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boom boom boom posted:No, those are stupid as poo poo. Britain spends millions to keep a gross family of racists in the lap of luxury. And if you ask why they'll be all, "they bring in tourist dollars" because god knows no one on earth would ever go visit a castle if there wasn't a mean looking old lady living in it, that's why the Louvre was knocked down and turned into a parking lot for abandoned cars decades ago. The sale of royal merch brings in a net profit to England dude edit: also the louvre contains one of the biggest collections of art on earth. Most of the castles that get visited because of the royal family don't, yet they still get visited dex_sda fucked around with this message at 16:41 on Jun 2, 2016 |
# ? Jun 2, 2016 16:34 |
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# ? May 30, 2024 03:55 |
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dex_sda posted:The sale of royal merch brings in a net profit to England dude Britain has no art?
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# ? Jun 3, 2016 06:33 |
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boom boom boom posted:Britain has no art? That's also true, yes.
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# ? Jun 3, 2016 08:20 |
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boom boom boom posted:Britain has no art? That's clearly what my post said.
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# ? Jun 3, 2016 14:04 |
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dex_sda posted:The sale of royal merch brings in a net profit to England dude You are right, when visiting the WIdsor Castle, I was mainly concerned if a living royal was locked away in a section of it so perhaps their aura could bring me ever so slightly closer to divine grace.
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# ? Jun 3, 2016 15:13 |
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The tourists who buy royal merchandise would spend the same amount of money on other stupid tat and / or services, and the Britons who spend their money on it are a burden to the economy by spending money on imported garbage instead of something productive.
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# ? Jun 3, 2016 15:15 |
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dex_sda posted:That's clearly what my post said. The French were able to turn a castle into a museum, couldn't the British do that? Or is the British art scene now reduced to just waiting for Banksy to do something?
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# ? Jun 3, 2016 20:07 |
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British art is blood spatters from football hooligans mostly? Or maybe a photo of a Lord dining with Jimmy Savil with big grins all around?
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# ? Jun 3, 2016 20:20 |
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boom boom boom posted:The French were able to turn a castle into a museum, couldn't the British do that? Or is the British art scene now reduced to just waiting for Banksy to do something? The Tories gutted art funding to the bone. There's nothing left really.
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# ? Jun 3, 2016 23:18 |
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http://www.reuters.com/article/us-finland-labour-metalworkers-idUSKCN0YP2F3 Finns agree to the competitiveness pact finally. I'm a bit sad, the negations were such hilarious clusterfuck.
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# ? Jun 3, 2016 23:39 |
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"We need to be more competitive! Workers have to agree to have their wages and benefits slashed, there is no other way." Meanwhile, in another country: "Look at this country over there! They're slashing their wages! We have to be competitive and slash ours too!" Back to the first country: "They're slashing their wages even more than we slashed ours! How can we stay competitive? We've got to slash even more now! Slash slash slash slash slash slash slash!" Back to the other country: "Okay, just screw it, let's officially reestablish serfdom and slavery. It's the only way to stay competitive." gently caress competitiveness. The whole competitive buzzword is just a way to organize a social and environmental race to the bottom, as politicians will dutifully unravel all the progress that has been made since the 19th century so as to sink the entire continent to the level of a hellhole like China. Meanwhile, 0.000001% of the population possesses half the world's wealth, but, you know, it's the bottom 90% who have to agree to becoming poorer in order to make sure that the top 1% can keep getting richer. Nevermind that by slashing the income of the people who actually loving need an income will result in greatly decreasing demand, which will cause the whole economy to go tits up, but hey, you know, what's good is being competitive by making sure poor people get poorer and rich people get richer and gently caress it when do we kill and eat all the rich yet Competitiveness is the exact inverse of what should be done. What should be done is increasing minimum wage drastically and putting huge fuckoff import tariffs against all countries with a lesser minimum wage to force them to race up, instead of letting them force us to race down.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 00:30 |
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boom boom boom posted:The French were able to turn a castle into a museum, couldn't the British do that? Or is the British art scene now reduced to just waiting for Banksy to do something? Sure they could, but they already have their art (aka the poo poo they plundered from their now dead empire; britain produced a lot of literature but not as much art) in giant museums that bring in profits that aren't counted with the royal merch. The merch + extra destinations for tourists are a bonus you probably won't match otherwise.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 09:56 |
