Ficus-lovin\x27 Capybara N\x27 pals • 🌟 • 25 yrs ago
More Perfect Union
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Comments by "Ficus-lovin\x27 Capybara N\x27 pals • 🌟 • 25 yrs ago" (@YourCapybaraAmigo_17yrsago) on "How to Stop an Amazon Warehouse From Taking Over Your Town" video.
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@youtubesucks1499 I don't care how you slice it. Exploiting workers/employees via bad pay is non-moral and must be stopped by any means necessary. I wish success for any business from the smallest up to a fairly large size, but NOT if that means workers are exploited. Nobody deserves to profit at the expense of workers. Either reduce your number of workers so that each worker can be paid better, or rethink your entire business. I hate to see layoffs and the number of open positions reduced, but I believe it's better for each worker to be adequately paid so they can have financial security versus twice as many workers making half the wages, which keeps them in a perpetual cycle of financial insecurity and struggling to make ends meet.
Also- reduce high level and executive pay significantly if necessary in order to pay everyone else in the company properly and retain positions. How many times have we seen greedy owners and executives continue to get paid certainly more than was necessary, when all other employees were being told to tighten their belts or that they had to take one for the team because the company has to go through some cutbacks right now, but isn't it funny the cutbacks only happen for the workers and employees not those at the top? Obviously this is totally bogus. I would love to see legal regulations that would stipulate that the highest paid employee/owner of any private business cannot be paid more than 40 or 50 times what their lowest-paid worker receives. The age of out-of-control pay and benefit packages for the executives in large companies needs to come to an end. In this pandemic, thousands of not millions of hard-working low and mid-level employees were let go because of supposed cash flow and profitability problems for certain companies, yet the selfish, self-serving executives and owners impose NO such cutbacks on themselves; gee what a surprise. If they had taken a 50% cut from their already excessively high pay and benefits how many tens, 100s or 1000s of standard employee positions and pay levels would have been able to be retained/saved??? Very many I am sure.
When there's trouble within a large company or firm, it shouldn't be the general employees whose heads are always first on the chopping block.
Perhaps we need laws to prevent this from happening.
I'm sure there are some emergency situations where some positions have to be cut in order to save others, but in general, belt tightening should have to start at the top and work its way down NOT the opposite. It's unfair to always ask the lower level and least paid employees to always take the hit if something within a company goes awry and cutbacks are being considered.
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@youtubesucks1499 regardless of whether a business has investors or not, and I don't know how many times I have to say this, all workers at any level of the company, skilled or unskilled deserve Fair and livable wages. everybody in the universe can't open a business, it has nothing to do with smarts, it's just not in the interest of a lot of people. For everybody who wants to open their own business, there's a hundred people who don't want that extra responsibility or who just simply don't have the interest. Where does this attitude of yours that is so disrespectful come from? how would any business operate without their workers? You should be getting down on your hands and knees and thanking people who are willing to do the dirty work, the hard work to keep your stupid business moving. Once again I see a complete disrespect and lack of appreciation coming from types like you. Why is this? Also for your information, I'm sure there are plenty of people that have ideas for opening their own business but they're just not ready to for whatever reason, yet it could very well be in their future plans. So nurses in your estimation shouldn't be paid comfortable professional wages for the life-saving and vital work that they do? Their workers. So are teachers. You see not all workers are janitors or street sweepers as you seem to think, not that there's anything wrong with those occupations, after all didn't the pandemic just teach everybody who's an essential worker and who's not? For people who are so essential people like you sure want to pay them slave wages. Is that right? anybody who would deliberately underpay workers at any level is an immoral person and they should be ashamed of themselves. you are completely over valuing the usefulness and the need for fools at the top, the exploiting class, and completely undervaluing the people who make the world turn which is all the rest of us the non-ceos, the actual workers. And if you don't think a lot of jobs require plenty of brain power in addition to muscle power as well, then you don't know much.
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@youtubesucks1499 as I mentioned in my previous statement I'm not referring to recently open businesses for the most part for the purposes of this discussion. I did acknowledge that those who invest usually want a return on their investment, and that is fine. I'm not saying they shouldn't receive that. As for ongoing shareholding, I suppose it's not necessarily a bad thing as long as it's NOT used as an excuse to shaft the workers aka the PRODUCERS, that group of people without which the business wouldn't exist because there would be no labor AKA no work done AKA no profits to distribute.
For the purposes of this discussion being "what is a fair minimum level of compensation for employees?", I'm really not referring to startups, but generally established businesses. Also not all businesses are publicly traded, many businesses are not including small businesses, and many businesses get initial funding either from it's owner's savings and/or a small business loan from a bank or loans/seed money from others they know personally. Not all businesses are gotten off the ground via investor groups.
