. After we spend the majority of our time participating in both productive and reproductive labor, we may attempt to maximize what little leisure time remains by reducing the time required in our consumption. To do so, we may opt to use self-checkout kiosks rather than waiting in line to pay employees for our purchasing transactions. We may bank online rather than visiting an actual bank building. As we engage in self-service, it is clear that, by reducing the cost of labor, we are not only serving ourselves but also management, owners, and investors of the corporations that sell the products and services we consume.

To understand the increasing importance of consumptive labor, we must also understand limitations to profit maximization that confront businesses within interactive service industries. Unlike jobs in manufacturing, which can be potentially exported to locations, where the cost of labor and other costs are the least expensive, interactive service jobs must be located in close proximity to customers. Moreover, where the shift system has enabled factory workers to labor continuously, customers dictate the hours, days of the week, and time of year during which a service is performed. For example, because most people prefer sleeping over shopping during the late evening and early morning hours, most retail stores are closed during that time. In the language of Thompson (1967), time discipline varies by industry. In this instance, time discipline norms pose a challenge to the profitability of services that does not apply to manufacturing.

Consumptive labor has been used to address these limitations, for example, enabling businesses to sell goods and services online, where consumers can complete tasks to locate and purchase items at any time of the day, week, or year, without visiting a physical location or receiving assistance from employees. With the occurrence of online shopping, we see a blurring of distinctions between productive and reproductive labor and between production and consumption. Additionally, consumptive labor can blur the lines between work and leisure, as many people not only shop to fulfill needs but also shop as a form of leisure in and of itself. Regardless of the blurring of distinctions, it is clear that consumptive labor benefits businesses by reducing the cost of their labor.

Social Reorganization of Time as a Social Problem

Summarily, I have argued that the growth of capitalism has accelerated on a global scale. This growth has been enabled by a social reorganization of time and a marked change in time discipline. The amount of time spent outside of employment has been shifting either back into employment or back into consumptive labor, which transforms consumers into quasi workers assisting in the production of goods and services that they themselves purchase. This reallocation has also resulted in a reduction of leisure time.

While the Great Speedup has enabled the global economy to expand and grow, we must address the social cost. We know that excessive time spent working in one’s job can lead to high levels of stress, burnout, and injury. We know that a lack of time to complete household tasks and childcare can not only create stress and burnout but may also strain our relationships with others. Although many of us attempt to make more time in our busy lives by engaging in self-service consumption, for example, we may find that the time saved cannot be enjoyed, because it is needed to extend our workdays or to compensate for time we no longer have to maintain our homes and care for our children.

In his book, The Condition of Post Modernity, Harvey (1990) introduced the concept of time–space compression, which enables corporations to profit by using digital technologies to overcome previous barriers of time and space. For example, computers, the Internet, and other new information technologies enable teams of workers to communicate with each other from workplaces located on opposite sides of the world in real time. However, one major problem with compression, of any type, is loss. For example, in the production of music, digital compression results in loss of the original signal quality of recorded music to the extent that some music lovers have returned to purchasing and playing records, and some musicians refuse to produce digital music, opting for older analog technologies instead. In education, many students and instructors are no longer required to meet in classrooms as college courses move online. However, online educators struggle to engage and retain students, as they would be engaged in a classroom, face-to-face with the instructor, and online students drop their courses at greater frequency than do students taking courses in traditional classrooms. Although time–space compression can enable a faster labor process, we must consider the likelihood that faster is not always better.

I do not want to conclude without at least mentioning the effects of the Great Speedup on the natural environment. The acceleration of processes that has accompanied the growth of capitalism is destroying our natural environment and threatening to create conditions on earth that are not suitable for human existence. One example that quite literally “hits” home is that during the past few years while living in Wichita, Kansas, I have experienced hundreds of earthquakes, most too small to be noticed, but a few strong enough to cause minor structural damage in Wichita more than a 100 miles away from the quake’s epicenter. Why have these earthquakes occurred? Economic growth requires an increasingly larger supply of energy, but the energy industry has confronted the limitations involved in its extraction by using conventional methods of drilling and mining. To overcome these limits, energy companies have invented and implemented new, more destructive methods of oil and gas extraction. The process of fracking uses massive amounts of water mixed with salt, sand, and other ingredients, which are pumped below the surface to create high levels of pressure that force oil and gas out of locations that could not be reached by conventional drilling. Waste water used in fracking is then disposed of by pumping it into deep underground wells near the fracking site, which also creates high amounts of pressure on surrounding rock. According to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), these waste water wells create human-induced seismicity, resulting in earthquakes caused by humans. The USGS (2016) recently announced that Oklahoma, Kansas, and five other nearby Midwestern states now face the same chances of experiencing damage from human-induced earthquakes as do Californians from natural occurring ones (USGS 2016). In this example, we see how the extraction of energy needed to continuously fuel the expanding global economy has been favored over the potential well-being of communities in Oklahoma and Kansas. Rather than risking the destruction of communities by earthquakes in our efforts to extract oil and gas, I suggest that we reduce our consumption of and demand for fossil fuels, while rapidly developing and increasing the supply of clean and renewable sources of energy. Here I would like to note that I am proud that our colleague and former AHS President, Tony Ladd, has been devoting his research to increasing our awareness of this issue. He has presented several papers at our annual meetings, including this one, and was well aware of the danger of fracking years before the ground began shaking in Kansas.

Although it might be surprising that earthquakes occur in Kansas, one would probably not be surprised to learn of a Kansas town destroyed by a tornado. Several of you have heard my presentations about Greensburg, Kansas, a community that took a new approach to disaster recovery following a large tornado that destroyed most of the town in 2007. In the aftermath, the people of Greensburg agreed to rebuild their town with the goal of making it environmentally sustainable. Perhaps most impressive is that Greensburg, as the Kiowa County seat, required all government structures be rebuilt to meet Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design standards. To their credit, this resulted in construction of some of the most innovative and energy efficient government buildings in the world.

