4 ms·

To take a quote out of context: """ As the economist Robert Frank wrote, “building wealth to them is a creative process, and the closest thing they have to fun

To take a quote out of context: """ As the economist Robert Frank wrote, “building wealth to them is a creative process, and the closest thing they have to fun.” """ So the wealthy are accumulating the fruits of workers' labor as a pastime?

anm89 5y ago
I love how stating the fact that people are paid to do jobs, but simply phrasing it in Marxist vocabulary is supposed to incite outrage. Yes, a VAST majority of people are not offended by the concept of paid work.
- anon_tor_12345 5y ago
  don't you think "paid work" is a dramatic oversimplification of, at least, what OP is alluding to?
  - anm89 5y ago
    > accumulating the fruits of workers' labor as a pastime That sounds a lot look any normal employment contract to me. Any American bank, engineering company, factory, restaurant, etc has this employment arrangement and they are all consensual. So no, I do not.
    - anon_tor_12345 5y ago
      > consensual everyone's retort to marxism is this same thing. i'm not going to debate you but i'll just point out that, again, consensual here is a gross oversimplification.
      - anm89 5y ago
        And this gets to what I'm saying in the top post. I get what you are saying with the consent argument. You are playing a word game via a redefinition of consent where even though they signed a piece of paper agreeing to do the thing while not under acute duress it wasn't "really consent" because the life is unfair and the system forced their hand. And what I'm saying is, not only do I not accept the validity of that word game, but that a VAST majority of society does not accept that word game. Under your definition of consent almost nobody ever has consent for anything. This is not how people generally use the word consent.
        anon_tor_12345 5y ago
        it's not a word game - there' a reason why things like inebriation factor into whether consent (during sex) was really given. just saying the word doesn't magically make it compulsion free consent. >even though they signed a piece of paper agreeing to do the thing while not under acute duress there are many many other things other than duress that make a contract unenforceable https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/unenforceable-contracts-tips-33079.html https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/unenforceable-contra... all you have to do to know this is witness literally any will go to probate. >not only do I not accept the validity of that word game, but that a VAST majority of society does not accept that word game you're wrong. you're just wrong. it's why lawyers exist. i'm sorry that you don't understand this but i can't teach it to you. i suggest you sit in on a 1L contracts class at your local law school.
        anm89 5y ago
        It's a word game
aeternum 5y ago
Suppose a businesswoman built a completely automated company/factory that manufactures shoes. She runs the whole thing herself. Would you consider that the businesswoman is exploiting society? And what if she decides that she wants to employ people again instead of using robots?
- claudiawerner 5y ago
  >Would you consider that the businesswoman is exploiting society? From a Marxist perspective, no, or at least not directly. Others in the supply chain do, however - from the people who are employed to raise the cows, to the leathermakers, to the rubbermarkers, to the employees of other companies that built the machines. However, according to the traditional Marxist conception (which isn't a universal conception among Marxists nowadays), such a company would only be as profitable in the long run proportional to the amount of labour the businesswoman adds herself. This is why there hasn't been a completely automated shoe factory run by a single person that's profitable in the long run once forces of competition kick in. The story is muddled a little if she acquires patents and copyrights, but it's not too far from reality, given that some countries have more lax attitudes towards IP and 'stealing designs'.
  - aeternum 5y ago
    There are plenty of successful companies run by a single person, especially in tech. I had one myself for quite awhile that sold elementary school gradebook software. Simple online SaaS that required very little manual effort but provided a lot of value and saved lots of manual effort for those who used it.

anm89 5y ago

I love how stating the fact that people are paid to do jobs, but simply phrasing it in Marxist vocabulary is supposed to incite outrage. Yes, a VAST majority of people are not offended by the concept of paid work.

anon_tor_12345 5y ago
don't you think "paid work" is a dramatic oversimplification of, at least, what OP is alluding to?
- anm89 5y ago
  > accumulating the fruits of workers' labor as a pastime That sounds a lot look any normal employment contract to me. Any American bank, engineering company, factory, restaurant, etc has this employment arrangement and they are all consensual. So no, I do not.
  - anon_tor_12345 5y ago
    > consensual everyone's retort to marxism is this same thing. i'm not going to debate you but i'll just point out that, again, consensual here is a gross oversimplification.
    - anm89 5y ago
      And this gets to what I'm saying in the top post. I get what you are saying with the consent argument. You are playing a word game via a redefinition of consent where even though they signed a piece of paper agreeing to do the thing while not under acute duress it wasn't "really consent" because the life is unfair and the system forced their hand. And what I'm saying is, not only do I not accept the validity of that word game, but that a VAST majority of society does not accept that word game. Under your definition of consent almost nobody ever has consent for anything. This is not how people generally use the word consent.
      - anon_tor_12345 5y ago
        it's not a word game - there' a reason why things like inebriation factor into whether consent (during sex) was really given. just saying the word doesn't magically make it compulsion free consent. >even though they signed a piece of paper agreeing to do the thing while not under acute duress there are many many other things other than duress that make a contract unenforceable https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/unenforceable-contracts-tips-33079.html https://www.nolo.com/legal-encyclopedia/unenforceable-contra... all you have to do to know this is witness literally any will go to probate. >not only do I not accept the validity of that word game, but that a VAST majority of society does not accept that word game you're wrong. you're just wrong. it's why lawyers exist. i'm sorry that you don't understand this but i can't teach it to you. i suggest you sit in on a 1L contracts class at your local law school.
        anm89 5y ago
        It's a word game

aeternum 5y ago

Suppose a businesswoman built a completely automated company/factory that manufactures shoes. She runs the whole thing herself. Would you consider that the businesswoman is exploiting society? And what if she decides that she wants to employ people again instead of using robots?

claudiawerner 5y ago
>Would you consider that the businesswoman is exploiting society? From a Marxist perspective, no, or at least not directly. Others in the supply chain do, however - from the people who are employed to raise the cows, to the leathermakers, to the rubbermarkers, to the employees of other companies that built the machines. However, according to the traditional Marxist conception (which isn't a universal conception among Marxists nowadays), such a company would only be as profitable in the long run proportional to the amount of labour the businesswoman adds herself. This is why there hasn't been a completely automated shoe factory run by a single person that's profitable in the long run once forces of competition kick in. The story is muddled a little if she acquires patents and copyrights, but it's not too far from reality, given that some countries have more lax attitudes towards IP and 'stealing designs'.
- aeternum 5y ago
  There are plenty of successful companies run by a single person, especially in tech. I had one myself for quite awhile that sold elementary school gradebook software. Simple online SaaS that required very little manual effort but provided a lot of value and saved lots of manual effort for those who used it.