• PeepinGoodArgs@reddthat.com
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    1 year ago

    Capitalism just means you get paid voluntarily for your work

    Exactly. The payment is voluntary, every from the amount to being paid at all. That’s why minimum wage isn’t a livable wage and why employers engage in wage theft at levels that dwarf all other forms of theft. But hey, I supposed you’re not in a slave camp in China.

    • M Force @exploding-heads.comOP
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      1 year ago

      Yes if you agree to work for slave wages that’s your fault. Not the employers. If your boss is stealing you can report him and quit. If it’s to hard to find a good job blame immigrants.

      • PeepinGoodArgs@reddthat.com
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        1 year ago
        1. What meaningful alternative does someone have who only qualifies for slave wages have? Homelessness and destitution?
        2. The institutions that police employers are woefully underfunded, like the National Labor Review Board. And what does quitting accomplish?
        3. If immigrants are the reason good jobs don’t exist, then why not tell employers to choose native-born people? Or is it my responsibility to be more attractive in the labor market than immigrants? Whose choice is determinative here: the employers, the native-born employees, or the immigrants?
        • M Force @exploding-heads.comOP
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          1 year ago

          What meaningful alternative does someone have who only qualifies for slave wages have?

          Is it the employer’s responsibility to help pay someone more than they are worth, who wasted their life instead of getting good at something?

          If I pay someone 10$ to mop a floor because that person wants to make some money and this is how I can help am I evil for not giving them 80k per year if I only make 100K?

          Whose choice is determinative here: the employers, the native-born employees, or the immigrants?

          We live in a democracy. Rich people like cheap labor. Two things will always be true.

          1. Rich people will always want cheap immigrant labor.
          2. There will always be fewer rich people than normal people.

          So go vote to stop immigration and vote to fund employment training.

          Or is it my responsibility to be more attractive in the labor market than immigrants?

          The person most responsible for yourself will always be yourself.

          • PeepinGoodArgs@reddthat.com
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            1 year ago

            Is it the employer’s responsibility to help pay someone more than they are worth, who wasted their life instead of getting good at something?

            Your classism is leaking through in your shoddy logic that implies someone that demands a low market wage “wasted their life”. I think it speaks a lot about someone that conflates remuneration and the good life. Like, rich people kill themselves all the time, which suggest there’s no relationship between the two. Rich people also do immoral shit all the time, which leads to a really bad time eventually, like going to prison. So, again…that suggests no relationship between the two. And yet here you are…

            Anyway, you know what else is true? Just because something is always true doesn’t mean it must be the way it is. Not that this is my preferred solution, but if rich people want to fuck over everyone, then there shouldn’t be rich people. Thus, what you said can be true and the forces that encourage cheap immigrant labor won’t have a chance to manifest. Then we have both immigrants and good jobs. See how I didn’t have to scapegoat innocent people who are not “wasting their life” by “getting good at something”? It’s funny that you ask me vote against them now while disparaging them before.

            The person most responsible for yourself will always be yourself.

            Yes, duh, but that’s not what I asked.

            • M Force @exploding-heads.comOP
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              1 year ago

              Classism. Lol some rich kid who took to much shit college is gonna lecture me on what class I am.

              then there shouldn’t be rich people.

              Again there will always be rich people because some people are just better than other people. You will never stop that. There will be moms who smoke crack pregnant and make a dumb kid. Some people are just genetically unlucky. You can change who the current rich people are. That’s called war. But you will just switch who the rich people are. Not remove them.

              Go see the grand daughter of Mao Zi Dong in China.

              She is rich. Because all they did about classism is kill some of the current rich people, along with a bunch of poor people and make new rich people.

              Then we have both immigrants and good job

              Just shows how little you understand about supple and demand and how finite resources work.

              Did you not understand my example?

              If a boss makes 90k per year how can he pay his cleaner 80k per year?

