Couple of things
Since I'm kinda busy today ...
- Obviously, I'm disappointed that Barack Obama won't be attending the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner tomorrow night, but I not surprised. Obama holds a lead in most polling in the state and, with so many contests ahead of all the candidates on Super Tuesday, it makes more sense to campaign elsewhere. I believe Obama will win, but it's going to depend on a field operation similar to what we saw in South Carolina.
- Frankly, I'm surprised that Hillary Clinton is still coming. One would think it would be imperative to stem the momentum Obama picked up from his South Carolina win and her being here means he's got some other state all to himself for a day or so.
- Still, even though my guy won't be there, it's a great opportunity for the state party and a great stage for them as well. And it's pretty cheap now as it costs $25 to go hear the speeches by Clinton and John Edwards.
- Both Ray MacNair and David H. Hunter are off on this higher wages thing, though the latter more so than the former. While I agree and wholeheartedly support increasing wages to provide for basic living standards and to keep up with inflation, doing so is nothing more than a temporary fix because the economy always catches up. What makes a difference is education, job training and a diverse economy that offers increased opportunities across the board.
- Just when you thought it was safe to sip a Coke on Sunday afternoon ... Sunday Sales is heading back to a General Assembly near you.
- Obviously, I'm disappointed that Barack Obama won't be attending the Jefferson-Jackson Dinner tomorrow night, but I not surprised. Obama holds a lead in most polling in the state and, with so many contests ahead of all the candidates on Super Tuesday, it makes more sense to campaign elsewhere. I believe Obama will win, but it's going to depend on a field operation similar to what we saw in South Carolina.
- Frankly, I'm surprised that Hillary Clinton is still coming. One would think it would be imperative to stem the momentum Obama picked up from his South Carolina win and her being here means he's got some other state all to himself for a day or so.
- Still, even though my guy won't be there, it's a great opportunity for the state party and a great stage for them as well. And it's pretty cheap now as it costs $25 to go hear the speeches by Clinton and John Edwards.
- Both Ray MacNair and David H. Hunter are off on this higher wages thing, though the latter more so than the former. While I agree and wholeheartedly support increasing wages to provide for basic living standards and to keep up with inflation, doing so is nothing more than a temporary fix because the economy always catches up. What makes a difference is education, job training and a diverse economy that offers increased opportunities across the board.
- Just when you thought it was safe to sip a Coke on Sunday afternoon ... Sunday Sales is heading back to a General Assembly near you.
posted by Jmac at 1:34 PM
40 Comments:
Although I am not going to hold my breath, but Sunday Sales should be allowed to be decided at the local level. Don't the Republicans have bigger things to worry about, anyway? Or do they want to control the local governments in every aspect - wait don't answer that, they do.
The AJC and WGAU update No-Show-Gate...
http://www.ajc.com/metro/content/shared-blogs/ajc/politicalinsider/entries/2008/01/29/rumorkilling_kidd_says_it_was.html
Reggie
Both Matthew Pulver’s and Ray MacNair’s recent opinion submissions raise the important notion that treating the symptoms of poverty is not enough to help this community rise out of poverty. However, the suggestion to support economic justice through the mandated increase of wages is a poor one. If the University pays low wages, it is because it can and the same goes for many local businesses. These organizations will pay what the prevailing market condition regulates. If more people need a job, the employer can go with the lowest taker if it so chooses. It is not a nice situation but it is a fact of economics and certainly a fact for Athens.
It is failure of this community to create and carry out a strategy to recruit and retain good paying jobs that is at the core of unemployment and underemployment. Athens has failed to replace the hordes of fleeing manufacturing jobs and has left a glut of employable citizens with no where decent to work. This is the reason why many Athens employers get away with paying pauper’s wages. The suggestion that forcing higher wages will relieve a potpourri of social ills will actually have the opposite effect. As employers are forced to pay artificially higher wages, they will seek opportunities and outsourcing in areas outside the city. The result will be fewer jobs, less businesses and more poverty. This all stick, no carrot approach to increasing wages is counterproductive and unrealistic.
