The New Poor

[ivan]

In some ways, Japan is just America cranked up to 11.

it has kept them from invading their neighbors though for going on 65 years, so is it really so bad they're cracked out on hello kitty n' cellphones?

[tvashtarkatena]

 

You create an unemployable underclass by forcing employers to pay more in wages that exceed the value of the output that the least skilled and educated people in society can generate.

 

 

someone needs to de-gibberish this sentence

 

Forcing employers to pay someone that can only generate $5 per hour in output $5.50 per hour in wages = guaranteed unemployment.

 

Quite a few of the least skilled, least educated people in the US fall into this category.

 

so lets fire up the death camps and get rid of them! Or promote them to run a hedge fund, because your assertion is comically asinine - because the laziest workers I've ever encountered were in healthcare and the massively bloated US healthcare industry

 

Fastest growing job market in the U.S? medical coder...a job which is almost unique to our particular American brand of health care fuckedupedness.

 

So much for the 'efficiency' argument. But hey, how about those pancreatic cancer outcomes? LOL

[Hugh Conway]

Fastest growing job market in the U.S? medical coder...a job which is almost unique to our particular American brand of health care fuckedupedness.

 

So much for the 'efficiency' argument. But hey, how about those pancreatic cancer outcomes? LOL

 

Thats skill man. Lots more skill than burgerflipping.

[j_b]

The real costs of some things have gone up. Others, like food, communications, appliances, etc have been trending downwards in real terms for ages.

 

Necessary expenses like daycare, healthcare, transportation (2nd car for 2nd wage earner), housing, and taxes (sales tax and fees) have gone way up, and much faster than wages have gone up. Hence we are nowhere near the picture of debt resulting from reckless spending on unnecessary items painted by conservatives who revel in blaming the victims of their policies.

 

p.s. and I know you like to think that the cost of communications has gone down because it fits your "deregulation is good" mantra but I'd like to see your evidence.

 

What social indicators validate your claims that society is collapsing? Divorce rates, property crime rates? Violent crime rates? Teen pregnancy rates? Drug use? High school graduation rates? College graduation rates? Etc, etc, etc....

 

Society is not yet collapsing but there are the highest poverty levels in 50 years, 1/3 of Americans without adequate access to health care, half of kids will be on food stamps during their childhood, etc ..

Edited February 24, 2010 by j_b

[j_b]

It'd make it much easier to find T-shirts, radios, and various other assorted gizmos made in the USA. Elevating pay rates above the value of their output leads to the robots and outsourcing that the ever-declining labor movement has been lamenting for the past fifty years.

 

"slaves are making this product for less than you do, so you'd better consider becoming a slave yourself... or you'll be unemployed"

[prole]

"To save the working man

you got to put him

out to pasture"

--Dead Kennedys

[Hugh Conway]

It'd make it much easier to find T-shirts, radios, and various other assorted gizmos made in the USA. Elevating pay rates above the value of their output leads to the robots and outsourcing that the ever-declining labor movement has been lamenting for the past fifty years.

 

"slaves are making this product for less than you do, so you'd better consider becoming a slave yourself... or you'll be unemployed"

 

Sounds like China!

[j_b]

that, or neo-feudalist haven

[Hugh Conway]

that, or neo-feudalist haven

 

no difference, why do you think authoritarians US conservatives love that shithole

[Buckaroo]

and the crooked criminal bankers that got $150 Billion in bonuses last year, right after a $700 Billion taxpayer funded "bailout"(THEFT), how much output did they generate?

[Buckaroo]

 

What social indicators validate your claims that society is collapsing?

 

[Stonehead]

There may be hope yet. Greenspan speaks...

 

“I hope we can find a way of resurrecting the subprime market,” because it was working well until those mortgages were widely securitized, he said.

 

Greenspan Says Crisis ‘By Far’ Worst, Recovery Uneven--Bloomberg.com

[Hugh Conway]

and the crooked criminal bankers that got $150 Billion in bonuses last year, right after a $700 Billion taxpayer funded "bailout"(THEFT), how much output did they generate?

You didn't feel the cumshot on the face of America? I certainly did, and unlike the FauxNewsers, didn't believe it was Champagne

[JayB]

 

It'd make it much easier to find T-shirts, radios, and various other assorted gizmos made in the USA. Elevating pay rates above the value of their output leads to the robots and outsourcing that the ever-declining labor movement has been lamenting for the past fifty years.

i don't think it's just teens that would be making us radios, t-shirts and asssorted gizmos - how would paying a lot of workers less increase their overall quality of life?

 

Those who are already employable at wage rates over the current minimum wouldn't be affected by eliminating the minimum wage.

 

Ergo it wouldn't be a matter of paying a lot of workers less, but of taking people who are currently unemployable and giving them the opportunity to become workers and earn a wage, however modest. Giving employers a durable incentive - profits - to hire the least skilled and capable people in society and selectively topping up their wages with a negative income tax (already more or less in place with the EIC) is a much better policy than mandating wage rates above the value of their output and feeling sorry for them because they can't seem to find a job.

 

 

[JayB]

Forcing employers to pay someone that can only generate $5 per hour in output $5.50 per hour in wages = guaranteed unemployment.

