Why is FAIR TRADE better than FREE TRADE?

[laughing dog]

I have, but you don't want to face the facts, that workers have been losing their market share of production even while the rich have been increasing their wealth in leaps and bounds...that this situation is not sustainable in the long term, probably not even in the medium term: the next fifty years or so.

You continue to assert this but your "proof" neglects the money going to tooling.

Can you point to where in the National Income and Product Accounts, income for "tooling" appears?

 

[DBT]

I have, but you don't want to face the facts, that workers have been losing their market share of production even while the rich have been increasing their wealth in leaps and bounds...that this situation is not sustainable in the long term, probably not even in the medium term: the next fifty years or so.

You continue to assert this but your "proof" neglects the money going to tooling.

Money that goes into tooling is factored into the cost to benefit ration of installing new machinery. If there was no financial benefit in retooling or mechanization, there would be no point in going down that road.

Your objection is irrelevant.

 

[DBT]

All the work is being done with simple hand tools. The only substantial tool in there is the conveyor belts. Contrast that with my former employer's factory--we had an overhead conveyor like in your video, but most tasks in the shop was performed on a machine that cost at least as much as a year's wages for it's operator(s), the most expensive machines cost more like 10x the wage of it's operator(s). I have not been on the factory floor of my current employer but my impression is the machinery cost per worker is substantially higher.

Machinery cost does not paint the full picture of production, profits, market value of work performed, etc...

I wasn't trying to paint the full cost, I was trying to show a cost that was vastly greater than it was in the old days.

In real terms, allowing for inflation, how much greater? Do you have the figures? While you are at it, what about projected or realized profit margins?

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Why isn't VOLUNTEER work illegal? if workers must be paid minimum wage?

There is an obvious difference between volunteer work and paid work: paid work is done to maintain a household in some manner while unpaid volunteer work is not.

You can't dictate this difference between volunteer work and paid work. Just because this might be so in most cases, there's nothing preventing someone from doing paid work for some other need, such as saving for a later business investment, or because they want money for gambling, or they want money to donate to a worthy cause (or unworthy cause), or many other possible purposes.

In some cases they may want the job for prestige, or even for a hobby interest, and the money is not the main motivation. In some cases a real job is done for free, which others are paid for, and maybe that free worker is later hired -- or then again maybe not.

There are all kinds of motivations for doing a paid job, and probably in most cases there other secondary motivations in addition to the household need. And what is a "household"? What about someone who travels so much that there is no one location? no house or apartment or continual living place? Is there still a "household"? What about a homeless person with a paying job? What's the "household" in that case?

And what about someone maintaining a household but NOT having a job to pay for it? What about winning the lottery or other form of income, and paying for the "household" with that source? Is that source of income then a "job" because it's used to maintain a "household"?

You can't dictate what a "job" is, or a paying job, by imposing your requirement of what the money is to be spent on. The worker being hired is not required to have a "household" to maintain as a condition for being hired. The employer does not require a proof of "household" certification before hiring the job applicant. Maintaining a "household" is not inherently an essential part of what the paying job is about.

What if a worker goes on a long trip, at very high cost, way beyond anything to do with maintaining a "household"? Maybe that's the main motivation for having the job -- i.e., to pay for lengthy expensive traveling. Is that traveling, seeing the world, etc., the same thing as "maintaining a household"?

Or a worker might put his earnings, or most of it, into an account to be used for some uncertain future investment, or for some project which is not a "household" in any sense. It might just be a fund for some possible future use which isn't determined yet, and might end up being spent on something unrelated to anything about maintaining a "household" -- this doesn't change the fact that it's a paying job, and the employer has no reason to fire this employee for misusing his earnings:

"You're fired! We just discovered that you're misspending your paycheck on something other than maintaining a household!"

No -- cut it out! That's not what a paying job is, or the difference between volunteer work and paid work.

A worker is free to give all his earnings to a worthy cause if he wants to. Maybe some have done that, or at least given a large part, even most, of their earnings to a cause other than that of maintaining a "household."

So you have not explained why minimum wage should not apply to volunteer work, or makes volunteer work illegal, or why volunteers should not also be paid minimum wage as a legal requirement.

