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Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed some of Atlas Shrugged. >It's not the Henry Fords and Steve Jobs who exploit people. Problem is not all of the 1% is Steve Jobs,
by squozzer 9y ago
Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed some of Atlas Shrugged.
>It's not the Henry Fords and Steve Jobs who exploit people.
Problem is not all of the 1% is Steve Jobs, Henry Ford or Warren Buffett. It also includes, for example, royal families whose contribution is not intellectual.
>When you work in a modern factory, you are paid, not only for your labor, but for all the productive genius which has made that factory possible:
And something which Ms. Rand forgot to include in her statement, which is the desire of customers to buy the product the factory produces.
>In proportion to the mental energy he spent, the man who creates a new invention receives but a small percentage of his value in terms of material payment, no matter what fortune he makes, no matter what millions he earns.
Paying someone less than the value they provide is what makes capitalism work. Not even CEOs or founders are exempt from this law, though I'm sure more than one skates awfully close.
>Instead, we live in a culture where Goldman Sachs is smeared as "a great vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity."
Not sure how deep GS was involved but here goes - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_crisis_of_2007%E2%80%932008 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Financial_crisis_of_2007%E2%80...
>There is indeed a vampire squid wrapped around the face of humanity: the Internal Revenue Service. And, at a deeper level, it is the monstrous perversion of justice that makes the IRS possible: an envy-ridden moral code that damns success, profit, and earning money in voluntary exchange.
Plus the need to finance the bodyguards for the New World Order (aka The War Machine.)
- beaconstudios 9y ago> Paying someone less than the value they provide is what makes capitalism work. Not even CEOs or founders are exempt from this law, though I'm sure more than one skates awfully close. But who says what the value you provide as a worker is, if not the job market? The original complaint from Marx and pals as I understand it, is that the profit generated by the company represents the stolen labour value. So does that mean that as long as a company takes no profit (or presumably just doesn't pay dividends, given that carrying over profit is just a way to maintain cash reserves) that there is no exploitation? The whole labour value criticism just doesn't add up.
- CryptoPunk 9y ago>>So does that mean that as long as a company takes no profit (or presumably just doesn't pay dividends, Dividends come out of profits. According to Marxist gobbledygook, any profit, meaning return to the shareholders, is theft from the workers, which implies investors should get nothing for investing. This sham of an ideology is responsible for tens of millions of deaths.
- beaconstudios 9y agoI know, but I'm always open to someone smart on this site opening my eyes to a pragmatic and sound interpretation of communist economics. It just hasn't happened yet and I remain sceptical that there's anything to it.
- jonhendry18 9y agoPlenty of CEOs are paid more than the value they provide.
- squozzer 9y agoI'll go along with that as an opening for a later discussion. But consider the value of a CEO is probably more than just profits generated - or to use a Moneyball term - "wins above replacement."