4 ms·

If there are too few jobs, it's just a game of musical chairs. The number of jobs is not a natural phenomena, but a varying outcome of the parameters of our eco

by zurn 11y ago

If there are too few jobs, it's just a game of musical chairs. The number of jobs is not a natural phenomena, but a varying outcome of the parameters of our economic system of managed market capitalism. It's very natural for citizens demand better management of the economy to create more jobs when there are too few. Indeed the right to work is a part of the universal declaration of human rights[1]. (Whether we should continue the system of unemployment post-material-scarcity is a whole another question, but a replacement system doesn't seem quick to arrive). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_work https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Right_to_work

hammock 11y ago
If there aren't enough chairs for you, and you think you can provide value, then go into business for yourself. You don't have to rely on a pre-existing employer to give you work.
- zurn 11y ago
  I wonder why all the unemployed people don't do it? Surely anyone can produce a little value.
  - Tactic 11y ago
    Assuming this is a serious question it is because working for yourself is not that easy. It requires sales and marketing to get your value out there to the people that are willing to pay for it. Working for someone else is easy because there is an established system to connect you to the people that are willing to pay for your value. That channel doesn't exist for everyone, especially people with skills in areas that do not commonly hire contractors, like IT.
  - tortoise_face 11y ago
    Because value is a combination of human labor AND the means of production and the means of production aren't owned by working people. I can start making cheeseburgers but McDonald's owns the efficient equipment, the marketing, the good locations to sell them, etc. such that I can't possibly make profit outside their system. So I'm forced to essentially rent space in their kitchen in order to be compensated.
Juliate 11y ago
Too few compared to what? - To the _number of people who want/demand a job_ because the system they've grown into told them that they had to study to get a good job to have a good life(and that they will get a job if they get a good degree)? - To the need for more jobs for the economy to work? - To a wild guess disguised as a "this is how the economy should work" by people who got a degree or an office so now what they say is supposed to be right? - To something else? There's a difference between having a right to work (that is, not being prevented from working re: discrimination) and demanding a work (notwithstanding with: is there something one could do?). If it's a game of chairs, unless you abide "the state/system", there's no one but you to get a chair or build a new one for you. Or for you and some others. Or someone else to step in and build a chair for you. But that's not a given. Don't rely on the state.
- zurn 11y ago
  In my view the economic system exists to serve the people instead of the other around, so I will pick the first option. But taken broadly, so accommodating necessary compromises to maintain the capacity of the economy (keep producing jobs and valuable output and so on). Like I said in my original comment, whether we want to maintain a system with the concept of unemployment is a whole another discussion. Also, > There's a difference between having a right to work (that is, not being prevented from working re: discrimination) and demanding a work (notwithstanding with: is there something one could do?). The concept as discussed in the universal declaration of human rights does include the supply of jobs: "just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment"
  - Juliate 11y ago
    I totally agree with your view (the system is built/exists to serve the people). But the supply of jobs must not be void of meaningful/useful jobs; and the State/system is very, very unqualified to create such jobs - it tends to build on the jobs necessary to self-sustain (on the practical and political planes), and not much more. Most qualified to create those new jobs/missing chairs are the people, on their own, or through the business they build. Then the (clever) support of the state or of big players is required to make those grow in their turn. You may demand something out of a system. Which can self declare "everyone ought to get a job". But the system on its own is not capable of providing. Note. I'm heavily biased. I'm French, living in France. And I am beyond amazed how this country is run on the economics level.

by zurn 11y ago

hammock 11y ago

If there aren't enough chairs for you, and you think you can provide value, then go into business for yourself. You don't have to rely on a pre-existing employer to give you work.

zurn 11y ago
I wonder why all the unemployed people don't do it? Surely anyone can produce a little value.
- Tactic 11y ago
  Assuming this is a serious question it is because working for yourself is not that easy. It requires sales and marketing to get your value out there to the people that are willing to pay for it. Working for someone else is easy because there is an established system to connect you to the people that are willing to pay for your value. That channel doesn't exist for everyone, especially people with skills in areas that do not commonly hire contractors, like IT.
- tortoise_face 11y ago
  Because value is a combination of human labor AND the means of production and the means of production aren't owned by working people. I can start making cheeseburgers but McDonald's owns the efficient equipment, the marketing, the good locations to sell them, etc. such that I can't possibly make profit outside their system. So I'm forced to essentially rent space in their kitchen in order to be compensated.

Juliate 11y ago

Too few compared to what? - To the _number of people who want/demand a job_ because the system they've grown into told them that they had to study to get a good job to have a good life(and that they will get a job if they get a good degree)? - To the need for more jobs for the economy to work? - To a wild guess disguised as a "this is how the economy should work" by people who got a degree or an office so now what they say is supposed to be right? - To something else? There's a difference between having a right to work (that is, not being prevented from working re: discrimination) and demanding a work (notwithstanding with: is there something one could do?). If it's a game of chairs, unless you abide "the state/system", there's no one but you to get a chair or build a new one for you. Or for you and some others. Or someone else to step in and build a chair for you. But that's not a given. Don't rely on the state.

zurn 11y ago
In my view the economic system exists to serve the people instead of the other around, so I will pick the first option. But taken broadly, so accommodating necessary compromises to maintain the capacity of the economy (keep producing jobs and valuable output and so on). Like I said in my original comment, whether we want to maintain a system with the concept of unemployment is a whole another discussion. Also, > There's a difference between having a right to work (that is, not being prevented from working re: discrimination) and demanding a work (notwithstanding with: is there something one could do?). The concept as discussed in the universal declaration of human rights does include the supply of jobs: "just and favourable conditions of work and to protection against unemployment"
- Juliate 11y ago
  I totally agree with your view (the system is built/exists to serve the people). But the supply of jobs must not be void of meaningful/useful jobs; and the State/system is very, very unqualified to create such jobs - it tends to build on the jobs necessary to self-sustain (on the practical and political planes), and not much more. Most qualified to create those new jobs/missing chairs are the people, on their own, or through the business they build. Then the (clever) support of the state or of big players is required to make those grow in their turn. You may demand something out of a system. Which can self declare "everyone ought to get a job". But the system on its own is not capable of providing. Note. I'm heavily biased. I'm French, living in France. And I am beyond amazed how this country is run on the economics level.