Your opinion seems to be workers really aren't people and they don't deserve comfortable compensation. I still don't understand why you think that way. Have you never been a worker before? Whether it's from the entry level worker all the way on up to a senior level manager, at the end of the day everyone has to go home and pay their bills and try to live a life worth having. Just because someone is newer on the job and hasn't gained extra skills yet, doesn't mean they should be paid like shit. I'm not saying more senior or skilled persons shouldn't make more than those who are less senior or less skilled, but the minimum level should be ethical. My minimum wage ideally is $24 for every position with a small business exception of $15. If you think that sounds like a lot, that's only bec you and many others have been gaslit and brainwashed from 40 years of anti-worker propaganda which has been successful in getting many people to view abnormally low wages as acceptable and justified.
The minimum wage used to track directly with inflation from its inception in the 1930s until around 1980, not coincidentally when Reagan became into office. You can look this data up yourself, but a properly-adjusted minimum wage today would be $18-24. Why is it that real wages have been virtually unchanged for the last 45 years across most industries for most workers, yet overall net productivity has soared? Where has all that extra profit gone? To the top of course into a tiny, tiny number of hands. In essence a tiny very rich parasite class has managed to legally pilfer gobs of wealth generated via the aggregate labor of millions of workers across hundreds of industries over the last roughly 40 to 50 years.
We want this wealth back and we deserve it. ALL wealth has its origins in the physical and mental work that employees across all sectors produce. therefore it is absolutely wrong that it should be concentrated in outsized proportions in a tiny few filthy rich hands.
We are living in a new gilded age, even worse than the first one. There is more outrageous wealth concentrated in a relatively very few hands at the very top right now than ever before in US history. This must end. In my lifetime, I pledge to do whatever it is within my power to do to retake most if not all of this excess wealth and get it redistributed back down throughout the middle and lower working classes where it belongs.
That's why I stand for socialism and justice, prosperity for all by any means necessary. It's not radical, it's just right. It's Justice that's all. it's fairness. Nothing weird or exotic or extreme about it. Paying all workers fairly, and making sure all households receive at least a small portion of the excess profits from some of our wealthiest industries, in the form of dividend payments the way shareholders receive, and/or the company in which they work.
That's the kind of socialism that I believe in and will work towards. Prosperity and security for all, not just a lucky few, or even one half.
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@youtubesucks1499 excuse me I don't work at McDonald's but I AM going to stick up for workers no matter where they work. I understand we're talking about primarily lower skilled positions but most of these people still need to live and support themselves, they don't all live at home with Mommy and Daddy and come from comfortable upper middle class backgrounds like people like you assume.
Minimum wage should be at LEAST $18 an hour across the board. I told you I don't have the stats in front of me, but you can go look it up. Go look up when minimum wage used to track with inflation, and then when they started letting it fall behind right around 1980, unsurprisingly when that shit-sandwich Reagan and his filthy fascist dirtbag robber barons came into office. And it's never caught up since.
If a business can't meet that standard, perhaps they shouldn't be in business. You seem to forget that LABOR is made up of human beings, not robots. You are dehumanizing them, do you understand? Workers are you and me; are everybody that isn't privileged with a silver spoon in the mouth. How dare you ask labor to be content with poverty wages! You should be ashamed of yourself. EVERYONE DESERVES FAIR WAGES, EVERYONE. NOT JUST THE WHITE COLLARS BUT ALL BLUE COLORS AND UNSKILLED WORKERS TOO. I DON'T GIVE A SHIT IF YOU'RE SCRUBBING TOILETS BECAUSE THAT STILL WORK, YOU DESERVE A GOOD WAGE!!! OTHERWISE WHY WORK IF YOU'RE JUST GOING TO BE EXPLOITED? SELLING DRUGS OR SOME OTHER HUSTLE WOULD BE MUCH MORE PROFITABLE.
No business has the right to stay profitable on the backs of employee exploitation. WORKERS CREATE EVERYTHING THE BUSINESS HAS. WAGES SHOULD AT A MINIMUM BE LIVABLE. YOU WANT WORKERS TO BE SLAVES HAPPY WITH CRUMBS. YOU ARE WRONG.
I am not saying a doctor and a janitor should make the same wage, but the lowest wages should be fair and livable, period. Doesn't that janitor have to live? Don't people on the bottom have bills to pay? Yeah I think so. They're not all teenagers living at home, not by a long shot.
And that is why unions are so goddamned necessary. Finally after decades of suppression, unions are growing again in the United States and they need to grow a hell of a lot faster and they will. How dare you suggest a business should balance its books on the backs of workers? Perhaps prices need to be raised modestly or executive pay needs to be cut back. Either way in most cases there's plenty room to pay frontline workers a good wage. Must be nice to see workers as slaves and expendable objects as you seem to. Unfortunately, that denies them their rights. It is wrong and YOU are wrong if you support it.
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@youtubesucks1499 Yes. Where would you be without the workers????? I understand- nobody wants to share. That's a value we've been taught in this society, to take as much as you can, f*ck your neighbor and sharing is for weak p8ssies. I get that. I also reject it.
Under hyper-capitalism, workers are devalued in some cases almost to the level of indentured servants. This is wrong.
