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Liquid Communism posted:
That is danger of being colonist yes, company town with the full local-economic-work always were and still is a colonial enterprise. That you take neutral of description as praise it is saying much of you. If the Walmart had that control they also would have to spend all the money to build of everything else, and no outside money. Is proposition that lose in day of anti-immigration and being retail store with ocean supply chain. It is not shock companys did not protest against tearing away this town model nearly as much as they protest a unions or a child labor ban.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 06:30 |
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# ? May 26, 2024 18:29 |
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:That is danger of being colonist yes, company town with the full local-economic-work always were and still is a colonial enterprise. That you take neutral of description as praise it is saying much of you. Yeah, it says I have enough understanding of American labor history to understand what happens when you give employers a lever into their workers' personal lives. You're missing the point on Walmart. They don't have to actually -provide- anything in the case of modern scrip. They, in fact, make a big business of offloading the costs of maintaining their workforce onto the public coffers. Combining that with financial capture by keeping their employees spending most if not all of their wages at their workplace is a huge win for them, if they can get away with it.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 06:53 |
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Jack2142 posted:Which one is this? It’s the sears that ended up hosting Starbucks HQ. The one on 1st just south of the stadiums.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 06:54 |
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We (in my house) have dickie’s work boots. They didn’t understand* the difference between EU/UK and American shoe sizing so hosed up, and everything is a size too big. *Or that women exist in the engineering industry and might want more than two options (one of them naturally in pink) when the men have sixty.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 09:05 |
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The Sears at the mall where I used to live has been an empty husk with a giant blue rectangle with SEARS burned into the paint for the past year or so. All the other big retailers are already accounted for in the area, and I'm pretty sure nothing is ever going to move into that space. They just put wall in the inside where the Sears entrances used to be. What the hell else would move in there at this point?
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 12:37 |
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SEARS'EM WELL GRILLS AND GRILLING ACCESSORIES
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 13:23 |
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:*** Plus, economically speaking, companies didn't benefit from script all that much. Fundamentally, workers trade [labor] for [real stuff]. Adding an abstraction layer in the middle (i.e., issuing script and then charging high "prices" for [real stuff] in that script) doesn't change that overall deal. Put differently, no matter what they "charged" in script, workers would demand enough of it to get the same about of [real stuff]. So why companies issue script? IMO, this was at time before electronic transactions and company towns were often located in the middle of nowhere. These factors made it very risky to get real dollars to those places. Think train robberies and the like. Liquid Communism posted:Yeah, it says I have enough understanding of American labor history to understand what happens when you give employers a lever into their workers' personal lives. Always practice safe commenting. Use a pseudonym.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 18:58 |
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gaj70 posted:Plus, economically speaking, companies didn't benefit from script all that much. Fundamentally, workers trade [labor] for [real stuff]. Adding an abstraction layer in the middle (i.e., issuing script and then charging high "prices" for [real stuff] in that script) doesn't change that overall deal. Put differently, no matter what they "charged" in script, workers would demand enough of it to get the same about of [real stuff]. 'Companies didn't benefit from script all that much' - someone in 2018 incapable of understanding the concept of a captive labor pool's effects on wages and worker treatment.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 20:43 |
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HEY NONG MAN posted:It’s the sears that ended up hosting Starbucks HQ. The one on 1st just south of the stadiums. That was still a Sears store? I thought it was closed before I was born.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 21:01 |
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Liquid Communism posted:'Companies didn't benefit from script all that much' - someone in 2018 incapable of understanding the concept of a captive labor pool's effects on wages and worker treatment.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 21:34 |
