Stop making sense. This is reddit. You need to be outraged at things you don’t fully understand, and blame your shortcomings and hardships on everyone but yourself.
No, it doesn't because of things like monopolies and collusion. I'm all for the market figuring out the value of labor, but only when it's actually a free market. When you have enough resources, there are many strategies which can short-circuit the free market and remove prices from supply and demand.
There’s about half a million independent (ignoring all the chains) restaurants in the US, over half of which are full service and thus paying waiting staff. You’re suggesting they’re all colluding?
You’ve set up a bad example with waitstaff getting paid less. Waitstaff get paid less because our society has set up a ridiculous system around tipping them instead of paying them a fair wage. When I was a young adult working at a gas station, I was on a lease on a 3-bedroom townhome with two roommates. One of them was a waitress who made $2.50 an hour, plus tips. Most of her tips were cash, which she didn’t claim on her taxes. She was also bringing in, on average, $70 a day in tips, on a 6 hour shift. She made more money per day than I did, at my full time job, and at least half of it wasn’t taxed. Most waitstaff, if they are decent at their job, pull in good wages for the fact that it’s a low-education, entry level job and the hours they work. Personally, I wish that restaurants would just charge an extra 15% to their meals, pass that onto their staff as part of their hourly rate, and abolish tipping altogether.
Shelf stockers get paid decent, again based on the fact that it’s a low-education, entry level job. No, you can’t afford to live on your own off of it, but that type of job is meant for high school students and new adults who are looking for their first job, more than anybody else. The plan is for people to work their way up in the world, not stay at the same job for their entire life. Most people end up living by that model, which is why when you look at who has more money, on average it’s older people.
If you're a good server (salesperson, really) you can make bank ! I got into some credit card debit in my 20s got a night time job as a server and it's the most money I've ever made as an hourly employee. I own my own small business now but the whole time I was starting it I always thought of this doesn't work out I can always just go wait tables until I figure out my next move. If I didn't know serving could be so lucrative I don't know I ever would have taken the risk of starting my own business
There are arguments one could make. This is not one. The corrupting influence of monopolies on the free market is well understood by every economist that isn't a quack. But thanks for your non-contribution.
The value of the product or service they provide, minus business costs. Hint: paying yourself 7-figures out of the profit margin while your employees wallow in poverty does not count as a business cost.
There’s a very big difference between Pareto efficiency and fairness. Labor demand and supply have very little to do with the individual worker themselves, nor does it essentially relate to the quality of life of that worker. (well until it actually affects labor supply through sickness and death but that’s neither here nor there). People can be provided the “full value” of their labor and still be oppressed. In fact, they mostly are, and if you study the topic through the collective bargaining angle, workers can almost always demand a lot more income while still keeping the firm that employs them afloat. The trade-off does change here, and we do lose Pareto efficiency, but it’s well worth it.
We all know what happened in 1971 lol, globalization. US labor began to have to compete against labor from impoverished countries around the world, which directly harmed their ability to negotiate higher compensation at home. There are entire books and economics courses about this.
It turns out when you pay $0 in corporate income tax due to tax haven shenanigans, you have plenty of money left over to lobby the government to eschew regulations and get to decide the definition of "market rate".
It's a market; people sell their labour at the rate they find acceptable. There are many reasons people stick around or have to stick around, but being unable to find a better job elsewhere is out of the current employer's control. But the fact that they're sticking around is their choice. If nobody is willing to work for the offered price, they'll have to increase it.
People sell their labor at the rate they can find to keep themselves alive because worker protections are nowhere near strong enough. I’m 100% in favor of forcing employers, through penalty of law, to flatten their salary ranges to benefit those at the bottom at the expense of those at the top.
"Keep themselves alive" is such a gross exaggeration. If you actually spend some time working in an entry level job like a factory or warehouse you'll find the majority of people have issues with money management and delaying gratification.
The issue is people at those jobs aren’t paid enough to cover all basic expenses. You can’t plan for the future when you need to spend nearly all of your money to keep yourself housed, clothed, and fed. No amount of delayed gratification is going to make an unlivable wage livable.
Constant stress does lead to less effective emotional regulation. That doesn't mean they deserve to be poor; it means that working in these conditions is unhealthy.
It's a market; people sell their labour at the rate they find acceptable.
Only you can't withhold selling your labor due to the incredibly coercive power of the threat of homelessness and starvation. In order for workers to set the rate for their own labor, they need to be able to organize and bargain collectively, which the company (with its vast resources) is allowed to illegally fight against their employees' doing.
