Random Thoughts Sechs: Eeeeehhhh...

[Dekker]

I don't want to make a separate thread on this and I don't think the Jobs thread is the right place either so I'll stick it here -

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/29/fas...-losing-100percent-of-workers-every-year.html

The article is about the toll that massive turnover is having on the restaurant industry. The article laments how restaurant chains are struggling to keep workers and/or automate themselves out of the problem of having employees. What's frustrating to me about the article is how many times it points out that 'restaurants can't afford higher wages'. What a load bullcrap. For independent mom-and-pop shops, this may be true to an extent but it's certainly not true for the large chains that pull in billions in profits. While I don't think these jobs were ever truly desirable, minimum wage used to be much higher when adjusted for inflation, health care and rent was cheaper and they didn't uniformly rely on scheduling gimmicks to keep everyone under full-time employment. These jobs used to support families.

Obviously automation is going to gut employment in a lot of these companies but we as a society have completely dropped the ball on supporting our workforce. Without countervailing forces (unions!) and with super-lax labor protections, these companies have pulled more and more out of our economy by underpaying and overworking their employees while shoving all the profits to the top. Wal Mart keeps their announcement boards stocked up with information on how their employees can apply for food stamps and medicaid because they pay so little their employees can't support themselves. That's one of the biggest, most profitable companies on the planet and our government is actively subsidizing their wage suppression.

There's also been a major shift in the fast food industry as younger workers avoid them to focus on their studies. The median age for restaurants is now 29 - putting paid to the notion that these jobs are throwaway temporary jobs for kids. These jobs are now the only option for gainful employment in many communities for people without higher education and we have collectively decided these working families aren't worth a living wage.

Even in places where you can find a non-restaurant job, pay has been suppressed to the point where if you don't know one of the business owners, you aren't going to be able to support yourself. At the small town I lived in in Illinois, I managed to get a job at the only factory in town. It was the kind of job that used to support families but when I joined, they had recently fired everyone involved in a unionizing attempt and the pay was $7.25 an hour - even for the overnight workers. I actually worked two jobs back then, in the mornings I was a manager at a Quiznos and at night I'd work at the factory. One of the supervisors promised me a raise if I quite the restaurant job to focus on the factory job. When I did so, he gave me a whopping $0.10 an hour raise. Obviously, I was no longer able to support myself and quickly quit to pursue an education. And of course my anecdote is just that, a story, not evidence. But I think it's instructive of how off the rails our job market has become as we allow the monied class to extract everything of value out of our economy to park it in the accounts of billionaires who do not re-invest in proportion to how much they've accumulated.

What do you is the best solution to prevent the monied class from doing this?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

What do you is the best solution to prevent the monied class from doing this?

I always lean towards killing them and eating them, but that's maybe just me.

 

[Traitorfish]

What do you is the best solution to prevent the monied class from doing this?

It's far from clear that there is a solution which involves the monied class persisting as a class.

 

[Takhisis]

I always lean towards killing them and eating them, but that's maybe just me.

Do we pluck them and boil them first?

It's far from clear that there is a solution which involves the monied class persisting as a class.

You propose to end inequality, which would mean the end of the aspirational value of wealth. A lot of people vote for corrupt wealthy rulers because they wish they could be there.

 

[Synobun]

They say you become more conservative as you earn more money, but for me it just highlights more and more how being a billionaire may just inherently be morally and ethically bankrupt. It's impossible to amass that much wealth and have it be okay.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

What do you is the best solution to prevent the monied class from doing this?

Repealing anti-union laws, enacting stronger worker protections, hiking the minimum wage a great deal and offering better/cheaper access to training programs. Universal healthcare would also alleviate these problems, as would reforming the entire tertiary education system. Primary/secondary education need reforms but a lot of that is already underway and the more urgent need for immediate reform is in the tertiary system.

 

[Mouthwash]

Ancient Greeks forced wealthy citizens to fund public works. "We're building an aqueduct, and you are our proud new sponsor!"

 

[Takhisis]

They say you become more conservative as you earn more money, but for me it just highlights more and more how being a billionaire may just inherently be morally and ethically bankrupt. It's impossible to amass that much wealth and have it be okay.

Money is power. Power corrupts.

 

[Dekker]

Repealing anti-union laws, enacting stronger worker protections, hiking the minimum wage a great deal and offering better/cheaper access to training programs. Universal healthcare would also alleviate these problems, as would reforming the entire tertiary education system. Primary/secondary education need reforms but a lot of that is already underway and the more urgent need for immediate reform is in the tertiary system.

Is that it? Will that still not lead to massive disparity? Is capitalism as is the best we can do?