 

Quite a few of the least skilled, least educated people in the US fall into this category.

 

Only because of unfair trade when Americans are supposed to compete with nations that have labor conditions reminiscent of the 19th century and environmental destruction. Spoken like a true regressive per usual.

 

If slavery in some developing nations was what we had to compete with, libertarians would have no problem with it: "if you don't want to be unemployable, you'd better produce for less than a slave does"

 

Even if the rest of the world disappeared altogether the combination of technology and competition within the US would have the same effect.

 

Speaking of which - why are you limiting your critique to workers overseas, when there are plenty of workers in the US who are willing to put forth effort greater than or equal to their unionized counterparts for much lower pay? Why aren't you proposing that Washington draft legislation protecting workers here from competition from Mississippi by making it illegal for Washingtonians to buy goods produced there? Why stop there? the same holds true for most of the state, so per your logic we'd all be better off if we were forced to buy only goods and services produced within King county, or better yet - Seattle proper.

 

Once you buy a set of cabinets fabricated in Spanaway as opposed to Queen Anne it's a race to the bottom, baby....

 

[JayB]

Forcing employers to pay someone that can only generate $5 per hour in output $5.50 per hour in wages = guaranteed unemployment.

 

Quite a few of the least skilled, least educated people in the US fall into this category.

 

Only because of unfair trade when Americans are supposed to compete with nations that have labor conditions reminiscent of the 19th century and environmental destruction. Spoken like a true regressive per usual.

 

If slavery in some developing nations was what we had to compete with, libertarians would have no problem with it: "if you don't want to be unemployable, you'd better produce for less than a slave does"

 

How do you explain what's happened to wages in Singapore, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, etc, etc, etc as a consequence of the race to the bottom? Shouldn't the standard of living have continuously declined in all of the above cases? How have they fared vs countries that adopted the import substitution models that you favor, such as Argentina, etc?

 

How does a country that's engaged in a pell-mell race to the bottom wind up outsourcing production to the US?

[ivan]

Those who are already employable at wage rates over the current minimum wouldn't be affected by eliminating the minimum wage.

 

Ergo it wouldn't be a matter of paying a lot of workers less, but of taking people who are currently unemployable and giving them the opportunity to become workers and earn a wage, however modest. Giving employers a durable incentive - profits - to hire the least skilled and capable people in society and selectively topping up their wages with a negative income tax (already more or less in place with the EIC) is a much better policy than mandating wage rates above the value of their output and feeling sorry for them because they can't seem to find a job.

 

maybe i worked more min wage jobs than you? i remember working w/ lots of middle-aged folks (sure, dumb as rocks, but wtf else were they going to do?) who were either min-wage like me or just a few pennies more b/c of a salary scale that at least started at 3.75 $ (virginia's poor man mandate at the time!)

[prole]

This thread should've been called The New Slavery.

[ivan]

as an aside jay, what do you make of the works of charles dickens, man of letters i know you to be? was scrooge simply misunderstood in his salad days?

 

'Are there no prisons?"

 

'Plenty of prisons,' said the gentleman, laying down the pen again.

'And the Union workhouses.' demanded Scrooge. 'Are they still in operation?'

 

 

'Both very busy, sir.'

 

'Oh. I was afraid, from what you said at first, that something had occurred to stop them in their useful course,' said Scrooge. 'I'm very glad to hear it.'

 

'Under the impression that they scarcely furnish Christian cheer of mind or body to the multitude,' returned the gentleman, 'a few of us are endeavouring to raise a fund to buy the Poor some meat and drink, and means of warmth. We choose this time, because it is a time, of all others, when Want is keenly felt, and Abundance rejoices. What shall I put you down for?'

 

'Nothing!' Scrooge replied.

 

'You wish to be anonymous?'

 

'I wish to be left alone,' said Scrooge. 'Since you ask me what I wish, gentlemen, that is my answer. I don't make merry myself at Christmas and I can't afford to make idle people merry. I help to support the establishments I have mentioned-they cost enough; and those who are badly off must go there.'

 

'Many can't go there; and many would rather die.'

 

'If they would rather die,' said Scrooge, 'they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population."

 

 

Edited February 27, 2010 by ivan

[prole]

Dickens is very appropriate here. Though Jay has expressed the need for a minimal social safety net, historically and theoretically, any social provision would have to exist at a level so low as to ensure that no one would actually prefer the poor house over the "dark Satanic mills". And without a minimum wage or minimal workplace safety standards (man, those are expensive), well... Not sure who you're channeling here Jay (Sorman?), but the surest way to the end of the social order you're bent on protecting is the path you're on. Good luck!

Edited February 27, 2010 by prole

[Stonehead]

Dickens is very appropriate here. Though Jay has expressed the need for a minimal social safety net, historically and theoretically, any social provision would have to exist at a level so low as to ensure that no one would actually prefer the poor house over the "dark Satanic mills". And without a minimum wage or minimal workplace safety standards (man, those are expensive), well... Not sure who you're channeling here Jay (Sorman?), but the surest way to the end of the social order you're bent on protecting is the path you're on. Good luck!

