SD on 1/4/2006 at 23:22
Quote Posted by TheGreatGodPan
The point was that most jobs increase the marginal revenue of a firm by much less than a million dollars so it would be irrational to hire people for that much.
Nobody ever suggested giving that much to low-paid workers so I have no idea who you're making this point to. There isn't enough money in the economy to pay everyone a million dollars for the jobs they do, but there
is enough to pay everyone a fair living wage.
Quote:
If the law also applied to older adults, would it be more acceptable?
What cesspit of useless thought are you dredging these questions up from? No, I don't advocate placing unfair restrictions on the employment rights of
any worker, whatever their age. If people want to work to the age of 90, and employers want to hire them, then they should get the same employment rights as anyone else.
Quote:
I hate socialism as much as anybody
I'm not surprised; I've seen computers that displayed a deeper connection to humanity. TGGP, a robotic lack of emotion is not a badge of honour, and blithely discussing the relative efficiency of slave labour is unlikely to do much to shatter any conceptions we may have of you.
Dude, you need to get fucking laid. Seriously.
Quote Posted by Convict
How does living below the "poverty line" make you not free?
I'm sure if you bother to expend a bit of time and energy utilising that fleshy organ between your ears, you might be able to come up with a few ways in which people's horizons are limited by an inability to afford basic amenities. Go on, give it a go, you might be surprised at who you can empathise with if you try hard enough.
Oh, and abbatoir workers are clearly skilled labourers - you think just any guy with a cleaver could fit a cow into those little polystyrene trays? I'm sure they had good reason to go on strike, even if you didn't see it.
TheGreatGodPan on 2/4/2006 at 01:53
Quote Posted by Myoldnamebroke
This depends on the labour market. If there are enough of them you can do what you like. They're competing to be employed by you.
The amount of labor doesn't change the fact that the employer has to offer something their employees will find acceptable, only what will be acceptable. If employers could truly offer whatever they liked, that would include zero dollars an hour or even negative ten. Wages, other prices, are determined by supply and demand. There is no clear "enough of them" point, a higher supply with constant demand results in a lower price.
Quote Posted by Strontium Dog
Nobody ever suggested giving that much to low-paid workers so I have no idea who you're making this point to. There isn't enough money in the economy to pay everyone a million dollars for the jobs they do, but there is enough to pay everyone a fair living wage.
To you there is a set amount of wealth and the only question is distribution. To me wealth is created through labor (of course I define labor differently than a lot of people), and government policies restricting it inhibit the abilities of people to create wealth. If people were hired and payed on the basis that enough money existed in the economy for it, that would sound to me like there was one organization with all the money and doing all the hiring. As things are your local barbershop doesn't care if Bill Gates has enough money to pay for another employee, its whether they themselves do.
Quote Posted by Strontium Dog
What cesspit of useless thought are you dredging these questions up from? No, I don't advocate placing unfair restrictions on the employment rights of any worker, whatever their age. If people want to work to the age of 90, and employers want to hire them, then they should get the same employment rights as anyone else.
I asked it because you said were against it because it made the young second-class citizens. If everyone operated under the same rules there would be no "first-class" above them (everyone would have "the same employment rights as anyone else"), so they would then be first class. To me it sounds like the law increases rights. People will now allowed to sign contracts they would not have been allowed to earlier. So in a certain sense, the law does strike me as unfair, but still a good idea. I feel it is unfair in that it targets a single age-group when it should apply to everyone.
Quote Posted by Strontium Dog
I'm not surprised; I've seen computers that displayed a deeper connection to humanity.
Because I hate socialism, that means I have little connection to humanity? Or the reason I hate socialism is a shallow or non-existent connection to humanity? I just view many government activities as harmful to people. I don't view people I dissagree with as lacking sympathy for others, I believe them to be wrong (as they of course believe me to be).
Gingerbread Man on 2/4/2006 at 02:41
hay guys lets play spot the 20 year-old idealist college student
Convict on 2/4/2006 at 02:48
Quote Posted by Strontium Dog
I'm sure if you bother to expend a bit of time and energy utilising that fleshy organ between your ears, you might be able to come up with a few ways in which people's horizons are limited by an inability to afford basic amenities. Go on, give it a go, you might be surprised at who you can empathise with if you try hard enough.
Your rudeness aside, how does not being able to afford basic amenities make you less free? I'm not saying that I necessarily agree with it, but how is that being less free?
