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DannyB chased by a bunch of wild rabid kangaroos writes . . .
Bernie Sanders introduces 'Stop BEZOS' bill to tax Amazon for underpaying workers
Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) and Rep. Ro Khanna (D-CA) have introduced a bill that would tax companies like Amazon and Walmart for the cost of employees' food stamps and other public assistance. Sanders' Stop Bad Employers by Zeroing Out Subsidies Act (abbreviated "Stop BEZOS") . . . would institute a 100 percent tax on government benefits that are granted to workers at large companies.
The bill's text characterizes this as a "corporate welfare tax," and it would apply to corporations with 500 or more employees. If workers are receiving government aid through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP, formerly known as food stamps), national school lunch and breakfast programs, Section 8 housing subsidies, or Medicaid, employers will be taxed for the total cost of those benefits. The bill applies to full-time and part-time employees, as well as independent contractors that are de facto company employees.
Sanders announced his plans for the proposal last month. He emphasized today that "this discussion is not just about Amazon and [Amazon CEO] Jeff Bezos." But as the bill's name would suggest, he's been particularly critical of Amazon and Bezos who became the richest person in the world (and modern history) last year. "The taxpayers in this country should not be subsidizing a guy who's worth $150 billion, whose wealth is increasing by $260 million every single day," [ . . . rest omitted . . . ]
Food stamps, School Lunch, Medicaid, great . . . but what about employees who must shop at Walmart?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 05 2018, @11:37PM (25 children)
Meanwhile Bernie has three houses, his wife is under investigation for fraud (she ran a Burlington College into the ground) and he's never around since he's a "national figure" - oh, and BTW, he only rails against billionaires now when he used to decry millionaires. Funny how he swapped the M for a B once he became one.
Hypocritical fraud. Oops, he's a politician, I repeat myself.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 05 2018, @11:40PM (16 children)
So instead of these nonsensical personal attacks, how about you focus on policy? If you disagree with the policies that someone else is speaking about, explain why. Otherwise, you're saying nothing at all and are totally irrelevant.
(Score: 0, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:04AM (15 children)
OP here -
Not a personal attack as Bernie's antics are well known in Vermont. What is a fact is that any taxes imposed on these companies will simply be tacked on to the price the feckless consumer pays for goods. It ain't going to work. The tax credits and write-offs for stock-based compensation that enabled Amazon to make out like bandit was passed by Congress.
And Bernie is still a hypocrite.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by c0lo on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:22AM (2 children)
For 5 points, explain the difference between extraction of money by taxing and by increasing prices.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:16PM
And the employers have the choice to not do things that will cause the tax to be levied at them.
(Score: 2) by Pino P on Wednesday October 03 2018, @12:33PM
Reply to spoiler:
Refusal to buy is inadequate once various levels of government have passed laws that require people to purchase certain things. These include land (sit/lie laws), clothing (public decency laws), commercial food (anti-garden zoning laws), and health insurance (Affordable Care Act and foreign counterparts).
(Score: 3, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:22AM (5 children)
And every dollar Bezos puts into his pockets or his newspaper will also be tacked on the price the feckless consumer pays. At least with taxes, the proceeds stand to help us all.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:26AM (3 children)
Aye yi yi youse guys must have gone to school in the past 20 years or so....
"At least with taxes, the proceeds stand to help us all."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:51AM (2 children)
As if our school system was good before that? It wasn't. It may have gotten a bit worse thanks to No Child Left Behind, but at no point was it ever good or even close to that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:13AM (1 child)
Friends of mine live outside Burlington VT. Their son went through the local public school system and just got into a very good technical university. No major complaints about VT schools from any of them. From what I saw when visiting a few years back, the school was set up nicely and run quite creatively. Seemed like it could be a good poster child for public education.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @08:07PM
I don't know. I've seen many people make the claim that a particular school is good, but upon further investigation of said school, it would turn out that the 'education' there extensively focused on rote memorization over understanding. Then, it went from, 'School X is good' to 'School X is less bad than some other schools.' And that's the problem: Many people confuse 'better than' with 'good.' That's also why school rankings can't be relied upon by themselves.
Mathematics classes need to teach people to think like mathematicians and to fully understand the subject matter being taught, not just have people memorize patterns so that they can apply a memorized formula to them. A similar thing can be said for other subjects. Yet, we see the latter happening all over the country, including in 'good' schools.
(Score: 3, Informative) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:53PM
Right up until Amazon no longer becomes cheaper or more convenient from your _____ store, at which point the customer defects to the company that internalizes those costs and deducts them from profit and not pass along as a cost.
This sig for rent.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bob_super on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:56AM (2 children)
> any taxes imposed on these companies will simply be tacked on to the price the feckless consumer pays for goods
You mean that the unfair advantage the seller gets over the physical stores which pay employees and taxes will be reduced or negated?
Mission . Fucking . Accomplished .
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:07AM (1 child)
Unfair? Try getting around some US cities in a wheelchair. Amazon is a godsend to disabled shoppers.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:57PM
That's a beautiful herring there. It's so red!
This sig for rent.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:03AM (1 child)
No, as often as this is repeated, it is still not true. The taxes are never tacked into the price consumers pay. Not immediately anyway. That is because the price is already what at what the market will bear. However, the costs do make the market less attractive, and that can cause there to be fewer producers over time which raises prices. In this case though, I haven't really heard of anyone except Amazon employing hordes of people at poverty levels.... except maybe Uber and the other freelance companies if those fall under this law.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:20AM
You've never heard of Walmart?
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Friday September 07 2018, @05:10PM
THAT'S THE WHOLE FRICKIN' POINT!
I despise Walmart, for destroying the town where I grew up, and for constantly using unfair practices against both employees and suppliers. I refuse to shop there. However, I'm still FORCED to subsidize the wages of their employees through my tax dollars. You talk about increased prices like it's a bad thing, but why the hell SHOULDN'T the people who actually shop there being the ones paying the employees' wages? Why should I be forced to subsidize a company that I would prefer didn't exist at all?
(Score: 2, Offtopic) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:31PM (7 children)
Would you listen to the policy of a 2000 year old jew, who many people adore, worship and give money to? (for clarification, yes I mean Bernie)
Even if he has three houses, his wife is under investigation for fraud and a politician and hypocritical fraud?
No matter what I think of the man, and I have no particular fondness or liking for him, this policy idea struck me as genius. IMO it directly fixes a problem and shifts the costs to exactly where they should be. If it raises costs in the market, this is merely a feedback into the mechanism which gradually self corrects until no big employers have people on public assistance.
But oh my, some corporate executives might get one less yacht this year. Sad. Very terrible.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 1) by shrewdsheep on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:32PM (6 children)
Why is everybody starting to talk like Trump?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:03PM
It's a good way of talking. No big words. You talk so folks know what you're saying. It's a very good way of talking. Very, very good. Failing Democrats use big words to lie. I would never lie to you. Maybe. Probably. It's the best way to get ideas across. Ideas are very important. Unlike the failing Democrats! Sad!
(Score: 3, Funny) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:51PM (4 children)
Not doing so is unpatriotic and perhaps soon even treasonous.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 3, Touché) by Sourcery42 on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:45PM (3 children)
doubleplus good explanation comrade
(Score: 2) by http on Thursday September 06 2018, @06:15PM (2 children)
Stop using long words, it is hard to follow you.
I browse at -1 when I have mod points. It's unsettling.
(Score: 1) by DECbot on Thursday September 06 2018, @06:37PM (1 child)
doubleplus good speak person-good.
newsspeak doubleplus gooder. Doubleminus words.
cats~$ sudo chown -R us /home/base
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @06:44PM
You sir, are going to cause an executive order that limits words to two syllables or less.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 05 2018, @11:40PM (1 child)
Let's forbid Amazon from hiring even one H1B tech worker to devop AWS anywhere because of GovCloud.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:59AM
I thought Trump tried to do this and all the haters came out and said H1Bs were good.