A better approach is thoughtful, strategic and fully funded economic development for jobs that are accessible to the working poor. By recruiting good jobs with benefits, we can increase the competitive environment for businesses to get workers thereby increasing wages. As the businesses compete for workers, the offer of benefits accompanies these higher wages. The result is a far healthier economy and community.
This community needs to face the fact that we cannot concurrently slam the door in the faces of our existing and prospective industry and expect elevated wages. Either we meaningfully pursue economic development or become satisfied with giving the impoverished a slightly cheaper bus ride.
To say that if people only got a better education then they would be able to get a better job is a "blame the victim" individualistic understanding of poverty in America and completely ignores the reality of economic class. Are there some who don't help themselves because of their own failings (eg drugs)? Sure. But to go to the other extreme to say that all we need to do to cure poverty is to get everyone educated is ultimately a highly conservative political position which individualizes the causes of poverty as being the result of individual failings and denies the broader structural forces that course through the economy. What we need is a fundamental structural change in how the economy works, one which requires it to be regulated in different ways from how it is today and which requires, for instance, a cap on CEOs' salaries and limits to paying them via stock options (which often encourages them to lay people off because that increases the profits of the company and so their own income but leads to poverty), greater limits on capital outflows through reimposing exchange controls, and a whole host of things we used to do but got rid of in the wholy misleading name of "deregulation" in the 1980s. Part of the solution is also a cap on the salaries of the highest-paid CEOs --by capping how high salaries can go it reduces the problems of the knock-on effect of increasing salaries/ wages at the bottom, which seems to be the argument of so many conservative economists.
Again. All stick no carrot. Rather than seeking creative ways to develop and market assets such as skills, labor or resources, someone (anonymously, of course) comes out swinging at the CEOs. A CEO’s compensation is between him or her and the board. It is none of the governments business and it is none of yours unless you are a stock holder. You have no right to dictate what a company, which you own no part of, pays its executives. It is such disrespect for company’s rights that drives many out of the US. Is that the solution to increasing wages you’re looking for?
Would you be so quick to cap….say… the fees a lawyer can charge? After all, the legal fees and lawsuits against doctors drive up the cost of things like health insurance. If you disagree then please explain why is it ok to cap a CEO’s pay but not a lawyer’s.
To say that if people only got a better education then they would be able to get a better job is a "blame the victim" individualistic understanding of poverty in America and completely ignores the reality of economic class.
Well, obviously you haven't been following my blog because that's the exact opposite of what I've argued all along - and suggest a rather naive understanding of the issue at hand, as well as project a nonsensical line of argument I can hardly follow.
True, increased opportunities for education aren't the end-all, be-all for increasing wages. But, increasing opportunities for education and job training, coupled with a diversified economy that offers a variety of employment opportunities, is a very sound foundation in which you'll see folks rise out of poverty.
Again, far be it from me to decry the value of increased wages - and I believe having UGA here artificially suppresses the wages in our community - but merely increasing the wages to that of a living wage is a short-term fix that only addresses the immediacy of the problem and does nothing to address the long-term problems related to poverty.
Decreasing health care costs, making child care affordable and widely available, increasing avenues of affordable housing, fostering an environment of financial literacy, increasing educational opportunities, diversifying economies ... all these things, when working in concert, can help to attack poverty and bring about some real change.
Increasing wages is a good thing and one, that it must be noted I don't oppose, but it is one minor element of the overall struggle.
My point is/ was that the mantra of "let's just educate everyone and that'll solve the problem" assumes that what causes poverty is lack of education. What causes poverty are structural issues of class and how class works under our capitalist system. Just because everybody gets "educated" doesn't fundamentally change the nature of the class system --it just means you may end up w/ janitors w/ PhDs. The whole discourse of "get yourself educated" is an individualistic discourse which says that the problem w/ individual workers is that they are not educated, that their poverty is a result of their own individual failings --they didn't pay attention in school, they didn't work hard enough in school, if they "really" wanted to help themselves they'd sacrifice to get educated, etc. Any such individualistic explanations are designed to divert attention away from the reality of the class system which operates in this country and to suggest that when people fail to get ahead it's because of their own personal failings. In that sense it is a deeply conservative argument.
"After all, the legal fees and lawsuits against doctors drive up the cost of things like health insurance."