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I've been reading the history of Ireland and holy crap they got a raw deal. I mean I knew that already but now I know it, you know what I mean? The English would not leave them alone and inflicted tragedy after tragedy on the island.

 

[Commodore]

Money is power. Power corrupts.

See, I don't believe power does corrupt. I just think it seems that way because only the corrupt are attracted to power. So they play the part of the humble and good-natured person until they amass the wealth and power they desire, at which point their true nature comes out.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

On the radio there was an advertisement for the local news show and the preview said something about the family of a murder victim speaking out against the convicted person's sentence. It bothered me and I think I just figured out why. Because if a murder victim has nobody to speak out for them about a supposedly unfair sentence, does that mean their life is worth less than someone with a family willing to go to the local news about it?

Maybe I'm overthinking things and being silly.

 

[Lexicus]

See, I don't believe power does corrupt. I just think it seems that way because only the corrupt are attracted to power. So they play the part of the humble and good-natured person until they amass the wealth and power they desire, at which point their true nature comes out.

Potayto potahto

 

[Commodore]

Potayto potahto

Not really. By saying "power corrupts" you are claiming that the source of the corruption is power itself. I don't believe the source of corruption is power, but rather people. There is a big difference because depending on where you believe corruption stems from will inform your beliefs about how best to deal with it. By believing the former, you might be more inclined to favor solutions that place limits on the amount of power one can acquire. Believing the latter might make you more inclined to favor solutions that limit what types of people can acquire power.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

I remember reading about this guy, who was granted a temporary dictatorship:

They then marched to the relief of the consul's relieving army. At the Battle of Mount Algidus, they used their spikes to quickly besiege the besieging Aequi. Rather than slaughter them between the two Roman camps, Cincinnatus accepted their pleas for mercy and offered an amnesty provided that three principal offenders were executed and Gracchus Cloelius and their other leaders be delivered to him in chains. A "yoke" of three spears was then set up and the Aequi made to pass under it as an act of submission, bowing and admitting their defeat. Cincinnatus then disbanded his army and returned to his farm, abandoning his control a mere fifteen days after it had been granted to him.

 

[Lexicus]

Not really. By saying "power corrupts" you are claiming that the source of the corruption is power itself. I don't believe the source of corruption is power, but rather people. There is a big difference because depending on where you believe corruption stems from will inform your beliefs about how best to deal with it. By believing the former, you might be more inclined to favor solutions that place limits on the amount of power one can acquire. Believing the latter might make you more inclined to favor solutions that limit what types of people can acquire power.

Fair enough.

 

[Takhisis]

I've been reading the history of Ireland and holy crap they got a raw deal. I mean I knew that already but now I know it, you know what I mean? The English would not leave them alone and inflicted tragedy after tragedy on the island.

The only time the English managed to get one of their priests to become Pope he managed to stay in power long enough to give the King of England a mandate to conquer Ireland in order to legalise the situation.

See, I don't believe power does corrupt. I just think it seems that way because only the corrupt are attracted to power. So they play the part of the humble and good-natured person until they amass the wealth and power they desire, at which point their true nature comes out.

A bit of both. Some people are more susceptible to temptation than others and it's true that they tend to flock to power. Some are already corrupt and seek public office for expanding their power.

In a way, it may be like some people who don't know how susceptible they are to an addiction until they've actually tried it.

 

[Lemon Merchant]

I've been reading the history of Ireland and holy crap they got a raw deal. I mean I knew that already but now I know it, you know what I mean? The English would not leave them alone and inflicted tragedy after tragedy on the island.

Yes they did. Now you know why we don't like the English very much.

 

[cardgame]

I remember reading about this guy, who was granted a temporary dictatorship:

The temporary dictatorships of the Romans would later provide precedent for dismantling the entire Republic entirely, though. Power corrupts.

 

[Takhisis]

Ancient Greeks forced wealthy citizens to fund public works. "We're building an aqueduct, and you are our proud new sponsor!"

Actually it was public service (leitourgia), which in times of peace materialised as paying for works. In the Greek city-states every citizen had a duty to arm himself for war (thus the birth of the Hippeis -the Roman Equites-) and wealthy enough citizens were conferred trierarchies (i.e. the duty of providing for a triere); notice that the men who fought in the wars were free men and they began the transformation of the political structures from monarchy or oligarchy into democracy. Do not confuse democracy, the rule of the deme or citizenry, with laocracy, the rule of the people -this is why the old Communist ‘People's Republic of’ are called ‘Laokratikí Dimokratía…’
The Romans copied this model until, amongst other reforms, Gaius Marius decided to have a paid, professional soldiery, which made the soldiers loyal to whomever paid them.

Surely there's a lesson to be learned somewhere, but I don't want to make an overlong post for you to dismiss it with ‘you do your thing’.