Hard to keep up
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday September 05 2018, @11:45PM (6 children)
is what's popping.
(Score: 2) by takyon on Wednesday September 05 2018, @11:46PM
https://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=popcorn [amazon.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 05 2018, @11:49PM (4 children)
Enjoy your retirement while you still can. Those damn kids on your lawn are coming to kill you for destroying their future.
How much Amazon and Walmart stock do you own, old man?
(Score: 5, Touché) by Runaway1956 on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:23AM (3 children)
I don't invest in companies that I detest.
(Score: 4, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:52AM (2 children)
I like the shit out of both of them but all my money's in buggy whip manufacturing. I see a big future for it after this automobile fad blows over.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:19AM (1 child)
Now we know your net worth -- if it's all invested in a non-existent industry it can't be much.
Or did you mean antennas? https://www.amazon.com/slp/buggy-whip/e7syqauknzbn5wy [amazon.com]
(Score: 3, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday September 06 2018, @10:29AM
Depends on what you have pulling your buggy. The antennas work really well on children, for example.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Wednesday September 05 2018, @11:47PM (32 children)
You gonna peg it to the cost of living in Seattle? How about San Francisco? Boston? San Diego?
There is a huge part of me that thinks if you have a job, you don't get welfare. There is a pissed off part of me that realizes that, for a lot of people, it pays better to not work than take minimum wage. Good thing I can keep both parts separate, depending on which side of the family I'm having dinner with.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:03AM (31 children)
That's the argument for Universal Basic Income : Here is money you don't lose if you go get a job for someone who relies on government subsidies to get you to a living wage.
Tyranny of choices towards the same result:
- High minimum wage and low effective employer tax
- Low minimum wage + handouts, paid by high employer tax
- Low minimum wage + UBI, paid by high employer tax
Obviously, not changing anything is better for the employers: low minimum wage, low effective tax, get to bitch about debt when the party you don't like is in power.
(Score: 0, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:02AM (30 children)
I live very well on below minimum wage.
It's not how much you make, but how much you spend and how well you can manage money. Sure I don't live in CA, but I can, and do, visit any time I want.
(Score: 3, Informative) by bob_super on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:06AM (1 child)
AC has atypical anecdotal experience. News at 11.
Care to share more details about your unusual situation ?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:21AM
he/she must be a trustafarian
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:35AM (15 children)
You cover your own housing, food, and medical benefits on below minimum wage? And are saving up for a good retirement? Because even if Social Security still exists in a few decades if you make less than minimum wage now you'll be collecting the inflation-adjusted equivalent of maybe $1,000 per month then.
Really?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by khallow on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:29AM (14 children)
Social Security was first and foremost a scheme for transferring money from working age people to the federal government general fund (and secondarily old people). As a substitute for investment, it's an awful idea. I imagine anyone with half a brain isn't counting on Social Security to shoulder the burden.
Spending control does mean that he's probably not living in a mansion, dining on caviar, and picking up elective health care on a Cadillac plan.
What would that be? That strikes me a lot like the marketing for breakfast cereals. There is a too specific idea of what a good retirement is.
(Score: 3, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday September 06 2018, @10:35AM
A little boat, something to pull it, fishing gear, and most anywhere with air conditioning would do me fine. Wait, I already have all that... Did I retire and not notice?
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:11PM (12 children)
Tell me how someone can afford a tiny apartment, utilities, food, and the cheapest health insurance program you can imagine on minimum wage. Cadillac? Really?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:34PM (2 children)
He is single and has no kids.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @06:49PM
maybe polygamous, leader of a compound, the kids bring in extra outside money.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @08:11PM
Sounds like a good idea if one is making minimum wage: Don't have kids you can't afford.
Being single or not, though, does not matter, since the second person could work as well.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:44PM (3 children)
Look into real estate an hour away from the nearest major city. You'll see how.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Thursday September 06 2018, @11:52PM (2 children)
I'm an hour outside of Philadelphia and you can't buy a dog house for less than $150,000. In the town where I grew up, two hours from the closest major city and with terrible job prospects, the average house price is in the $60,000 range and a one bedroom apartment is $500 per month - which is still crazy hard to afford on minimum wage.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Friday September 07 2018, @02:28AM
Must be a Pennsylvania thing. Try somewhere with more land or less people. TR is currently trying and failing to sell his three bedroom house back in OK for less than $60K. Granted, the neighbors who keep piles of random junk and busted-ass furniture in the yard next door might have something to do with that but still.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Friday September 07 2018, @05:18PM
Yup, my first apartment was around 3 hours from the nearest city (Pittsburgh). $1000/month for half of a basement. Two bedrooms and a kitchen. Then again, three years later I found a nicer apartment (only one bedroom though) which was cheaper ($900/mo) and within walking distance of downtown Providence., and closer to Boston than that first place was to Pittsburgh. Proximity to a major city is hardly the only factor that matters here.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @03:27AM (4 children)
Ok. You ask how? They earn money at minimum wage and spend a portion of it on those items. I'll note that the entire list of items you mentioned cost me (and my coworkers) about $700 per month ($450 for room and board, $250 for insurance, utilities are free). The entire list.
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Saturday September 08 2018, @07:13PM (3 children)
And food? And does that health insurance have a deductible? Can you meet the deductible if you develop a serious illness or fall down stairs or something? How do you get to work, walking?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday September 09 2018, @12:05AM (2 children)
Yes.
Yes and I can meet it.
Yes. I have a car, but I don't need to have one.
People don't have to make the same choices or the same sacrifices I choose to make. But if you're in the US, and think you're stuck in an awful job, with no chance of escape for the next few decades, then you're doing life wrong. Learn to play the game.
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Monday September 10 2018, @05:50PM (1 child)
How can you afford your car and car insurance and fuel and maintenance? I still find your scenario absurd. What state? What kind of insurance policy do you have - is it through work? I'd seriously like an itemized breakdown of your budget, I find your numbers ludicrous.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday September 10 2018, @08:38PM
I bought the car used for about a third to quarter its original price (ten year old Nissan Versa, two years ago). Insurance, fuel, and maintenance just haven't been significant costs. I also have a cheap cell phone.
You've already got the great majority. I make more than minimum wage, but food, rent (and all utilities), and health insurance all is $700 per month. That's the key to it. With 180 hours of work at $7.25 and a quarter taken off for fed taxes (after the cost of room and board is taken out, I might add) and such, I would still be making $1000 per month roughly. $300 per month would leave more than enough for the remaining two big items in my budget, car and phone.
It's not be great income at minimum wage, but I could still save money. And the business I'm in has a lot of turnover. It's not difficult for someone who is willing to work hard to get positions that pay significantly above minimum wage. I've seen people go from entry level (currently pays I think $8.50 per hour for lowest hourly positions to $7.25 per hour for corresponding tipped position) to an assistant manager position over the course of a summer (it's seasonal work) or move to a better paying position.
While you probably have it figured out, I'm working seasonally in the tourism industry with a summer and winter season, usually about 9 months of work and 3 months downtime. But the company I'm with does have jobs at locations that are year round, should that ever become important to me.
The point of this exercise from my angle is not that everyone can or wants to work my particular niche market, but rather that these sorts of opportunities wouldn't exist in the first place, if the US really had that many desperate people looking for work. We get plenty of people each season who either never show or up and leave because they find something better elsewhere. The narrative is bogus.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:08AM (11 children)
Around here rent of only $800 is hard to find. At minimum wage, you're talking rent alone taking up nearly half your paycheck. And that's before you pay utilities, probably another 100 a month minimum, buy food or pay for a bus pass.
Perhaps where you live, things are cheap, but not where most people love.
By the end of the month, you're not going to have much over if you do anything discretionary, you'll likely be in the red.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:48AM (5 children)
That's why you pay rent for your mom's basement. It's well below $800.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:45AM (4 children)
No, that's why you don't live in areas with insanely high costs of living like an idiot.