Cat Mattress posted:"We need to be more competitive! Workers have to agree to have their wages and benefits slashed, there is no other way." Do you have any examples of this happening in the real world? My impression is that wages are far to sticky for this to work.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 09:57 |
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GaussianCopula posted:Do you have any examples of this happening in the real world? My impression is that wages are far to sticky for this to work. It happens on this planet you might have heard of it.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 10:25 |
ReagaNOMNOMicks posted:
It really doesn't, as this graph will show you: If his description were accurate, the graph should point downward, which it doesn't.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 10:36 |
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People from other countries care way more about our monarchy than we do apparently.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 10:43 |
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GaussianCopula posted:It really doesn't, as this graph will show you: Did you notice that massive divergence between the Labour Productivity and the (stagnating) Real Wage indices? I'm also pretty sure you're not familiar with the content of the Finnish Competitiveness Pact actually includes. Working hours will be extended while pay rises will be limited, which will directly result in a fall in real purchasing power for workers. lollontee fucked around with this message at 11:06 on Jun 4, 2016 |
# ? Jun 4, 2016 10:58 |
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GaussianCopula posted:It really doesn't, as this graph will show you: Look again, people are being paid less and less for the same amount of work that they do. Someone is getting scammed here and it's definitely not the owners of the means of production.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 12:12 |
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Way to obliterate your own argument though lmao
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 12:16 |
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Friendly Humour posted:Way to obliterate your own argument though lmao Please explain, Friendly Tumour.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 12:22 |
His argument: Competitiveness can only be achieved by slashing worker compensation and this leads to a downward spiral in worker compensation The graph shows: Worker compensation actually has increased over the last 14 year and competitiveness can be increased through labor productivity gains. Now if you want to talk about the question how the gains of labor productivity increases should be distributed, that's a very different discussion.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 12:25 |
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It is actually the same discussion.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 12:40 |
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Cat Mattress posted:"We need to be more competitive! Workers have to agree to have their wages and benefits slashed, there is no other way." before the Euro, European countries would engage in competitive currency devaluation instead, thereby devaluing wages anyway this being realized to be nonetheless much, much better than the Depression-era nationalist solution of a strong currency policy (i.e., increasing the real value of wages) and putting huge fuckoff import tariffs against all countries that 'steal their demand' through devaluation. Because, really, think of it from the perspective of the country you are tariffing: what is a greater threat to their domestic demand, the abstract Final Crisis of Overaccumulation that never seems to arrive, or your glorious-and-morally-superior nation putting huge fuckoff import tariffs on their exports in the here and now? Better put some tariffs on your exports! Policy moves cut both ways. I want to point out that the italicized - the assertion that the an increasingly unequal income distribution actually decreases 'demand' - is above all an empirical assertion. Maybe it's true, but it's a bit tricky to show, if so. It's a kind of a bastardized, layman version of the Marxist crisis of accumulation as translated into a Keynesian universe of effective demand (discarding the surplus-theory elements, since the Marxist version traditionally implies the impossibility of sustainable devaluation and instead demands colonialism, creation of new markets, etc - not very palatable for plausible policymaking). The problem is that, having adopted Keynesian methodologies, the other legs of the Marxist chair fall off too; Keynesian effective demand is a slippery thing. Too many things increase effective demand. The things which are most effective are not popular. The things which are popular are ineffective (and, really, one would reasonably object why these solutions are the ones being put forth). And, China and global inequality, well...
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 12:43 |
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GaussianCopula posted:His argument: Competitiveness can only be achieved by slashing worker compensation and this leads to a downward spiral in worker compensation You are just trying to spin the fact that a worker today is getting payed less per $1 of work than 20 years ago. Also, productivity gains have been a constant fact of life for thousand of years, they are not something new. We have already settled how these gains are to be distributed here, in the west, during the first half of the 20th century. They are to be distributed fairly, because that's the only way that seems to work long term. No taksies backsies!
