Are wage-earners poor victims who should be paid based on pity toward them rather than their value?
#117
bilby
A "fair rate" is the market rate, based on supply-and-demand. Just like the "fair" price for a loaf of bread is the market price, set by supply-and-demand.
This price is "fair" because it is best for consumers. It ensures that the price or wage is high enough in order to get the production done, for the consumer's benefit, but no higher than the minimum necessary to accomplish this production.
In magical free-trade wonderland, where no person ever gets any income unless he works for it, this might be true (although that is debatable, and certainly has not been demonstrated).
I stated above why the market price is the "fair" price, i.e., because it best ensures that the wage level is high enough to attract needed workers but no higher, which serves the consumers, and the whole point of the business is to serve consumers.
And this purpose is served in any economy, including one where many of the consumers receive income without working for it.
The market price, as described above, has to be one which will attract some workers. If it is too low, no one will apply and the employer cannot do the production. But it also cannot be any higher than necessary to attract those workers, so this labor cost is kept down as low as can be while still being high enough so the work gets done.
How can that not be best for consumers? How is that not a "fair" wage? I.e., what wage level is more "fair" than one which best serves the consumers for whom all the work and production exists in the first place?
In the real world, where taxpayer money is used to prevent people from selfishly cluttering up the public highways with their famished corpses, the market price is distorted by this subsidy.
Whatever this means, how is the market price still not the best price for everything that is bought and sold? Though there are public costs paid out of taxes, is it still not the case that the market price is the best price, for the reasons I've given?
Why should prices, including the price for labor, not be determined by supply-and-demand in a competitive market? even though there are public costs paid out of taxes? And if there are distortions of prices, because of taxes or public costs, how does that change the fact that the market price is always the best price?
Even if there is distortion of prices, it is still best that the prices being distorted are set by a competitive market and supply-and-demand, and all the production is thus impacted by the distortion spread across the whole economy. The distortion might be a necessary evil that is kept to a minimum in order to maximize the benefit from the market price system which would produce the ideal market if there were no distortion, but still gives the maximum benefit possible within the reality of the inevitable distortions.
So how is the competitive market system, driven by supply-and-demand, not the best system for the benefit of all consumers? regardless of any inevitable distortions? Just because something gets distorted does not mean it doesn't operate and perform its function, but only that it does it in a less-than-ideal fashion, or does it imperfectly, but still does the function as well as possible within the limitations.
Pretending that the real world doesn't exist, because you would rather it didn't, is not a good way to make policy.
Supply-and-demand and competition do exist in the real world. The competitive market system changes the real world to make it better. Perfection is not necessary for the market to work. The market system puts pressure on producers to perform better, and better performance in the real world makes the world better.
Nothing is more important in the economy than making sure that the production gets done at the lowest possible cost or price, because this is what is best for all consumers, and thus for the whole country.
Is the economy more, or less, important than the people?
The market system is what best serves all the people. Maintaining that system for setting all the prices ends up making us all better off. What can be more important for people than making us all better off, which is what the free market system does, or would do if allowed to.
What could be more "fair" than whatever serves the whole country?
The last I checked, the 'whole' country includes poor people. Your policy implies the exact opposite of 'serves the whole country'; you are suggesting that poor people should be required to serve the wealthy.
Everyone should be required to serve, or to earn or produce in proportion to what they consume. This rule applies equally to low- and middle- and high-income classes. No class is exempt from this rule.
But to require workers to be paid higher than their market value is to argue that they should be exempt from this rule and be paid according to their need rather than according to the value of their production or performance.
If the wage that employees get for their labour is inadequate to meet their cost of living, that becomes a social problem.
No, that's an individual problem for that one employee.
If it is just one guy, then I will give him a job at $15 an hour tomorrow.
Why do that? Why not pay him $10 or $5 an hour, or whatever is real value is, or the value of his work? Why is it necessary to pay him a charity wage, higher than his market value?
Overpaying the worker is not good for the country, because anyone overpaid is being subsidized at someone else's cost, and ultimately the consumers have to bear that cost, which reduces their standard of living.
But it isn't; it is an entire section of society - millions of people.
Whether it's one worker, or 50 million, the damage done by overpaying him is the same multiplied by that number. The same damage is done in proportion to the number. So whether you inflict
x dollars of damage onto the country by overpaying one worker or
x-multiplied-by-50-million dollars of damage by overpaying 50 million workers, it is equally illogical, though the total harm done is obviously less if it's only one worker overpaid.
So, overpaying someone, out of pity toward them, still does net harm even if it is a large number of them being overpaid. Multiplying the number of them by millions does not change the fact that net harm is inflicted. Because the higher number simply increases the cost imposed onto all those who have to pay the cost of it.