 

Politics is widely considered to be the art of manipulating people to a particular goal. My understanding is that the historical process is a juggernaut. Despite our democratic illusions, the majority of us are powerless to influence the means. With this understanding it is fundamental to envision where we are going.

 

William Blake calls for a new Jerusalem arising among the ‘dark satanic mills' (and by Jerusalem I take that to be symbolic of a new center, that perennial metaphor where meaning derives). But, even though Blake’s imagery is evocative, I’d bring it forward to a more current understanding of society formulated in the thought of Lewis Mumford.

 

Technology was the central thought of Mumford’s writing and especially where technology intersects the human dimension. So, the concept of alienation (Marcuse) is brought to the forefront and the primary question is whether all politics can be condensed to a politics of meaning, because it doesn’t truly matter what system exists, if we live in a realm where human value and dignity are reduced to being a cog in the machine.

 

This is where the liberal (pardon me, the progressive) appears disingenuous when he speaks of helping his brothers yet laughs derisively at the ‘folks of Wal-Mart’. Paradise on earth is a political existential vision which in reality is reflective of a situation where earth appears more as a prison or more appropriately could be referred to as hell on earth excepting, of course, those at the pinnacle of the social pyramid. All that altruistic crap is just that—crap. When envisioned in its entirety, the Democratic Party platform follows the prime objective which is the pursuit of power. One could just as well speak the same of the Republicans.

 

And here is what we have: A world where meaning is debased to temporal visceral pleasures, the pursuit of power for its own sake. Ken Wilber spoke of this surrogate gratification where sensual desire is a replacement for real fulfillment by which is meant a meaningful existence that is rooted, not solely in the body but transcends it.

 

Maybe it’s crazy to imagine a third way but if it were possible as reality, one should be able to conceive it mentally then articulate it.

 

All men dream: but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dream with open eyes, to make it possible.

T. E. Lawrence, "The Seven Pillars of Wisdom"

 

[video:youtube]v=SZxgtUANXpU

 

[j_b]

Even if the rest of the world disappeared altogether the combination of technology and competition within the US would have the same effect.

 

no, it wouldn't.

 

Speaking of which - why are you limiting your critique to workers overseas, when there are plenty of workers in the US who are willing to put forth effort greater than or equal to their unionized counterparts for much lower pay? Why aren't you proposing that Washington draft legislation protecting workers here from competition from Mississippi by making it illegal for Washingtonians to buy goods produced there? Why stop there? the same holds true for most of the state, so per your logic we'd all be better off if we were forced to buy only goods and services produced within King county, or better yet - Seattle proper.

 

Once you buy a set of cabinets fabricated in Spanaway as opposed to Queen Anne it's a race to the bottom, baby....

 

I am not limiting my criticism to foreign unfair trade. I am also against poor remuneration of employees in the US. I believe that minimum wages, working time, time off, etc .. should be regulated, the same way that I am for cracking down on US employers who use illegal labor. We certainly would be much better off if we traded a lot more locally.

[j_b]

How do you explain what's happened to wages in Singapore, Taiwan, Japan, Korea, etc, etc, etc as a consequence of the race to the bottom? Shouldn't the standard of living have continuously declined in all of the above cases? How have they fared vs countries that adopted the import substitution models that you favor, such as Argentina, etc?

 

Korea's spectacular economic success is also due to protectionism, so was Japan's, Taiwan's, etc .., like 99% of economic expansions throughout time (including our own). Argentina's economy cratered thanks to the neoliberal economics that you advocate. If you want to see what happens in the race to the bottom check out the textile industry, where manufacturers are now finding even cheaper labor in Africa and other destitute places.

 

 

How does a country that's engaged in a pell-mell race to the bottom wind up outsourcing production to the US?

 

what are you talking about?

[Buckaroo]

JayB hates it when the workers ask for a living wage.

 

He prefers the bankers who stole billions with their 50 to 1 derivatives then got a $700 Billion taxpayer funded "bailout" for the problem they intentionally caused, then took $150 Billion in bonuses last year.

 

$150 Billion tax dollars for crooks, that should be in jail if there was any justice, that's equal to all the red ink in all the states.

 

that's what this is about, disparity. Repugs always support disparity.

[JayB]

Those who are already employable at wage rates over the current minimum wouldn't be affected by eliminating the minimum wage.

 

Ergo it wouldn't be a matter of paying a lot of workers less, but of taking people who are currently unemployable and giving them the opportunity to become workers and earn a wage, however modest. Giving employers a durable incentive - profits - to hire the least skilled and capable people in society and selectively topping up their wages with a negative income tax (already more or less in place with the EIC) is a much better policy than mandating wage rates above the value of their output and feeling sorry for them because they can't seem to find a job.

 

maybe i worked more min wage jobs than you? i remember working w/ lots of middle-aged folks (sure, dumb as rocks, but wtf else were they going to do?) who were either min-wage like me or just a few pennies more b/c of a salary scale that at least started at 3.75 $ (virginia's poor man mandate at the time!)

 

Possible - we could compare notes - but I'm not sure what that'd have to do with what's best for folks who are money losers for employers even at the Federal minimum wage.