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Liquid Communism posted:'Companies didn't benefit from script all that much' - someone in 2018 incapable of understanding the concept of a captive labor pool's effects on wages and worker treatment. They do not though. I not understand why you do not notice this. What good is captive labor pool who makes nothing for you to sell? Wal-Mart employee often need federal welfare and food cash just to live, you seem to propose the Wal-Mart make just as much money if they need supply same thing out of Wal-Mart fund instead of other person and company tax that cost Wal-Mart no money. I am company who run old times company town. I pick up new immigrant desperate for job at immigration post. I bring him to my town in empty wilderness near copper mine. I take all this copper i make him mine, sell it to people who use real money for real money, use pittance of this to buy supplies to 'sell' to worker just enough that I do not need to spend too much real money to get another immigrant. Now I am Wal-Mart. I go to build store in empty area and bring in people to work there and sell things. All this thing I sell, I bought with real money from outside. Only people who come to store are people who live in my Wal-Mart town and have Wal-Mart Marks to pay. Where is my real money profit? Or am I just marking down "make Liquid Communism mad" in my ledger book and my investor in cities with real money nod their heads and give me more real money for this.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 21:36 |
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:Now I am Wal-Mart. I go to build store in empty area and bring in people to work there and sell things. All this thing I sell, I bought with real money from outside. Only people who come to store are people who live in my Wal-Mart town and have Wal-Mart Marks to pay. Where is my real money profit? Or am I just marking down "make Liquid Communism mad" in my ledger book and my investor in cities with real money nod their heads and give me more real money for this. The part where you become able to pay people less and charge them higher prices because they can't leave or buy somewhere else because they don't have a cent of real money. Like I want to go back and point to the dumb thing people were doing where they just went "hurr hurr, sounds like a regular american bank account, am i rite???" at the extremely bad terms of the walmart card.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 21:40 |
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:The part where you become able to pay people less and charge them higher prices because they can't leave or buy somewhere else because they don't have a cent of real money. Like I want to go back and point to the dumb thing people were doing where they just went "hurr hurr, sounds like a regular american bank account, am i rite???" at the extremely bad terms of the walmart card. Do you understand that if you pay me in monopoly money, and then tell me you want 5000$ monopoly moneys back to buy a banana, you still do not make real money on that banana you paid someone else 1$ real money for? You can say that now you want 5$ millions of monopoly money for that banana, you still are not making more money. You sound of person who invest in knockoff bitcoin, that is level of economics on show here.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 21:49 |
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But you didn't have to pay the employee real money, either. So instead of paying the employee's salary & for the banana, you're just paying for the banana.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 21:51 |
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:Do you understand that if you pay me in monopoly money, and then tell me you want 5000$ monopoly moneys back to buy a banana, you still do not make real money on that banana you paid someone else 1$ real money for? You can say that now you want 5$ millions of monopoly money for that banana, you still are not making more money. It isn't about making money on the script transaction. It's about the workers being unable to risk demanding better working conditions or more pay because they're paid in currency that is no good in the rest of the world, and are thus completely at the mercy of the company for sustenance and unable to build up savings to weather the possibility of being fired or to move to a better job elsewhere.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:00 |
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:Do you understand that if you pay me in monopoly money, and then tell me you want 5000$ monopoly moneys back to buy a banana, you still do not make real money on that banana you paid someone else 1$ real money for? You can say that now you want 5$ millions of monopoly money for that banana, you still are not making more money. You aren't getting rich of banna sales, you are getting rich because paying someone funny money makes them fully reliant on you and whatever you decide to pay or charge for anything. If disney pays you in disney dollars you can't shop anywhere but disney and if you leave you realize you have no actual money, if disney wants to cut your wages or raise your rent you have zero power to leave since you have zero real money.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:01 |
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The historical example is mine workers in company towns being fired and their families evicted with only the clothes on their backs and no way to transport anything before they've even gotten back from the mine as a way to scare the rest of the workers out of unionizing.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:05 |
