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My argument was not even about sales. So I don't know how it got thrown in there. Sales are important, marketing people are important, managers are important. T

by devoply 10y ago

My argument was not even about sales. So I don't know how it got thrown in there. Sales are important, marketing people are important, managers are important. That's not the issue that concerns me. It's this sort of behavior where you supposedly have a labor market, but it's not really a market, that concerns me. The markets regulate themselves with the value of labor going up with the value that it generates in the market through competition for finite resources. But here we have some sort of pseudo slavery, where a worker is only justified enough money to maintain their living while companies are deriving multiples of value from their work without competing for their services. It's as if I were selling a product, and the middle man as a class were forcing a price through collusion so they could make a massive profit on it. That in law is called unjust enrichment and it's illegal.

mooreds 10y ago
Ah, I was replying to the parent comment, but your point is interesting. > where you supposedly have a labor market Anyone who thinks we have an econ 101 labor market (where what is being sold is fungible and easily tradeable) hasn't searched for a job recently. Unlike capital, where a dollar is typically a dollar no matter where it comes from (though the idea of "smart money" implies that this statement is false), labor has many gradations and suppliers that vary. Because of that, and because of the fact that employers have more leverage (because they typically are a monopsony of a particular laborer's offering), prices of labor are not equal to the marginal productivity of that laborer, but instead, as you argue, far lower. The solution is pretty simple: the laborer should stop being an employee, start their own firm, bear more of the risk that an employer does (ever chase down an invoice? No fun!), and get compensated as such. Other than that, you could organize and have the group (formerly called a union) compete with management for a greater share of profits, but the variation in laborer productivity would still exist and the more productive laborer would still be under compensated.

by devoply 10y ago

mooreds 10y ago

Ah, I was replying to the parent comment, but your point is interesting. > where you supposedly have a labor market Anyone who thinks we have an econ 101 labor market (where what is being sold is fungible and easily tradeable) hasn't searched for a job recently. Unlike capital, where a dollar is typically a dollar no matter where it comes from (though the idea of "smart money" implies that this statement is false), labor has many gradations and suppliers that vary. Because of that, and because of the fact that employers have more leverage (because they typically are a monopsony of a particular laborer's offering), prices of labor are not equal to the marginal productivity of that laborer, but instead, as you argue, far lower. The solution is pretty simple: the laborer should stop being an employee, start their own firm, bear more of the risk that an employer does (ever chase down an invoice? No fun!), and get compensated as such. Other than that, you could organize and have the group (formerly called a union) compete with management for a greater share of profits, but the variation in laborer productivity would still exist and the more productive laborer would still be under compensated.