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I’ll spell it out for the unaware, especially those in non-US countries that lack context. There’s a lot of assumptions built into this summary, and it is not c
by floatingatoll 5y ago
I’ll spell it out for the unaware, especially those in non-US countries that lack context. There’s a lot of assumptions built into this summary, and it is not clear whether it’s fully accurate or not, but it does help convey the viewpoint you’re referring to in a more comprehensive fashion.
America was and continues to be built in large part by wage theft and labor exploitation. We don’t provide the social support services that are taken for granted in first-world countries like Canada, because doing so conflicts with the strongly-held belief — the ideology — that the best way to support the poor is to ensure that they’re employed in a job, no matter how terrible the working conditions or pay. Workers are told that this is a “ladder of success”, but upward mobility has stalled due to the wealth being drained out of the system into the ultra-wealthy and their families. Workers are encouraged to work for local businesses, who are themselves going bankrupt and collapsing at the swordpoints of Walmart, Amazon, and Covid. Health care costs have skyrocketed, health insurance is only offered to a subset of the workforce, and minimum wage doesn’t cover rent, food, and health care (pick one only).
So, Montana is canceling unemployment as a way to force people to work at jobs they otherwise wouldn’t work at. This forces people back into the modern enslavement system, and takes for granted that enough employers are left in Montana to hire those workers. Rather than assessing whether enough jobs exist for their citizens and then requiring businesses to pay a reasonable wage that covers living costs, or offering benefits to attract workers, the state of Montana will simply block unemployment benefits. Employers that offer miserable wages, no health insurance, and poor working conditions are expected to see an increase in workers applying for those roles, further weakening the negotiating position of workers versus employers.
The best analogy, then, for the perceived cruelty of these motivations is, in these modified words of the consultant from “Office Space”:
“We fixed the glitch. So they won’t be receiving an unemployment check anymore. So it’ll just work itself out naturally.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUE0PPQI3is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BUE0PPQI3is
- keeganpoppen 5y agolooks like we've found David Graeber's account... ;P
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- floatingatoll 5y agoI looked up this guy and apparently there's one of three things intended by this comment. Either you're complimenting me (but the emoji and throwaway nature of the comment suggest otherwise), you're insulting me by calling me an economist (not exactly a common insult, but it's definitely not a favored profession), or you're comparing me to someone who's dead (which is terrifying and probably not what you meant, but who even knows with today's trolls). Of those options, I think you meant this to be an insulting and dismissive comment, wherein you jokingly compare me to a dead man in order to weaken or diminish the views represented in my detailed writeup of the 'unspoken' viewpoint referenced upthread. If so, you will find that Hacker News is not a reliably effective venue for that sort of manipulation of others. If I'm wrong in my interpretation, I of course welcome clarification. :)
- 0xBDB 5y agoDavid Graeber was an anthropologist, not an economist, and a leader of Occupy Wall Street and author of "Debt: The First 5000 Years". I think the reference is to the latter. Whether you should take it seriously or consider it flattering I couldn't say, but having read the book and your comment, they are in fact quite aligned.
- floatingatoll 5y agoAh, interesting! I will add it to a list, thank you.
- keeganpoppen 5y agouhhhh none of the above? you just sound like him. nice to just fly off the handle based on a bunch of assumptions about my intent, though i think your assumptions and hostility say more about you than me. the emoticon was because it was teasing-- that's what the tongue out emoticon means. didn't even know he was dead-- read his book not that long ago. not sure what the fuck you're on about comparing people to dead people-- are we just supposed to stop speaking of the dead altogether?
- pb7 5y agoThis doesn’t check out. If I was paid $500K to work, and $600K to not work, I would choose not to work. The absolute numbers don’t matter for the incentives to be inverted. Low wages are an unrelated problem. Suggesting the US is not a first world country further weakens this entire comment.
- floatingatoll 5y ago(I'm so glad to see this reply, because it means I was successful at describing the referenced mindset and have inspired a discussion of the viewpoint itself. Even if I'm not sure how much of it I agree with myself, that's a win.)
- wholinator2 5y agoHow can you say that the fact that wages are lower than the alternative is the problem, and in the same paragraph say that low wages are an unrelated problem. Low wages are literally _the_ problem. If you paid people more, they would leave unemployment and take the pay. In my experience it's a small subset that refuses to work at all costs. I know people who want to work but just can't find jobs that ate _worth it_. A job needs to be worth it or we create a dystopia of essentially mass capitalistic incarceration. By your own statement, if they raise the wage, people will go back to work. This "solution" is just kicking the legs out from under people who are just barely able to stand as it is.
- floatingatoll 5y agoPersonally, I’m a pretty solid fan of UBI, but I didn’t try to incorporate my views on that into the explainer. As you note, there are a lot of weaknesses in the “work is required for life” principle that we inherited from the founding colonies.
- msh 5y agoWell unamployment benefits does not need to be constant. Where I am from I can get 90% of my previous paycheck up to a max of approx 3200 USD a month for the first two years. Then they start to drop off quite fast to a much lower buttom. So even if a new job was lower than the 3200 USD I could be getting I would still be incentivised to get a new job before the high benefits runs out.
- bingbong70 5y agoThis is quite a succinct explanation floatingatoll, thanks for expanding.
- jl2718 5y agoUnemployment insurance is only applicable to people that can work, choose to work, but cannot find work. Your criticism is all about the entire system of work. Different concepts. I think you’re advocating for UBI. Maybe UBI is a better idea, but UI is not that.