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 13:10 |
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you know there are marxists like Andrew Kliman that have academically disputed the productivity-wage gap argument
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 13:28 |
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kliman has a horse in the labour theory of value fight though, it's like his signature contribution to marxist economics kliman (1992): quote:Another reason why Mongiovi’s claim is preposterous is that Marx’s law of the tendential fall in the profit rate is certainly one of his most “basic propositions about how capitalism … develops through history.” Marx himself said it is. He wrote that this law is “in every respect the most important law of modern political economy” (Marx 1973:748). Yet the physicalist-simultaneist revisions of Marx’s theory, codified in the Okishio theorem, negate his law (see, e.g., Okishio 1961; Roemer 1981, Chs. 4-5). Whereas Marx (1981:347) held that “The profit rate does not fall because labour becomes less productive but rather because it becomes more productive,” the neo-Ricardian models of physicalism-simultaneism conclude that rising productivity must tend to raise the profit rate... obviously, if this is the approach to be taken, then you do not want to be cornered arguing 1) that productivity has outpaced wages, and 2) that the 'gap' has gone to corporate profits or that corporate profits are at an all-time high. You would be implicitly conceding that Okishio was right, that the neoclassicals are right, that the wage should be set at the marginal product of labour (and hence why problems stem from its failure to do so). ronya fucked around with this message at 14:17 on Jun 4, 2016 |
# ? Jun 4, 2016 13:47 |
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ronya posted:kliman has a horse in the labour theory of value fight though, it's like his signature contribution to marxist economics I'm aware of the factionalism and tbh I consider it mostly academic but I was wondering whether they were aware and what they thought about it
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 14:31 |
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'factionalism' suggests that the disagreement is a matter of divergent aesthetics; I would say that the disagreement goes to the heart of whether either worldview has any validity at all. ... in that sense it is academic, yes most people just don't feel the epistemic responsibility
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 14:43 |
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GaussianCopula posted:His argument: Competitiveness can only be achieved by slashing worker compensation and this leads to a downward spiral in worker compensation That's a meaningless statement when real wages have remained stagnant for the past 8 years. You can select whatever point in the past before 2008 and say that real wages have increased. As for productivity, you are completely mistaken. If I work more hours for the same pay, in reality I'm getting paid less despite my real wages remaining constant. Do you think that the incoming French Labour reforms are going to increase worker benefits or something? Their aim is to decrease the cost of labour so that their employers can earn more. And no, labour productivity increases are not a separate discussion. If the value of work done increases but workers don't see an increase in their real wages, they are being more exploited. You can call that 'competetiveness' but it's not the workers who benefit from that. They are still being forced to compete in the value of their work with countries with more predatory labour practices with zero benefit to themselves.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 15:29 |
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nvm lollontee fucked around with this message at 15:44 on Jun 4, 2016 |
# ? Jun 4, 2016 15:35 |
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ronya posted:'factionalism' suggests that the disagreement is a matter of divergent aesthetics; I would say that the disagreement goes to the heart of whether either worldview has any validity at all. when has it been important whether the worldview has validity before its enacted, you know what i mean? especially in economics lol
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:07 |
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Friendly Humour posted:And no, labour productivity increases are not a separate discussion. If the value of work done increases but workers don't see an increase in their real wages, they are being more exploited. So you support vastly increasing the income of farmers then, since the work each one of them does today was done by a dozen or more farmhands three centuries ago, and their produce is of better quality too? Of course, this would need to be supported by huge increase in food prices, but we'll ask have to give something to avoid exploiting them I guess?
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:08 |
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Shazback posted:So you support vastly increasing the income of farmers then, since the work each one of them does today was done by a dozen or more farmhands three centuries ago, and their produce is of better quality too? Yeah!
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:13 |
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Shazback posted:So you support vastly increasing the income of farmers then, since the work each one of them does today was done by a dozen or more farmhands three centuries ago, and their produce is of better quality too? This would be a better argument if a lot of farmers didn't have to rely on the CAP to remain solvent.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:17 |
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lower food prices, other things equal, is an increase in real wages; that's what the 'real' means
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:17 |
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Shazback posted:So you support vastly increasing the income of farmers then, since the work each one of them does today was done by a dozen or more farmhands three centuries ago, and their produce is of better quality too? It's not about sharing the revenue fairly, it's about sharing the profits. Farming is not a very profitable business right now. Usually unions and owners would decide what is a "fair" distribution in violent knife fights that could take weeks, but union are dying so owner just do what they want more and more.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:17 |
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ronya posted:lower food prices, other things equal, is an increase in real wages; that's what the 'real' means
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:20 |
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Kliman's argument, (or at least the version he uses for laypeople) is that productivity has outpaced compensation growth, just not for workers as a whole, but due to increasing divergence within compensation generally. Or at least that's an implicit conclusion, in that he explicitly notes that relative stagnation is a consequence of increasing shares of total compensation going to executives and senior managers and so on. I think another important part of the situation is that in real terms capital goods have gotten cheaper during this period as well, undergoing less inflation than the American economy as a whole.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:40 |
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Brainiac Five posted:Kliman's argument, (or at least the version he uses for laypeople) is that productivity has outpaced compensation growth, just not for workers as a whole, but due to increasing divergence within compensation generally. Or at least that's an implicit conclusion, in that he explicitly notes that relative stagnation is a consequence of increasing shares of total compensation going to executives and senior managers and so on.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:49 |
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# ? May 30, 2024 03:55 |
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A Buttery Pastry posted:This is the Europe thread. And the 38% is based on American data, and would be different for European countries. But it is used as a point of comparison and there's no point in singling someone out for being clear about the source of the data.
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# ? Jun 4, 2016 16:53 |