(Score: 4, Informative) by requerdanos on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:11PM (3 children)
Judging by your definition there, it may be that no such areas exist in the United States. The below referenced study claims that except for a few localities with artificially high minimum wage, there's nowhere in the U.S. where rent isn't "insanely high" (30% or less of minimum wage income). The lack of affordable housing is reflected in the fact that the difference between areas is the minimum wage, not the presence or absence of "high cost of living" overall...
Affordable Housing Crisis: Minimum wage doesn’t cover the rent anywhere in the U.S. [brunswickhomeless.com]
An excerpt:
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @08:55PM (2 children)
You can't deny that some areas of the country have a higher cost of living than other areas. That is just a fact. Knowing that, try to avoid the areas with the highest cost of living, especially if one is going to need to work a minimum wage job.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Friday September 07 2018, @01:13AM (1 child)
I don't see why not. People have denied things just as true and continue to do so. Whether it can be denied by a denier doesn't have much to do with it.
I understand your recommendation, and appreciate the concern. There are, however, many reasons that someone might live in a particular area (couldn't get a job in the low-cost area but got one in the high-cost area, would love to live in the low-cost area but here in the high-cost area is where my friend/family lives who I depend on for a ride, etc.).
"AC with shallow vision just saying let them move to a low cost area and eat cake" not only isn't a solution, it's unhelpful and breathtakingly shortsighted besides. People who need help and hear you say that will move away from you because they are intelligent and insightful. You, witnessing this, might then respond "see? they, not listening to my brilliance, obviously don't want help"...
All other things being equal, costs are lower where costs are lower? Sure, that's listed under "tautology." But all other things generally aren't equal.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday September 09 2018, @12:11AM
Let us note that this is a classic problem of a high minimum wage. One would rather live in the low cost areas, but the jobs aren't there any more. Just look at Puerto Rico for an example. While some costs are pretty high, in general most of it is fairly cheap due to low property values. It has plenty of other things wrong with it, but it doesn't help that the jobs aren't there, but are there in places like New York City or Miami, which happen to be higher cost as well.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday September 06 2018, @10:38AM (4 children)
Erm... The three bedroom house I'm living in now is less than that. The 4K+ square foot church The Roomie just bought to remodel into a house is as well. Get out of major cities if you don't want all your money going to rent.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:55PM (3 children)
Yes, but you had to acquire that house. How realistic is this for people living hand-to-mouth, without saddling themselves with a bunch of debt?
Such a "let them eat cake" statement
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:46PM (2 children)
It didn't take much acquiring. First and last month's rent plus a smaller than one month's rent security deposit. You know, like everyone in the US who has a place to live had to do.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday September 06 2018, @06:55PM (1 child)
Your post is ambiguous...are you talking about renting, or owning?
would seem to indicate owning, but
and
is talking about rent.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday September 06 2018, @07:30PM
The place I'm in now is a rental. The place TR just bought is an ownership thing. The reason they got lumped together is they're both less than $800/month for a good sized place in a nice neighborhood. For that matter, TR is renting his three bedroom house back in OK for a lot less than $800/month.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by requerdanos on Wednesday September 05 2018, @11:50PM (29 children)
The 100% rate may not accomplish what backers want to accomplish.
Let's take Harry Hardluck, employee of Zon Mart, as an example. Harry makes P (paycheck) dollars per year, and receives F dollars in foodstamps per year and S dollars in Section 8 Rent Assistance per year.
This tax would make the company pay P to Harry plus S + F to the government.
If the company were to simply pay Harry enough to make up the difference (so Harry will take home P+S+F), however, they would have to pay P (current pay) + S (rent) + F (food) + Additional federal and/or state payroll tax on Harry's now larger income (otherwise he won't take home P+S+F) + additional federal medicaid tax (both employer portion and employee portion) on Harry's now larger income (otherwise he won't take home P+S+F) + additional federal Social Security tax (both employer portion and employee portion) on Harry's now larger income (otherwise he won't get P+S+F).
So the company can pay a little more in tax, Harry gets nothing more (zero zilch nada), or the company can pay a lot more, and Harry makes enough to theoretically not need the Food and Section 8 benefits anymore.
Thus, this law would strongly financially encourage any company who wants to pay a little instead of a lot to lower employee wages as much as possible and tell them to go file for benefits.
That's, in my humble opinion, nuts.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:01AM
Harry Hardluck should have learned to Code and gotten a cert in Zon Cloudy Zervices. Then Harry Hardluck could earn Zero Dollars per year when Manisha Curryface takes his job. Too bad coders like Harry Hardluck just aren't in demand.
(Score: 5, Interesting) by bobthecimmerian on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:49AM (1 child)
The situation you describe is still better than what we have now, because today Zon Mart has the same broken incentive structure and they cover even less of the cost. They pay Harry the minimum amount they can get away with, and taxpayers cover the rest.
A perfect fix to the situation is just too complicated to be practical. You could try to tax Zon Mark an amount equivalent to S + F + all relevant federal income tax, Social Security tax, and Medicare tax that the S + F increases would cause. Then it would be genuinely cost-neutral to pay the employee vs paying the tax. But how would you track all of that data? Audit every employee at every store and track the benefits they would receive? It would never work.
I propose a simpler protocol. For most of the history of minimum wage its purchasing power was equivalent to $10 per hour today, roughly. Set the minimum wage at $10 per hour, plus $0.05 per number of employees at the company, capped at $15 per hour.
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:31AM
I am not saying that setting the tax at >= S+F+ΔP is a good idea, but it's a much less bad idea than taxing at S+F.
From the other direction, I imagine, by adding a question or two to the application forms of the programs in question. (Who is your employer? About how many employees have they?) Again I don't think that's a good idea, but it's a much less bad one than tracking every employee at the zillion largest employers and then chase down what benefits they receive if any.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:50AM
Politicians failing to see unexpected consequences? **shocker**
(Score: 2) by Fluffeh on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:49AM (16 children)
The way I understand things is that you are able to get food stamps, rent assistance etc if your wage is below a certain level of income - irrelevant of what job you are in.
By that, I mean, you'll get the same benefits whether you earn $5 an hour for 40 hours work, or $200 an hour for one hour of work per week.
So if your benefits lessen the more you earn, isn't there perfectly good incentive already for people to go out and find better jobs than the ones in this discussion? There was an interesting debate a while back about whether a person in a mcjob (whatever low paying shitty simple job) should have the expectation that the work will cover the needs of an adult/family. The concensus seemed to arrive that no, no-one thought a fast food, or cafe job actually HAD to prvide a wage that would give you enough for a mortgage along with all the rest. Low paying jobs are simply that - people should take them temporarily or to supplement other income, or while they are young and not having full living expenses.
These jobs should be a starting point, not a goal in your career aspirations, shouldn't they?
If people moved in and out quickly enough - or not into these jobs at all, the companies would automatically raise their wages to get the workers they need. With higher wages, no need for as much assistance from the government...
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:51AM (4 children)
Yet, that's not what's happening, because lots of people depend on these jobs.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:22PM (2 children)
My employer is a near minimum wage employer in the US. I see plenty of people use those jobs as a starting point contrary to your assertion. And virtually everyone I know who holds a nice job has held minimum wage jobs in the beginning. One wonders why you continue to insist on this viewpoint. Is life too easy for you and the people you care about, that you need to invent false problems?
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:40PM (1 child)
"Lots of" != "all"
Dont worry, your agenda is an illusion and nothing willl be lost when it dissipates.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @03:41AM
In a population of over 300 million you can always find "lots" of exceptions to anything. Doesn't mean a thing until we know how big that group actually is.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:50PM
This is true. And it's happening because they are fucking worthless in the employment market. Why this is so and why they do nothing to change that fact is what we should be asking.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by hemocyanin on Thursday September 06 2018, @06:28AM (8 children)
I used to think similarly -- that McJobs are for HS kids who need pocket money or college kids who need beer money -- but more and more it seems there isn't much in the economy beyond these crappy jobs. With college and grad school you can do OK (after spending half your working life knocking down that six figure student loan, I know, this is what I did) but its some ugly sort of elitism that says only those who can go to the extreme lengths of education deserve a decent living. And even then, many high skill jobs are even more susceptible to offshoring than manufacturing is -- a doctor in ThirdWorldIstan can sit in a little room with a networked computer and read MRIs quite easily, much more easily and cheaply than an entire factory can be rebuilt elsewhere.