Actually, legal settlements have very little to do w/ the cost of healthcare in this country, despite what the right has argued re tort reform. What is a far bigger factor is the advertising budgets that pharmaceutical firms expend to convince us to buy the "purple pill" or pills for "restless leg syndrome" or whatever else is the latest syndrome/ condition they have invented to get us to buy their products.
As to a CEO's pay. Sure society has a right to cap what they're paid, if they're getting any kind of benefit from public expenditures (govt contracts, using products developed with the public purse --like pharmaceutical companies and others who farm out research to public universities), or use public resources in other ways (like using of public infrastructure to distribute their goods). Whether this is likely, of course, is another matter. :-)
"A CEO’s compensation is between him or her and the board"
Actually, it's not. It's regulated by all sorts of laws, SEC regulations etc. What has happened in the past 2 decades or so is that those laws/ regs have been changed --eg allowing stock options rather than regular salary. What that does is encourage CEOs to try to bid up the value of their shares so they get a big golden parachute rather than make profits by, say, being the most efficient producer (and having the highest stock price and being the most efficient producer are not necessarily the same thing). One of the ways in which stock prices are increased is by retrenching large numbers of employees, which of course has a negative downward pull on the labor market. SO, if you want to understand why poverty has increased in recent years you have to understand some of the causes, and this is one of them, whether you like it or not (of course, it's not the only one, but to ignore it is to fundamentally misunderstand how the nature of the economy has changed in the past 30 yrs or so).
"Would you be so quick to cap….say… the fees a lawyer can charge?"
I have no great fondness for lawyers, but most work on the principle of getting a third of what they win for their clients in things like class action lawsuits. Many may balk at such a high figure (it makes me gulp too). But we should consider the alternative --if we went to a system in which lawyers primarily worked for a flat fee, and you paid regardless of whether you won or didn't, then the only people who woudl be able to sue anyone in this country would be the very wealthy, because others couldn't afford to do so. Are there frivilous lawsuits? Sure, and any halfway decent judge will throw them out (as many are). But that's a different argument. Now, whether they should be allowed to take a third or a quarter or 10% is something we could debate but it is also a different argument.
Just so we’re clear with what you are saying:
1) Education and job skills training are not the answer to poverty but capitalism is the cause. Also, the effort to educate people out of poverty is intended to divert attention from a right wing conspiracy to maintain a class system.
2) Skyrocketing malpractice insurance rates which force some doctors to close their offices, out of control hospital liability insurance rates, hugely expensive procedure (like a cesarean section) which have commonly become defaults from less expensive and invasive procedures avoid a lawsuits are all not to blame for cost increases in healthcare. Instead the blame is the advertising budgets of a few of pharmaceuticals.
3) Rather than spreading out timelines for when CEO’s can exercise stock options (a common practice) the governments should regulate salaries, particularly those tied to the increases they bring their stockholders. This will not drive companies to Europe or Asia where tax models and regulation of what a company can pay people are less invasive.
4) Lawyers are only motivated by money.
Sorry if this seams a bit of a straw man, but this really seems to be the essence of your argument dressed up with words like “discourse” and “individualistic”. I work with many people who are trying to educate the poor. My wife spends her days teaching people not to beat their children to death or smoke crack while pregnant. These people have heard enough of your damn right wing conspiracies and how the man is keeping them down. They want hope and they want to hear from people who want to bring them jobs and opportunities. They’ve had enough of your fruitless, activist talk about how we need to get the CEO’s.
I really think this is why Obama is kicking the shit out the passé 60’s democrats (both of them). We’re tired of the divisiveness. We didn’t grow up hating the squares or spitting on soldiers. My generation does not necessarily think the most empowering thing a woman can do is have an apportion.
So screw your politics of blame and whining. I’m going with the politics of hope.
Well, some of us who don't care about the politics of hope are also supporting Obama.
I would point out that the reason malpractice insurance rates are skyrocketing is not lawsuits but the fact that malpractice insurance companies are run for profit. If people are required to have it and you increase the price (all of you who run these companies), they're still required to have it. They just have to pay more.
