Re: Wal-Mart and Wages?

From: Dez Akin (dezakin_at_usa.net)
Date: 07/23/04 

Date: 23 Jul 2004 02:01:32 -0700

The Trucker <mikcob@verizon.net> wrote in message news:<cdmbs60sr2@news4.newsguy.com>...
> Dez Akin wrote:
> >> In recent years the U.S. has been drifting in that direction, the god
> >> king
> >> and friends being the growing aristocracy. (come visit here and I'll
> >> take you on a tour of the palaces).
> >
> > Erm, sounds like the beginning of a marxist manifesto.
> > ---snip---
>
> Looks like the typical neocon sound bite rebuttal of anything that might
> contradict the religious position of the neocon. So we use the word
> neocon just like the neocon uses the word Marx. It is the conjuring of
> the devil, of evil, of the bogeyman.

How wonderfully ignorant of my political views, and the term 'neocon'
as well. Neocons are often referred to in reference to foreign policy
rather than economic models, and you'll never see a post from me
defending Israel or the rather foolish US support of a state that no
longer serves (and indeed jeapordizes) US interest.

> >> An important equity mechanism is -- or was -- the labor union. Unions
> >> provided some balance between the power of employers and workers.
> >> In the U.S. in recent decades unions have become largely ineffective or
> >> non-existent. ( It would be worth your job if not your life to be a Wal-
> >> Mart union organizer. )
> >
> > Instead of attending the very affordable colleges and trade schools?
>
> The H1B system destroyed all of that. It is not cost effective to
> waste one's time learning anythin other than how to use government
> and monopoly rights to fleece everyone else.

H1B visas are useless for lawyers, doctors, and other locally credited
trades. Introducing skilled labor into the economy increases
productivity of the entire economy, raising everyones wages. The only
ones that have been forced out of their job because of H1B visas
couldn't do it very well to begin with, and would have been forced out
by other more competant, less expensive Americans eventually.

If you really believe that it isn't cost effective to get an
education, then in your case its probably true. But for those that
pursue an education there are many rewards in the US.

> > Historically, unions have done little except ration out jobs for
> > non-professional labor as cartels, reduce business competitiveness and
> > foster organized crime.
>
> The typical rewrite of history that graces most right winged positions:
> Just leave out the data you don't like.

Everyone seems to editorialize, certainly. But the economics of labor
unions revolve around rationing jobs to workers and labor to industry
to maximize labor price, typical of cartels. Obviously there are union
members who believe they are doing a greater social service by calling
attention to worker grievences. But they are also enriching themselves
at the expense of the shareholders, consumers, and unhired employees
not afforded due to high labor costs.

One can make an argument that Standard Oil did good for the oil
development by regulating the price of oil and preventing the price
spikes and crashes through market manipulation as well, but the
economics of it are the same.

> > Far better 'equity mechanisms' would be punishing estate taxes,
> > simplification of income tax, and comprehensive public education
> > programs that turns the poor into professionals.
>
> Not a bad conclusion, however. But then there is that One World
> stuff that insists that Americans must be impoverished so as to
> raise the poor of other nations.

I'm sorry, but I really don't understand where this statement comes
from. Where do you read in my comments impoverishing Americans to
subsidize the foreign poor?

> >> >I sense a theological belief in salvation through higher wages in your
> >> >posts.
> >> >
> >> God forbid we descend into a French Revolution. We're a long way
> >> from it now but the trend is in that direction -- if you squint when you
> >> look at the horizon.
> >
> > Revolution that you are implying comes when the vast poor majority
> > have nothing to lose, when people are really suffering. The trend
> > isn't even pointed in that direction. Everyone in the US is getting
> > wealthier, and has been for the entirety of the existance of the US
> > history, and starvation is the last concern of the poor.
>
> (snicker) Talk about smoking your own dope! Wealth is not measured
> in food. It is measured is freedom.

Wealth with respect to revolution is measured in food; People revolt
when their survival, not luxuries, are threatened. As for wealth in
other respects, the median income has been steadily rising in the US
year on year for the past two centuries. What the average person could
afford in 1964 in terms of goods and services is far less than in
2004.

> > You might be able to convince yourself that the rich are getting
> > richer and the poor aren't getting rich as fast (or even getting
> > poorer), that the inequity is growing, but that doesn't breed
> > revolution of the French variety. That comes from more than envy,
>
> Ah, yes. The envy pony. The Republican favorite.

I'm afraid you're again miscalculating my political affiliations.
Attack the argument rather than the misconstrued affiliation. The
argument had nothing to do with 'The envy pony' anyways, but with the
conditions necissary to foment violent revolution.

> > but
> > inflicted misery in a state that has no concept of democratic veto and
> > hereditary privlege enshrined by law. If you honestly believe that the
> > US is moving _closer_ to such a state of affairs, your living in a
> > willfully ignorant fantasyland.
>
> And if you believe anything OTHER than the facts of growing wealth
> disparity then you are blind as a bat.

Really? When its been remarked by one minor aristocrat growing up in a
bygone era: "I never thought myself so rich to be able to afford a
motor car, yet to poor to afford personal servants."

Wealth disparity has been dropping. I certainly am in favor of
policies which cripple the aristocracy such as tax free inheritances,
broad based education spending and other policies that ensure equality
of opportunity (if not outcome) but the economy is growing less
aristocratic (in spite of the efforts of our _aheh_ brilliant
executive branch) than in previous centuries.

> > It may be pleasant to believe that such naive approaches as 'pay them
> > more and the economy will grow' apply, and its certainly appropriate
> > to be skeptical of the market finding optimal solutions in all
> > scenarios. Markets tend degenerate into monopolies and cartels (see
> > the rise of Standard Oil, De Beers, and ironically the rise of labor
> > unions) and occasionally markets allocate resources less than
> > optimally. But in the absence of an omnicient oracle, markets usually
> > work better than fiat dictated by a central planner driven by a single
> > economic theory, or even worse, naive idealism.
>
> Thank you very much for your confirmation of the current problem:
>
> "markets usually work better than fiat dictated by a central planner
> driven by a single economic theory".
>
> The Republicans seek to maximize rent at all times. To therefore maximize
> wealth disparity on the premise that a caste system is necessary to
> the moral guidance of the ignorant masses.

While I don't have a direct insight into what 'The Republicans' think,
I don't believe there is a vast conspiracy to enforce an aristocracy,
but rather slavish adherence to an ideology that isn't revolted nor
appologetic about its existance.

> http://GreaterVoice.org/econ/glossary/aristocracy.php
>
> Of course it helps to employ Faux news and controlled "statistics"
> to keep the masses as ignorant as possible.

Oh sure. Just verify the source, such as GDP, median income, and so
forth, these can be verified from the department of commerce, and
various economic journals and then be spun as you like.

Be skeptical of subscribing to any ideology from Ayn Rand to Karl
Marx, or adhering to strongly with any ideological tribe. Especially
those that use terms in usenet such as Faux News, Klinton, Amerikkka,
and so on. Although it certainly I imagine is relaxing to turn ones
brain off and follow the tribe in word and deed.

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