Frontline workers, the upper management, and the owners, are all working to the same end (in the private market): a profitable business. Each deserves relevant and fair compensation for their part of the effort. Not 99% for some owner who doesn't do shit but decorate up an office, not 99% for faceless investors, but an equitable distribution of the profits among EVERYONE. It doesn't all have to be the same, but I'd say it should be fair. It can decrease or increase proportionately based on a given employee's seniority, position, and job difficulty.
All workers, based on their level, deserve a piece of the profits. Hourly wages are fine, altho for most people they are too low, but why shouldn't they receive an additional bonus from the the profits at the end of given cycle? Didn't they help create those profits?
I understand initial investors, if there are any, eventually want a return on their investment. I suppose that makes sense. But after that? After that time period is passed?
The workers are also taking a risk. If it doesn't work out they need to find a new job. they say up to 60% of America citizens cannot afford a $400 emergency. Is this because everybody is just blowing their whole paycheck at the casino? Hardly it's because most people who work for average or lower than average wages can hardly afford to save anymore. This is mainly due to rising rents, stagnating wages and other rising costs of living. so if somebody without significant savings suddenly finds themself without employment I'd say that they are in a much more difficult than urgent position that somebody who is already rich who supposedly took on some limited financial risk. As for the owner of said company and other higher level persons, I never suggested that they shouldn't be fully compensated based on their position and hopefully, whatever contributions they were making to the company. I don't agree with outrageous compensation for corporate executives however not at ALL, not ever, and I could go on about that another time.
Anyhow most workplaces are well established by now. I'm not talking about brand new companies, I'm talking about the majority of workplaces from small size to large corporates than have been around for some time, when this risk factor that you refer to is no longer relevant.
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@youtubesucks1499 I understand some skills are more valuable or entertaining or rare than others. So be it. Haven't I already addressed this several times by now? Look, professional athletes make what they make due to the popularity of sports, and the willingness of many people to pay a certain price for admission to sports games. It's not just because that level of talent is very rare, it's that there is a hefty base of the public, including myself, who appreciates sports and are willing to pay for the privilege of experiencing them. In short they have strong popularity. If a certain sport does not have strong popularity it's players or owners could not make as much. So clearly in the world of private professional sports and many private businesses in general, desirability and popularity are the determining factors in a given business's ultimate success. Now within that single business entity, whether it's a large corporation or a mom and pop shop, as I've already stated pay can be determined along seniority, responsibility, and skill level. So I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you, but I am claiming that your view is incomplete. Again, whether at a lower or higher skill level, my minimum wage, if I had my wish right now, would be $24 an hour (or $15 for a small independent business under 25 employees).
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@youtubesucks1499 Your constant desire to use McDonald's as a catch-all example of an unskilled worker is getting tiresome. There are hundreds of other better examples. Not all low-skilled jobs are McDonald's or food service. Many are I grant, but many are not.
But on this I've made my position clear. Unskilled or low skilled labor still deserves a decent wage. Your issue is that you seem to think it's still 1980 where $12 an hour can get somebody an acceptable standard of living. I wish that were true; but with a few exceptions in perhaps some rural regions, that has not been true for a long time.
Did you know that many nurses in the county where I live have had to go on strike one or more times over the past 5 years? Turns out that even though registered nurses are considered professionals they are STILL exploited and taken advantage of by greedy for-profit hospital owners. Now isn't that a shame? First of all, I'm morally opposed to a for-profit hospital. I oppose all forms of a for-profit healthcare system. We should have universal healthcare from coast to coast to coast in all 50 states and all US territories. We should have had that decades ago. But for the time being, sadly this gross ultra-profitized system has infiltrated all sectors of our society, much to the harm of the rest of us, and some of these ridiculous hyper-greedy owners have found their way into the medical industry, where they have bought hospitals which may have been non-profit previously and are using any number of methods to unscrupulously extract maximum profits. This then often includes medical understaffingand underpaying nursing staff to a greater or lesser degree.
This has led to nursing staffing shortages which impact nurses heavily and patients both. So really it should be illegal because worst case scenario this can result in wrongful patient death, which besides causing wrongful loss of life, could end up harming the hospital if it results in successful malpractice suits against it from the grieving family. So these unscrupulous managers now blatantly allow understaffing because they don't want to hire more nurses and they don't want to adequately pay the ones that they do have. So even these professionals have been disrespected by their unethical greed-seeking management group, which has led to various strikes within the industry of nurses and nursing-related technicians in recent years.
I'm glad you value our noble nursing professionals. Clearly not everyone does. Clearly even highly educated higher-skilled professionals are not always safe from the threat of various levels of exploitation by those at the top, in the cases where a hospital has been bought by these types of greedy business interests.
It seems to be that there are many instances of even higher- skilled and/or experienced workers having trouble getting their due.
Clearly some or many owners/managers are allowing their personal greed to take over and are refusing to adequately compensate even their skilled Labor.
It's nice that you claim to value skilled labor but clearly even skills aren't enough to protect those who do the work in many different workplaces across the us. I wonder why this is? Could it be perhaps an ideology amongst those in private business that justifies, as you seem to do, shafting workers as often as possible, whether it is the unskilled ones or in these other cases even those who bring skills and trained knowledge to the table??? That ideology that says it's okay to exploit workers or cheetah or pay them as little as you can legally get away with after all they're not really people and the only people that matter are owners and shareholders? Does this seem fair?
