You would agree that a person who has worked a position at some factory probably is more productive than someone who just entered the job? Yet if the veteran worker and new worker walk it to the same place in some countries they most likely will be paid the same wage when they being the job. So the value of labor isn't real. It's artificially fixed by people who holds all the cards no matter if their production increases with a good work staff or decreases with a poor work staff. I'm sorry but that's not the type of capitalism I think is healthy.

Aids drugs.
Mobile phones.
China in china.
China in africa.
High commodity prices (china)

“They pretend to pay us; we pretend to work.” - Russian joke from the Soviet days.

When you don't pay your workforce what they are worth it runs into inefficiency.

The chorus of people who track global poverty as something that proves the benefits of the WTO, IMF, World Bank and liberalized trade agreements ignore a lot of factors. A huge one is improvements in technology. Another is the decrease in non-monetary/financial economic transactions and cooperation in the developing world which were not recognized in things like GDP.

Decreasing absolute poverty did not start in 1981 and all those charts on the internet that start around then and leave off everything before that are trying to trick you that the neoliberal policies are responsible for the decrease in global poverty.

Ill struggle a bit here. Partly because when non economists talk about this stuff you use a bunch of terms that cross and overlap with economic terms, or paths of thought/study that are well trodden.

So bear with me. I think theres two concepts here in what you are saying.

1. The employer has all the power. So they can pay lower wages than they could afford to pay. I.e. the factory becomes super profitable, but they dont oass that through to workers.

2. They pay all workers equally, rather than paying some more or less? In particular, highly productive workers?

Re 1. This isnt always true. In most places, wages go up over time due to competition for workers. This (plus unions) is what lifted the british and american working class out of poverty.

In the philippines. Call centre wages, while still cheap, are going up every year at a fast rate, because any worker can quit with me one day and have a new job down the road on monday.

The counter to that, (and the major cause of flat US wages) is global competition, the more wages go up in one area, the more incentive there is to move to lower cost areas. While this sucks for the current lot of workers, its great for the next lot in the lower cost area.

This process is heavily responsible for a lot of the poverty reduction in the last 30 years.

Im not sure what the alternative is? I would much rather we spend time focusing on political remedies. (Education, health and safety and fire regs, redistributive taxation, contracts and employment courts, etc) that trying to set prices, and im not convinced it would necessarily help.

Re 2. Im not quite sure i understand your objection.

If they pay a flat rate. The most productive workers are underpaid, but the least productive are "over"paid.

This is some really ****ty first level thinking. Many of the guys settig wages in developing countries are people like me. We spend alot of time looking at models, our competition, productivity, churn and attrition rates, etc.

You think "hey maybe if we pay a little more we will get more productive workers" never comes up?

rugby, if you think Paul D doesn't have a degree in economics you know nothing about Paul D.

I am extremly surprised by this.

EDIT. Not intentionally being a dick, but that really doesnt come across in his posts.

We aren't only talking about call centers. We talking about low skilled jobs in sum.

My objection is is the current state of capitalism has broken down into a state where production probably isn't as efficient as it could be. We have inferior factories that catch fire in parts of the world. We have workers who are told accept or walk no matter how productive they could be on a job.

I see that sort of thing as a real problem with capitalism that isn't being addressed globally. It could lead to revolts in the future.

My point being is for capitalism to be a great thing and strive the nature of the relationship between employer and labor has to be healthier

Not sure why. There are a lot of real economists who express similar views to mine. Economics is much broader than econ101. I prefer just the number crunching of econometrics over the more political side of economics.

So thats a really general statement, but i think we generally agree. Im certainly not trying to carry water all the free trade libertarian slappies.

I consider myself pretty econ-literate myself. I don't have a degree in it, but I'm reasonably well read on the subject.

Well. Im certainly not going to deny that you do. And the econ 101 argument was orginally brought up by me ad a counter to the "but the chose to trade" idiocy, so im all onboard with real economicts being more liberal/lefty

Normally they at least nod to the orthodoxy before going beuond it though

It pertains to orthodoxy though.