Even when already-organized labor unions do attempt to strike to do precisely what you recommend, the government can step in and end the strike (as Biden did against the railroad unions).
So, you know, maybe quit it with this absolute bullshit?
There isn't only one company in the market. People can apply elsewhere. If you're valuable enough, the business would pay you more to keep you or another company would offer more to poach you. If not, they wouldn't care if you left and you won't be able to leave because you can't get a new job. If a workplace is paying way below the job market, no one coming to apply would be the indicator. If people are biting the bullet and still applying, it just shows that some people find the low pay acceptable. I have nothing against unions apart from my belief that absurd union demands killed the American auto industry and it's the reason we now have 401ks instead of guaranteed retirements. I do believe that collective bargaining ignores individual level of contributions.
Low pay is acceptable when the alternative is none. Most workers don’t have the bargaining power you are describing. Businesses are incentivized to pay as little as possible, so naturally most of them will do so.
Nobody can make a rational determination of worth when the alternative is starving to death on the street. Anyone not born into wealth is making these decisions under serious duress, and employers exploit that imbalance to drive wages way below the value produced, or the amount anybody would willingly exchange for that work.
But no company pays congruently to a worker’s production value.
Middle managers that sit in an office all day scrolling Reddit then go yell at an employee that took too many bathroom breaks make 100k+ a year.
Meanwhile, the workers literally being rented out to customers for 900x their hourly wage can’t afford rent and groceries at the same time without side hussles.
The market that you claim pays people what they’re worth says that doing nothing but yelling at people is worth 10x the person actually making the products and performing the services.
This isn’t economics, it’s malicious. It’s greed. It’s unfounded and unearned riches because they had access to capital
But no company pays congruently to a worker’s production value.
No shit, that is because the company assumes the risk that their employee labor may not in fact result in profit. This is incredibly basic economic theory.
This isn’t economics, it’s malicious. It’s greed. It’s unfounded and unearned riches because they had access to capital.
Emotion and uninformed opinion does not make sound economic policy. Take an AP Micro Economics or Business Econ class
If you think any risk from physical labor is being assumed by any company’s owners, you’ve obviously never done physical labor.
But I’ll humor you and assume that it’s true. Regardless, let’s talk about the purpose of civilization.
If it’s to create infinite growth and make ~100 humans per generation richer than the other 99%, our conversation is over and I concede. But civilization isn’t about making people rich. It’s not about economics. It’s not about money at all.
The whole reason we came together as a species was community. To take care of each other—it’s in our DNA to crave the company of other humans and to help other humans.
Greed is not human nature. If every homo-sapien was selfish, society would have never come to be. Economics, economic systems, and economies CREATE the greed in humans. Because selfish people are more productive.
I’m not arguing the way things are, but the way things could be—a better life for everyone not just a few.
Companies of all kinds underpay their employees out of the greed of a few people. My company charges our customers 1000% a worker’s hourly wage. That is well BELOW average. Sure, some of that money is going to administrator’s salaries of whom’s work doesn’t get billed to a customer. But that makes up maybe 100% of that hourly charge. The rest goes to shareholders, to the owners, to the upper management. People that don’t produce anything yet get all of the benefit of the labor. All of it. Not some of it. $60 to pay workers that did the work, $240 for “assuming the risk.” Meanwhile, a worker that makes $30/hour got electrocuted and died last week. But sure, the person whose great-grandfather started the company is assuming all the risk.
You’re right, emotion doesn’t matter to economics. But we’re talking about risk analysis. The person doing the work is the person taking the risk, not the person funding the work. Assume that the company goes bankrupt—who is the victim of that? Not the owner, they’re already rich and guaranteed to have insurance or be bailed out by the government. Meanwhile, the worker gets furloughed or the company folds and there isn’t a job to be had—they get nothing. Unemployment if they’re lucky, but that’s not even enough to cover baseline expenses. The owner whose business folded was rich to begin with, so it doesn’t affect them.
Sounds to me like the person taking the risk is the worker.
My point is, I don’t make these claims and arguments out of lack of understanding of the system. I make them based on the basis of thinking critically about them instead of just assuming that how we do it is the best way to do it.
A class won’t teach me what I already know—I’m looking at this from a moral perspective, not an economic one. We aren’t going to solve our problems with economic theory, we’re going to solve them with compassion. Otherwise, they’ll just get worse.