If we don't start protecting jobs at home, all we'll have left are these menial low skill positions. Even skilled labor in the construction trades isn't a safe haven and face downward pressure on wages due to immigration -- http://www.latimes.com/projects/la-fi-construction-trump/ [latimes.com] -- although the article tries to paint it otherwise, this is pretty telling:
(Score: 3, Insightful) by fliptop on Thursday September 06 2018, @11:12AM
Where I live, pipeliners and coal miners start at around $25/hr. Welders and truck drivers can make that much too. I have a client who's a contractor and he's hiring carpenters, plumbers and electricians starting at $20/hr. No college education is needed for any of these positions.
But to get your foot in the door, you have to pass a drug test.
Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:25PM (6 children)
You could have always not gotten that six figure loan. Most college students have figured out how to do that.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:51PM (3 children)
"most"
citation needed
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @03:39AM (2 children)
Note that if a majority had six figure debt, then the average could be no lower than $50,000 (assuming the absolutely minimum possible thresholds to get the lowest possible average, 50% had exactly $100k in debt to barely qualify as "six figure debt" and the other 50% minus one person had exactly $0 in debt).
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday September 13 2018, @09:23PM (1 child)
So what you're saying is that you're technically correct because you hyperbolically quoted an inflated figure, but once your number is fixed your argument is still wrong, or at least irrelevant. Nice.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday September 13 2018, @09:25PM
Oops, looks like my Grump Ray was mistargeted--it was actually hemocyanin who introduced the "six figures." My apologies.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:21PM (1 child)
Pay your way through college AND a rigorous grad school program on a McJob? *eyeroll*
(Score: 2) by requerdanos on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:39PM
Though risky, a McJob provides opportunities to sell high-profit-margin drugs from your workplace. No need to pay rent, utilities, salaries on your store--McEmployer is paying those. I have seen such operations [eater.com] called things like "brick-fil-a [t.co]".
(Score: 5, Informative) by bobthecimmerian on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:42PM (1 child)
The problem is that according to Forbes, in 2015 42% of American workers make $15 per hour or less and the great majority of them are above the age of 21. So the competition to move up above that is colossal, and employers don't have a lot of upward pressure on raises. "I want $13 an hour!" "I can find someone else to do the job for $9. Get lost." A manager at a gas station, Lowes, Walmart, hotel, restaurant, Pep Boys, etc... can make a perfectly decent income. But most of those places will have twenty or thirty or fifty or two hundred employees. There is no way, ever, that enough leadership positions will be available for all of the people with the intelligence, education, and discipline. Most of them are stuck at the lower wage level, and when a better position opens up there are fifty competitors.
An urban area changes the problem but doesn't improve it. There are thousands more jobs but hundreds of thousands more competitors. So there might be thirty better-paying positions in a two block radius but instead of thirty competitors for one position you've got two thousand competitors for the thirty positions. Most people still lose.
You're living with the myth that the market is slightly fair, that if you just put in enough work everything will work out. It's just not true. There are plenty of job openings in the current market, but if every good person that worked hard was going to have a job available we would need 30 million new $20/hour+ jobs to appear. It'll never happen. It's unavoidable - if you can't carve out a niche in the supply and demand curve you are screwed, and by definition of how supply and demand works most people can't. Plumbers make good money, but if a lot of people in an area become plumbers to make an income then average plumber pay drops. The market fundamentally screws most of the population.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @03:42AM
Why aren't you considering demand? More employers means more competition for those workers. It works both ways.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by slinches on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:52AM (6 children)
Or instead of incurring any of the added costs, they can just fire the people on government assistance programs.
Why keep Jim around when he costs you twice as much in payroll and taxes as Jane? If the difference in quality of the work between different employees was valuable enough to make up that extra value, then it would make more sense to offer higher pay to attract more skilled employees and the job wouldn't be near minimum wage in the first place.
All this bill would do is cost people in the most vulnerable positions employment opportunities.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:24PM (5 children)
That only works if Jane is earning enough, or her family is earning enough combined, to be excluded from gov't assistance. Once the business narrows its labor pool to such workers, it might find that it can't stock shelves and staff registers, in which case, people will just stop shopping there.
(Score: 2) by slinches on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:56PM (4 children)
Or they pay more for the work than it's worth causing the company to shut down that portion because it can't maintain a profit. Or it drives more automation and the business continues to succeed, but the jobs are gone.
In the long run, no scenario plays out well for the workers on government assistance with this bill.
(Score: 2) by hemocyanin on Thursday September 06 2018, @10:31PM (1 child)
Yeah its easy to keep hyper-focus on those lazy uneducated dumb fucks, but the real issue is the exportation of good jobs up and down the social hierarchy. Accountants and MDs face offshoring now, just as programmers have for some time, and of course it has been happening to those in blue collar work for even longer. It is always easier to condemn and blame than to address the real issue, which another poster mentioned elsewhere: what is an economy for?
If an economy is for making a very few people insanely rich and turning everyone else into slaves or serfs, then we're doing fine. If an economy is for providing an environment in which people can thrive, ours is doing a bad job. I'm reminded of the great interview Charlie Rose did with Sir James Goldsmith (capitalist shark if there ever was one) who discusses some of the reasons behind economic systems, such as serving as a basis for safe and orderly society. Anyway, it's worth it if only to see the Clinton hack saying how great those 90s free trade agreements were going to work out for everyone (she's still doing fine today -- a professor or something): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wwmOkaKh3-s [youtube.com]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday September 09 2018, @12:19AM
Particularly, since helping them is allegedly the whole point of the proposed law.
Funny how Sanders's proposal helps that. But I suppose that massively increasing the cost of employing the poorest people in the US will somehow make things better. It's remarkable how people claim to care about a problem and then propose ways to make that problem worse.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Friday September 07 2018, @06:13PM (1 child)
Then the work wasn't all that essential, was it?
I keep hearing this argument...but nobody ever seems to be willing to explain what is so virtuous about doing busywork jobs that could just as easily be done by a machine. Let the machines do the things that they do best, and take the money that is saved and use it to pay these unemployed workers to paint or make YouTube videos or care for their children or whatever the hell else they think our society actually needs. Personally, I have no interest in any economic ideas that rely on people being paid a pittance to spend all day LARPing as a restocking bot.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Sunday September 09 2018, @12:23AM
It means you're trying to be something other than a problem and making the world better for other people. And as already noted, if that work weren't more valuable to the employer than automating it, they wouldn't have paid in the first place.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @06:54PM
Excellent observation.
The fix would seem to be that the tax should be much higher than 100 % of the employee's public assistance. The point seemed (to me) to be to get employers to pay people decently enough to not need public assistance. Thus saving taxpayer money, and not adding this tax to employers.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2, Troll) by jmorris on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:08AM (73 children)
The premise is people are "owed" a "living wage" sufficient to eliminate their need for public assistance. This is of course an utterly stupid idea. Ignore the ugly truth that you can't really define "living wage" since Bernie is handwaving that away with "public assistance" trick which of course is only adding a layer of indirection since qualifications for public assistance require someone define the term.
Lets get to the root and reject this because it is literally ripped from the pages of Atlas Shrugged. The scene where American Motors has decreed everybody will get paid based on need and the race is on to have the best sob story of need. No more paid based on value of work, but on how many children are at home, whose kid has a medical condition, etc. You know, right around that point where John Galt "goes Galt" and coins a phrase for all time.
So like 1984 was supposed to be a warning and not an instruction manual, now Atlas Shrugged is a guidebook for the Left.