Also, some volunteer work does involve a small benefit to the worker, like a free meal, or other "payment" which is unofficial, but just as real, and which is far less than minimum wage. And the worker may actually do the job for that benefit, maybe in desperation, because they can't get hired in a regular job, or they cannot manage the longer hours of a regular job. So they are in effect "paid" for their volunteer work, and it's much much less than minimum wage.

So you are not distinguishing volunteer work from paid work. And you're not answering why it's OK to put people to work at ZERO wage -- volunteer work -- while at the same time imposing minimum wage requirements onto paid work. All work is work, no matter what the worker spends the money on (if it's paid work), and no matter whether the worker is paid or is doing it for free.

That crucial difference is so obvious, one wonders why anyone bothered to bring it up.

No, it's not a crucial difference. Maintaining a "household" is not a crucial requirement for a paid worker to spend his earnings on. You're free to take a job and spend your money on anything you wish. Much of one's income from a job is spent on items unrelated to maintaining a household. Even most in some cases.

 

[laughing dog]

You can't dictate this difference between volunteer work and paid work. Just because this might be so in most cases, there's nothing preventing someone from doing paid work for some other need, such as saving for a later business investment, or because they want money for gambling, or they want money to donate to a worthy cause (or unworthy cause), or many other possible purposes. .....

"Maintaining a household" includes the maintaining (or attempting to maintain) the well-being of any household member which might include any of the possibilities in your interminable wall of text. And to anyone familiar with economics understands, "well-being" is judged by the individual in question, not by an outsider.

Which means the obvious difference has been explained to you. Of course, whether or not you acknowledge that is a completely different question.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I have, but you don't want to face the facts, that workers have been losing their market share of production even while the rich have been increasing their wealth in leaps and bounds...that this situation is not sustainable in the long term, probably not even in the medium term: the next fifty years or so.

You continue to assert this but your "proof" neglects the money going to tooling.

Money that goes into tooling is factored into the cost to benefit ration of installing new machinery. If there was no financial benefit in retooling or mechanization, there would be no point in going down that road.

Your objection is irrelevant.

You have said this before, you haven't established the relevance. It's only profitable with the lower % going to the direct workers--as has been pointed out the money is now going to the tooling-builders rather than the workers.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I wasn't trying to paint the full cost, I was trying to show a cost that was vastly greater than it was in the old days.

In real terms, allowing for inflation, how much greater? Do you have the figures? While you are at it, what about projected or realized profit margins?

Note that I expressed it in terms of worker's pay, not $--inflation isn't an issue.

Other than the conveyors in that video I saw nothing that would cost even a day's pay.

 

[DBT]

Money that goes into tooling is factored into the cost to benefit ration of installing new machinery. If there was no financial benefit in retooling or mechanization, there would be no point in going down that road.

Your objection is irrelevant.

You have said this before, you haven't established the relevance. It's only profitable with the lower % going to the direct workers--as has been pointed out the money is now going to the tooling-builders rather than the workers.

Unlike you, I have supported what I say but it appears to be ignored. I could post the stats and examples of exploitation again but I suspect it would just be ignored.

 

[DBT]

I wasn't trying to paint the full cost, I was trying to show a cost that was vastly greater than it was in the old days.

In real terms, allowing for inflation, how much greater? Do you have the figures? While you are at it, what about projected or realized profit margins?

Note that I expressed it in terms of worker's pay, not $--inflation isn't an issue.

Other than the conveyors in that video I saw nothing that would cost even a day's pay.

That's just hand waving. ''I saw nothing...'' is meaningless. You need to provide information to back your claims, stats, figures. Something specific.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Money that goes into tooling is factored into the cost to benefit ration of installing new machinery. If there was no financial benefit in retooling or mechanization, there would be no point in going down that road.

Your objection is irrelevant.

You have said this before, you haven't established the relevance. It's only profitable with the lower % going to the direct workers--as has been pointed out the money is now going to the tooling-builders rather than the workers.

Unlike you, I have supported what I say but it appears to be ignored. I could post the stats and examples of exploitation again but I suspect it would just be ignored.

You think you have supported it but you've never addressed the issue--the money is going to other workers, not just the direct workers.