Don't get me wrong, I want a politics of hope too, and I grant you that it is FAR better to have an educated society than an uneducated one., to have a society in which people don't smoke crack and beat their wives etc. But I am also saying that individualistic solutions don't address structural ways in which the class system in this country and others work (unless, of course, YOU don't think we have a class system in this country, in which case there's not much point in continuing this thread). Capitalism (particularly the "ultra free market" form that has been pushed in the past two decadees or so [and which actually began under Jimmy Carter in the US when he started deregulating stuff]) can certainly bring great wealth for some but it also causes poverty for others since it's about one class extracting surplus labor from another (go and read Marx if you want to understand this).
As to your other comments, yes indeed yo do create a straw man, but that's ok. Companies, in fact, ARE more regulated in Europe and the European economy seems to do just fine w/out a lot of the social destruction of poor people's lives that we get here. In fact, the UK is the world's second largest recipient of foreign direct investment, for instance.
And I'm still trying to figure out how your politics of hope and unity jives w/ your wish that I go screw myself for deigning to challenge your position.
My politics are of hoping you go screw yourself, Anon.
No matter, it is useless to argue with someone informed by conspiracy theories. I don’t read Marx but I do read the Harvard Business Review which recently said very matter of fact that threatened and impending further regulation of corporate governance is sending jobs overseas, particularly to Europe. Please, go back to the 60’s and stay there.
And Hillary, you’re right…somewhat. These for-profit insurance companies are using the sue first nature of our society to screw anyone they can. But that does not mean that repeated multi-million dollar settlements and judgments for dips shits who spill coffee in their laps or drunks who slip and fall in the wal-mart do not drive up the required cost for the rest of us. The same goes for fools who get pregnant against a doctor’s recommendation, have complications and then sue the doctor. There needs to be far more transparency in insurance and far more consequences for BS lawsuits. When you buy insurance, you should be able to ask what its margins are, what percentage of claims it denies and there should be disclosure about what is covered that is readable rather than the techno speak jargon they use to hide little schemes.
Lawyers who bring repeated frivolous lawsuits should be fined and the money should pay for legal service for those whose case isn’t big enough to attract the sharks. Not too much, we want to make sure they can still afford private tennis lessons. I’m think a small percentage will do fine. Like maybe 30% of whatever they earn.
It's so nice to see that you are a mature enough individual to engage in debate :-)
Anyway, re your "No matter, it is useless to argue with someone informed by conspiracy theories". Where's the conspiracy theory? Do you or do you not believe there is a class system in America? It's a simple question.
And you don't think the Harvard Business Review has an agenda to say such things? Are you really that naive?
The only class system that exists is in the minds of people for whom it serves their agenda. I think it's very safe to say you fall into that group. Wow….and now the Harvard Business Review is conspiring to keep you down as well.
Does Chuck even play tennis?
The only class system that exists is in the minds of people for whom it serves their agenda. I think it's very safe to say you fall into that group. Wow….and now the Harvard Business Review is conspiring to keep you down as well.
Jeff, I'm pretty sure the person with whom you're arguing has not disclosed his or her economic status. One can have money and still see that society is stratified.
Class warfare 2012!!!
"The only class system that exists is in the minds of people for whom it serves their agenda."
So you're seriously arguing that class is imaginary in America, a figment of our imaginations? If so, I'm sure you would be in favor of a 100% inheritance tax, then, so that wealth cannot be passed down from generation to generation and we all get where we end up in life through our own hard work, right? If you're not in favor of such a policy, then you have to recognize the reality of class (these, btw, are mutually exclusive options --if you want to argue we all get where we end up in life based on our own actions, then you logically have to favor a 100% inheritance tax and no inter-generational transfer of wealth; if you don't favor such then you cannot logically deny the existence of class).
"Wow….and now the Harvard Business Review is conspiring to keep you down as well"
It's not conspiring to keep me down at all, and your flippant comment reveals your inability to debate the points of the argument w/out resorting to such childishness. What I said is that the HBR has a particular political agenda (to push "free market capitalism") and so, of course, it's going to argue what you said it did --it's going to argue (whether rightly or wrongly) that greater regulation of the economy is "bad for business" and therefore "bad for America" (as if what's good for business is automatically good for America :-) ). That's not a conspiracy --it's just a factual recognition of the HBR's political agenda. Of course, although their politics are radically different, this is exactly what Marx was also doing --he too had an agenda, obviously (it's not for no reason that he said "the philosophers have heretofore merely interpreted the world; the point, however, is to change it").