Economics is not solely about supply/demand. It is ultimately about managing resources and figuring out how to be the most productive. I think in the very real world, labor is mismanaged and hasn't reached it's true capacity in production because of it.

True. But i would argue thats much more to.do with stuff like a lack of investment in education and infrastructure than in factories underpaying.

Oh come on Nielso wasn't THAT bad...

FYP IMO

To be honest the majority of people everywhere kind of only care about what happens in about 100 Square mile radius from where they live... When I say majority I think I'm lowballing.

Look at all the local FB "local" politics groups there are and how horrible the people posting in them are. Facebook was meant to bring the world together at first (well maybe) but I think has done more to polarize society than anything in history...

I want to apologize for derailing the Trump thread last night. I engaged in bad posting and then got defensive instead of cutting my losses.

My orginal point was based on a piece citing "exploited workers" to criticize the CF in Haiti without going into details. While its entirely possible and perhaps likely this was far from the most efficient use of resources to help out Haitians, its overwhelmingly a good thing when factories open in poor areas even when wages are low.

Getting defensive resulted in making lousy arguments that suggested I don't know the definition of the term exploit (among other things) for which I'm currently rather embarrassed. I'm not an ACist and I don't oppose minimum wage laws in the US. I sure as hell will not be voting for Trump in 2020 under any circumstances.

Solid apology, if excessive for 2p2. The original derail was that the Clinton Foundation had to be criminal (without evidence) because why would someone who has been and done everything be nice to people? Setting up a foundation to help people is a transparent criminal front, especially if you are a Clinton. I mean, Bill Gates obviously just cures childhood diseases because the more children there are, the more software engineers there will be, which will lower wages and make him more money. Amiright? Bummer we all decline and die and you can't take anything with you and your children will likely be unhappy louts anyway. Ever hear of the giving pledge? I mean, that's just insane right?

FWIW, I more or less regard any use of labor for profit, or really any other motive that the labor would not otherwise engage in, as "exploitation." I also think that the use of labor for profit is, by in large, a very beneficial thing. That likely includes factories in Haiti.

The thing about the rubes on this site, and people the world over, is that money, sex, power, whatever isn't everything. You can really eat like two meals a day. Any middle-class person in the US can eat pretty similar to a billionaire. And there's just no way to get grade A pieces of ass on the daily. It's complex, logistics, legalities, complications, etc. And even great drugs always have a downside.

There's a reason one of the greatest Roman emperors, the most powerful person in the world at the time, wrote a book counseling stoicism as the right way to live. In fact, there are a lot of people who want to make the world a better place and see that as the "meaning of life" and consider it noble and important. I guess a lot of losers don't recognize that because they desire so much that they cannot understand the altruistic motives of people who have enough and see the world differently than they do.

I mean you can be president of the US and a billionaire and basically be miserable. The universe isn't created for you; you just kind of have to deal with it. There are many *******s in the world, but they're not like a supermajority.

I'd agree with the first part. I think I care more than most and I wouldn't say I care a lot. I try to be conscious and not blithely ignore the ills I contribute to, but I'm not weeping or making huge sacrifices over many things that don't immediately affect me.

As for the second part I don't Facebook at all, but that could be true of the whole of anonymous social and political interaction on the internet. People used to keep their opinions more on the lowdown and didn't realize how much they would hate each other. My personal experience on 2p2 mirrors that as I used to like almost everyone when I posted only in strat forums, then about half the people when I posted in OOT and now in politics I hate everyone.

That's cool and I'm sure I owe you an apology. I'm a lot more casually rude than I used to be (see my last post).

On a related note. I recently gave up facebook because i spent 3 hours a day every morning when i woke up browsing cat videos and arguing with idiots instead of getting on with my day.

Im now spending as much time arguing here instead... sigh

arguing here instead of FB still +EV

Yes and no. People here are way way way smarter. Even the worst posters. But that creates a false view of the world.

Arguing with morons on fb has helped me understand the world as it is (trump, brexit, refugees in australia) much better.

strong