Because I wrote these at the same time, part 2 is under this post, not above.
Before I say anything else, Socialism is defined (by me and older dictionaries) as “An economic model where the government controls the means of production and distribution of goods.”
This all started with the Planet Money Podcast Socialism 101. I went on their Facebook page and told them how I could take their featured “Socialist Economist” apart without any difficulty.
I was ultimately responded to by another user who said (I did not edit or clean it up) this:
We Produce More Now Than Ever In Our Recorded History, And The Workforce----The Ones Who Make It ALL Possible----Are Poorer Than Perhaps Ever(, & Drowning In Foisted Debt).....We're CLEARLY Being Scammed ---> #FollowTheMoney
Management ain't Nothin', But it's Not hard. Bezos, etc., is Nothing without the Laborers; They're Almost Everything-----With Or Without him. C(r)apitalism's payscale is Mostly 'Regressive'...
I disagree with the Minimum Wage, as it has been structured, because it Doesn't work; it's Too Easily defused. It's idea's heart is in the right place, but it is Too Flawed to be implemented effectively. What's Needed is the 20-to-1 rule; Not necessarily that Exact fraction, But That Principle. Tie the wages of the Lowest Payed to the Highest Payed.
That said, it's better than nothing, For The Moment.
Imagine NOT working, Exploiting the Labor of those who Do( work), And Extracting this
https://www.google.com/imgres...
The fact of the matter is, Moving "up" is Nice, but Realistically Not Everyone CAN because of Simple Physics------You Can't pick yourself off the ground. There Needs to be people in All Stratas for the society to function-----The Higher Up, The Less Possible Positions Available. If you work, you should have enough to survive And enjoy your Life/Freetime. Wages Need to be Tied to business's ( Total-)Pies, not Archaic Extortion-Brackets.
Janitors may not be Technically as valuable as Scientists, True, But, if the scientists have to do the Janitation As Well, they'll hardly have Time for the Science-----Suddenly Janitors-Etc. are Revealed To Be Almost As Valuable As Gas To Automobiles, lol.
..and What Good is a Car Without Gas?
We ALL Need Each Other OR The Whole System Ceases Functioning. We're ALL Essential. We're ALL Necessary To Produce 'Value'.
This user gave me a couple of videos to watch, which I did. Here’s the first:
Let me say right off, “The blackest lie is a lie that is a half- truth.”
Yes, some large corporations like Luxotica have an actual monopoly in some markets. That’s called “The Setup” where you throw out a couple facts to establish you’re being truthful. It reminds me of Robert Reich, whom I took apart one of his videos in 12 Strawmen.
It was at 1:26 when the lies started with the “Work or starve” point. Please, Ms. Teachout, point out any point of history outside of the post WWII developed nations, where this wasn’t true.
For the past 100,000 years of Homo Sapiens, this “work or starve” concept has been a simple, cold, hard truth. If you were able to work (not physically or mentally impaired) and didn’t work, no one supported you for very long. Individuals or churches (not government) would perform short-term charity to individuals to “get them on their feet.” The charity quickly stopped if the person receiving the charity didn’t start working somewhere. If this not working and begging continued, the person was deemed a freeloader and “ridden out of town on a rail.” The rail was not part of a railroad, rather a fence rail, which was a quarter-log, like this:
The community would also express their displeasure on this freeloader and to encourage him to leave the area (and serve as a warning to those who might encounter him), he was tarred and feathered.
The only exception to this was when a couple became too old or infirm to work, their children would support them. And example #2 where individuals, not government supported those who could not provide for themselves.
In the Antebellum South, slave owners used to work a slave until they were too old to work anymore, then the owner would give them their “freedom papers” and let them loose to fend for themselves. Believe it or not, it was the Southern states that passed laws to stop that kind of thing. But it was the slave owner, not the government, who had to support the retired slave. Example #3.
Just to keep you off balance, they throw in another fact: 40% of people don’t have at least $400 in a personal emergency fund.
I’m sorry, most people are sold a bill of goods about a job, with the understanding of “you should always go after your dream job.” I’m here to say, “NO. You shouldn’t.” The quickest way to kill your interest in a passion or hobby is to do it as a mandatory income-producing activity on a daily basis, knowing that you have to live off the profits generated from it. You should do what you like and you’re good at doing. I like and am good at fixing machines. That’s what I get paid to do and that keeps food in my fridge, a roof over my head and my lights on. My “dream job” would be to sit here and write content for this website, a YouTube channel and so on. The good news is I know my wordsmithing does not rise to the level where I could earn enough to live off, and I’m okay with that. I am perfectly happy to make this website my #5 priority and crank out articles when a subject or an idea that I want to write about hits me. Not “I have to crank out articles on a consistent basis to keep my income streams going.”
Next, she laments that “All jobs are menial and repetitive.” No matter what you do, you perform the same actions over and over and over again. It doesn’t matter if you’re putting a ball through a net on a basketball court, fixing a machine, assembling a product, or dealing with people. While the exact circumstances may change, the overall concept is exactly the same. Repetition is how we become fast, efficient and good at our jobs. Michael Jordan probably shot 1,000 baskets on the practice court during his career for each shot he took during a game. And not just “shooting baskets” like you or I might do, but the mental work, the physical work and the striving to make each shot better than the last one.
And what IS a job exactly? It starts with a person or company has decided they want you to make/do something for them. It doesn’t matter what “it” they are asking for is. In return you receive an agreed amount of compensation. If you do “it” to the company’s satisfaction, you get to do it again. You are there to generate income for the company, period. If you can’t generate enough income for the company to pay you and generate a profit, you’re out of a job. In 2020 I was hired by “Company A” to be an on-site IT technician at “Company B” to fix stuff broken by the workers of “B.” I was laid off after 4 months because there wasn’t any work for me to do. I sat around for 7+ hours a day watching YouTube videos and other stuff because everyone was still working remotely. There was a financial liability to keep me around. They liked the work that I did, but that was the economic reality. And while I don’t like or justify it, an employer has the duty to monitor you however they see fit concerning your paid work. If you’re not doing what you’re told (and paid) to do, why should you be paid for that time?
If you think there should be “worker protections,” look at places with those kind of policies, like New York Schools. How to Fire an Incompetent Teacher. Something is wrong when a teacher can openly admit to sexually harassing a student, and then got paid to do nothing for SIX YEARS, getting paid $350,000 overall as the school system goes through the laborious (and expensive) process of firing them. The average time it takes to fire a teacher is 830 days, or just over two years, at a cost of $313,000, which means that money wasn’t spent on children or raising the pay of good teachers.
I cannot and will not defend the actions of any company. Not my place to do so, unless I am paid for the effort. Yes, people are worked long, hard and incessantly at an Amazon warehouse. Ms. Teachout decries Amazon’s treatment of their warehouse workers, but I just wonder how many Amazon packages are delivered to her doorstep every month. Because every box she orders keeps Amazon in business and more people are oppressed.
If you don’t like the work practices of a company, don’t buy stuff from them. Leftists are good at boycotts (well, they think they are. Check out how well their boycott of Chik-Fil-A is doing), maybe they should all boycott Amazon. More importantly, you need to BUYCOTT companies who do engage in practices you like.
Here's Part 2, just in case you came here directly.