Sorry. I had to duck out to work.
First, Hillary. I don’t think you need to have a particular SES to perpetuate the idea of class warfare. All you need to do is teach your children that anytime they don’t get what they want or think they are entitled to, it is because of this grand system devised to keep them out. Plenty of Cobb county parents are telling their kids they the reason they did not get into UGA this year is because of affirmative action. Such people are doing a fine job of teaching their kids that your actions don’t mean squat. Coupled with the beliefs that education and support do nothing as well (as our anon poster expounded on so nicely) it continues the feeling of hopelessness that is so infectious and persistent while having no value except to give a parade for people to jump in front of and pretend they are the solution.
Anon, first off. Please cut out the whole “apparently, you’re mature enough….’-Robert’s rules of debate bullshit. It sounds like you’re writing for a high school newspaper and it’s horribly annoying.
I like the idea of a 100% inheritance tax if the tax only affects the filthy rich. The problem is plenty of poor people would like to inherit grandma’s house, even if it is a piece of shit. Plus, there are plenty of grandparents putting their grandkids through college because the parents are worthless slouches. Much like the alternative minimum tax, this concept sounds nice on paper but really the burden will come down on the already strained middle class. The rich are not the only people who inherit. However, again, your viewpoint is that rather than make a place for ourselves and our own opportunities in this world (perhaps through a better education); our only option is to go take from others. Whether it’s CEO’s or someone’s dying grandma, you just want to take and have no accountability for your choices. After all, the man’s holding you down and you’re owed yours, right?
And have you ever read the Harvard Business Review? You again wrongly assume that it only deals with big business and therefore has a conservative bent. Restaurants, barbershop and most farms in America are businesses too. The issues of management, finance and marketing all apply to nearly every business. It is not about some grand political agenda; Harvard is amongst America’s most enlightened and progressive schools.
However, I can understand your desire to put down the HBR in favor or Marx. Your rhetoric explains as much.
And sorry to hit it and quit but I really need to work most of today. I'll try to keep up but cannot promise to. You can always e-taunt me at jeff@sn-ta.com
First, Hillary. I don’t think you need to have a particular SES to perpetuate the idea of class warfare.
Right, but you did say "and now the Harvard Business Review is conspiring to keep you down as well." Your choice of "down" implied that the person with whom you're arguing is of lower SES.
I'm totally _into_ class warfare.
Feeling like you are "kept down" is a matter of perspective, wouldn't you agree?
There are plenty of rich people who feel like they are kept down and out of oppurtunity. Like....you know, everyone who calls in on the Neal Boortz show.
"Anon, first off. Please cut out the whole “apparently, you’re mature enough….’-Robert’s rules of debate bullshit. It sounds like you’re writing for a high school newspaper and it’s horribly annoying."
So you think that saying "My politics are of hoping you go screw yourself" is the kind of exchange that mature, reasonable people should have, then?
"I like the idea of a 100% inheritance tax if the tax only affects the filthy rich. The problem is plenty of poor people would like to inherit grandma’s house, even if it is a piece of shit. Plus, there are plenty of grandparents putting their grandkids through college because the parents are worthless slouches. Much like the alternative minimum tax, this concept sounds nice on paper but really the burden will come down on the already strained middle class. The rich are not the only people who inherit. However, again, your viewpoint is that rather than make a place for ourselves and our own opportunities in this world (perhaps through a better education); our only option is to go take from others. Whether it’s CEO’s or someone’s dying grandma, you just want to take and have no accountability for your choices. After all, the man’s holding you down and you’re owed yours, right?"
Again, you read what you want into what I wrote. What I actually said is that if you truly believe there is no class system, that it is imaginary (as you claimed), then logically you should be in favor of a 100% inheritance tax FOR ALL, and then we ALL get to where we end up in life based on our own merits. It doesn't matter whether someone wants to inherit grandma's run-down shack or not. That wasn't the argument. The argument was a counterpoint to your claim that class is a fiction. And, of course, if class is not a fiction but is real, then individualistic solutions to poverty like urging people to get educated (which is where we started in this thread) don't fundamentally challenge the nature of that class system, which will continue to generate poverty. Dr King said it far more eloquently than can I: "True compassion is more than flinging a coin to a beggar. It comes to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring."