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:You aren't getting rich of banna sales, you are getting rich because paying someone funny money makes them fully reliant on you and whatever you decide to pay or charge for anything. If disney pays you in disney dollars you can't shop anywhere but disney and if you leave you realize you have no actual money, if disney wants to cut your wages or raise your rent you have zero power to leave since you have zero real money. Why did I waste the time to lose 1$ on a banana by building this store and "hiring" all these employees in the nowheresville? I can instead charge 2$ real money in store that already exist to person who has real money. The old time company town business ran such a store, because there was a thing of value to force workers to get for you, that made you the real money. Making the company town business just the store makes no senses. Liquid Communism posted:It isn't about making money on the script transaction. Where is the money made of then? Wal-Mart is just a store, it stocks of things that were obtained from somewhere else with real money. How does Wal-Mart make money off of all these "workers who can't demand better working condition" and who have no real moneys, but are also the primary customer of the store. Am I going to visit this Wal-Mart town just to spend my real money there, and they bother to build whole hypermarket and supply a dozen workers with imported goods just because I may show up and buy a cart of grocery? Is not even just the store expense Wal-Mart need to pay, it's all the place employee live that somehow takes Wal-Mart token instead of telling them to get lost and pay market rate real money. It is whatever means they use to get to store and sell to just each other. It is said again - old time robber baron can do this for his town, because the town has a thing people pay real money for and he just need slave to bring it up and send it out, it more than pay for meager cost of bad houses and minimal food import. And when that thing runs out he just says "I will not support this town anymore, you are not needed" and so place is abandoned.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:22 |
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1) locking in your workers is still convenient and lets you overcharge them (which essentially means cutting their pay) even if you’re not literally running a company town outside a mine 2) you deny the competition sales 3) you increase your turnaround, allowing you to squeeze suppliers even harder
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:28 |
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I had literally no idea that there was people that were pro company scrip
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:29 |
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:Why did I waste the time to lose 1$ on a banana by building this store and "hiring" all these employees in the nowheresville? I can instead charge 2$ real money in store that already exist to person who has real money. ok but on the other hand, recorded history
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:32 |
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:Wal-Mart is just a store, it stocks of things that were obtained from somewhere else with real money. How does Wal-Mart make money off of all these "workers who can't demand better working condition" and who have no real moneys, but are also the primary customer of the store. Am I going to visit this Wal-Mart town just to spend my real money there, and they bother to build whole hypermarket and supply a dozen workers with imported goods just because I may show up and buy a cart of grocery? Your whole argument seems to be based on some weird sealed walmart that has zero customers except the 50 people that work there. That does not and will not ever happen. You exploit the workers so you can make more money off the other people around. No town has literally every single human employed at walmart.
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:40 |
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Owlofcreamcheese posted:I had literally no idea that there was people that were pro company scrip
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:43 |
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Haifisch posted:Not surprising. There are still people who are pro-gold standard, even though the fact that only one country in the entire world still uses it should be a massive loving clue that it's a bad idea, whether or not you understand why. People get the weirdest blind spots when money's involved. With gold standard at least it's the dumb person "solution" to the fake and made up racist problem that the economy works by jews and/or bankers just printing money all the time and giving it to their friends. And the people that support the gold standard are always working on some variation of trying to solve that stupid and made up racist problem they think is a thing. I don't know who would like scrip. Or what ideological bent would lead to 'scrips not so bad".
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# ? Aug 24, 2018 22:52 |
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suck my woke dick posted:1) locking in your workers is still convenient and lets you overcharge them (which essentially means cutting their pay) even if you’re not literally running a company town outside a mine You also just pay America's very low minimum wage to them, and they are unable to leave job anyway because it does not allow them to save. Is that not what is already done and why Wal-Mart rely so heavily on most employee having food stamp payment? Skip the time and expense of running your own payment network/adding special token drawer to registers etc. Wal-Mart already doesn't have the real low price either. And again, so you give the people i don't know 7 real dollar hour plus 50 wal mart dollar per hour except all the wal mart dollar price are raised to match that.. where is the wal mart dollar making wal mart actual money on this versus just paying the 7 dollar minimum and tell employee to gently caress off if they can't handle that?? CoolCab posted:ok but on the other hand, recorded history You mean where company scrip is rare now because there is easier way to soak proletariat? Owlofcreamcheese posted:Your whole argument seems to be based on some weird sealed walmart that has zero customers except the 50 people that work there. That does not and will not ever happen. You exploit the workers so you can make more money off the other people around. No town has literally every single human employed at walmart. That is only situation where scrip works in any form, so that is what I refer to. If you don't have walmart company town, who is taking walmart dollar for rent? Who is taking walmart dollar for all the other thing the employee needs to live that isn't at Wal-Mart, or how is walmart affording to add these to their store and sell it for their fake money? Or who is providing all that things so cheap that the walmart employee can afford it on tiny American minimum wage real money or less? Did the landlords suddenly agree to radical cut of rent out of goodness of their heart lulz. Maybe pigs flew by.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 00:14 |