Well it doesn't to me.
Skilled and experienced labor will naturally be valued at a higher level than unskilled and inexperienced; no one really disputes this. But if a strong high floor is not set for minimum wages, then even those who bring skills and experience and education to the table will, in some or many cases, be at risk of being paid less than what they deserve. In a sense it's like a trickle up effect. If it's okay to shaft unskilled labor. Sooner or later it's going to be okay to shaft those who perform skilled labor.
It seems only logical to me that setting a ridiculously low minimum wage under values everyone's perspective wages, because the minimum wage is the starting point that all other wages are compared to. If an hourly wage was compared to $8 an hour then it would look a lot better, then if that same wage was compared to $20 or $24 an hour.
I suppose some business owners will always want to take it all and will always foolishly and unjustly refuse to appreciate the Labor pool where the totality of their skilled, semi-skilled, or unskilled workers comprise the engine that makes their entire business possible, and will thus try to devalue their wages as much as they can get away with.
I say that's a damn shame.
Owners and executive level managers need to stop feeling so entitled, stop seeing greed as some kind of virtue, and gain some more basic respect and appreciation for their workforce. I don't understand why this doesn't come naturally to these people, it's easy to sit around in a suit at a desk and do nothing all day. I mean I understand that some desk jobs do require mental effort, but I wager it's far easier to be a pretty-face executive and wear a fancy suit all day, then do the real work, skilled or unskilled, on the factory floor, or in the classroom, or in the community, i.e. a field repair technician for example.
The workforce IS the business. All profits and end products generated FIRST has to be work exerted by the labor pool (skilled or less skilled). Trying to suppress the wages of these people under any justification is completely unjust. Instead, owners and managers should be grateful for these people and respect them, for where would their business be without them?
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@youtubesucks1499 and this goes to show the lack of ethics amongst the ownership class sadly. I guess we need laws to prevent your class's greed.
If it's going to take the force of law to keep your class from exploiting us then we will keep fighting until we get the laws on OUR side for a change.
Outside of that I have already acknowledged that in the long run I believe it's worth it to lose a few positions so that all the remaining positions can be paid at the proper level. However if this can be achieved just as easily through cutbacks to the probably-not-essential executives then that should be done first and foremost without hesitation.
We will most certainly win. LABOR has all the power. LABOR can walk out anytime it wants. It's true it's not always easy, but this is why strikes happen. And the more we're willing to strike the more we show that we aren't to be f*cked with and that we mean business and that you give us our due or find someone else willing to accept exploitation. More and more won't.
It is sad you see this as a competition. You do not respect your labor force. Shame on you.
Therefore you don't deserve to have a business because your labor force is literally GIVING you your business and you do not want to compensate them more fairly for their efforts. I suppose that's unsurprising. That seems to be a bizarre longstanding idea that's been around since the dawn of industrialization, hell maybe before. Somehow the people who perform the mental or physical Labor aka the work itself isn't seen as vital human resources worthy of the highest respect and fair pay. Somehow this wacky pernicious idea trickled through all of the private business community long ago and unfortunately still seems to be kicking around. One of these days it'll die a bloody and long overdue death.
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ALL labor deserves an EQUAL voice at the negotiating table with FULL veto power and this is why we need a new union movement in this country.
It's obvious to any politically active person that we need many reformations to pre-existing labor law and new labor laws put in place in this country. We will get those once we kill the amoral and sociopathic GOP for all time and get genuine Leftists into office that represent the PEOPLE for a change, not the bloodsucking elites. It's true that this process of political change won't happen overnight; the well-connected and entrenched interests aren't going to give up easily, but we will never give up and will do whatever is necessary to bring positive change to this country for those who work for a living.
All Labor (skilled or otherwise) and it's genuine representatives deserves fair and quality pay, and in most cases, an equal voice to management. Anyone who opposes this is my enemy and I will fight them. I'm a very politically active person and I will only continue to be more so in the future.
There's truly no need to even fight over this issue. People like you just need to do what's right and there would be no conflict at all. When it comes to business, we should be partners not opponents. There is enough to go around for everybody, but if Some people want it All and are willing to shaft others to take it, this is going to lead to problems.
If people in your position continue to deny half of the workforce their due, or more, then you leave us no choice but to fight back. It's a shame though because it shouldn't even come to that. We're all on the same team- but if you choose to underpay or undervalue anyone who works for you, you are doing wrong and should stop immediately. We all want the same thing, a profitable return. But if you think that workers only deserve some piss-poor or mediocre wages and that's all, then you are wrong. ALL workers deserve a say in the conditions of their workplace. ALL workers deserve a vote and say in issues relating to pay and benefits, and then from there, let the majority win.