As to the HBR, not only have I read it but I have assigned it to students. And of course it's about some grand political agenda (which is NOT to say it's a conspiracy!), because it's written for, and pushes the agenda of, business. There's nothing sinister about that; it's just the way it is.
Sure, I prefer Marx to the neo-liberal view of how economies should work, though not necessarily because of his political stance but because I think his analysis of how capitalism operates is simply conceptually superior, being derived from the labor theory of value school which dominated classical political economy until the marginal utility neo-classical people like Alfred Marshall came along in the 1870s. IMO, Marx should actually be taught in business schools along w/ Adam Smith if profs really wanted their students to understand how economies operate (and Smith, btw, was also an advocate of the labor theory of value and in that regard shares more in common w/ Marx than w/ Alfred Marshall).
As to the refrain of "class warfare" ("you just want to take [from others]") Why is it only class warfare when somebody points out that those at the bottom get screwed under capitalism but it's not class warfare when somebody lauds those at the top and works to make them richer?
I have no interest in taunting you. That's not my purpose. In fact, I had hoped that reasonable people could debate matters such as these w/out resorting to taunting (or one person telling the other to go screw themselves :-))
Sorry. I'm really busy. I’ll have to be brief.
Just because I believe that social classes exist does not mean I believe is some grand plan to turn classes against each other.
Do I believe the rich using schemes to defraud the poor is class warfare. Of course.
Do I believe that there is some organized conspiracy behind class warfare? No.
Do I think class warfare exempts people from working hard or trying? No.
Do I think class warfare is perpetuated by people of all SES for their own gain and power? Yes.
What type of people do I think do this? You.
And now that we know you're a teacher, why do you have such little faith in the capabilities of education to transform impoverished societies? If you really believe that and are really a teacher, that’s really sad.
And if you are who I think you are, did you really hand out a petition in your class and ask students to sign it even though they knew little about what it was.
That story has been circulating since your letter. You might want to get ahead of it.
[Let me clarify, also, that when I say I'm a fan of class warfare, I mean that I'm on the side of the lower classes. Just in case that didn't come across.]
Viva la Hillary's resistance.
I would point out that the reason malpractice insurance rates are skyrocketing is not lawsuits but the fact that malpractice insurance companies are run for profit. If people are required to have it and you increase the price (all of you who run these companies), they're still required to have it. They just have to pay more.
The largest medical malpractice carrier in Georgia is MAG Mutual, which is owned and operated by the doctors. What these doctors (and others) don't want to address is the costs of malpractice insurance arising from the profession's inability to police itself.
The concept of "frivolous lawsuits" is an oxymoron. "Frivolous lawsuits" do not drive up the cost of the system. The suits that drive up the cost of the system are by definition not "frivolous".
Whether or not you agree with the outcome of a specific lawsuit, to challenge the system based on the outcomes is to challenge the integrity of the entire jury trial system. This may be what you want to do, but "the lawyers" do not shape jury verdicts, which are the standard by which the system operates.
Georgia enacted tort "reform" for the doctors, and can anyone say that medical care has become more widely available or cheaper as a result?
Lawyers who bring repeated frivolous lawsuits should be fined and the money should pay for legal service for those whose case isn’t big enough to attract the sharks.
This is another myth perpetuated buy certain business interests. Unless you can construct some system that exempts lawyers from the fundamental laws of economics, no lawyer repeatedly brings frivolous lawsuits. Just like Wal Mart, lawyers have fixed costs that keep on keeping on--lights, toilet paper, employees-- which costs cannot be met by repeatedly filing frivolous lawsuits.
Your argument infers a causation that is false. You assert that because a lawsuit is brought to trial or receives a judgment, that it is therefore fair. Does this also mean that because a person is convicted by a trial therefore certifies their guilt? Also, a large percentage of lawsuits do not go to trial, they go to settlement. And reaching a settlement is not always about guilt. A company may weigh the costs of negative publicity, legal fees and the possibility of a runaway or rogue jury. There are plenty of lawyers who file and uses these suits to get rich while never stepping foot in a courtroom.
