Port strike and automation

[Axulus]

It is simply not possible for that labor's share of GDP in the US since the 1980s because of people are being replaced by automation because THERE ARE MORE PEOPLE WORKING.

What you are missing is that more is being done.

Some numbers for illustration only: We had 100 workers and machines equivalent of another 100. Now we have 150 and machines that are equivalent to 300. More workers, lower percent of productivity due to the workers.

I pointed out a fact that contradicts barbos’s written claim. Labor’s share of GDP did not decline because fewer people are working because there are more people working. Productivity is irrelevant to that reality based observation.

What decline? The share is in line with historical levels:



https://taxfoundation.org/blog/labo..., the most recent,long decline in labor share.

 

[laughing dog]

It is simply not possible for that labor's share of GDP in the US since the 1980s because of people are being replaced by automation because THERE ARE MORE PEOPLE WORKING.

What you are missing is that more is being done.

Some numbers for illustration only: We had 100 workers and machines equivalent of another 100. Now we have 150 and machines that are equivalent to 300. More workers, lower percent of productivity due to the workers.

I pointed out a fact that contradicts barbos’s written claim. Labor’s share of GDP did not decline because fewer people are working because there are more people working. Productivity is irrelevant to that reality based observation.

What decline? The share is in line with historical levels:

View attachment 48106

https://taxfoundation.org/blog/labo..., the most recent,long decline in labor share.

Post 57 in this thread prompted this offshoot. It mentions a decline in labor’s share of GDP from the 1980s. This overall decline is not large (in fact there us an uptick) from a macroeconomic perspective. I agree the share is not an outlier.

 

[ZiprHead]

The thing is a strike isn't about withholding their labor.

Yes, it is. That's the complete and accurate definition of a strike.

No. Withholding your labor would be quitting and going to work for somebody else.

Unions are about denying any labor to a business. Monopoly power. It's wrong when done by business, it's wrong when done by labor.

Management has alway been free to hire scabs

There are cases where they are explicitly prohibited from doing so by law. And when a union controls a whole market where are you going to find them?

Where?

 

[ZiprHead]

Labor share of GDP is 69%, so capital gets 31% share. If everyone got a 45% pay raise then capital share would be 0.

If there was no capital then labor would get something like $500/year (the approximate amount produced per capita in counties with almost no capital investment).

What is the appropriate share for capital given that the current level makes labor something like 150 times more productive, and labor gets something like 100x higher wages compared to not having access to that capital?

GDP doesn't fully measure wealth. My concern is not productivity, it's wealth distribution. Productivity has risen greatly yet wages have stagnated for the lower and middle classes.

Lower class certainly has. That always happens as societies develop--the market values skills over warm bodies. The spread between high skill and low skill is much wider than it was in the past and thus low skill is farther from the average. And the answer is not to simply pay them more--the result of that approach is more unemployment.

Productivity and skill doesn't justify this.



And this.

 

[Bomb#20]

Nobody is saying they should not get paid. But they are already very well paid. They want ridiculous amount more (70% pay increase) and no automation in ports, and are using extortion, monopoly power of their union, and an unreasonably friendly White House to get their way.

First time I've heard collective bargaining referenced to as extortion.

That's bizarre -- that rhetoric is a fixture in debates about unions, and you've been in quite few of those. But hey, you've heard what you've heard. Have you ever heard employment for wages referred to as extortion? "Do what I say or else you're fired."? Calling that extortion is a fixture in debates about capitalism, and you've been in a few of those too.

The thinking behind this sort of rhetoric is identical. It's not reasoning-based; it's a pattern-matching thing. In some people, "If you don't do for me what I want, I won't do for you what you want." triggers the same neural network as "If you don't do for me what I want, I'll beat you up.".

 

[Bomb#20]

Nobody is saying they should not get paid. But they are already very well paid. They want ridiculous amount more (70% pay increase) and no automation in ports, and are using extortion, monopoly power of their union, and an unreasonably friendly White House to get their way.

First time I've heard collective bargaining referenced to as extortion.

Then fix your ears. It most certainly is extortion.

The opposite is slavery.

