In PatrickHenry's
Share a Link! thread, gr8fuldaniel showed us an article called
Defeat The Right In Three Minutes, from Conceptual Guerilla's Strategy and Tactics. gr8fuldaniel requested we. . .
Quote:
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Quote by: gr8fuldaniel Check out these bullet points |
. . . well, I don't mind if I do!
- Cheap-labor conservatives don't like social spending or our "safety net". Why. Because when you're unemployed and desperate, corporations can pay you whatever they feel like – which is inevitably next to nothing. You see, they want you "over a barrel" and in a position to "work cheap or starve".
Not so. Companies should be able to pay you whatever they wish, because it is a
good thing. If you accept supply-and-demand as a valid mechanism for determining the optimal allocation of resources (and there is no respectable economist who doesn't), then there is no logical objection to applying the same theory to the labor market, too. That is,
successful companies will always meet their employees at least half way. Any company, which can not pay sufficient wages, will either lose business, or get exposed as a fraud. Both consequences are a result of poor business practices, and occur without any nudging from bureaucratic oversight.
Otherwise, you have the sort of environment where big business is
encouraged to lobby and support economic regulation that poses a detriment to competitors and, ultimately, the overall market, yet have little affect on the monopolistic firm's own operational costs and profit margins. This is why governments are often accused of perpetuating monopolies, as they are the only entity immune to their own antitrust laws.
It is a popularly held misconception that governments pass economic regulation in order to ensure a "fair" market and ensure "ideal competition". These notions are
travesties to the highest degree. A "fair" market permits businesses to fail as quickly as they began,
not invoking government action when Store A has a competitive advantage (such as low prices) compared to Store B. These actions are not coercive, and are thus, already fair. "Perfect competition" involves companies serving the interests of their customer base, and in turn, generating a profit as compensation for their service,
not a government-sanctioned cartel.
- Cheap-labor conservatives don't like the minimum wage, or other improvements in wages and working conditions. Why. These reforms undo all of their efforts to keep you "over a barrel".
Again, another myth. If supply-and-demand works with goods and prices, then why not with workers and wages? Minimum wage contributes to unemployment and makes starting your own business more expensive than it may otherwise be. See my thread
Why I Hate Big Business. In it, I detail how companies, like Wal-Mart, that enjoy a significant cost advantage over their smaller competitors in certain areas, will seek to maximize these circumstances to their benefit. In this case, Wal-Mart supports a minimum wage increase when it
already pays an average that is almost double the federal minimum. Even a 100% increase in minimum wage may not seriously affect Wal-Mart's operations. But for some smaller firms it could trigger massive layoffs, huge cutbacks, a sharp reduction in the scale of their operations, and other unanticipated effects that would not
naturally occur
otherwise in a free, unregulated market on labor.
- Cheap-labor conservatives like "free trade", NAFTA, GATT, etc. Why. Because there is a huge supply of desperately poor people in the third world, who are "over a barrel", and will work cheap.
I like free trade, too. But I do not like so-called "free trade agreements". FTAs are mercantilism, and they're not even in disguise. People are just too dumb to realize the difference. Free trade occurs when there is no government say on who gets "preferential treatment" (protectionism) when trading, and enacts no tax or tariff upon goods and services traded. An entrepreneur anywhere in the world can choose where and when they wish to do business, depending upon their preference and ability. If they have no market at home, they can search for a market somewhere else. That is the essence of globalization.
- Cheap-labor conservatives oppose a woman's right to choose. Why. Unwanted children are an economic burden that put poor women "over a barrel", forcing them to work cheap.
I do not oppose a woman's right to choose. In another thread, I said, "Animals have no rights." You can replace "animals" with "fetuses" and the statement would still be entirely true.
- Cheap-labor conservatives don't like unions. Why. Because when labor "sticks together", wages go up. That's why workers unionize. Seems workers don't like being "over a barrel".
Wages go beyond equilibrium because of things like minimum wage (brought to you by unions), and other coercive tactics the unions utilize. I would have no problem at all with labor unions,
if they hadn't been a major source of anticapitalist propaganda since about the 18th or 19th Centuries, and cause more harm than good to the workers they claim to protect. When Roosevelt's New Deal sought a more neoclassical approach to economics, and took influence from the Keynesian school, labor unions took the opportunity to secure rights from the government that enable a union to act with
zero criminal liability. A good piece about this is "
The Myth of Voluntary Unions" by Thomas DiLorenzo, author and professor of economics at Loyola College in Maryland.
An historical example of labor unionism at work is the
Luddite movement in early 1800s England. The Industrial Revolution radically changed the way many goods were produced, and manufacturing jobs were constantly getting handed off to machines that produced a similar or higher quality product, for less than the time and money spent on human laborers. It permitted factory owners to more efficiently organize their human resources, and factories became cheaper to manage. However, the Luddites didn't enjoy all these new “fangled” contraptions in the workplace, and went so far as destroying and sabotaging technology for the sake of their obsolete professions. This is one very telling tale of labor unions
stagnating progress, rather than contributing it.
- Cheap-labor conservatives constantly bray about "morality", "virtue", "respect for authority", "hard work" and other "values". Why. So they can blame your being "over a barrel" on your own "immorality", lack of "values" and "poor choices".
This talking point plays on the misconception that morality is a
limit upon freedom of choice, by defining rigid ethical standards that do not conform to our natural sense of what may be "right" or "wrong". The problem here is not morality itself, but rather your perception of it. Morality is to be understood as the guidelines that you determine for yourself, in order to achieve whatever you wish to fulfill.
Aristotle tells us that excellence is not simply an act, but a
habit. The habits constitute our virtues. We practice our virtues in order to achieve a desired end, or value. The only way we can tell if a value is "good" or "bad" is by determining if it conforms to your moral standard.
"But wait," you protest. "How do I know my moral standard?" Well, that is ultimately up to you. But I'll make a suggestion. How about
your own life?
- Cheap-labor conservatives encourage racism, misogyny, homophobia and other forms of bigotry. Why? Bigotry among wage earners distracts them, and keeps them from recognizing their common interests as wage earners.
Actually, I think what is being attacked here is the employer's right to deny anyone employment or business for whatever they wish. Businesses are
private functions. An employer's right to deny someone's business for whatever reason is the same right homeowners possess to remove any unwanted person from their home, for whatever reason. In most cases, I think bigotry would probably harm a business more than it benefits it, however that all depends on your market and demographic. When it comes to matters of law and natural rights, then all men are indeed created equal.
In conclusion, some good points, but still a bit too left authoritarian for me. :)