So yes, lawyers often can and do get rich by filing or threatening to file frivolous lawsuits. There is an entire industry based on it.
"Just because I believe that social classes exist does not mean I believe is some grand plan to turn classes against each other"
Ok, now we're getting somewhere, as previously you didn't believe in them (classes) :-) Anyway, the relationship between the employing class and the working class is always a relationship of tension because profit is generated by the labor of the latter for the former --a business can't operate without employees. Sometimes workers are stronger and can demand a higher wage, sometimes they're weaker and are forced to accept a lower one. But it is always a matter of struggle b/w these classes, whether we want to recognize that or not.
"Do I believe the rich using schemes to defraud the poor is class warfare. Of course.
Do I believe that there is some organized conspiracy behind class warfare? No.
Do I think class warfare exempts people from working hard or trying? No.
Do I think class warfare is perpetuated by people of all SES for their own gain and power? Yes."
But you are talking at the level of individuals here. Some rich people screw others over and some try to help them; some poor people are layabouts and others work very hard. But at the end of the day we are talking about class as a social/ economic category --a capitalist, no matter how nice an individual, no matter how much he/ she may donate to charity etc can only remain a capitalist if they can extract surplus labor from their workers. How they feel about it as individuals is irrelevant to the class relationship between the capitalist class and the working class --the owner of the factory/ office/ mine/ whatever will quickly go out of business if he/ she can't make a profit and profit is generated through the securing of surplus labor from one class by another (as BOTH Marx and Adam Smith recognized through their labor theory of value).
"And now that we know you're a teacher, why do you have such little faith in the capabilities of education to transform impoverished societies?"
I don't, and have previously said that a society in which people are educated is far better than one in which they are not. But what I did say is that education, in and of itself (ie "qua education"), does not transform class relations (which you have now admitted exist, despite your earlier claim that they were illusory). Sure, education may allow a few lucky individuals to rise socially, but it does not transform the essential nature of the classed society which is this country --not everyone can rise up out of the working class simply through getting educated. What is needed, rather, is a fundamental transformation of economic relations, such that workers own the fruits of their own labor and do not have to give up part of that labor to capitalists simply because the latter own factories/ mines/ offices etc and all that workers have to sell is their labor power. (And, btw, you don't have to agree w/ Marx's political position to recognize the accuracy of his analysis of the nature of class under capitalism).
"And if you are who I think you are, did you really hand out a petition in your class and ask students to sign it even though they knew little about what it was."
I don't know who you think I am, but it's not this person. For the record, I would never allow anyone to circulate a petition in my class on any topic, myself included. I just don't think that is appropriate in a classroom, whether it's a petition to end the war/ save the whales/ end child labor in Pakistan or whatever. Nor am I anon 1:26pm who posted about lawyers :-)
The Republican Party has always been a party that hates local control.
Hugs and Kisses,
Abraham Lincoln
"But you are talking at the level of individuals here. Some rich people screw others over and some try to help them; some poor people are layabouts and others work very hard. But at the end of the day we are talking about class as a social/ economic category --a capitalist, no matter how nice an individual, no matter how much he/ she may donate to charity etc can only remain a capitalist if they can extract surplus labor from their workers. How they feel about it as individuals is irrelevant to the class relationship between the capitalist class and the working class --the owner of the factory/ office/ mine/ whatever will quickly go out of business if he/ she can't make a profit and profit is generated through the securing of surplus labor from one class by another (as BOTH Marx and Adam Smith recognized through their labor theory of value).
Okay, but the labor theory of value is SOO 19th century. Like, totally. And this is much more fatal to a classical economist like Marx than it is to one such as Smith, since Smith's overall economic system wasn't about explaining how owners oppress workers. Smith's point was simply that individual actors in the market acting in their own interest end up creating wealthy societies almost by accident, i.e. 'the invisible hand.' And this thesis can be advanced whether or not the labor theory of value is true.