 

[DBT]

Unlike you, I have supported what I say but it appears to be ignored. I could post the stats and examples of exploitation again but I suspect it would just be ignored.

You think you have supported it but you've never addressed the issue--the money is going to other workers, not just the direct workers.

What is that supposed to mean? It doesn't appear to be related to what I said, or the issue of growing inequality.

Which, to remind you, looks something like this:

In the last 15 years, inequality has spiralled
''If the national minimum wage had kept pace with FTSE 100 CEO salaries since 1999, it would now be £18.89 per hour instead of £6.50. However, for some reason broadcasters rarely ask CEOs about the gulf between their pay and that of the poorest staff in their organisations. The unstated implication is that the lowest-paid staff are lucky to have any job at all, and only have what they have thanks to the benevolence of the 1%, with their superior leadership skills.

If the top 1% actually created more jobs as they became wealthier, then ordinary people would be surrounded by employment opportunities in both the US and the UK. Instead, it is in Germany, where the wealthiest 1% receives in pay and bonuses half as much as their counterparts in the US, that unemployment is at a 20-year low. In countries that keep their top 1% in check, the highest earners work more effectively for the good of all, or at the very least create a little less misery.''

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

If $1/day-wage-labor is wrong, then VOLUNTEER work is also wrong.

There is an obvious difference between volunteer work and paid work: paid work is done to maintain a household in some manner while unpaid volunteer work is not.

You can't dictate this difference between volunteer work and paid work. Just because this might be so in most cases, there's nothing preventing someone from doing paid work for some other need, such as saving for a later business investment, or because they want money for gambling, or they want money to donate to a worthy cause (or unworthy cause), or many other possible purposes. .....

"Maintaining a household" includes the maintaining (or attempting to maintain) the well-being of any household member which might include any of the possibilities in your . . .

So according to you, no job is legitimate unless it's done to maintain a "household member"? Which "household"? There are millions, or billions of households. So you mean THIS household rather than THAT one? i.e., the one the worker belongs to, and no other? So it's not legitimate for a worker to spend his earnings on anyone other than a "member" of the particular "household" s/he belongs to?

Or do you just extend "maintaining a household" to mean anything whatever is the worker's purpose, or anything to be gained, or in order to buy something for any purpose at all?

So "maintaining a household" is just a catch-all phrase meaning anything imaginable, as their purpose, that might motivate one to do that job. But if that's all it means, then even a volunteer worker is "maintaining a household" by doing work for free, by producing or gaining something from doing it and not needing to be paid money in order to gain whatever their purpose ("maintaining a household") is for doing that job.

Just because you come up with a term for it ("maintaining a household") doesn't mean they must be paid some wage you dictate as necessary but which is not their choice. If they choose to do it and be paid only $1/day or even no dollars at all, that doesn't somehow negate whatever their purpose is, or make one legitimate and the other illegitimate, just because you come up with some label to put on it. It's still their purpose, based on their choice, regardless that you name it "maintaining a household" or some other label you want to put on it.

If one worker is being paid $1/day and another worker is being paid zero dollars, both have their reason, regardless what name you want to call it -- either one is performing a task for their particular reason, and both are equally legitimate. You can't give any reason why one is permitted but the other must be made illegal. Just giving a name to something (e.g. "maintaining a household") doesn't make it legitimate or illegitimate.

Even if you can conjecture what someone's psychological motive is for doing something, in many cases, that doesn't entitle you to impose rules onto everyone doing something similar, who in some cases might not fit your psychological analysis, or conform to your set of rules defining their behavior, or presuming to restrict it.

If your rule was legitimate, then every employer must first test the job-seeker to make sure that "maintaining a household" is their motive, and reject anyone who might have a different motive than this.

Or, if "maintaining a household" is simply the label to put on ALL work of any kind, or any purpose one has for ever doing any work, then it has to also include volunteer work, which is done for some purpose which can be called "maintaining a household" (or whatever name you put on it) and yet not being paid dollars in return for it.

Whatever their purpose is, you're calling it "maintaining a household" which you can do if you want, but you can't dictate how much the worker has to be paid just because you call it this name.

. . . the well-being of any household member which might include any of the possibilities in your interminable wall of text.