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:
It's rare because it's illegal, good loving god.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 02:58 |
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The Dipshit posted:It's rare because it's illegal, good loving god. And the reason its illegal is literally all he reasons people have been saying. Scrip only benefits the people issuing it.It also makes it impossible to save or move. You can't bank it because the company can just issue different scrip whenever they feel like it. It makes it harder to escape because it is literally worthless elsewhere. So not only can't you save to move away but you also can't spend anything you take with you if you do. That makes it harder to get away from the company as literally every job in the company town only pays scrip. If you get paid in scrip the company effectively owns you.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 03:31 |
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The Dipshit posted:It's rare because it's illegal, good loving god. It is not illegal to give additional bullshits for pay above minimum wages, which are usual paltry and not enough to live on. Do not your country allow wages as low 2$ per hour for many worker or even less? There is also much payment in other kind in lieu of cash allowable, for example in US farm worker can be made to take some of their compensation as mandatory housing at rate set by employer. Or worker at remote camp such as of Alaska oil company may be billed before of pay for accommodation and provisions, on top of company operating said site operating only store for far around that employee must simply accept price at. It not like you will be able to fast 3 week on work rotation to avoid paying them or bring large amount of supply on bush plane! ToxicSlurpee posted:And the reason its illegal is literally all he reasons people have been saying. Scrip only benefits the people issuing it.It also makes it impossible to save or move. You can't bank it because the company can just issue different scrip whenever they feel like it. It makes it harder to escape because it is literally worthless elsewhere. So not only can't you save to move away but you also can't spend anything you take with you if you do. That makes it harder to get away from the company as literally every job in the company town only pays scrip. If you get paid in scrip the company effectively owns you. Once again you make argument for why company cannot rely on scrip-payment without also running whole company town to use it in. To use walmart as example, if walmart dollar does not pay your rent and such thing, it is very hard for them to rely on it for their payment. Unless they want to blow a bunch money on building house for you with real money that you pay them for with fake. The modern company store system use real money because it is far simpler and cheaper to run that way - for the employer. Do not pretend meaningful choice exist in isolated places.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 05:00 |
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nepetaMisekiryoiki posted:It is not illegal to give additional bullshits for pay above minimum wages, which are usual paltry and not enough to live on. Do not your country allow wages as low 2$ per hour for many worker or even less? Those things provided in lieu of wages must be provided at a fair, market rate. I also think it's not something employers can actually force but in the cases of like Alaskan oil workers you'll end up without a choice. Of course oil workers are not the best examples; the job security is total rear end but those dudes make cheddar. But unfortunately yes there are cases where wages as low as $2 an hour exist; prisoners are often paid in amounts measured in dimes. See, they aren't blowing a bunch of money on housing. Company town housing where only scrip is paid was generally pretty dreadful; not even really minimal living standards. The conditions in company towns sucked. Nobody could compete with the company to offer better things for two reasons; first off they owned literally the whole town. Second off the only money available was scrip which nobody was going to take as rent except the company. This is I think the thing that you're missing. When company scrip was A Thing there were also mail order companies as well as the mail system. These things don't take company scrip. Same goes if a wandering merchant or a local farmer of some sort happens to come by. Well actually they wouldn't come by because the only way they could actually sell something was to the company. The company could completely, totally control what was available in the area, what it cost, and who would buy it. American corporations are not exactly known for their generosity. It was total, complete control and that's why it was an extremely cheap option.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 05:53 |
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Throwing this in the ring. I don’t know what America’s benefit system is like but in the U.K. if you earn under a certain amount the government will top up the difference with cash and rent payments. This means that companies can get away with paying people less in the knowledge that the taxpayers will subsidise them.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 06:24 |
