YMix wrote:Simple Minded wrote:Who is defining the stagnating wage? Who is defining the need for a discount?
The government as the institution where the conflict between the employer's search for higher profit margins and the worker's need for a decent wage is resolved. The businessman who needs to sell his products and the people who need to stretch their paychecks.
I can't tell if you are ducking my questions or simply trying to sell me your religion. So let me try to sell you mine.
Simplification: In the economic world there are customers, employers, and employees. Each group has internal competitors.
Customers buy from both employers and employees. Employees sell to both employers and customers. Employers sell to customers and buy from employees.
Who caps the employee's wages?
a. customers
b. employers
c. competitors who are will to take the employees job at lower wage/higher productivity
d. all of the above.
Now who caps the employers wages/profits?
a. customers
b. employees
c. competitors who are willing to sell to the customer at lower profit margins
d. all of the above.
Who determines the price the customer pays?
a. the customer, because they can always walk away from a bad deal
b. the employer. because they determine the selling price
c. competing customers who are willing to pay more or less for the product offered
d. all of the above.
Fascinates me to no end to see how Fred CHOOSES define himself as a victim, and who he CHOOSES to define as his oppressor. Often seems to be in response to fashions.
I have two friends who have each bought, sold, and owned over 50 motorcycles in their lives. One buys a bike from the other. They both claim they got f**ked on the deal! Only one understands why I think this is hilarious.
My UAW brothers, making 4 times what they could make in a free market, claimed they were oppressed by GM (evil employer), and Toyota, etc. (higher quality car at a lower price). When I told them told them they were also oppressed by my Grandmother on fixed income, and me, the poor schlub who could not afford to buy a new car, they didn't get it. They also couldn't get it when I pointed out that they were their own oppressors when they left work and bought products made by foreign companies or US companies who employed non-union workers. Why would they sell out their ideals? Cause they did not want to pay the higher prices.
Humans are a remarkably consistent bunch. Thankfully we get to shift roles multiple times each day. How to replace the selfish interests of customers, employers, and employers with a infallible, benign power that I can trust to define "fair" better than me, still mystifies me.