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> the most critical and important jobs in society are among the lowest-paid: retail and foodservice Pay has nothing to do with how critical or important a job
by lurquer 5y ago
> the most critical and important jobs in society are among the lowest-paid: retail and foodservice
Pay has nothing to do with how critical or important a job is. Nothing.
Pay is determined — like everything else — by supply and demand.
Nails are the most ‘critical and important’ component of a house. They are also the cheapest. Because the supply is endless. The chandelier in the entryway, on the other hand, is neither critical nor important, yet it costs a great deal more than a nail.
- camgunz 5y agoNah, it's status. We have a teacher and nurse shortage in the US, they're critical professions, and they're super underpaid. Supply and demand doesn't explain the low wages.
- lurquer 5y agoYou just described supply and demand. If the wages are too low, you’ll have a shortage. To remediate the shortage, wages must increase.
- camgunz 5y agoYeah but step 2 of that is "wage increase" (then step 3 of that is "either school A increases wages or school B increases wages and gets all the teachers, etc.) You can't arbitrarily pick a point at which you stop making an appeal to authority to Econ 101; it's all or nothing. The point here is, the situation should make us ask ourselves "huh, I wonder why wages aren't increasing." But I can save you some time and tell you the answer is mostly we don't think those jobs are high status enough.
- rhizome 5y agoComparing people to nails is a new one! I'm not sure I find it apt, though. >Pay has nothing to do with how critical or important a job is Well yeah, that's the observation I was describing. The difference is that I think that's a bad thing. >supply and demand We aren't describing free markets, so you're going to have to fill that out a little bit to meet reality.