Pass this bill and get one of two likely futures. The first is where having children or being married with the spouse not working makes one unemployable. Or one where it is illegal to ask a prospective employee what their level of "need" is but employers hire private investigators on the downlow anyway. There probably isn't a realistic third option. Since making employee pay unknowable up front is not survivable, the only third options are really dark ones. Like all employees work for a less than fifty employee sub contractor and lawfare rages as Socialists try to stamp it out, economy in depression, etc.
We want low wage jobs to be an option if we want people to have a route out of poverty.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by c0lo on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:30AM (7 children)
jmorris is anti-slavery not because of human rights but because slavery is so much more expensive than capital feudalism.
Just think: you really want to feed and clothe and give those slaves that you own a roof above their head?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:17AM (6 children)
This is why I don't care about slavery. I used to think it was bad, but now when I learn that slaves had better conditions than I do today, and I have it pretty good compared to most of the rest of the world, I think meh, I have it worse than your ancestors and you're still whining. stfu
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:14AM (2 children)
Define better. Do you value freedom? Not being forcibly separated from your family? Not having your daughters raped by Master?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:45AM (1 child)
I'm a working slave as were my ancestors back to the stoneage. A slave. Period.
And worse off than my ancestors, they were fed and clothed. I'm a slave that is allowed to starve to death. Who cares if I have freedom. Yeah, I have freedom to starve. Fuck you, master
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday September 06 2018, @11:50AM
Working slave != slave.
Yet you still manage to find the calories to whine about it on SN.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:10AM
Frederick Douglass [gutenberg.org]. Perhaps you ought to learn from people who have been both free and slave rather than whatever benighted source you used above?
(Score: 3, Insightful) by DeathMonkey on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:59PM
but now when I learn that slaves had better conditions than I do today,
You are a fucking idiot if you believe that fairy tale.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @07:04PM
Most workplaces don't whip people, maybe even to death, if they feel like it. Or if the lady of the house is in a bad mood or feels disrespected.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:36AM (11 children)
Thus speaks a low rank public servant**, paid every month a bunch of money enough to keep him alive, money taken from taxes.
** By his own admission, he works for a library, maintaining the 'smut filters'.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by jmorris on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:10AM (10 children)
Worked a lot of jobs. Worked minimum wage to buy my first computer and teach myself how to program. Took a bit more effort to save up $400 when the minimum wage was ~$2/hr. Now the min is more like $~8/hr and a perfectly good computer can be had for $250 and you don't really need a single book since the Internet has tons of teaching material free for the taking. You don't even need a computer at all, I admin a lab full of em free for anyone to come use. Not only can you use any of the online resources they all have the entire GNU toolchain installed along with Eclipse, etc. If ya don't feel like becoming a programmer you can use the same machines to learn Blender, GIMP, take an online course in damned near anything, etc. We are awash in free knowledge and opportunity.
Which is why I have little patience for people who try to explain how the poor are trapped. Bullshit, been there, done that, have the t-shirt and every day I watch people on Facebook, watching anime on YouTube, etc. who could be learning skills that would put money in their pocket. Hell, they could come in and work Mechanical Turk and make coins. People have no excuse other than lack of motivation. People don't expend the effort because being a loser is now fairly painless. This is not compassion.
First jobs tend to be crappy low paying jobs, that is just a fact of life. Nobody who wasn't born rich starts out in the corner office, doesn't start out with a "deeply meaningful" job where they can "make a difference" or any of that, it will be grunt work that needs doing but doesn't require a lot of experience. But if people can't get a first job they will stay on public assistance forever. Bernie wants that of course, because that person will vote Democrat until he dies. Everyone votes Democrat after they die of course.. :)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:53AM
This!!!
In todays world, much of the poor remaining trapped in poverty is simply not having the gumption to get up and do something about it. Nothing more, nothing less.
(Score: 2) by julian on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:39AM
I'm happy things are going well for you.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by DeathMonkey on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:53PM (1 child)
Lucky for you mommy and daddy were providing you room and board because that luxury-item of a computer would have been a bit harder to save up for if your money was being spent on those items instead.
I love the suggestion that people pull themselves up by the bootstraps their parents bought for them.
(Score: 2) by Tara Li on Thursday September 06 2018, @09:33PM
*laughs* Um - no. Not a case of Mommy & Daddy providing his room & board. I know him F2F - that was *not* how it worked.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Friday September 07 2018, @12:34AM (5 children)
Congratulations on being first among your particular crop of losers.
Your flaw is your contempt for your own class, and (probably unconsciously) yourself. If you were black they'd call you an uncle tom. Congratulations though - you managed to get by on contempt/hatred for others and yourself... and STILL "succeed" by certain measures. That's somewhat remarkable... like placing well in a race using only the bottom three gears. How did you over-rev and not blow your engine? Statistically I suppose it happens, though not usually for overly long.
When you do crack though, and self-flagellation is not enough to make you succeed then your contempt will be waiting for you... and it will eat you alive from the inside. It will eat you just like it has already eaten those you judge so hashly. Surely then your failure will be clear for even you to see. Much more likely though is that you won't be able to face that reality, and you'll externalise the blame like most other failed koolaid-drinking neopeasants in that position - Damned Liberals! Chinese! Socialists! Mexicans! Damnit... anything so I can keep my hateful personal responsibility religion!
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @04:01AM (4 children)
(Score: 2) by Pav on Friday September 07 2018, @08:31AM (3 children)
Who knows, but the country as a whole is largely there already.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @12:00PM (2 children)
[...]
But it should be quite clear to you that there isn't a race there. jmorris choose to better himself while most of his supposed cohort didn't even try. I think that implies how faulty a concept it is to lump the two together in the first place.
Why would jmorris "crack"? That implies stress or some such. The funny thing about a lot of peoples' lives is that they are where they want to be and are flexible enough to adapt to the routine disruptions that come their way.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Friday September 07 2018, @04:24PM (1 child)
Every society requires stress to succeed above expectations. I'm only referring to pointless and counterproductive stress... the kind that makes you weak. It's certainly possible for individuals to succeed despite that flaw while the society fails as a whole - own your outcomes!
(Score: 1) by khallow on Saturday September 08 2018, @02:11AM
Depends on the expectations.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:40AM (1 child)
>No more paid based on value of work
If the corporation does NOT value the work at the COST of keeping a living human, then let them do without. Or go shop for a dirt-cheap robot. Or whatever floats their boat.
If a company does not value work of their truck, or bus, or whatever, at the cost of parts and gas, government does NOT step in to tax someone else and supply parts and gas for free. WHY should it be any different for meatbags?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:48AM
Companies already go without when they aren't willing to pay market rates for jobs.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:00AM (22 children)
We differ on this - and I'm not even a bleeding heart liberal.
If you're making good money due to your investment and your employee's hard work, then you owe it to your employees to reward them. Sure, you can keep a modest profit, and still be morally and ethically correct. But if you're not rewarding your workers for making you rich, you have no morals or ethics.
And, just to be clear - those employees come before stockholders. Stockholders have done very little to make your company profitable. They've tossed a few expendable dollars your way, but they have no idea how to make your company profitable. Your people who make things happen should always be the first people you reward when the profits start rolling in. Always. If that means stockholders get a 2% return on investment, instead of 2.75%, that's just fine. They've still made a profit for doing nothing.
(Score: 2) by PartTimeZombie on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:40AM
LOL, not even close.
I think you're right in this case, and it's even worse when you consider a company like the one I work for. You have heard of it.
As it is well over 100 years old, any shareholder purchasing shares is not actually putting money into the company at all (other than boosting the share price maybe) but because of 40 years of industry consolidation, we own something like 50% of the market we operate in worldwide.
We are also still trying to purchase our largest competitor.
This means that with limited competition consumers obviously pay more, and staff with industry specific skills are reduced to the option of (at least in my country) two employers.
The only people who really matter to management are the shareholders. Employees are paid lip service to and no more.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:02AM
Clap clap clap clap clap!
Well said!
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 5, Interesting) by jelizondo on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:37AM (10 children)
I’ll tell you a true story. The company will remain unnamed as I did sign an NDA upon leaving, but the story is true.