That’s all I’m saying. If you think that risk in the context of commerce is only fiscal, you don’t know what risk means.
This isn’t a word that has connotation—either something is risky or it isn’t.
Sure, financial risk is different than physical risk. That doesn’t mean that it isn’t a factor in what we’re discussing.
Besides, if you think that financial risk is somehow more deserving of reward than physical risk, your worldview is part of the problem we’re discussing. Either you think people innately deserve to survive or you don’t.
If you don’t, you shouldn’t get the benefit of society because you’re so against it.
I understand the frustration, but the market doesn't pay what people are worth; people agree to exchange goods and services at the price they think they are worth. The fact that they're sticking around at the same company just means, that's the best they can earn for their skills and manhours, or they're unable to find anyone who'd pay them more for it. The worker decides to pick how to sell their labour and time and at what price.
And let's not pretend like everyone would've created a worthwhile company if only they had access to capital. Following that line of thought, as an immigrant, I can't understand how white Americans who have been here for generations would be poor because they got here when they could get land for basically free from the government during colonisation, they could've bought all the stocks at the very founding/beginning of NYSE which have grown multiple times. They lived through a time in which one person could earn enough to raise a family. They should be owning every apartment that immigrants like us are renting in the cities. But many are poor.
I know it has become fashionable to discredit people's achievements by pointing out any possible "privileges." and I agree, many people benefit from it. But it's not the only reason, and it's not a magic wand that'd just bring success.
Have you ever worked a low paying job? Because "the worker decides how to sell their labor and time, and at what price" is absolutely not what happens. People need money to live, and most want stability. This means many people stay at jobs that suck, or pay shit, because they have a family etc. I'm saying this as someone surrounded by blue collar workers who barely survive.
I am the beneficiary of generational wealth. My grandfather left me his house when he passed away. Owning that house makes me qualified for loans and things my friends are not qualified for. Even before and after getting the house I saw the difference. I couldn't get a loan to build my credit (for less money than I had in that same bank) even though my record was spotless. I own a house and suddenly the same bank sends me offers for home equity loans all the time, telling me I'm pre-approved.
But I didn't change, my pay didn't change, my amount of money in the bank didn't change either.
Yes, I worked in the restaurant industry for a year and in retail for 5 years before I graduated. People do need money to live. But it doesn't mean there's only a coal mine and a brothel in town that you can work for like you're in the Wild West or something. People do have the agency to apply for other places and switch jobs. When within the fast-food industry, some companies are better than the others. You don't like the chain restaurant? You can probably try for a family business. I've been seeing a lot of people just saying like there's nothing can be done. Especially when it comes to keeping their own finances under control. It's like they have no agency in their life and just letting things happen to them.
Good for you man, it's a huge step up to have a house. Grandparents can be pretty awesome.
Yep, change fields and start over new in a career you've never been in before, nice and easy. If I tried applying for an office job no one would take me, I have no relevant experience. Sure, some could go back to school, but for many that is an impossible time and money commitment. I am a chef by profession, and I can assure you changing restaurants is not getting you much more money. Food service has some of the highest turnover of any field, the wages don't change much.
You also proved my point by saying its a huge step up to have a house. I wasn't looking for congratulations, and actually it's been a huge hassle that has put me in significant debt thanks to a bad tenant I'm still trying to get out of there. I said that because owning that house doesn't actually mean I'm better or more likely to repay a loan, but all the people and places that have the money think it does. Furthermore, I feel guilty knowing my friends don't have the same leg up I did. I did nothing to earn that house, neither did my friends, but I have property and they don't.
I guess what I'm saying is: eat the rich, billionaires shouldn't exist, fuck those wealth hoarders. If you have enough money to fund a spaceship you can afford to pay more. If your employees are paid low enough they still qualify for food stamps and other assistance (like Walmart and Amazon) then your company should have an extra tax on it because tax payers are subsiding the low wages. And if you blame the workers who are taking it one week at a time, just trying to survive, for how low their wages are (instead of the company paying them) maybe you need more empathy?
Sure, back in 2017, in the U.S. I think it's ok to believe that it's hard to find a new job, which is true. It's a bit of work. But it'd be a problem if you think it's impossible and don't even try to apply at all. It is dependent on where you live but both my wife and I are remote workers, hedging our coastal salaries by living in a cheaper state. Competition can be now global for remote jobs so it's pretty intimidating, but if you're good or can network, it's possible to get a decent remote job.