              He can’t. You can make everyone poor I guess. But it will be worse not better than capitalism. And eventually capitalism will come back because it’s the natural way of producing goods and services

              • PeepinGoodArgs@reddthat.com
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                1 year ago

                Lol some rich kid who took to much shit college is gonna lecture me on what class I am.

                I get “good at something” and don’t “waste my life”, and you denigrate me for it. This just goes to show it’s never about the other person. There’s something wrong with you that allows you to treat people who don’t get good at something and fail to become successful (financially) poorly and do the same to those who do.

                Also, I didn’t say what class you’re in. Poor people can be as classist as the rich, and often are.

                If a boss makes 90k per year how can he pay his cleaner 80k per year?

                Proof of concept: Dan Price and Gravity.

                It was six years ago when CEO Dan Price raised the salary of everyone at his Seattle-based credit card processing company Gravity Payments to at least $70,000 a year. Price slashed his own salary by $1 million to be able to give his employees a pay raise. He was hailed a hero by some and met with predictions of bankruptcy from his critics. But that has not happened; instead, the company is thriving.

                It makes sense that you’d think it’s impossible because capitalism emaciates the political imagination. A CEO must make way more than the lowest paid employee! Except that isn’t a law of nature. It’s a choice by the executive management. The fact that everyone makes the wrong does not make it right.

                Okay, this is boring. I’ll see you on another thread.

                • M Force @exploding-heads.comOP
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                  1 year ago

                  That dude still owned the fucking company. And it was a publicity stunt. Elon musk goes years without a paycheck. That doesn’t mean anything. The CEO still owned the company which is worth millions when he sells it.

                  You keep using the word Capitalism in your critique but have not given a single example of a working solution. That spans whole economies. Because you can’t. Every attempt has failed.

            • markeuzu@exploding-heads.com
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              1 year ago

              Like, rich people kill themselves all the time, which suggest there’s no relationship between the two

              Posting a fallacy. Everyone knows rich people are on average happier than poor people. Up to a certain point it has a massive improvement in happiness and stagnates above a certain point.

              There are dozens of studies that show that wealth correlates with happiness. Which is kinda obvious as well.

              So yes, there is a correlation.

              Again, your issue is with democracy and not capitalism. Its a flawed system but the only one that will ever work in this world.

              Any other option never worked out and usually had genocides as result.

              • logen@exploding-heads.com
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                1 year ago

                If anything, the problem is probably more with the Republic concept rather than democracy. Democracy has its problem of that the minority always loses, but Republics… That’s just putting power into the hands of the few. Which tends to come back to the wealthy.

              • PeepinGoodArgs@reddthat.com
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                1 year ago

                your issue is with democracy and not capitalism

                Go on. How is my issue with democracy?

                Its a flawed system but the only one that will ever work in this world.

                What do you mean “work”? Because fuedalism “worked” just fine, too, along with monarchies and other forms of government and distributions of power. They all “worked” just fine…for everybody that wasn’t oppressed by it. I’m not sure how capitalism meaningfully differs in that respect from any of the other versions.

                • markeuzu@exploding-heads.com
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                  1 year ago

                  Your problems are all related to economics and can be fixed with the right laws. Capitalism just has the inherent problem of edging on the border of abuse of the working man if not left in check.

                  Democracy with short term roles has the issue of politicians chasing short term goals to convince the public to vote for them again.

                  We get those weird situations in which some folks get massive taxbreaks and others get nothing nada.

                  Feel free to correct me if im wrong.

                  • PeepinGoodArgs@reddthat.com
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                    1 year ago

                    Capitalism just has the inherent problem of edging on the border of abuse of the working man if not left in check.

                    Not just the working man. Climate change is a direct response to fossil fuel executives knowing the potential for climate change and then going out their way to suppress that information for decades. Infamously known for his appreciation of capitalism, part of Marx’s criticism of capitalism was that it devoured everything.

                    I’m not sure there’s a such thing as “right” laws, but yes, laws can address some of the issues. But that’s like chaining a killer dog: the second you get lax, your dog might end up doing what comes naturally to it.