I suppose unscrupulous owners want workers to be content with being treated like slaves or indentured servants. Well sorry, we won't. Treat us like human beings, meet our fair and justified demands, or we can go round and round and have conflict for the foreseeable future. I would prefer to avoid that, but if we have to fight and strike for what we believe we deserve, we'll do it. If some workers want to accept a shit deal, that's their business. But the more Labor as a whole organizes and the more militant we become, the lower and lower the chance of settling becomes for any given lower-skilled jobseeker.
Stop trying to f*ck your workers. It makes you a bad person. Do what's right. You owe everything you have to your workers, skilled or unskilled, so why do you think it's okay to mistreat them and pay them crap or, less than what you could? And I would say the same to any senior decisionmaker within any business organization.
You can try to justify it any way you want but it's never morally okay to pay people shit wages, I don't care if they're entry level or not.
No matter how long it takes, ALL of us out here will do whatever is necessary to put workers on the equal par with anyone who would make decisions above them. This is primarily accomplished through unions. So if you unethical owners want to f*ck US, you're going to have to go through the Union, and; (provided the union is working the way it's supposed to); that's NOT going to work.
A strong federal minimum wage of say, $22/hr with a small business exception, and limits on executive pay (and remember my limits are pretty generous- up to 50 times what the lowest paid worker gets, that adds up to a heck of a lot); would solve all these problems. Why go round and round in circles forever just because you people want to be stubborn? If your people just do the right thing then there's nothing to fight about.
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@youtubesucks1499 who says they have to risk everything? Who's asking them to put their entire life savings in? Isn't that their choice to risk everything? Again my aim of this debate wasn't really to focus exclusively on startups.
I failed to see how a salary at 50 times a person making $10 an hour is insufficient to live the high life. Are you telling me a yearly salary that breaks down to $500 an hour, isn't a phenomenal salary?? Because if that's not sufficient for somebody then I see that as a personal problem. I mean how much money are we talking about here? A zillion borZacks a year? Is that enough? I mean when is enough ENOUGH?
You're really going to love this next part. As you know by now I am a hardcore Socialist so, naturally, I believe in wealth caps. Not to have personal wealth caps by law is obscene to me. Of course I always strive to be reasonable. I do not feel I am extreme in any way. My chosen personal wealth cap would be a yearly income NOT to exceed 10M per year, and a net worth after taxes of no more than 100M.* Now, please entertain me with your retorts of how a filthy rich asshole can't live like an emperor on 100M net worth????? And you expect me to listen to that with a straight face when the median income in America is something like $55,000????? And everyone else is supposed to be happy and satisfied with that but some freaks who hit the lottery, figuratively speaking, don't have to be satisfied with untold millions, and it's okay for them to demand more?? That may make sense to you but I'm sorry it does not to me.
If I had my honest to god most truest wishes I would set the limit at 50M. You tell me how a net worth of 50M isn't an incredible amount of wealth. Unless you're trying to buy a yacht a minute who in the world couldn't live like a king on that kind of money?? Honestly nobody deserves more than that. Nobody in the world does. If a person can't be happy on THAT kind of money there ain't NO amount of money in the world that's going to fix their problem. That kind of a problem can't be fixed by money.
Where do you people, or people that you evidently look up to, get off being so greedy? I would just like to know. Who in the world gave them that kind of entitlement? Or is that just what you aspire to have later in life sometime, some kind of ridiculous wealth and you think it'll make you happy, correct? Are you that empty inside and you think that if you just keep stuffing more money inside, it'll somehow bring you a fulfillment that you've never felt? News flash- material things can't do that for you. That's a spiritual problem.
The problem with this culture we live in is that people like you (or at least people that you look up to) worship money as an end to itself. That's where the problem starts. I agree that in our modern society money is necessary to live, for good or for ill, but for you people that's your entire reason for living! I think that's a real shame. I can't imagine that's a very fulfilling way of life, and I wouldn't want to live that way. I've been flat broke for a large chunk of my adult life, other times I've had an okay amount of money. I've never had a lot and I can't imagine I ever will have a lot and you know what- I'm okay with that. I grew up middle class, my parents came up from the working class, and if someone threw a million dollars in my face I wouldn't know what to do with it. I probably give most of it away to people who are worse off than I was. And that's what I want, to make sure others have enough. I'm sure I'd save some for the future and I probably buy myself a few things that I've always wanted but I've never been able to afford, including most likely, a house. But after that? Why would I need much more than that? I can't speak of you personally, cuz I don't know anything about you, but the greed in this country for a certain % of the population is out of f-king control. Money accumulation for people that you seem to aspire to be like is an addiction. I think that's insane. It's literally an addiction.
When is enough enough? When is it ever enough lives are being destroyed all across America because some very rich people are mentally sick because no matter how much they have they always want MORE. There's a hole inside of them that cannot be filled with physical things but they are not well, so they think it can so they keep on grasping and grasping and grasping, and they seek all kinds of manipulative ways in the private business world to impoverish others on a mass scale, in hopes of filling that hole all to no avail; such as the disgusting trend that's happening right now with a bunch private equity criminals from back East, who are buying up vast tracks of single-family homes and mobile home parks, jacking up the rents out of range of most of these residents who are low or modest income, slumlording in some cases, and forcing thousands into homelessness and destabilizing thousands of innocent lives in the process. This is a slow moving crime, a crime against humanity. All for what? The perversion of infinite greed that refuses to be satisfied.