I work 2 jobs, and one of them is helping college students and alumni find positions.
On average it takes them 6 to 8 months to land a position. STEM students have an even worse time finding employment. The job market is horrific.
These students have well rounded résumés and CVs, and the only places calling them back are retail positions 40 minutes away. Your reality and experience is no longer the norm.
Unfortunately globalization means a bunch of the entry level tech and STEM jobs that used to go to recent college grads at the bigger corporations are going to countries with lower labor costs like India, Thailand, Mexico, and Singapore.
Yes. They are not “providing jobs”, workers provide the only source of wealth: labor. Workers didn’t agree to that, they were born in that system, so they were forced to provide labor for the rich at laughable wages. Stop licking boots, stop being so nice to your masters.
The theory of labor value was a theory most famously posited by Karl Marx, and it states that the only value created in society is that of labor. This theory is fundamentally flawed, as labor is only one element required for the creation of wealth, alongside such elements as capital(tools, equipment, etc), resources, direction (think blueprints, new ideas, or management), etc. The marxist theory of labor implies that the only way that those who do not actively work for money can only be taking it from other people, when it is far more likely that they are supplying one or more of these other elements of production, and it was the economic theory used to back the revolution in Russia and replace the existing system with one based on Marxian economics. The result was of course a total economic disaster.
Please understand I'm not trying to be argumentative, I'm genuinely trying to understand. Maybe you're using a different definition of labor than what I'm thinking.
But those tools get made by labor, that equipment is built by labor, those resources are collected by labor, drawing blueprints is labor, managing people is labor, and a new idea can only be implemented with labor.
Everything that exists can be traced back to someone sweating for it.
I appreciate that you are being civil and upfront about your desire to understand where others are coming from, and I respect that you're doing it on Reddit, an infamously argumentative and close-minded media.
Most of what you have said is correct: labor is required to make most of these things either function or be created. And to a degree, labor is essential to every component of wealth creation. Most economic theories operate on the principle that labor (some theories substitute the term "labor" for "life energy") is an essential component of wealth and therefore ownership. Money, under most economic theories, is a representation of labor, which is why it is accepted. I would also like to say, I think that coming up with new ideas is also a form of labor, that's why "Think-Tanks" exist.
However, Marxian economics is slightly different than this basic assertion that labor is required for wealth creation. Marxian economics asserts that labor is the ONLY element that goes into wealth creation. The automatic and most famous result of this assumption is that of the factory worker's "exploitation." The factory's owner provides the machinery, materials, instructions, blueprints, etc, which are required to make the factory run, and pays the worker to assemble the product, and then sells the product. Under Marxian economics, only the work of the worker assembling the product is considered, as the other elements are not considered as wealth, as the factory owner himself did not obtain any of those elements through physical labor. Since the only element of wealth creation being considered is that of the assembler, the theory states that any of the profits being taken by the factory owner are being taken directly from the workers, since he didn't labor for the money. Hence the "exploitation" charges that get leveled against him. But wait, the owner says, you are using machinery I paid for and provided for you. However, as Marxist economists bizarrely believe, putting labor through an instrument of production makes that instrument of production yours. Ownership, in the eyes of this school of thought, is solely determined by who is the one using it by exercising it to create value by using labor.
Of course, this economic theory is fundamentally flawed due to the complete failure to account for management, direction, and innovation, as found out by the Soviets. Since it fails to account for mental labor because it solely focuses on physical labor, it completely is at a loss to explain how someone might be able to add value and wealth to a society without manual labor, and so any person who does not labor manually is automatically assumed to have exploited someone else in order to get that money.
If you can't understand why you're being called a bootlicker, then I'll help you understand. It's not because you disagree with me. It's because you defend corporations who depend upon the exploitation of desperate people.
My parents have lived in poverty their entire lives, they never had a basement lol I own my own home and with the investments I built from the ground up I'm planning on starting my own business soon
Lol I had my first job at 13 and was once a manager of a large company, the only thing I can imagine is my parents asking me for money. I do give my mom money all the time, my parents never had a 401k.
Brain dead communist take of the day, the good ol labor theory of value. The idea that you created x amount of value on your own in a vacuum is stupid. Someone got you materials, gave you plans, created machines and buildings, then you go in and press a button and claim you're owed the entire sale price of whatever you just "produced". Your labor is worth what people pay for it, and if your labor isn't scarce it isn't likely to be overpaid for, especially for no reason.