It seems to be fundamentally flawed. Not sure how much you want to get into it, but the subjective theory of value (or the 'marginal' theory of value) is much stronger imo. Look up Menger and Bohm-Baverk, who were 19th century economic theorists. And then of course there is the 'Austrian' school of the 20th century. But the Austrian school is the most radical free market school; the truth is that almost no one today, except Marxists, holds to a labor theory of value. It just ain't true. Chicago school, London school, Keynesians, whoever. They all reject it (though I'm not as sure about the Keynesians, who often shock me in strange ways; but it is certainly not an essential Keynesian position even if some Keynesians happened to hold to it).
Wow Xon.
I couldn't have said it better.
In fact, I couldn't have said it.
"Okay, but the labor theory of value is SOO 19th century."
And that makes it false because...?
"Smith's point was simply that individual actors in the market acting in their own interest end up creating wealthy societies almost by accident, i.e. 'the invisible hand.'"
The point about Smith (and Marx) is that he saw that wealth is only created through labor (that's why he subscribed to the labor theory of value). Certainly, he was interested in "the market" (though he didn't refer to it in Wealth of Nations as being an analytically separate object of analysis [the way in which we refer to it today], which raises questions about how Smith's modern-day admirers misuse his ideas). The market, for followers of the LTV, is simply about redistributing wealth; the market doesn't create wealth per se (for everyone who buys low and sells high, there is someone who buys high and sells low). For the economy as a whole, then, buying and selling doesn't create wealth [value in the labor theory terminology (and we have to accept that neo-classical and classical economists use the terms value differently --the former as equivalent to price, the latter as a measure of the amount of labor that went into producing a product)]. Only through labor/ work is the economy's collective wealth increased.
Only through labor/ work is the economy's collective wealth increased.
But labor on its own doesn't create wealth. It has to be organized and combined with other resources (land, financial and physical capital) by the entrepreneur (i.e. capitalist) who takes on the risk of the enterprise and is compensated in the form of profits if he combined the resources into producing something that consumers value (i.e. are willing to pay) more for than it cost to produce. If his idea sucks, then he will lose everything that he has sunk into the enterprise.
The capitalist is not extracting surplus from workers. He is receiving compensation for bearing the risk of the productive enterprise. Workers have nothing invested in the enterprise and are owed their wages regardless of whether they are producing something or value or not. (They may not actually get it but that is a different points).
Entrepreneurs only make money if their idea is good. They only make profits if they have been able to create value by bringing together the other resources (including labor) in such a way that it is worth more than the sum of its parts.
"The capitalist is not extracting surplus from workers"
I'm afraid s/he is. That is the source of profit, as recognized by both Adam Smith and Marx. (The only real difference b/w these two on this matter is whether they had a problem w/ it; Marx did, Smith didn;t [so much]). Sure, the capitalist has to put forward his/ her monetary resources and bring elements together for production to occur, but the only thing from which profit can be generated is labor. The other things (raw materials, electricity etc) that are brought into the production equation can change their material form (their "use value" -- a piece of wood becomes a chair), but they can't engage in creating something out of nothing; the only element in the production process that can is the worker (who creates value out of his/ her labor power).
"Entrepreneurs only make money if their idea is good"
PS: you are correct here; if their idea sucks or if they are inefficient producers they will (usually) go out of business. Marx certainly would agree w/ you on that point. But there's a difference b/w someone going out of business because they have a sucky idea/ are inefficient manufacturers, and the source of wealth generation. These are two different questions. Again, for every person who, in the market, buys low and sells high, there is someone who buys high and sells low --overall there is a wash and the only question is who wins and who loses. This is a different question from how value/ wealth is created for the economy in toto.
the only thing from which profit can be generated is labor
This seems to be assumed rather than proven. Is it not the same argument to say that the laborer adds no value without the direction provided by the entrepreneur and that the one who is actually creating something out of nothing is the entrepreneur who visualizes the product that the worker can transform materials into?
Hi Rich: I certainly appreciate your willingness to debate the issue civilly (unlike some others :-) ). One could make your argument, and many business people do (I'm not suggesting you're a business person, btw --I don't know you). But, I think at the end of the day we have to ask ourselves this question to get to the nub of where value is created: which of the two entities --capitalist or worker-- cannot survive without the other? Clearly, the worker can live his/ her life w/out the existence of the capitalist, but the capitalist cannot live their life w/out the existence of the worker. I think that tells us a lot about where value originates.
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