WHEN IS ENOUGH ENOUGH?
Well I suppose that's a philosophical question now isn't it?
I stand by my standards. I feel they are very sensible, and quite generous. Maybe it's because I don't love nor worship nor even desire money very much. I mean why would I? What's the point? I love things as much as the next person but I don't make my whole life about THINGS. I wouldn't mind having more than I have now, but I wouldn't need THAT much more to feel satisfied, and believe me at the moment I don't have that much. I've gone through some unfortunate loss incidents, and I used to have more in the past, but I've made my peace with those and I'm doing fine.
A whole society based on greed is very unhealthy, and causes a great amount of harm to many millions of good people, ALL of which is avoidable. I don't agree with that, and I don't like seeing it. Unlimited greed by relative tiny few is causing the bottom 40 to 50% in this country to be pushed further and further into poverty and insecurity. And yeah I stand against that 100% I feel that is so deeply wrong. I stand for a moral redistribution of wealth that eliminates poverty once and for all and that stands against the mindless, endless, pathological accumulation of the crazy few at the top. I wouldn't say I'm a communist per se, I don't feel that label fully describes me, but I am most certainly very much a Socialist.
Getting back to the hard data for a minute-
Prior to 1980 based on my research it was common for CEOs and execs in larger companies not to make more than 40 to 50 times their lowest paid workers. They were living pretty high on the hog and didn't seem to feel deprived. Now it's out of control thanks to 40+ years of plundering by the 2% class. I'm asking for the bare respectable minimum for the people on the bottom, you seem to feel that's excessive; yet you're arguing for unlimited riches in fir those that occupy the most senior levels in a given firm? So those who are already well off if not quite rich they deserve [unlimited], but those on the very bottom who are barely scraping by (set aside teenage minors who live at home with their parents in the comfortable suburbs for a minute- that is not the population that needs the help nor are they the cases in point that I'm debating about right now, okydoke?) don't deserve better wages, which btw has a nice knock-on effect of raising all other wages on the lower end as well.
Recall I did not say that all compensation should be equal. I never said that I said it should be proportional to the level of one's position. But yes the floor should be exactly where I said it should be in the ceiling, if it was all up to me, would be exactly where I want it, which is 50 x LPW. Obviously I can't wave them actual wand and make this the law of the land right now but yes I believe this is where we need to have our limits. I don't accept your claim that that suddenly makes some businesses not worth the effort. That doesn't sound straight to me. You're trying to tell me that those returns for a given investor wouldn't be high enough? Huh. Sounds like that investor has a greed problem to me.
Again, I'm really not trying to debate the finer points of the minimum standards necessary to make startup successful. I'm referring to the 90+ percent of businesses that have already been open for at least one year and are projected to continue for the foreseeable future. Maybe the startup sector requires a slightly modified approach, maybe I'm sure it depends on many factors, but let's set that aside for a minute as I've asked you to do already, and focus on stable businesses. Startups are one thing that is a niche sector I'm not really trying to debate those right now. I'm willing to grant that under limited circumstances, maybe MAYBE, there may need to be some exceptions to my preferred requirements. Fine, now that I've granted that, let me refer back to the rest of the private sector which is NOT a startup, ok?
In the case of businesses that have already reached a reasonable level of stability, I demand a much higher minimum wage for their entry level workers. That is my position. I need the working class and those on the bottom to get a bigger piece of the pie right now, and this is the most effective way to do that.
*I understand that this requirement might have to have exceptions for those who have irregular income such as professional athletes or film stars. Nonetheless, the overall net worth limit could certainly still apply.
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@youtubesucks1499 If you stand against workers and unions you are an immoral person. In which case I suppose this conversation is over. I did hope you were able to listen to reason and had a decent heart inside of you, I suppose I was wrong. I believe I've said all that I came to say.
You wish to dehumanize workers, at least unskilled ones. That is immoral. You should change. If that's how you treat your own workers, guess what? Your business deserves to fail. If only you could see reason, you wouldn't not deny that workers have rights and you are wrong to deny those rights. If you are doing well, that's all well and good, but if that is at the expense of your workers, then that's not so well.
I hope in time you choose to see the error of your ways and gain a moral sense of right and wrong. Workers are people. We have rights and we will demand what is our due. If you don't like that that's too damn bad. It's no longer legal to own slaves in America. Guess you were born too late. Sucks to be you.
I believe any business can succeed and be profitable while paying its workers $20-25 an hour or $15 if they are legitimate small business. You are trying to tell me that's not the case, but I've seen no proof of that just your opinions based on the fact that you don't want to share a LITTLE bit more out of the amount that you are currently taking for yourself.
Sure of course you love capitalism because unlimited capitalism plays to immoral people because it says go ahead and exploit workers, keep all the profits for yourself. It justifies the shafting of workers and calls it "good business sense". Since you stand to benefit from this arrangement of course you defend it. You don't care if others lose so long as you win. Well that's wrong.
