Comments by "Wandering Existence" (@WanderingExistence) on "WTF Do CEOs Actually Do All Day?" video.
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Wage labor for a CEO/ boss is renting yourself via "self ownership". Employment is literally renting another human being as if they're property. The employer-employee relationship is a very insidious dynamic. Employment is a rental contract, like if you rented capital (say, a chainsaw from Home Depot), you pay rent for the "time preference" (basically the cost of time) for a piece of property. Capitalism is based on a principle of self ownership, which sounds empowering, until you realize that most people don't own capital goods other than themselves, and must rent out the authority over themselves as pieces of "human capital". This is a process of dehumanization where human beings are valued for their return on investment as capital goods. This is why, at the very least, capitalism needs unions and safety nets (or abolishment), or else the system won't value people for their human value. Importantly we must also think about our sick, elderly, and disabled people, as they can't provide competitive economic return for the investor class to value. We must figure out a way to change this economic system if we wish to value each other.
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@JosiahTaschuk Totally! Personally, I've been interested in two grassroots groups focused on economic democracy, called the Next System Project and the Democracy Collaborative. They have devised a way to keep production local and contract service to cooperatives, called the Preston Model. They have helped multiple cities struggling with job loss due to factory closures build back their communities, in the US and UK. In addition, trade unions, collectives, public banks, credit unions, community land trusts, CSA's, and many other democratically controlled institutions can work together to create democratic networks outside the market to create an economy that doesn't reduce people, their governments, and the environment to a monetary value. I think this can be a viable strategy to give people the autonomy over their work. I believe economic democracy is the only way people who work for the economy will have the economy work for them, their families, and the planet too.
This way of revitalizing communities by building community wealth has helped many communities all over the globe, and it is utilized by the UK labor party and touted by Jeremy Corbyn. Preston, Lancashire became the most improved city in the UK because of community wealth building. https://youtu.be/MObfh_VNqs4 Not to mention, much of the progress in labor rights has been due to union's collective power. The thing that draws my conviction to the movement is that I can see it now, helping empower people to live happier, healthier, and wealthier lives.
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@me-myself-i787 Lmao! Trust me I know how simple it is to plug in numbers into a compound calculator.... I used to set out rather realistic projections for my investments all the time. But the one thing that makes it really hard to keep investing and building wealth to a point where one feels secure enough to take off from work voluntarily, is to be forced out of a job because you're literally unable to fulfill the requirements of nearly any job because of disabling health issues.
I started working and investing at 13. Some of the first stocks that I bought are Home Depot and Google. I've saved and invested and put myself in quite a good position... But I was lucky enough to hear about investing at a young age and lucky enough to have the math brain to understand why compounding was so important. All that said and done, I'm still unemployable due to my health issues, and while I do rely on family and my stock account many things would be much more difficult without state assistance. It's easy to make plans, and it's a bit harder to stick to them... I was able to do both for awhile and set myself up in a good way for the position that I'm in currently, but even though I'm young, and even my health is quite fragile, and that can quickly make you have to scrap your little table to a $1M, just like I had to.
I'm not disagreeing with the math because the math is just the math, but I am speaking from the standpoint of life experience as well as an understanding of economics and finance. One of those economics/ finance lessons is that the understanding that sometimes the economy doesn't make the math work out for most people. Investing $10K/yr is rough when 64% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck and most of them can't afford a $1,500 emergency. That would indicate that they don't need to spend money on investments, they should put money into their emergency funds. When people's education, health care, insurance, and housing costs all rise higher than inflation but their wages barely keep up with inflation... That's a deficit that's not going to be magically funded. CEOs and shareholders dividend pay/ buybacks have drastically increased at the expense of workers. I speak as a $GOOG shareholder who is getting a portion of capital appreciation due to $100B in buybacks, meanwhile 7,000 Alphabet employees got laid off. Home Depot loves to give me 8-20% dividend increases annually... But would totally hesitate to increase their wages 8 to 20% annually, and I've literally never done any work other than scan something at the self checkout at Home Depot.
C'mon, I'm a shareholder and even I understand how unfair it is. I hope this wasn't too long for you to read, but I just want you to know the real world example of how those projections sometimes turns out.... It's all a probability curve ;)
P.S. The ACA and Medicaid have saved my life.... Literally.
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