I was put in charge of three stores owned by this corporation. The stores had been losing money or not making much more than rent and wages. I changed the sales people commission structure, revised the inventory jettisoning low turn items and made some other changes. First year, profits up 70% (not sales, profits). Second year, profits up 30%.
On the second year the board got in a fit over the amount of money sales people were making. Too much, they cried, we must reduce the commissions! I argued and argued to no effect. Look at the profits! Forget the commissions! They are making you money! They cut the commissions. I resigned. A couple of years later, two of the stores have closed and the other one barely makes a profit.
And on the board sits a gentlemen who has a PhD in Economics from the University of Chicago! Some people are too stupid to live, even if they are smart enough to get a PhD.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:11AM (5 children)
Yes. And notice the happy ending to your tale? They were stupid and they paid the price of failure. Odds are the sales reps you had built up found new opportunities since there is always a demand for proven high performing sales types. I have tried sales, I sucked hard at it but I saw some naturals at work and see what they bring to the world. That is how the game is supposed to work. The "invisible hand" of the marketplace is supposed to redistribute capital from the hands of the incompetent into the hands of the competent through the power of competition. Stupid is supposed to hurt.
Yes it means a lot of other people get hurt along the way but when stupid people have a lot of capital they HAVE to somehow be parted from it or that potential is locked up doing stupid things.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:37AM (4 children)
The price of failure is very expensive. Just think of how much gold is needed to make the parachute when they fail.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:59AM (3 children)
See another post nearby for details. Yes I see the problem with Officers being divorced from the risks out of proportion to their potential for big rewards for short term gains, even paper gains. But the ownership class is the ones who must take losses when they suffer a fool to lead a company into oblivion, and they do indeed suffer. So that part of the system still mostly functions.
Most people's philosophical problems come from mistaking our current system for Capitalism. They need to understand that we are closer to Communism than Red China, most of our remaining public displays of Capitalism are for show and for tradition. In short the world would be a lot better if people read some Moldbug.
Reading any measurable portion of Moldbug's output is a massive undertaking, but if everyone here would at least try a taste and comment, this one is pretty relevant to what I' trying to say:
Moldbug: Technology, communism [unqualified-reservations.org]
and the Brown Scare
The almost five years since it was written changes nothing, not even the upheaval of Nov 2016 or the shitshow since.
(Score: 2) by jelizondo on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:18AM (1 child)
Indeed, thanks! My point is precisely that capitalism has gone wrong, at least in the U.S. and many other places as well, but let’s not go there.
I think we agree that (true) capitalism has given humanity the most advances both scientifically and ethically, and should be considered the most efficient economic system, bar none.
Probably you will enjoy reading a pamphlet by Frederic Bastiat [bastiat.org] (published in 1848!) that in mind sums up pretty well what I think we should strive for.
(Score: 2) by Pav on Friday September 07 2018, @12:40AM
pffft... you mean post-WWII "golden age" USA? 90% top marginal tax rate, ~52% corporate tax rate... paying welfare not only for itself, but for Europe and Japan as well (through the Marshalll plan)? Or do you mean the roaring 20's (sandwiched between the Long Recession and the Great Depression)?
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Dr Spin on Thursday September 06 2018, @08:52AM
Never underestimate the pain of being tickled with a soft pillow.
Warning: Opening your mouth may invalidate your brain!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by canopic jug on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:20AM (2 children)
And on the board sits a gentlemen who has a PhD in Economics from the University of Chicago! Some people are too stupid to live, even if they are smart enough to get a PhD.
That is just further evidence that degrees in economics or in business administration are fantasy-based and not grounded in empircal facts. Short term they are money makers for the grifters who acquire such degrees but long tem, they are killing the country. The anti-science trend has continued to become an anti-knowledge trend which has continued to become an anti-competency trend.
Money is not free speech. Elections should not be auctions.
(Score: 2) by jelizondo on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:53AM (1 child)
You are quite correct. Indeed, I worry that the anti-science trend will effectively kill the U.S. faster than any attacks from Russia or China.
The Russians and particularly the Chinese, have gone from the idiotic idea that peasants should run everything (look up the Great Purge or the Cultural Revolution for details) and understood that Science is the only way. Watch Yuval Harari [youtube.com] expound this view better than I could.
The advantage they have is that both Russia and China have authoritarian governments, so what Joe Sixpack thinks is irrelevant while in the U.S., Joe is electing representatives that want to bring back the 16th century.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:26AM
It's also a huge disadvantage. Science doesn't work so well in authoritarian societies.
(Score: 0, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:21AM
You call *him* stupid? You took the "high road" and had to look for a new job, the people in the stores along with the rockstar sales people either lost their jobs or had to find new employment, but Mr Economics PhD still sits under the moose's head. Profits have dropped, but so have costs, risk of key employees leaving and endangering profits has been eliminated, and his income has probably gone up. Furthermore, having a PhD on a board is sexy, so after a United Way dinner, his neighbor at the table set up a sweet new board position for him.
(Score: 2, Troll) by jmorris on Thursday September 06 2018, @03:01AM (7 children)
Wrong. Learn the difference between Owner, Partner, Officer, Shareholder, Bondholder and Employee.
Employees have the least risk and therefore must be last to share the rewards of success. If the business fails the Owner loses his ass along with the Partners. Literally, they can lose everything they own since liability is unlimited. Shareholders can only lose their investment, although in theory their reward is unlimited. Bondholders have a fixed reward but must be paid back over almost all other considerations as compensation for the capped reward so their risk is far less. All have different risk / reward profiles but all have a role to play. The most problematic is Officer, i.e. an officer in a publicly traded corporation, their risk is minimal yet their rewards are increasingly unlimited. Stock options and such were well intended efforts to align the motives of Officers with the risk / reward of Shareholders but the practice hasn't worked out well.
Employees are at most out a final paycheck and being forced back onto the labor market. Because of this they are not entitled to share in the fruits of success to any extent beyond their own contributions. Notable performance should be rewarded, both individually and perhaps even on the workgroup / dept level but not so much the success of the whole enterprise. Employees can of course also be in the ownership classes, owning shares, bonds or being Partners and then they of course DO get the rewards along with the risks. But any investment manager will warn against investing overly in one's workplace as it puts too many eggs into one basket. If your employer fails you lose your job AND your investment / retirement funds. Most employees do NOT want to assume the risks of being a Capitalist, which is why they are working for someone instead of starting their own business.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Thursday September 06 2018, @10:39AM (5 children)
That is complete and utter bullshit. The little guy often has everything he owns staked on the little trickle of money he gets from that one job. Everything, and possibly his health and wellbeing, not to mention his family's health and wellbeing. That job IS his life.
Other than the owner/manager, all the rest of your examples have mostly expendable funds invested. NONE of them are going to miss a meal, or have to choose between rent or medical needs, because the plant shuts down.
Please just stop imagining that the upper crust is so very special. They're just people, and they don't DESERVE any more consideration than the peons working to make their money.
(Score: 2, Disagree) by khallow on Thursday September 06 2018, @12:16PM (4 children)
You're not getting it. All that little guy has to do is get another job with all his equipment and work environment provided for by the new employer. As to the bad decisions that result in a huge dependence on a job? He could just not do that. It's tiresome to have this continual conflation of poor choices with necessity.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:44PM (1 child)
The irony is rich here. As if we're at negative unemployment so that every little guy who suddenly finds his sole source of income gone will have a line of employers outside his door waiting looking to hire him.
The "bad decision" is to live in a society that values personal ownership of the means to provide for basic necessities and not to be born to parents who are already independently wealthy. That combination means the vast majority of us need a job if we want to have food, shelter, clothing, and health care.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @03:20AM
What's supposed to be "bad" about that? It works after all.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by digitalaudiorock on Thursday September 06 2018, @05:44PM
FTFY.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Thursday September 06 2018, @10:02PM
That's not entirely off. But, the same applies to you, the business owner. You've invested 18 hours a day, about 360 days a year, for the past 15 years. And, the business finally goes teats up. And, all that YOU have to do to put bread on the table, is to go down the street, and get another job.