That's ridiculous. Slavery is "You can't quit.", not "You can't strike.".

If labor cannot withhold their labor when they feel they aren't being paid enough it's slavery.

But it doesn't take collective bargaining to withhold your labor. There are all sorts of things you can do as an individual that you can't do as a group.

If a widget manufacturer wants to raise his price from $10 to $20, he can -- they're his widgets and he can charge whatever he wants. But if all the widget manufacturers collude among themselves to all raise their prices to $20, the Sherman Act says they can go to prison for three years. Some widget company owner no doubt was offended by that law and argued "If manufacturers cannot withhold their widgets when they feel they aren't being paid enough it's price controls.". Do you agree with him?

 

[Swammerdami]

Labor share of GDP is 69%, so capital gets 31% share. If everyone got a 45% pay raise then capital share would be 0.

If there was no capital then labor would get something like $500/year (the approximate amount produced per capita in counties with almost no capital investment).

What is the appropriate share for capital given that the current level makes labor something like 150 times more productive, and labor gets something like 100x higher wages compared to not having access to that capital?

GDP doesn't fully measure wealth. My concern is not productivity, it's wealth distribution. Productivity has risen greatly yet wages have stagnated for the lower and middle classes.

In my opinion, BOTH sides of this argument have merit.

What is often overlooked, I think, is the largish share taken by highly-paid labor rather than "capital." Wall Street traders and fund managers are my go-to example of highly-paid labor, but lawyers, criminals, dentists (and perhaps dockworkers!) are among several other examples. (Top executives are highly paid but their role is more of capitalist symbiont than "labor.")

Labor pricing in the U.S. spans several orders of magnitude:
* $30/day -- cheapest labor, or disabled
* $300/day -- middle income
* $3000/day -- upper middle income
* $30,000/day -- today's upper income
That final group, earning one THOUSAND times the minimum, are very well off yet STILL are not in the stratosphere where America's thousands of billionaires and near-billionaires partake.

Income and wealth inequality are already major problems, and continues to rise. Yet civilization is faced with unrelated problems of even higher priority. Interesting times.

 

[Bomb#20]

No. Withholding your labor would be quitting and going to work for somebody else.

Unions are about denying any labor to a business. Monopoly power. It's wrong when done by business, it's wrong when done by labor.

Management has alway been free to hire scabs

Sometimes -- when strikers don't prevent it by violence.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I didn't say Putin was running. I'm saying he's trying to cause friction in all the free societies of the world

Yes, by being competent and right.

Russia has been doing it for decades, the internet has made it far easier.

Yeah, RussiaGate and Hunter notebook.

That is the tip of the tip of the iceberg.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

What is being counted that shouldn't be?

Don't know, you tell me. As far as i am concerned 100% of GDP is labor of some kind, always. Hence the article is BS.

You're the one who claimed counting problems.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

when a union controls a whole market where are you going to find them?

[scabs]

Well, if the workers all chose to join (and remain in) the union, rather than to take scab jobs, I guess you need as an employer to think hard about why that is, and what inspires such loyalty to the union rather than to the employer.

What you don't understand is that the optimum outcome for the people in the union is not the same as the overall interests of business and the workers.

The members of a union will get maximum income if they slowly destroy the company over the period they are working.

 

[Bomb#20]

What is being counted that shouldn't be?

Don't know, you tell me. As far as i am concerned 100% of GDP is labor of some kind, always. Hence the article is BS.

A caveman eats a banana that fell off a wild banana plant. You're arguing that it was not the banana plant that produced the banana, but the caveman going to the effort of peeling it?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

It is simply not possible for that labor's share of GDP in the US since the 1980s because of people are being replaced by automation because THERE ARE MORE PEOPLE WORKING.

What you are missing is that more is being done.

Some numbers for illustration only: We had 100 workers and machines equivalent of another 100. Now we have 150 and machines that are equivalent to 300. More workers, lower percent of productivity due to the workers.

I pointed out a fact that contradicts barbos’s written claim. Labor’s share of GDP did not decline because fewer people are working because there are more people working. Productivity is irrelevant to that reality based observation.

Your claim is akin to saying 2 + 2 = blue.