Including volunteer work, which is one more possibility. Even my eternal infinite wall of text can be called "maintaining a household" if it serves some purpose I choose. Anything done for some kind of goal, however ambiguous, is "maintaining a household" (according to you) -- but you can't impose a certain minimum price on it which must be paid in order for it to be legitimate, and without which it has to be made illegal.

And to anyone familiar with economics understands, "well-being" is judged by the individual in question, not by an outsider.

That includes the price to be paid for it, judged by both the buyer and the seller, including when the dollar amount is low or zero in some cases (e.g. volunteer work) -- not to be judged by an outsider (anyone other than the individual buyer and seller).

Which means the obvious difference has been explained to you.

All you've explained clearly is that there is no difference between volunteer work and paid work requiring one to be restricted but not the other. Both are done for the purpose of "maintaining a household" by your terminology, meaning simply whatever "well-being" is to be accomplished by the work, for whatever "household member" it might be who is to benefit. It could even be done for the benefit of an animal in the wild, or a tree, which is the "household member" -- anything which might be made better somewhere is the "household member" whose well-being is served.

The "household member" whose well-being is served is determined by the worker (seller), as all choices are that of the individual buyer or seller who judge this, never "an outsider."

Of course, whether or not you acknowledge that is a completely different question.

I acknowledge that you mean ALL work, paid or volunteer, is always for "maintaining a household" by your terminology, meaning whatever is to be gained from it.

And so there is no minimum price which can properly be imposed onto anyone choosing to buy or sell labor for their "maintaining a household" (whatever that might be), and so the price can be $1/minute or $1/hour or $1/day or zero dollars, according to their individual choice (buyer and seller) only and "not by an outsider" imposing it on them.

So I acknowledge your argument against minimum wage (or living wage) imposed by the state or other outsider, including that your argument is more succinct than mine.

And you're acknowledging that there is no legitimate purpose served by imposing a minimum price on the labor unless it's also imposed on the volunteer work, or -- there's no more reason to prohibit $1/hour labor than to prohibit volunteer work (zero/hour labor).

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Unlike you, I have supported what I say but it appears to be ignored. I could post the stats and examples of exploitation again but I suspect it would just be ignored.

You think you have supported it but you've never addressed the issue--the money is going to other workers, not just the direct workers.

What is that supposed to mean? It doesn't appear to be related to what I said, or the issue of growing inequality.

Of course you don't understand blasphemy.

Most of the money is still going to workers, just to other workers that didn't used to exist.

In the last 15 years, inequality has spiralled
''If the national minimum wage had kept pace with FTSE 100 CEO salaries since 1999, it would now be £18.89 per hour instead of £6.50. However, for some reason broadcasters rarely ask CEOs about the gulf between their pay and that of the poorest staff in their organisations. The unstated implication is that the lowest-paid staff are lucky to have any job at all, and only have what they have thanks to the benevolence of the 1%, with their superior leadership skills.

The minimum wage shouldn't keep up with inflation as the standard of living is rising.

If the top 1% actually created more jobs as they became wealthier, then ordinary people would be surrounded by employment opportunities in both the US and the UK. Instead, it is in Germany, where the wealthiest 1% receives in pay and bonuses half as much as their counterparts in the US, that unemployment is at a 20-year low. In countries that keep their top 1% in check, the highest earners work more effectively for the good of all, or at the very least create a little less misery.''

You realize low unemployment in Europe is high unemployment in the US?

 

[laughing dog]

"Maintaining a household" includes the maintaining (or attempting to maintain) the well-being of any household member which might include any of the possibilities in your . . .

So according to you, no job is legitimate unless it's done to maintain a "household member"?.....

That idiotic straw man was the intellectual high water of your subsequent wall of text. It is almost as if you intentionally misconstrue simple sentences to come up with these howlers of argument. Really, if you cannot accept understand that maintaining a household has multiple dimension including keeping the members fed and safely housed (which would mean your interminable walls of text could not completely maintain a household of human beings), rational discussion is not possible.

 

[DBT]

What is that supposed to mean? It doesn't appear to be related to what I said, or the issue of growing inequality.

Of course you don't understand blasphemy.

Most of the money is still going to workers, just to other workers that didn't used to exist.

That completely misses the point. It's like you didn't read what I said or what I provided.