          • logen@exploding-heads.com
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            1 year ago

            Wut?

            Everyone likes cheap labor. The poor like cheap labor because it keeps prices down. The rich like it because it keeps profits up.

            • M Force @exploding-heads.comOP
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              1 year ago

              Poor people generally do not like cheap labor. One of the main reasons the north didn’t like slaves in America was because poor free white people could not compete in the job market with cheaper slaves. Example modern times. Upper class people like cheap labor to cut their grass.(Mexicans) Poor people are going to cut their own grass, whether it’s 40$ or 25$.

              • logen@exploding-heads.com
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                1 year ago

                Fair enough, but I suppose it doesn’t really matter for the poor.

                If there’s not cheap labor, prices will have to go up, so really, cheap labor or costly labor, either way, the poor person on the bottom is still the poor person on the bottom.

                You mention grass, but just take all the made in china stuff. That’s all about taking advantage of cheap labor. Everyone seems to have a phone these days, even the poor. Maybe, if that wasn’t the case, we’d have lots of jobs that pay well, but that still results in higher cost of goods so no one is really doing better because of it.

                Outside of technological advancements, I’m not sure how it’s possible to pay low skilled laborers well. When you increase the cost of basic labor, the cost of basic goods go up with it.

                • M Force @exploding-heads.comOP
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                  1 year ago

                  Immigration hurts wages. Poor people don’t need a cheap Barbie doll or cheap iphone. They would be better off with a construction job, building their own house on cheap land but illegal Mexicans make that impossible. The Mexicans don’t pay taxes. If they start to get caught they just go back to Mexico. They form groups that don’t hire Americans. Happens in every immigration community in one way or another.

        • logen@exploding-heads.com
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          1 year ago

          Jobs don’t exist when people don’t create them. It’s not business owners’ fault that the majority of people would rather take the easy route of working for them rather than run their own business. They are literally helping people survive that cannot survive on their own merits or are too lazy to bother. Your earnings and earning potential is your own business, not anyone else’s.

          So yes, people can create their own jobs, it’s how it’s been most of human history. The employee employer relationship, as it is now, is pretty recent.

          • PeepinGoodArgs@reddthat.com
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            1 year ago

            Your earnings and earning potential is your own business, not anyone else’s.

            This just ignores like…the entire history of capitalism and its justifications. Frankly, it’s incoherent in any context. I mean you explicitly say people are working for others and then say my earnings and earning potential is on me and me alone. Because the one I’m working for has absolutely no say in my earnings or earnings potential.

            • logen@exploding-heads.com
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              1 year ago

              They are on you and you alone. You can choose to work at some job an employer offers at whatever deal you agree to, or you can run your own business.

              Just because an employer has a say in how much they pay, doesnt mean you can’t go a different way.

              Of course the easy way is cheap… If employers are the complaint, create your own income streams.

    • markeuzu@exploding-heads.com
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      1 year ago

      That’s why minimum wage isn’t a livable wage and why employers engage in wage theft at levels that dwarf all other forms of theft.

      I fail how to see that this is an issue of capitalism? Isnt it on the people to vote someone in that will raise minimum wages?

      This looks like an inherent problem with democracy, not capitalism.

      • PeepinGoodArgs@reddthat.com
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        1 year ago

        You don’t see how employers committing wage theft, paying people less than they’re legally owed, reporting it as reduced expenses, and being lauded for their financial prowess by investors while workers are employed in two or three jobs is a problem of capitalism?

        Rather, it’s a problem with democracy, wherein the inability to vote in someone to raise minimum wage is the real issue.

        God…it’s like people go out of their way to just be wrong. It’s like you think to yourself, “How can I let rich people get away with as much as possible? Oh! Blame literally everybody that isn’t a rich person!” Genius

        • markeuzu@exploding-heads.com
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          1 year ago

          I posted my reply to you in the other comment. Im taking you 100% serious on this incase you think im arguing in bad faith.