Another employee might be able to do that job at the low wage. The individual employee has to decide if the wage level is agreeable, and if it is not, there is a solution: RESIGN! Only a crybaby demands more than this. If you can't make the deal, you part company. Let the job be done by someone else who will accept those terms. Why should consumers be punished with higher prices because an employee is a crybaby demanding more than necessary to get the job done?
Your ideas are simplistic, crude and stupid.
What is the error in the above? Isn't it true that the worker can RESIGN if he doesn't like the terms? Isn't it true that the consumers have to pay higher prices if some workers are paid more than is necessary to get the job done?
Your lack of compassion defies belief;
What is compassionate about making the world worse off by forcing consumers to pay higher prices? How is it compassionate to force 300 million U.S. consumers, including millions of poor people, to pay higher prices in order to subsidize the incomes of a few million uncompetitive workers out of pity toward them? Where is the compassion for all those millions of consumers who have to pay those higher prices?
I would strongly recommend that you seek professional assistance for what I suspect is a severe personality disorder.
How is it a "disorder" to want consumers, and thus all of society, to be better off?
You should get a proper diagnosis from a psychiatrist, it might help you and those around you.
Can you recommend one to me who will explain why 300 million American consumers should have to pay higher prices in order to subsidize the jobs of a few million uncompetitive workers demanding more than their market value?
A minimum wage is determined by the CPI. We also have award rates for skilled work.
The right price [i.e., "award rates"] for anything, including labor, for any job, is whatever the market determines, based on supply-and-demand. This price is always the right price, . . .
And of course takes into consideration higher and lower levels of skill, and does this better than the CPI or any papal bull handed down from on high from those in power.
. . . because it best serves the interests of the whole society, or the whole country, because it's best for consumers. This always takes priority over the interest of an individual producer.
The producers, including wage-earners, have to adjust to accommodate the interests of consumers. They exist to serve consumers. But consumers do not exist to serve producers, or to be an outlet for their production. The producers have to keep changing and modifying their requirements until they find terms which are good for consumers.
Preaching is prohibited by the TOU of this board. If you want to make assertions of this kind, you should back them with evidence.
You mean my assertions above are prohibited by the TOU?
Which of the above assertions require evidence?
"The producers, including wage-earners, have to adjust to accommodate the interests of consumers."
This assertion requires "evidence"? Don't producers have to do this? If a producer fails to meet market demand, doesn't he lose out in the competition? Shouldn't he? Aren't the producers supposed to adjust to serve consumers? How does this require evidence?
"They exist to serve consumers." Don't producers, as producers, exist to serve consumers? How does this require "evidence"? Do you disagree with this? What do producers exist for if not to serve consumers? If they fail to do this, don't they disappear from the market?
"But consumers do not exist to serve producers, or to be an outlet for their production." You disagree with this? You think consumers exist to serve producers? Is the TOU going to censure me for asserting that producers exist to serve consumers but that consumers do not exist to serve producers? What "evidence" is needed to prove this?
Shouldn't policy aim at getting producers to change in order to serve the consumer demand, whatever that demand may be? Shouldn't we want to cultivate more producers, or encourage production to take place that will serve the consumer demand?
So if consumers want something that's not being produced, shouldn't producers change in such a way as to begin producing it, if it is possible?
But on the other hand, if a producer is producing something that consumers don't want, should something be done to change consumers to make them want what is being produced? Why? Why should consumers have to change their demand in order to accommodate uncompetitive producers?
So therefore isn't it true that producers are supposed to adjust in order to serve the consumer demand but that consumers are not supposed to change their demand in order to accommodate the need of producers for customers?
"The producers have to keep changing and modifying their requirements until they find terms which are good for consumers." Isn't this true? Don't producers need to "get with the program" and do what is necessary to meet the consumer demand, or change as needed in order to find a good business strategy to reach the consumers and offer them what they want?
So what "evidence" is needed to prove that producers exist to serve consumers but not that consumers exist to serve producers?
Those who instead get subsidized or get charity payments given to them out of pity, such as through minimum wage, are parasites, and a drain on society, and the world is made worse off because of these parasites.
Insulting people does not bolster your argument.
If telling the truth is "insulting" them, then let them be insulted. You disagree that we're made worse off as a result of parasites who are a cost burden to others? If they're paid out of pity, instead of according to the value of the production, doesn't that make the world worse off than if they were paid according to the value of their production?
Isn't more valuable production preferable to less valuable production? Isn't the world, or aren't all of us, made better off if workers produce at a higher level of performance, or if they produce more value by their work? Doesn't higher or better performance lead to better results for everyone than lower or worse performance?
Which is the better society? the one where we produce at a higher level of performance and are rewarded for our performance, in proportion to our production, or the one where people are paid charity wages out of pity toward them because we feel sorry for them and assume that's all they're good for?
Your assessment of people who have the misfortune to require assistance as 'parasites' says nothing about their character, but speaks volumes about yours.
But the lowest characters of all are those characters who want to make parasites out of people instead of getting them to perform better and earn their way without being a cost burden on others.