The minimum wage shouldn't keep up with inflation as the standard of living is rising.

Why shouldn't it? If it doesn't, those on minimum wage will quickly get to the point where they cannot meet their basic needs.

You realize low unemployment in Europe is high unemployment in the US?

Europe is composed of a diverse mixture of cultures and economies. Unemployment varies between nations. Greece being the highest (for obvious reasons) and Czech republic the lowest at 2.7%.

 

[Lumpenproletariat]

Aren't volunteer workers paid LESS than minimum wage (living wage)? So why shouldn't that be illegal?

"Maintaining a household" includes the maintaining (or attempting to maintain) the well-being of any household member which might include any of the possibilities in your . . .

So according to you, no job is legitimate unless it's done to maintain a "household member"?.....

That idiotic straw man was the intellectual high water of your subsequent wall of text. It is almost as if you intentionally misconstrue simple sentences to come up with these howlers of argument. Really, if you cannot accept understand that maintaining a household has multiple dimension including keeping the members fed and safely housed (which would mean your interminable walls of text could not completely maintain a household of human beings), rational discussion is not possible.

who? what?

The basic point is: If it's wrong to recruit workers and pay them only $1/hour (less than minimum wage), why isn't it also wrong to recruit VOLUNTEERS to do work at zero/hour = less than minimum wage?

You're not answering this. There can't be anything wrong with paying only $1/hour to workers if it's not wrong to pay them even LESS, such as zero/hour. If zero/hour is harmless, how can there be harm in paying them a little more than zero? What harm happens by paying them $1/hour which doesn't also happen by paying them zero/hour? Zero/hour is worse than $1/hour, and yet zero/hour is permitted while $1/hour is made illegal. Why? Your "maintaining a household" language does not answer this.

In either case the workers are making a free choice, and in either case needed work gets done which otherwise would not get done. So, why is not the $1/hour work just as legitimate as the volunteer work? and why should it not be just as legal?

 

[Bomb#20]

In the last 15 years, inequality has spiralled
''If the national minimum wage had kept pace with FTSE 100 CEO salaries since 1999, it would now be £18.89 per hour instead of £6.50. However, for some reason broadcasters rarely ask CEOs about the gulf between their pay and that of the poorest staff in their organisations. The unstated implication is that the lowest-paid staff are lucky to have any job at all, and only have what they have thanks to the benevolence of the 1%, with their superior leadership skills.

If the top 1% actually created more jobs as they became wealthier, then ordinary people would be surrounded by employment opportunities in both the US and the UK. Instead, it is in Germany, where the wealthiest 1% receives in pay and bonuses half as much as their counterparts in the US, that unemployment is at a 20-year low. In countries that keep their top 1% in check, the highest earners work more effectively for the good of all, or at the very least create a little less misery.''

The Guardian once again exhibits how little it cares for journalism. Good god, what a load of economic creationist propaganda. "The unstated implication is that the lowest-paid staff are lucky to have any job at all, and only have what they have thanks to the benevolence of the 1%, with their superior leadership skills."?!? Oh for the love of god! That's not what people who aren't upset over CEO salaries are implying; Mr. Dorling is projecting onto his political opponents the beliefs he personally would need to have in order not to be upset over CEO salaries. The unstated implication of his words is that he has a conception of economics so primitive that he takes it for granted that the people who disagree with him about policy agree with his primitive conception of how economics works. He's so incompetent he can't assess his own skills. He is Dunning-Kruger in action.

 

[laughing dog]

That idiotic straw man was the intellectual high water of your subsequent wall of text. It is almost as if you intentionally misconstrue simple sentences to come up with these howlers of argument. Really, if you cannot accept understand that maintaining a household has multiple dimension including keeping the members fed and safely housed (which would mean your interminable walls of text could not completely maintain a household of human beings), rational discussion is not possible.

who? what?

The basic point is: If it's wrong to recruit workers and pay them only $1/hour (less than minimum wage), why isn't it also wrong to recruit VOLUNTEERS to do work at zero/hour = less than minimum wage?

