In practical and pragmatic terms, isn't there a gray area anyway about voluntary vs. involuntary?

Being a lawyer or doctor due to family pressure...voluntary, involuntary? Drafted into military service, or going into it due to family tradition? A calling to the nunnery or priesthood? Inheriting and running the family business? . . . and on and on.

Folks figure out their own rationalizations of work/life balance, i.e. freedom vs non-freedom.

In practical and pragmatic terms, isn't there a gray area anyway about voluntary vs. involuntary?

Being a lawyer or doctor due to family pressure...voluntary, involuntary? Drafted into military service, or going into it due to family tradition? A calling to the nunnery or priesthood? Inheriting and running the family business? . . . and on and on.

Folks figure out their own rationalizations of work/life balance, i.e. freedom vs non-freedom.

My wife took the meta view of everyone being beholden to an economic system in one way or another and accepting the proposition would increase the amount of prosperity in the world and in your immediate influence. She leans yes.

Wife and I were watching Handmaid's Tale last night and for some reason this hypothetical popped into my mind.

You are presented with a choice at age 18. The choice is, you are gifted unimaginable wealth and can live your life any way you please, and you and your friends and family will never need to worry about money again. But this is conditional. You have to accept as a personal assistant someone pulled from poverty at age 18 who will be required to work for you until they reach retirement age. You can pay them any salary you'd like, provide any benefits you'd like to them and their family, provide the best working conditions imaginable, but they are obligated to you for 40h per week, every year from age 18 through 65 and they cannot leave the job. The candidate is selected randomly from an impoverished 3rd world region and in the hypothetical they will be capable and pleasant to work with. They will not have a say in whether they are assigned to you and once they are they are obligated to you for the next 47 years of life, and their day to day work life will be entirely determined by you.

Does the capacity to give someone who would otherwise likely die in poverty a lifestyle they could hardly imagine outweigh the moral offense of depriving them of their freedom of self determination in that one aspect (choice of employment, location, etc), and does the fact that you would personally benefit from doing so affect that answer?

My wife took the meta view of everyone being beholden to an economic system in one way or another and accepting the proposition would increase the amount of prosperity in the world and in your immediate influence. She leans yes. I remain on the fence.

Do you accept the proposition?

When she stopped a paying job to stay home, she in effect is my employee

It sounds like your wife is assuming that, if everyone was in this position, they'd all or mostly do good things for their assigned worker.

Do you accept the proposition?

It is the latter. I thought that was clear in the OP. They would not be a consenting party (though they may thank you for it later) and they would be obligated until retirement.

It is analogous in ways to a military draft which isn't uncommon throughout the world. You don't have a say in that, either, but in a military draft it may cost your life and with little compensation or benefit to your family.

I'm not sure which I would resent more, being drafted into a war or into wealth but with no true autonomy.

You are thinking along the same lines my wife teased out last night. We are, the vast majority of us, beholden to certain conditions that are or become for all practical purposes, involuntary, and they center around economic realities.

Ike is correct in that this was among the rationalizations for the institution of slavery, giving savages the opportunity for a (slightly) better life, as they saw it. But that was through the lens of the slaveholder and society that tolerated it. It robbed the slaves of agency, which is a fundamental human right. So the question ultimately is, under what conditions, if any, is it acceptable to deprive someone of that right.

I asked also if the fact that you benefit financially from accepting the proposition changes the moral calculation. If you could choose this destiny for someone else, where they would be assigned to this job without their consent but you could determine the terms of their compensation and benefits, with no limitations whatsoever, but you do not personally gain a penny from the experience, would you do it?

I still would. It's not about personal / monetary gain. Breaking even would be fine too.

IMO, the difference between your hypothetical and slavery, is that during slavery there was the view that slaves were "lesser" or "second class" etc.,. So it was acceptable to persist the inequity and mistreatment for generations. Whenever that view is held, you get oppression and bad juju. Apartheid, 3rd world oppression of the lower castes etc.

A see a big part of your hypothetical proposal is that the impoverished individual is not perpetually impoverished. In fact, the onus and incentive and right thing to do is to get them out of a dire situation. (more on the free will part later)*

This is more akin to real life situations where a impoverished family is given opportunities for self-improvement (e.g. nursing school tuition from a benefactor). Person busts their ass to succeed, and then has a noble obligation to return the favor to other family members. Not uncommon in the Philippines. And a version in India, where there's some reality show on this that my wife streams.

* The free-will angle is a mythical illusion and we can tell ourselves we have it, or not. It's a spectrum and you have to be ok where you are on it. My college kiddo complains about academic load and stress, and she's not free. I tell her to suck it up for now, she's living the great life. Or one can choose to take a job in DC vs. Boston. You're free to choose, but you still have to do the work. It's just degrees of free will.

. . .
Sure, it's a package deal and part of that package is that I will be expected to do some work. I still got to choose whether to take the package. Free will does not require that you live a life without consequences.

If you didn't have the choice of Boston or DC (i.e. offer was only from one place), that would be like sphere's hypothetical, no? And the hypothetical is even better b/c it come with job security of lifetime employment. And 9-5 would be even better working hours than the mega hours asked of you I imagine.

Sure you could freely choose to not work at all and deal w/consequences. Much like the hypothetical impovershed pre-employee could choose not to work at all somehow I suppose.

There may be a significant moral difference between one person accepting this scenario, and the scenario being the economic model for all people.

It sounds like your wife is assuming that, if everyone was in this position, they'd all or mostly do good things for their assigned worker. I don't think that is borne out by historical example. If we've seen anything, it's that people will take advantage of each other, treat their "slaves" as lesser than, scramble for as much personal gain as they can, etc.

So while you or your wife might pay the worker well and treat them well, for sure there would be a lot of people who didn't.

This could derail things. But by some of the descriptions in this thread, I can't help but see a comparison in some ways to adoptions. Especially from 3rd world countries. Child has no say, some parents good, some bad, and basically obligated until 18 when they can walk away... Maybe it's better than where they are, but they lose freedom of choice (not that an infant can really make the choice).

Immediately I thought of all the kids Brad and Angelina adopted. Wonder if any are not happy in the situation. What about after the divorce...