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Congratulations, you've discovered Walmart's strategy. From what Liquid Communism linked upthread:https://www.forbes.com/sites/clareoconnor/2014/04/15/report-walmart-workers-cost-taxpayers-6-2-billion-in-public-assistance/#7a9d87be720b posted:Walmart's low-wage workers cost U.S. taxpayers an estimated $6.2 billion in public assistance including food stamps, Medicaid and subsidized housing, according to a report published to coincide with Tax Day, April 15.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 06:28 |
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Meanwhile people like the Walton kids bitch that taxes are too high and the poor are getting too many handouts. Except that in this situation it's literally Walmart getting a handout as they're forcing everybody else to subsidize their labor force.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 06:55 |
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ToxicSlurpee posted:Meanwhile people like the Walton kids bitch that taxes are too high and the poor are getting too many handouts. look if the state doesn’t give those lazy poors working at walmart handouts it’s a win win situation. the taxpayer will save money and the poors will have to spend 70h/week working at walmart to not starve. really makes u think.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 07:26 |
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Prison labour is also effectively paid in company scrip given the only way they can buy things is from the prison commissary.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 08:00 |
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ToxicSlurpee posted:Meanwhile people like the Walton kids bitch that taxes are too high and the poor are getting too many handouts. I was talking with one of my friend's idiot co-workers the other night, and he seemed to have got it in his head that minimum wage is bad because if it went up to $15/hour then he couldn't Job Create as effectively by hiring a nanny for a near-poverty wage. As if his right to hire a nanny at wage essentially subsidized by the taxpayer is something that should be considered a net benefit for society. These "conservatives" are just lazy, selfish assholes.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 13:26 |
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PT6A posted:These "conservatives" are just lazy, selfish assholes. Now you get it...
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 13:56 |
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PT6A posted:I was talking with one of my friend's idiot co-workers the other night, and he seemed to have got it in his head that minimum wage is bad because if it went up to $15/hour then he couldn't Job Create as effectively by hiring a nanny for a near-poverty wage. I mean, childcare is a real problem in the US. If you work a full time minimum wage job and need to pay someone minimum wage to watch your kids while you do it it makes sense someone is going to lament "god, I need to hire someone, I'd even be willing to pay, I just can't pay my whole (half of my/a quarter of my) salary just to get to work to make my salary" Like obviously the solution is full communism now and obviously it logically couldn't work out for someone to watch kids for sub poverty wages, but I don't think people are thinking about how it'd work for the babysitter when they wish "man, I wish I could afford a babysitter". Like they just wish for a way for the product to be cheaper until we set up government funded baby storage cubes, that is their side of the concern, how that would actually work out for the babysitter is less what they are talking about at that moment.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 13:58 |
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That argument is based around somone having one on one childcare, like you would have with a nanny. Poor people use daycare where you pay x per hour and there are many children there. The big issue is that this system isn’t geared towards shift or night work so the poor have to use a friends and family network or they are screwed.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 15:12 |
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ToxicSlurpee posted:Meanwhile people like the Walton kids bitch that taxes are too high and the poor are getting too many handouts. Billions of dollars of public subsidies in Cali alone, on top of all the tax abatements they demand to build places.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 16:21 |
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# ? May 26, 2024 18:29 |
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learnincurve posted:That argument is based around somone having one on one childcare, like you would have with a nanny. Poor people use daycare where you pay x per hour and there are many children there. No it's not. Daycare is still pretty expensive, running from $500-$1000 dollars for a month on the cheaper end. And even if you find something less, you're still responsible for providing diapers which adds hundreds more dollars on top. It's not uncommon for one parent to just give up their job because daycare expenses would eat up their entire salary anyway, especially if they have more than one kid. And that's middle class people. Poor people rely on family, friends, religious institutions, or that one old lady that watches kids at her house. The thing is we already subsidize daycare for kids over a certain age through the public education system. We could do the same for babies and toddlers, or at least relieve a lot of the burden with paid parental leave and free diapers.
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# ? Aug 25, 2018 18:13 |