Oh - down the street, Old Sam is working. He's the shop superviser there now. He used to work for you, but you treated him like shit, and underpaid him. When you go in to ask for a job, you'll have to look Old Sam in the eye, and wonder how he's going to treat you. Forget about getting any raises any time in Sam's lifetime. You'll start at minimum wage, and you'll retire at minimum wage.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @07:11PM
I think you are interpreting it differently than I did.
My take was to pay people well. Not necessarily mountains of money. Just well. Especially if they are making you rich. They are also making the investors rich. So pay them well.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @07:06PM
If only you could be modded higher sir.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by bob_super on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:01AM (4 children)
> We want low wage jobs to be an option if we want people to have a route out of poverty.
Ever heard the concept "working poor", you dear dimwit ?
(Score: 1, Troll) by khallow on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:16AM (3 children)
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:27PM (2 children)
I didn't give you that troll mod, but you know you deserve it.
I keep meeting people from the Hard-Working Poor. For all the promises of opportunity, very often life sucks and you can't get far enough ahead to offset disease, terrible luck, prejudice, and accidents.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Working_poor [wikipedia.org]
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:54PM
Yeah, these fools think there are infinite markets so if someone just applies themselves then they will make good money. It is an irrational belief so no amount of discussion will change their mind. The only way they will get it is if we strip them of everyrhing but a few clothes and stick them in one of the crappy situations. However, there is limited mobility so we would have to take millions of these fools so thst they could see the proper stats. Maybe a small scale would work if they had to start out at minimum wage and could only use that job on their resumes.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @04:11AM
(Score: 5, Insightful) by jelizondo on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:06AM (1 child)
You don’t go far enough. No one is “owed” a wage, period. Let’s get the government out of this entirely, no more handouts.
Employers should give employees shelter, some food and clothing in exchange for their labor and it should be more than enough. Some might call this slavery, but in reality it prevents tax dollars being handed out willy-nilly.
It’s called reductio ad absurdum [wikipedia.org].
You must realize that the economy keeps chugging along because wage earners spend their money, if they have no money to spend, the economy tanks. Of course the economy can stay afloat by wage earners going into debt, but at some point, no more loans are available and the economy tanks. Rich people do not spend as much of their earnings as middle class and poor people. Even Henry Ford [wikipedia.org] realized this.
Companies that pay very low salaries are not being capitalistic, they are being abusive: your tax dollars subsidizes their profit. And that is not capitalism, it is inverse socialism.
(Score: 3, Informative) by c0lo on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:29AM
It is called corporate welfare.
Have pity of that poor corporation, it's a person too. It must record profits or else it dies, you insensitive clod.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 5, Insightful) by bobthecimmerian on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:58AM (10 children)
If low wage jobs were a route out of poverty then how come the number of Americans working low wage jobs is increasing? Explain that.
Atlas Shrugged is one giant joke. The capitalists are the hardest workers, they never lie, they never cheat, they never steal. If that reminds you of any modern American business leader, you're out of your mind. Every single person that wasn't a capitalist in that book was lazy, stupid, evil, or all three together. Comic book villains are more interesting and likable than the people Dagny, Hank, and John went up against. It was a wild fantasy.
And George Orwell was a communist. He hated authoritarianism, not the redistribution of wealth. Modern day free market libertarians are the ones creating 1984, by dismantling everything blocking the oligarchs from taking control.
Our country had much higher taxes on the rich, higher minimum wage relative to cost of living, and much stronger worker unions in the 1950s. There were plenty of other problems - racism, sexism, and so forth. But the middle class was far stronger than it is now. Somehow Ayn Rand, Reagan, the Bushes, and the Trumps have convinced half the country that returning our politics and economics to that find is a path right into Stalin 2.0. It's all lies to keep the oligarchs in power, and it worked on you.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Gaaark on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:17AM (2 children)
Yes, Atlas Shrugged is a joke: comic book characters on the level of L.Ron Hubbard's Mission Earth. Good guys are ultra good, bad guys are ultra bad.
In the book the good guys pay decent wages. In reality they pay like ass, usually...and are corrupt enough to force laws to benefit themselves.
Atlas Shrugged is a joke.
And Galt's speech that has people weeping, it's the best speech ever given? 80 pages (yes 80 fecking pages!) of things like "This is this and that is that" and "A is A and B is B".
Fecking awful book. I'm always surprised when I hear someone say it's their favourite book.
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. ---Gaaark 2.0 ---
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:45AM
Hey! No slagging on Mission Earth. Those were awesome and I'll fight anybody who disagrees!
Anyone who didn't roll on the floor laughing at least a few times has a defective sense of humor. Hell of a way to go, write a ten volume mega book raising a giant middle finger to everybody who ever pissed ya off in your life, timed to release after you are in the grave to assure you get the last word.
(Score: 1) by Goghit on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:03PM
I was only able to get 50 pages into it. I want that 50 pages of my life back.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by jmorris on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:39AM (4 children)
Don't ask a question unless you want an answer.
Globalism. When you are forced to compete with some dirt world person who will work their ass off for a bowl of rice, and there are billions of them, that kinda puts downward pressure on wages for any job that can be outsourced to those guys.
It was, like 1984, written to make a political point. The characters are all overly exaggerated stereotypes but with enough Truth in them to recognize the reality in them being exaggerated. Successful Capitalists generally are hard driven types, not quite to the extent as in Miss Rand's fictionalized world but we all recognize the reality there. The bad guys are also over the top but turn on C-SPAN and you can see where those characters are drawn from as they too are eternal archtypes who actually exist, just not in quite the pure forms in the novel. Galt is a too perfect hero, not so much a Mary Sue for Rand, more like an idealized Heroic Man's Man she really kinda wishes would come and screw her brains out and put the babies she never had in her womb. You won't see me defending Miss Rand, her Objectivism or generic Libertarianism overly much. Point being the modern Progressives are taking cautionary tales and bringing them, if not to life, to legislation. Not a good thing.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:38AM (1 child)
Globalism is just an excuse, other countries don't have this level of disparity, the reason for it is greed and a tax/regulatory structure that encourages it.
Other countries don't let corporations book losses on money that hasn't been repatriated and other countries have universal healthcare that prevents employees from going bankrupt due to health conditions. Other countries also have laws to protect the citizens from predatory lenders and offer a real education to the youth.
Globalism didn't cause this, corrupt and incompetent leaders allowed this market failure. Done right, globalism could have been great for Americans.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @12:22PM
What is wrong with the level of disparity? Particularly, when most of the disparity is based on goods that aren't universally desired and disparity would happen anyway? Almost no one I know wants exotic financial derivatives or bitcoins, for example.
Other countries don't have broad taxation laws where repatriated money gets taxed. And universal health care routinely doesn't fix the underlying health problems, meaning you still can go bankrupt from the health problem even in the presence of universal health care. And the US has those laws against predatory lenders and those "real education" to the youth.
Market failure? You haven't mentioned a thing that involves markets, much less failures of markets.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by bobthecimmerian on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:27PM (1 child)
The US had production inside the country from slave labor in the form of prisons in the 1950s, and there was nothing stopping them from buying junk made by South Americans for a bowl of rice or local equivalent per day. Try again.
I'm not an ally with state socialists. Instead of asshole oligarchs fucking everyone else you have asshole bureaucrats fucking everyone else. My own sympathies lean towards anarcho-communism: small mostly independent communities with the same anti-capitalist ideas as the socialists but the only government is local direct democracy instead of a bureaucracy that spirals into Stalin + Mao: Electric Bugaloo.