Gingerbread Man on 2/4/2006 at 02:52
It's "less free" in that it forces you to struggle for the basics (however you define them) which, in turn, disables you from doing things which ameliorate your situation / life or increase you happiness. Survival vs Living, or something. I don't know, I haven't read this thread since it turned into wank, plus I have polished off eight beers and a half bottle of Balvenie tonight.
But my interpretation still stands.
If you struggle to meet the necessities of life, it is arguable that you are -- essentially -- enslaved to the rat race and unable to pursue anything beyond the basics. Which, in most people's estimation, makes you UnFree.
If you have to work 14 hours a day at a job so that you have enough money to live in a house and own a car that gets you to your job, you are, arguably, enslaved.
oh god how did this get here I am not good with articulation
PigLick on 2/4/2006 at 04:32
you need to slow things down first, then gradually speed up!
TheGreatGodPan on 2/4/2006 at 21:50
Quote Posted by Gingerbread Man
hay guys lets play spot the 20 year-old idealist college student
19, actually. But I've been this way for a good while now.
It is definitely true that having more money makes it possible to do things you can't do otherwise. But if our standard of freedom is whether or not it is possible to do certain things, than all of us are rather unfree in the sense that we can't fly as well as an eagle or slam dunk as well as Michael Jordan, as well as do countless other things that are not possible under the laws of physics.
I suppose it's rather nit-picky, but the working for a house and car bit doesn't sound like enslavement. Many people rent rather own houses, and cars, while definitely a great thing to have, are not a necessity. By my rule of thumb, if people lived a long time before something existed, it isn't a necessity. If our hypothetical person gave up a car but still had a place to live that came with a place to park the car they do not have, they could (
http://sixteenvolts.blogspot.com/2006/04/monetas-et-venustas.html) rent out the space to others.
Wyclef on 3/4/2006 at 21:13
So here's (
http://crookedtimber.org/2004/07/12/the-new-consensus-on-minimum-wages) yet another reason why the world is more complex than freshman econ might lead you to believe.
Ironically, it seems like moderate socialists and social democrats (i.e. not Leninists and their ilk) are generally more attentive to mainstream economic scholarship than Internet libertarians.
ilweran on 3/4/2006 at 21:34
Quote Posted by TheGreatGodPan
Many people rent rather own houses, and cars, while definitely a great thing to have, are not a necessity. By my rule of thumb, if people lived a long time before something existed, it isn't a necessity.
Whether you rent or have a mortgage you are still paying for somewhere to live, and cars can be a necessity- not everywhere has great public transport, what if you need that car to get to work? I used to have to work the occaisional Sunday. If my boyfriend hadn't had a car & I'd had to rely on public transport I'd have caught the earliest bus at 12.05 to catch the 3.15 train, would have got into work at 3.50 and would have had to leave straight away to get 4.00 train and then a taxi home. And my job really didn't pay enough for me to get the train, let alone a taxi as well.
scumble on 3/4/2006 at 22:15
Not necessarily ironic, as libertarians aren't in the mainstream in the first place. The sorts of things that come out of mainstream economics are just more likely to satisfy someone of the social democrat persuasion. Mainstream economics and the political system are somewhat intertwined.
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Now that we’ve re-evaluated the evidence with all this in mind, here’s what most labor economists believe: The minimum wage kills very few jobs, and the jobs it kills were lousy jobs anyway. It is almost impossible to maintain the old argument that minimum wages are bad for minimum-wage workers. In fact, the minimum wage is very good for unskilled workers. It transfers income to them
The first thing that comes to mind here is that the lousy jobs don't actually disappear. Some people may have just had their jobs outlawed, but then illegal immigrants tend to turn up to fill the shortfall. Or it's possible that the same people might work illegally anyway, assuming they weren't doing to well with any benefits they may get.
I mean, surely the whole point is to help the marginal workers actually in the "lousy" jobs, and killing those jobs is actually relevant, as there's no guarantee these workers will get minimum wage jobs at the new level. It's a case of the few being sacrificed for the many unfortunately. At least it seems that way on the face of it.
Still, I'd agree with the author that far too much fuss is made over minimum wage, and there are far deeper systemic problems to be considered.
Quote:
I suppose it's rather nit-picky, but the working for a house and car bit doesn't sound like enslavement
Not literally, but it does tie someone down a lot. It's enough that you are stuck with expenses very close to your income level. If the social system makes certain necessities more expensive, then it is contributing to the immobility of those least able to pay.
