Jan van Leyden
Adventurer
That works today. In a decade, with the population having grown and the cost of living gone up, it's less true.
Not necessarily so. The population of Germany, e.g., is shrinking the average age rising. The costs for maintaining the pension system and healthcare might rise until the system's breaking point while it has to be paid for by less and less people.
The problem with that is that now those employees have the option to just walk away, and still have enough money to live. That means that employers will need to compensate them for the opportunity cost of using that time for more enjoyable exploits, which will apply an upward pressure on wages.
You don't think that less pressure to work results in lesser desire to get stuff and status symbols, do you? I'd rely on human greed (and neighbours' shiny new e-car) to make many people want to earn more money. Maybe earning money turns into something like a sport rather than pure necessity?
Well, idle speculation all this. If Finland really tries to change its society into something new, less based on wealth, I'll be a very curious observer.