Much of that recovery effort was made possible, directly or indirectly, because the town was featured on its own Discovery Channel (Planet Green) reality show entitled “Greensburg.” The show’s executive producer was the movie star celebrity Leonardo DiCaprio. Between the show’s segments, advertisements urged consumers to purchase new, more eco-friendly products of many sorts. Corporations seeking a greener image not only purchased advertising on the show but sponsored and provided funding for green construction projects in Greensburg. The media attention that focused on Greensburg resulted in the arrival of thousands of volunteer workers, often by the busload. It also brought dozens of corporations wanting to market and advertise their green products in Greensburg. The town’s long-range plan was to rebuild and recover its economy by attracting ecotourism and green businesses. In many respects, their efforts have been admirable. However, some Greensburg residents point out that the recovery effort was a very expensive endeavor, which, they argued, would not be affordable in the long run but was affordable in the short run, only because of national media attention and the influx of charity and corporate philanthropy that followed.

Although the future of Greensburg remains to be seen, the plight of the town does illustrate a contradiction in that, while environmental preservation can best be accomplished by reducing, reusing, and recycling, the model preferred by corporations that helped fund the reconstruction of Greensburg is largely the opposite: increased production and consumption of new, albeit more environmentally friendly, goods and services.

As we have seen, many facets of our lives are greatly impacted by the reorganization of time. In fact, we experience this firsthand within the AHS. Due to dwindling education budgets, wage stagnation, and shortage of tenure-eligible jobs in academia, among other factors, many of us must work longer and/or harder than previously to make available time for and to afford the expense of attending our annual meeting. Also, with all we have to accomplish in our lives, we may find it difficult to make available time and energy to volunteer for an office. To be clear, I do not wish to give the wrong impression, because I deeply appreciate the contributions of all AHS members and conference participants, and I am thrilled that you all made time to join together in Denver. We are a small organization and survive only because a significant proportion of our membership volunteers, in spite of their busy schedules. However, I think you will agree that more people would join and/or increase their involvement with AHS if they had fewer obligations within and outside of their jobs.

Slowing Down and Taking Back Our Time

How then do we go about regaining and controlling a larger portion of our time? Within the realm of productive labor, we must advocate and support organized labor in struggling to accomplish many of the things for which it has long struggled: reasonable hours, a livable wage, and humane working conditions for all, regardless of race, gender, sexual orientation, and other attributes within the various inequality dimensions.

According to Sweet and Meiksins (2013), two thirds of countries in the world have laws that regulate the maximum number of hours per week that employees can work. However, the United States does not have these laws. Establishing a law capping the number of hours we work could help alleviate unemployment. Rather than employing few workers laboring long hours, more workers could be employed, each working fewer hours. A reduction in overall work time, by virtue of decreasing the production and consumption of goods and services, could also reduce the speed at which we are destroying our natural environment. It could also free up time for rest and relaxation, thereby improving the health of the population and decreasing escalating health-care costs.

In fact, we can find many examples of laws and policies that could help reduce the hours we spend working within our jobs. These include universal health care, compensated family leave, paid vacations, and free childcare, to name a few. When funded collectively, these social benefits become less expensive and reduce the amount of personal income needed to afford them.

Freeing up time spent working could result in an improvement in reproductive labor and eliminate problems described by Hochschild (2013) as we “outsource ourselves.” For example, although hiring childcare around the clock frees up time, we also lose the experience of spending time with our children. Regarding our consumption, with fewer hours spent working and more time to consume, we could visit a bricks-and-mortar store and interact with a “real human being” rather than “interfacing” with a machine online or opting for self-checkout. We could also choose healthier and less environmentally damaging forms of transportation. For instance, we could ride a bicycle, use public transportation, or even walk to work when possible, rather than driving an automobile.

In fact, many people support these types of changes. For example, the “slow food” movement has advocated for the minimization of unhealthy fast food in favor of a return to the self-preparation of food and/or opting for eating establishments that prepare food in slower but healthier ways. Here I am reminded of last year’s conference theme in Portland, Oregon, and President Kathleen Fitzgerald’s 2015 Presidential address about “locavorism” (Fitzgerald 2016). We learned that, although purchasing locally grown food from farmers’ markets may require a greater expenditure of time than does purchasing food from a grocery store chain, buying locally is more sustainable for our communities, the environment, and our bodies.

Conclusion

When I look at the mountains, as I mentioned in the opening of this talk, I sometimes think of metaphors. However, what I most think of when seeing the mountains is that they have long been my favorite place to go when I have time to vacation with family and friends. The mountains provide open spaces where I can walk freely on the path of my choice, while pondering anything I wish to contemplate. I often do so knowing that I am without cellular reception and disconnected from all who would make additional demands of my time. The mountains are where I have enjoyed activities that are both fun and healthy, such as hiking, camping, and downhill and cross-country skiing. The mountains are where, as a college student, I met and dated my spouse of now more than 23 years.

As I describe spending time in the mountains, you may notice that I admire them not only for their natural beauty but also because, when I’m in them, I almost always have an ample amount of and discretion over my personal time. For me, going to the mountains is “rehumanizing,” the opposite of dehumanizing conditions we can experience at work and home while trying to squeeze an impossibly large number of tasks into an impossibly small amount of time. And, now you know the reason I chose Denver for our 2016 conference site. It has been a pleasant change of pace to come to the mountains these past few days, to see old friends, make new ones, and spend time together discussing how we might go about improving the world. I cannot think of anything I would rather be doing with my time, and I would like to thank you for giving me your time and attention tonight.