The assertion is the percentage of GDP to labor is declining. Your claim is the absolute number of workers has gone up. That has no bearing on the percentage of GDP going to labor.

 

[Bomb#20]

when a union controls a whole market where are you going to find them?

[scabs]

Well, if the workers all chose to join (and remain in) the union, rather than to take scab jobs, I guess you need as an employer to think hard about why that is, and what inspires such loyalty to the union rather than to the employer.

If the workers in a company town all chose to join and remain in the company, rather than beg in the street, would you take that as a sign that the employer inspires loyalty? No? Then why the bejesus would you assume that everyone joining a union means the union inspires loyalty? Where the workers all chose to join and remain in the union, it's usually because the union negotiated a contract barring the employer from employing non-union workers. Loyalty doesn't enter into it.

 

[barbos]

What is being counted that shouldn't be?

Don't know, you tell me. As far as i am concerned 100% of GDP is labor of some kind, always. Hence the article is BS.

You're the one who claimed counting problems.

I have no counting problem, these idiots however do.

 

[barbos]

I didn't say Putin was running. I'm saying he's trying to cause friction in all the free societies of the world

Yes, by being competent and right.

Russia has been doing it for decades, the internet has made it far easier.

Yeah, RussiaGate and Hunter notebook.

That is the tip of the tip of the iceberg.

Exactly, these russians are everywhere and behind all your problems.

 

[Bomb#20]

In my opinion, BOTH sides of this argument have merit.

What is often overlooked, I think, is the largish share taken by highly-paid labor rather than "capital."

"Taken"? That term would seem to imply that the wealth in question wasn't produced by the highly-paid labor. Who produced it? How do you measure the contribution of each participant in a cooperative production procedure?

Income and wealth inequality are already major problems, and continues to rise.

(Source: nih.gov)

 

[Bomb#20]

GDP doesn't fully measure wealth. My concern is not productivity, it's wealth distribution. Productivity has risen greatly yet wages have stagnated for the lower and middle classes.

Lower class certainly has. That always happens as societies develop--the market values skills over warm bodies. The spread between high skill and low skill is much wider than it was in the past and thus low skill is farther from the average. And the answer is not to simply pay them more--the result of that approach is more unemployment.

Productivity and skill doesn't justify this.

View attachment 48107

And this.

View attachment 48108

How do you know it doesn't? How do you measure the productivity of the people whose income paid for their respective families' assets?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The thing is a strike isn't about withholding their labor.

Yes, it is. That's the complete and accurate definition of a strike.

No. Withholding your labor would be quitting and going to work for somebody else.

Unions are about denying any labor to a business. Monopoly power. It's wrong when done by business, it's wrong when done by labor.

Management has alway been free to hire scabs

There are cases where they are explicitly prohibited from doing so by law. And when a union controls a whole market where are you going to find them?

Where?

The case I'm thinking of is commercial passenger airlines. The safety rules do not permit a complete turnover of cockpit crews--I wouldn't be shocked if this was deliberately put in there to have the very effect it does. So you have the current reality that the very senior pilots get very good pay while the junior pilots in many cases don't get enough to be safe. Union pay scales are engineered to trap workers with a single company to deprive them of their most powerful weapon: their feet.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Lower class certainly has. That always happens as societies develop--the market values skills over warm bodies. The spread between high skill and low skill is much wider than it was in the past and thus low skill is farther from the average. And the answer is not to simply pay them more--the result of that approach is more unemployment.

Productivity and skill doesn't justify this.

I don't believe we have any way to truly measure "deserve". However, we do have a market that does a pretty good job of correctly allocating income: entertainers. Things like music scale incredibly well, your marginal cost is tiny. Thus we see fewer people doing it but the best bring in very big bucks. Billionaire type bucks. A lot like your first graph.

As for your second--there's a huge flaw in that data. Once again, I point to Freakonomics. It is incredibly common for people to go from the bottom quintile (starting out in life) to the top quintile (at retirement.) They only addressed it by quintiles and your chart breaks at 90% rather than 80% so it is not directly comparable. However, note that 90th percentile is $1.6m which is a completely reasonable number for professionals at retirement.