But if you think modern capitalist leaders have more in common with John Galt and Dagny Taggert than they do with James Taggert, you're out of your mind. Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Mark Cuban, Page and Brin, Walt Disney, Jeff Bezos, Sam Walton, Steve Jobs, the Koch brothers - they all have colossal work ethics, but they also have the morals of Al Capone. The only reason they don't hire assassins to take out the competition is that they're not certain they could get away with it. False advertising, FUD campaigns, monopoly deals, bribing government officials, screwing business partners, working employees until they're burned out or sick and then tossing them aside like trash, knowing employees qualify for federal assistance programs and keeping wages low, burying competitors in junk lawsuits.
"They worked 70 hour work weeks for years and are incredibly smart!" So what? That describes my plumber too, why don't you give him 15 billion dollars?
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday September 07 2018, @12:36PM
This is another way Ayn Rand hits the mark. The villains in her books always use moral arguments when they have no other basis on which to propagate their odious behaviors and beliefs. Morality is the last refuse of the immoral. Here, you mention almost a dozen people, who happen to make your list merely because they were wealthy and well known, and assert without any sort of factual basis that they'd be killing people, if they thought they could get away with it. It's not an insightful moral observation, it's libel.
Notice that not a one of those things, even when it is somewhat immoral, is on the level of assassinating people.
If he creates the next business worth several tens of billions of dollars, then I would have no trouble at all with doing that.
(Score: 5, Funny) by fritsd on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:20PM (1 child)
Hey, did you hear this one:
A quote from John Rogers [wikiquote.org] (I don't know who that is)
(Score: 2) by bobthecimmerian on Saturday September 08 2018, @07:10PM
I have encountered it before, but thanks for the reminder. :)
(Score: 5, Insightful) by requerdanos on Thursday September 06 2018, @01:45PM (2 children)
Please mod parent up not because he is correct nor insightful (he isn't), but because his stated viewpoints, though narrow and unpopular, do, in fact add to the discussion by pointing out an extant viewpoint that must be considered in the overall problem that the bill in TFA seems intended to address.
If someone is simply unpopularly wrong, that doesn't make him troll, flamebait, or spam. You idiots (you know who you are).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @04:22PM (1 child)
oh allright then.. it's now +1 Troll.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @07:17PM
I've managed a +5 Troll on both this site and the green site before. So it can be done.
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 06 2018, @02:11PM (1 child)
What do people owe society? What does society owe people? Unless you want unproductive people, including people who are simply in circumstance and not by choice, to simply die. If that option isn't palatable then the question is how are those people enabled to live. But I'm sure you're basically a heartless bastard who thinks they can just eat cake.
You certainly can define "living wage" in any number of dimensions. There just isn't a universally agreed upon metric for it. But like indecency, you can know it when you see it. People who are employed, living a modest life, who nevertheless have to take public assistance to eat is not a living wage.
Low wage jobs are, on a societal level, digging oneself out of a hole these days. Don't do something about this and you get a continuously increasing mass of people who are employed but yet rely upon the government to survive on a continual basis. Or you'll get a mob who will happily string up anybody they feel is responsible for the system.
(Score: 2) by DannyB on Thursday September 06 2018, @07:16PM
What we get: a society of young people unwilling to do anything because they are convinced that they have no future.
If they believed they had a future (even if it were not true) then they would work to build that future. (Of course, if the promise is false, they are smart enough to figure that out sooner rather than later.)
When trying to solve a problem don't ask who suffers from the problem, ask who profits from the problem.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Friday September 07 2018, @06:20PM (4 children)
No, the premise is that the cost of feeding and housing your employees should be paid by the people who actually require their services. Why the fuck am I forced to subsidize a Walmart employee's wages when I don't even shop at Walmart? If you've got an answer for that which isn't "Well we should just kill people who aren't sufficiently profitable", then maybe I'll consider that you may have a worthwhile idea or two.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Friday September 07 2018, @08:35PM (3 children)
Still missing the point. The value of an employee's work is unrelated to their living expenses. Both numbers vary wildly. Imagine a 2D plot with employee pay on one axis and employee expense on the other. Your policy proposal draws a line across that space and says those people in the bad part of the graph are unemployable, that those people either have to find a higher paying job (if they could, they would, so realistically we will assume that isn't an option) or live on the dole, because employers WILL NOT, because they CAN NOT, pay more than a job is worth to them.
Imagine you are an employer (not likely with your attitude but it is a thought experiment) and you are hiring a new person to work in your lawn care business. You have some morals and want to Hire American so day labor picked off the parking lot of Home Depot isn't your thing. Morals or not, if you pay more than $X you won't make money competing in the local environment. So in walks a kid who lives at home, going to college and wants to work for you part time for extra cash. Next comes a recently laid off father of four with a mortgage who would work full time and any overtime you can give because he needs the money, even though the $X you can pay won't cover all of his expenses. Your intuition tells you the kid is likely to be a bit flaky on attendance but will probably work the season. Dad will be on the prowl for a better gig and will bail if he finds one, but will be reliable until then. You say you would prefer to work around the slacker kid's schedule and let the father go on the dole, that it in fact be illegal for you to choose otherwise. I suspect you would prefer a different choice be available if actually hiring someone. And once you agree with me that the dad would also agree, the debate ends.
Don't get too lost in statistics, remember your policy proposals will destroy real human lives if you push through something dumb. Don't be evil. It is a good motto, just didn't belong at an Evil outfit like Google.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Monday September 10 2018, @11:34AM (2 children)
What you seem to be ignoring is that any people who are affected by this law are *already* "on the dole". We can either pay them public benefits to go LARP as a restocking bot, or we can pay them public benefits to do whatever they choose, which hopefully is something a bit more useful to society. And even if most of them spend all day watching TV and muching Cheetos, it's still not really any worse.
Yes, and this law would likely increase the possible values of X by increasing costs for your competition.
The argument entirely relies on the premise that the dad is already relying on public assistance, and would continue to rely on public assistance once he gets this new job. You know what they do when you get a job while you're on public assistance? They cut your benefits by an amount proportionate to your income. So by taking this job, dad doesn't really get more money to support his family, but he does have less time to look for a better job or to improve his skills. The only way taking that job helps him is if it's actually going to give him some relevant, marketable skills. But if he gets offered the job and refuses, he could lose his benefits. So the best possible world would seem to be one where he would not be offered the job unless it's going to pay a decent wage. Which seems to be something that you think is a problem rather than a possible solution. This bill does not exist in isolation, and if you ignore the existing system in which it exists while analyzing it, you're going to draw an incorrect conclusion.
(Score: 2) by jmorris on Monday September 10 2018, @06:37PM (1 child)
You do not understand the horror of the Welfare State. Dad would be trying desperately to tread water while job hunting, tapping savings, accumulating credit card debt, wife working extra job / extra hours. The Welfare State is not for taxpaying Solid Citizens down on their luck. You can get a few things, unemployment obviously, a few handouts; but to get the major ones requires destroying your family and everything you worked to build. Can't own a home so have to sell it and move into a rental, any savings have to be fully depleted, including the kids college funds. And the big money isn't available to the family until the wife divorces her loser husband and becomes a single mom married to Uncle Sugar. He lives a hunted life in a crappy apartment as the State chasing him for back child support he obviously doesn't have. That is what failing from the Middle to the Lower Class in America looks like, you want to make that problem worse.
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Monday September 10 2018, @06:56PM
...which is no different than if dad got a job that won't pay enough to cover his bills, except that he's gonna lose eight hours a day to that job as well.
Once again, how does that change if he's on welfare with a job or welfare without a job? The only change is that if he's on welfare without a job, they don't have an income figure to subtract from his benefits payments. And he's got more free time to *actually* get his shit together rather than getting stuck not even treading water in a job he can't afford to stay at but can't afford to leave either.
And you apparently want the middle class to be converted to day laborers. I don't see the advantage in that. What I want is for the existing problem to be paid for by the people who are actually creating the problem. THEN we can better discuss how much they need to be paying. You'll never see me advocating a reduction to the social safety net, I'm just opposed to it being used as a form of handouts to the wealthiest business owners the world has ever seen. Fund it PROPERLY, then we can look into expanding it.