something something blueberries Something you said: But the work they did used to be worth the cost of an apartment. The work hasn't changed, yet the homeless rate has risen. They held up their end of the bargain. This is the thrust of the "shrinking real wages" problem: if you do useful work within a society, that society should give you a useful reward. Are the robots bagging groceries? Are they flipping burgers? Or is that work still being done by people? And why have we tilted society such that these tasks are no longer allowing people to sustain themselves? 'cuz here's the thing: the social contract doesn't just protect you, it protects you from roving bands of brigands. I want that grocery bagger to make a living wage because that means he's invested in the same vision for society as I am. He's a citizen. His kids go to school. He votes in the same elections I do. I make that guy the underclass and all of a sudden, I'm a privileged minority surrounded by hostiles who hold me up as the reason for their oppression. And the last thing I want to do is tell them to stop having kids 'cuz they're poor. (1) They're poor NOW and my condescension doesn't fix things (2) Who elected me god? Children are the embodiment of hope for parents and here I am, deciding they get none. I'd wanna shoot me, too. Some jobs will always pay better than others. But we actively harm society when we decide entire classes of jobs shouldn't earn enough to support someone. Walmart costs this country $6 billion in welfare. Walmart made $118b in profit that year. So in a way, we are helping out... but if Walmart raised their wages to something resembling livable they'd give up on less than 8% of their profits. The homeless rate in LA is up 26%. Meanwhile, there's a $250m spec mansion for sale. and LA is on the bottom of the top 10. I don't think we need to worry about birth control. I think we need to pay poor people better.Maybe we are just in an era where the work these people do just isn't worth the cost of an apartment.
We've got a lot more people, the same amount of resources, and value isn't about what you produce, it's about the value of what you produce. In an era where there's lots and lots of old rich people maybe bagging groceries in a wealthy region of town is worth an apartment, but in an area with a bunch of fit poor people it's not going to get you anything. The value of our labor is going down for many people as automation impacts their community. In order to progress, we must be "more" than we could have been ten years ago. But in order to be "more' we have to be made into more by our society, and that takes an investment of a lot of money, time, and effort. Secondly, it's an investment that is best made young. Once we've failed people, they are stuck. We could have decided to not fail them a decade ago, and invested heavily in our educational system while making it so that nobody has to be worried about being on the streets because they don't have a job, but we didn't, so here we are. Robots aren't bagging groceries, but they've put so many people in that category of labor out of the job that you now have twice as many people trying to bag groceries as you did before. And if all the jobs similar to grocery bagging have been automated then grocery bagging isn't long for this world either. If the prices of labor go down it takes longer for there to be a robot doing the job, but it also means people get treated like shit. We could, as a society, automate many of the jobs people aren't paid much for. However, it's presently cheaper, by more factors than just cost, to treat a person like shit and have them do the job a robot could than to invest in and build a robot to do the task. I'd rather they make a living wage doing nothing than make a living wage bagging groceries, if the job can be gotten rid of. We should value human beings as more than a robot, and an overpaid grocery bagger is much worse than a person given a living wage for free. A bored person who is supported by society is way way better than a person supported by society and forced to do a menial and useless job. A robot can bag groceries, let the grocery baggers do something else. Paid well or not, a person bagging groceries their whole life is a waste of human life, which is why the job pays like shit. Do a robot's job, get a robot's wage. They'd fire everyone bagging groceries because their jobs aren't worth a living wage. Then, rather than having a job and not much money, they'll have no job and no money. See back above where I say we should give living wages for no work rather than living wages for work that isn't worth a living wage. I'd be very willing to support people being able to quit their jobs and still live a happy life without work. But is such a situation really realistic? People aren't generally the empathetic forward thinking types, at least on the non-personal stage, and we aren't getting an ideal society in my opinion. Instead, we are absolutely getting one where "those lazy bastards aren't getting any of my money!". >And the last thing I want to do is tell them to stop having kids 'cuz they're poor Remember that the rich are already not having kids. They are able to be in tune to what's going on in society and make decisions on it because they have the wealth necessary to control their lives. The poor don't. Getting the poor to stop having kids isn't a matter of forcing them to not have kids, that's absurd, inhuman, unhealthy for society, and just won't work well in the long run (one child policy). Instead, it's about giving them more knowledge and control of their life, and they will decide to not have kids on their own. In an era where we need more and more people to do labor, children are a moral imperative. Our culture and society twists itself in a knot trying to help and support as many children as it can. Mothers become expected to stay at home and pop out children all day. Fathers are expected to devote their whole life to supporting a family. Republicans who hate birth control and abortions at the same time still live in this era, or likely many of them used to live in this era, and are still mentally there, which is why their logic doesn't make sense if you don't view it from that context. We don't live in that era anymore, so it becomes a moral imperative to encourage people to not have kids. Birth control, abortions, family planning, adoptions of foreign children to raise them out of poverty. Secondly, it becomes a moral imperative to make the most mentally/socially healthy people as possible, because we don't do as much physical labor anymore. Stop eating a lot to be a "big strong man" and start eating healthy so you live longer. Be politically correct. Recognize and accept those who were weird or outcasts in the past, and so on.But the work they did used to be worth the cost of an apartment.