You're not answering this. There can't be anything wrong with paying only $1/hour to workers if it's not wrong to pay them even LESS, such as zero/hour. If zero/hour is harmless, how can there be harm in paying them a little more than zero? What harm happens by paying them $1/hour which doesn't also happen by paying them zero/hour? Zero/hour is worse than $1/hour, and yet zero/hour is permitted while $1/hour is made illegal. Why? Your "maintaining a household" language does not answer this.

Yes it does. It is almost as if you intentionally misconstrue simple sentences to come up with these howlers of argument. Really, if you cannot accept understand that maintaining a household has multiple dimension including keeping the members fed and safely housed rational discussion is not possible.

In either case the workers are making a free choice, and in either case needed work gets done which otherwise would not get done. So, why is not the $1/hour work just as legitimate as the volunteer work? and why should it not be just as legal?

FFS, fair trade is about enforcing standards via free trade. If consumers refuse to purchase item X because they feel the workers are mistreated, that is free trade in action. For some obscure reason, you feel you are a better judge of their needs and well-being than they are. For some obscure reason, you fail to comprehend that the producers of item X can either improve the lot of their workers in order to cater to that part of the market or ignore that part of the market.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

That completely misses the point. It's like you didn't read what I said or what I provided.

You keep posting ideological answers rather than addressing the facts.

The minimum wage shouldn't keep up with inflation as the standard of living is rising.

Why shouldn't it? If it doesn't, those on minimum wage will quickly get to the point where they cannot meet their basic needs.

Minimum wage is supposed to be what's needed for survival.

You realize low unemployment in Europe is high unemployment in the US?

Europe is composed of a diverse mixture of cultures and economies. Unemployment varies between nations. Greece being the highest (for obvious reasons) and Czech republic the lowest at 2.7%.

Czech Republic is eastern Europe, not where the heavy worker protections have made companies very reluctant to hire.

 

[DBT]

In the last 15 years, inequality has spiralled
''If the national minimum wage had kept pace with FTSE 100 CEO salaries since 1999, it would now be £18.89 per hour instead of £6.50. However, for some reason broadcasters rarely ask CEOs about the gulf between their pay and that of the poorest staff in their organisations. The unstated implication is that the lowest-paid staff are lucky to have any job at all, and only have what they have thanks to the benevolence of the 1%, with their superior leadership skills.

If the top 1% actually created more jobs as they became wealthier, then ordinary people would be surrounded by employment opportunities in both the US and the UK. Instead, it is in Germany, where the wealthiest 1% receives in pay and bonuses half as much as their counterparts in the US, that unemployment is at a 20-year low. In countries that keep their top 1% in check, the highest earners work more effectively for the good of all, or at the very least create a little less misery.''

The Guardian once again exhibits how little it cares for journalism. Good god, what a load of economic creationist propaganda. "The unstated implication is that the lowest-paid staff are lucky to have any job at all, and only have what they have thanks to the benevolence of the 1%, with their superior leadership skills."?!? Oh for the love of god! That's not what people who aren't upset over CEO salaries are implying; Mr. Dorling is projecting onto his political opponents the beliefs he personally would need to have in order not to be upset over CEO salaries. The unstated implication of his words is that he has a conception of economics so primitive that he takes it for granted that the people who disagree with him about policy agree with his primitive conception of how economics works. He's so incompetent he can't assess his own skills. He is Dunning-Kruger in action.

The Guardian is merely commenting on established statistics from multiple agencies. I have provided material from several sources.

This issue has nothing to do with Dorling or politics, it is just a simple fact of life and how our economic systems are structured to favour the few.

That the super rich have significantly increased their income and wealth over the last four decades while workers have fallen behind is not controversial.

Your display cynicism is misdirected. This is a global issue.

Here, for example, is an ABC report based on ABS figures.

It's official: the rich are getting richer.

''Well-off Australians are pulling away from the rest of the nation, with inequality of wealth rising in recent years, new figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics show.

The data is detailed in the ABS's latest Household Income and Wealth Australia 2017-18 report, released today.

The figures show income growth has been virtually non-existent for many — average household incomes have stagnated, with virtually no growth since 2013, although income inequality has also remained relatively stable.

However, the report shows that wealth is highly concentrated in Australia.

The average net worth of the top 20 per cent of households is more than 93 times that of the lowest 20 per cent — some $3.2 million compared to just $35,200.''