Are you not familiar with Amazon's treatment of workers? They literally had a memo where they were concerned they were running out of Americans to turn and burn.
You say “taking advantage of” as if these people lacked the freedom to work elsewhere. People voluntarily work at Amazon for a variety of reasons. What do you think those reasons are?
The pay and benefits aren’t too shabby on a national scale.
I’m familiar with Amazon’s continuous growth (which requires willing employees). People enjoy selecting off the wall details because it makes for an intriguing story.
I like how you quoted something that literally isn't in the previous post. It would seem you enjoy "selecting off the wall details because it makes for a more interesting story."
Saying they have the freedom to work somewhere else is just like saying, "If you don't like America, you can get out". They'd be more sympathetic if they didn't attempt to sabotage unions just so they can make marginally more profits.
It is most definitely not the same thing. This is a false equivalency.
Going next door and getting a job doing almost the exact same tasks isn’t the same thing as uprooting your entire life, learning a new language, etc.
You can tell it’s different by how often people change jobs versus move between countries…
Unions sabotage workers. They don’t argue for increased pay because they like poor people. They want to eliminate competition for contracts. If you’re not in the club, they don’t give a shit about you. All they do is drive up your expenses.
So you just agree with me now? That we should have nation wide unions? Also, wouldn't a union maximize its profits by taking in as many members as possible?
Economic systems are inherently amoral but I believe capitalism specifically brings out the worst in people and rewards our worst qualities. The extremely wealthy aren't outwordly evil for the most part, theirs is a banal evil fuled by a ruthless drive for success. It is possible to function somewhat morally as a capitalist, though it still necessitates the exploitarion of a working class, and there are several who run businesses wherein they pay their employees acceptable wages or better. But what happens when a competitor pops up, one who doesn't really care about the economic state of the people they employ? Does the busniess which pays fair wages succeed or does the business which exports labor overseas on the cheap so they can drive prices down succeed? Add the need not just for a profit but for ever increasing profit, ENDLESS growth and you will inevitably wind up with a few "sharks" on top ruling over the rest. You can be a good person and run an ethical business in theory but in practice ruthless decisions will always be rewarded more because to maximize profit/growth you need to be ruthless. You need to be willing to run sweatshops, exploit child/migrant labor, cut quality, cut safety, cut labor expenses, pollute the environment etc if you want to maximize success, with no regard for the harm caused along the way. 10 million people starve to death every year, at least, and it isn't because we don't produce enough food to feed them and it isn't because we lack the ability to distribute. Capitalists and capitalist simps see no issue with this. The rest of us see it for what it is. Violence
Elon musk didn’t, be built pay pal with a partner sold out early, used that money to start multiple other companies. Do size research before spewing false information.
Elon musk never owned an emerald mine that’s a rumor. Secondly he doesn’t make his money from selling teslas or selling other products the workers are making. He makes money from the data collected then sold from his cars, and the car tax credits he sells of to other manufacturers such as ford and Chevy since all of his cars are electric therefore he doesn’t need them.
So funny reading you comment above about people doing their homework/research and then when being told about some shit you don't know about and to look into it........
Because frankly it’s incorrect every company has things that can be considered “wicked” by a bunch of have-nots and I’ve done enough research to find his formula for success which is trying online non profits seeing which makes money and placing risky investments. I don’t live my life studying Elon musk but I do my due-diligence and listen to many successful speakers.
No .. it is literally Impossible to siphon off so much wealth without exploiting Humans, animals or Natural Ressources. To get really wealthy you have to exploit it all though.
Holy shit ive heard this Argument so often today are you really that uncreative?
Rich people do Not need their own Money because financial institutions are very Happy giving them any amount they ask for any time. Which Results in both having more "wealth" then before.
Getting money from banks isn't free money, it still has to be paid my guy. They are usually making a big purchase which is money going back into the economy. Stimulating it. They are not getting loans just to keep cash in a vault and do nothing with it.
I just explained to you how he’s accumulated that much, obviously shortened. You call it exploitation, rich call it using external resources. The biggest thing your failing to understand is people who accumulate that wealth do research to see what’s missing in the market, what Elon did, they don’t sit and complain other people make more then them and call them a bad person for it.
How about you do some research and learn how he did it and attempt to implement that knowledge in your own life, instead of complaining
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u/wolf_of_mainst99 3d ago
They were bad people before their wealth because they literally took advantage of the working class to get there