If a deal isn't win-win it's not ethical and it's worth having. Both parties deserve to receive a fair deal.
You're not more special than anybody else. That's great that you started the company if he did but you're not the first mfer to start a business and you're certainly not going to be the last.
Workers deserve a say in their workplace and to be paid well, according to skill level yes, I never said differently, but well. and that's the difference between you and me, because you think just because somebody doesn't have a college degree or advanced skills they deserve poverty or slave wages. They do not. especially in today's world, all wages must become living wages and I've told you for me what I consider to be a living wage.
And that's the bottom line and there's nothing in the world you could say or ever will say that will make me change my mind on that because that is one of THE most fundamental core values that I could ever have regarding economic justice.
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@youtubesucks1499 I can't talk to anybody says unions are worthless. I can only talk to people that recognize human worth and human rights. How can you say unions are worthless? Look man I- I'm sorry I like to think I can have a good faith debate with anybody but it looks like we have differences that we cannot bridge. Unions are the ONLY thing that have preserved human dignity from the evil capitalistic predators that that would have used and abused them for decade after decade after decade, that clearly clearly you seem to think are perfectly good people. It's like you're trying to tell me Nazis are really just misunderstood and in actuality they're actually pretty decent people. You may think what you're saying is entirely reasonable but from my worldview and my value system, I'm hearing the statements as extreme thoughts and value judgments that I stand totally opposed to.
Its like we're speaking two different languages man. It's like you're saying "uh you know slavery ain't that bad slaves aren't really people it's perfectly okay to own other human beings".
there comes a point where my moral system is just incompatible with somebody else's and it seems pretty clear that there's just no room for compromise.
I'm glad you recognize that nurses are valuable professionals, I appreciate it hearing you say that, but you still think it's okay to take advantage of people who haven't had a chance to gain that same level of ability, knowledge, or experience; aka the low-skilled worker. I feel that's completely wrong, I don't accept that and I don't believe any employer should do that. all workers have value within an organization. ALL workers are entitled to Fair working conditions, Fair wages, and to be free from any kind of exploitation or taking advantage of.
I'd like to think I could at least attempt to form common ground with almost anybody if they generally mean well, but sometimes there's no common ground to be found. It seems this is one of those times.
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@youtubesucks1499 I get the basic mathematics that go into running a business for profit and what a profit margin is. I respect all successful businesses at most sizes. Only ones I really have a problem with are the large corporates. I oppose very large businesses, possibly all large businesses. They're too big, they exploit their workers, they put smaller businesses out of business, they criminalize and over-criminalize poor people and homeless people, and depending on their industry they caused massive levels of harm to the environment. In some cases they're irresponsibility has literally killed their employees and poisoned or killed tens of citizens in the public. How many oil spills has the fossil fuel industry been responsible for? Ecosystems decimated? Corporate greed and corporate malfeasance has caused intractable damage to our communities, mostly from heavy industry but I don't have any love for the retail giants either, AND the country at large, and they will CONTINUE doing so until we get a political class that isn't their b*tch.
No offense to business owners but I don't think it's exactly brain surgery to understand the basics of running a business. If you know how to add and subtract, if you know what being in the red and being in the black means, I think one has the basics down.
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@nateb118 With 12 100M, or 300M. 400M maybe at most. There has to be a limit somewhere. To allow unlimited wealth while 40-50% of the planet, maybe more, live in some level of poverty and/or recurring insecurity is madness.
If you're not worried about the rest of the globe then just focus on the situation here at home. I assume you live in the US. If not you can correct me. we have the worst rates of poverty and inequality in the developed world. This does not need to exist. There's more than enough to go around but there NEEDS to be better rules to ensure everybody has enough and nobody has stratospheric sums that boggle the mind. If somebody can't be happy with 300M then doesn't that sound like insanity to you? Would an extra 100M make the magical difference??? If someone can't be happy at 50 or 250 or 300M, that's not a problem money can fix.
What entitles someone to that kind of money anyways? Nothing I can think of.
I'm not opposed to all wealth but I am opposed to nonsense levels of wealth. They serve no useful purpose.
We should get to work on meeting everyone's basic needs. We can do it. People can't strive towards their potential if they're constantly worried about going without one or more basic material needs, ie food, shelter, medical care, transportation, childcare, mental health support, etc.
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@youtubesucks1499 With a basic plan of some startup capital and the ability to follow through anyone could start a small business. Who knows what the future holds? I may choose to do that at some point. I'm a little busy right now and it's just not something that I feel the need or the desire to do at the moment. But that may change, who knows? I understand the allure of working for oneself. I'm sure it's very rewarding.
I agree a business has to remain profitable over the long-term in order to stay in business. I'm sure you can't stay in the red forever and not eventually fold. A major part of the problem is medium- and large-scale landlords who provide rental units. They seem to think there's no limit to the kinds of rents they can charge. Without a flattening and a sharp decrease of rents, all that's going to do is put pressure on the working class and while in the short term it's going to cause them lots of problems, it's also going to cause an overall demand for higher wages because that's the only way that working class people are going to be able to afford to keep their housing.