Are the robots bagging groceries? Are they flipping burgers? Or is that work still being done by people? And why have we tilted society such that these tasks are no longer allowing people to sustain themselves?
I want that grocery bagger to make a living wage because that means he's invested in the same vision for society as I am.
Walmart made $118b in profit that year. So in a way, we are helping out... but if Walmart raised their wages to something resembling livable they'd give up on less than 8% of their profits.
Something you're fundamentally not getting: capitalism argues that a job is worth whatever the market will bear. Socialism argues that a job is worth whatever is necessary to provide a living for the worker. Extremes in either direction don't work. We've got a hundred years of history demonstrating this. However, every problem on this page is the result of markets being favored over society. And you say things like this: That are offensive and nonsensical. Why. For what reason. Because the job of bagging groceries has not changed, and it used to provide a living wage. If you're in a union, it still does. And maybe I'm a bleeding-heart liberal but as far as I'm concerned, if someone is going to spend eight to ten hours a day performing labor in a market system, they deserve enough to thrive. And if automation and advancement eliminate those jobs, then whatever jobs there are should pay more, not less, because it's in MY best interests as a member of this society that it not collapse under the weight of millions of idled workers fighting for scraps.and an overpaid grocery bagger is much worse than a person given a living wage for free.
Why is it better for people to do nothing than to do menial tasks? Because a human being is better than bagging groceries. A human being can create, they can entertain, they can get bored and spring up the next silicon valley or find a passion that revolutionizes our society. A person bagging groceries is less likely to do sometime great. A person bagging groceries for a living can't take a risk and devote hours of their day to something new, because they have to be back at the store to bag groceries every day. If we pay people to do nothing, they'll start doing things. If we pay people to do something, and that something is stupid and not valuable, they will do essentially nothing. Same can be said for the job of waking people up in the morning, before alarm clocks were invented, or the job of repairing televisions and radio sets, or the job of working in a factory, or the job of delivering milk, and so on. Those jobs don't exist anymore, because we found better ways to do it, and that lets/forces those people do something else. You aren't provided a wage for doing work, you are provided a wage because your work allows something to exist that couldn't have without your work. If I can get a job done without hiring someone, I won't hire someone. When amazon picks up and makes the stores count your groceries automatically, you won't be able to make any wages off of being a cashier anymore, because that job won't exist anymore. A person spending 8 to 10 hours a day on a job that isn't valuable anymore is a waste of time, money, and energy. Our problem, as a society, is that people are still doing these jobs at all. Our problem is that we've accepted that such low wages are acceptable rather than taking the little bit of extra effort required to get rid of the jobs for good. People are doing the jobs of robots, and are treated as is fit for someone in that situation. If you want people's lives to improve, for all people to get a living wage that is good for a reasonable human being, you have to have them doing the work of a human being, not a robot. Better yet, if a job can pay a living wage, and people have the option of doing nothing instead, that job will start paying a decent amount. Paying people to do nothing is indirectly better at raising the pay of those jobs than forcing jobs to pay a living wage. Or, you should be happy to pay them to do nothing at all because that's what you have to do if you want a healthy society. Bored people find things to occupy themselves with, we need more bored people, more people with vision and the stable foundation with which to realize that vision. They do. That's part of why inequality is skyrocketing. 10 jobs were replaced by 1, and that 1 pays very well. But we still have 10 people who need jobs. The jobs for humans exist, but there aren't enough of them, so the people working the jobs for robots are getting treated like shit while the "upper" society does just fine. We can't pretend 8 hours of labor is worth shit. It's not about work, it's about production. We must make society encourage production, not work. To say that people must make a living wage from a job that just doesn't create a living wage's worth of goods is akin to saying that in order to get welfare one must go out and move dirt around for an hour or so. No, just give them the money for free and we'll all be better off in the long run. the job of bagging groceries has not changed, and it used to provide a living wage.
if someone is going to spend eight to ten hours a day performing labor in a market system, they deserve enough to thrive
And if automation and advancement eliminate those jobs, then whatever jobs there are should pay more, not less