So who's really that fault here? Obviously everybody would like to make more money as a matter of principle, but it's not just that. What's the root cause? If you're looking for someone to blame look no further then property owners who rent out rental units, especially large holders. They're the ones that constantly want to more money and constantly charge an arm and a leg for rent. My current rent is outrageous. The only way I'm able to make it currently is because I have somebody else in my household who is also contributing to it. If there was hard and fast rent control from coast to coast, and it can be county adjusted because COL does vary by ZIP code, but nonetheless overall, if rent control was a thing then it wouldn't be as critical to raise wages on the bottom. So if you want to consistently pay people on the bottom low wages, which I disagree with but if you want to continue that ethically, then the first thing you should support is aggressive and universal RENT CONTROL. Forget about your business personally, there are people from all backgrounds without a college degree who start at these lower positions and yet most of them still have bills to pay and are trying to support themselves. We both know a lot of these people are not just teenagers living at home in a nice house in the burbs.
Even if rent was cheap, I would still support better wages at the bottom because it raises wages overall, and everybody who works for a paycheck below the executive level deserves more as far as I'm concerned. We all deserve more security. There is such a thing as saving for the future, to buy a house, provide for a family, or have an emergency fund.
You seem to think only people at the top deserve any money. That's just not fair. Well news flash, so long as money exists, we all need money to live.
The point is, I may even be inclined to deal with a lesser wage if I felt it was something people could reasonably expect live off of, but that is not really the case anymore, at least in a growing number of counties. When the owners of rental units consistently increase rents because they want to make big profits, and lawmakers refuse to put a limit on this to protect those who rent, then that leaves workers no choice but to demand higher wages so that they can pay this and not be forced to leave their home.
It's all connected and it's not rocket science. I'm sure you can see that.
People understand more education and higher skills will almost always lead to better pay and benefits from an employer. That's fine. But those who work the first level jobs have no choice but to demand better wages. They have a right to be able to pay all their bills AND have a little left over at the end of the month AND support their families too. Perhaps in the past they could do this but more and more this is getting to be impossible for the reasons I've already said, mainly the continually rising costs of food and rent.
Obviously those costs are outside of their control. So don't blame the workers. Blame the other large companies that are continually choosing to raise end costs, including the grocery stores but mostly the suppliers to the stores, and of course the landlords themselves. Landlords are demanding massive rents because of their greed. Well shit rolls downhill. You demand massive rents of people who work for modest money of course you're going to cause a lot of harm in the short-term, and the people who work for those modest wages have no choice but to demand more from employers. Would you not deny that someone who's willing to work for their money deserves a home? Of course they do. (I believe everyone deserves a home but that's a separate discussion. We're just talking about working people right now)
So the root cause is landlords as usual. So if you're looking for someone to blame, blame them. Even if rents were cheap I would support better wages as I told you, but I could be persuaded to accept not-so-great wages if rents were stable and cheap. This really isn't the case anymore.
People on the bottom deserve I respectable wage regardless of what's going on in the broader economy. That's a principle that I'll always fight for. But it's a practical matter now because landlords, for lack of better word, are getting extremely greedy. They're leaving people no choice but to demand better wages because they're demanding higher rents. It's a one-to-one relationship. So if you think higher wages for the unskilled worker is a problem, don't blame the unskilled worker. He usually doesn't have much of a choice anymore. Blame his landlord.
If lawmakers recognized that safe and quality housing was a human RIGHT, and limited rents to a decided upon amount based on relative COL in each county, then perhaps people could afford to be satisfied with being paid less. I shouldn't have to spend $2000 for a below average box where I live when it's worth $650 at most. I'm going to have to try to get around this unjust system because I would like to own a house someday, unless my parents leave me theirs which I'm expecting. However if that doesn't happen then I'm mostly screwed. I'll figure out something but that's another problem right now- homebuying cost , but that's a separate discussion.
My fundamental principle is that every worker no matter how lowly deserves a good wage. There is some work which is pretty easy that may not necessarily justify 25 bucks an hour but we have to set the standard somewhere. I don't see how practical it is to apply a different wage for "easy" work versus hard work or more demanding work. Once we set the wage by law that wage applies to all positions. So it's true a few people might be getting an extra advantage for work that may not seem to justify it, BUT overall I believe most people deserve that wage because I believe MOST jobs at the lower level do involve some level of labor and/or tedium and aren't always easy.
Secondly, there's never been more practical need for better wages than now because landlords in my lifetime have never been more aggressive and unreasonable about jacking up the rents. So you can set principles aside and just look at this from a dollars and cents POV. People at the lower end of the work ladder are being squeezed by very greedy and demanding landlords. That's out of their hands. Most people prefer to stay housed so without help from the government, they have no choice but to try to pay these, and they are human beings they shouldn't have to work 25 hours a day. they need to sleep, eat, relax, and haven't at least some time with their family too. That leaves no choice but to demand better wages. I'm sure you can understand this.
Think about all this.
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