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Everything you mentioned to provide a dignified life requires labor to produce. If you have enough people who don’t find building houses, studying medicine, res

by mlac 5y ago

Everything you mentioned to provide a dignified life requires labor to produce. If you have enough people who don’t find building houses, studying medicine, researching, and farming to be what their life is about, then those resources become scarce and more expensive (basic supply and demand). And there is a scale of quality in all of those areas. There’s good food and bad food, cheap basic housing and nicer upgrades, good schools and bad schools with parents who don’t care about their kids’ education. The doctor who graduated at the bottom of his class and practices once a week is a doctor, but not as good as a the person who is the best in the world at neurosurgery. Resources are scarce, and there are not enough to go around, especially in a sustainable way, to provide what some would consider a “dignified” life, because some people view “dignified” as equal, and others view it at all different levels. Ask 10 people and you will have 10 definitions. Almost none of them will be sustainable for 7 Billion people. In fact, it would mean that the US drops its standard of living and starts providing charity to the rest of the world. But that charity would require work, which again “may not be satisfying for some or what they think life is about”, so good luck there. A future defined by a career is very dark if that career is not a vocation or if the person doesn’t view it as a vocation and has nothing else in their life. But I’d argue one doesn’t have to let their career define them (and if someone lets a minimum wage job define them, it’s not healthy. They should find other work that adds greater value to someone so that they can attain a level of income to support a life that they deem dignified. But that’s it, right? The pursuit of happiness is protected in the US, but not guaranteed. We can’t guarantee that, or some other vague changing metric, because when we deal with 300m people it’s very, very hard to come to an agreement. There will always be edge cases, disabilities, and people who truly need the governments support. But if someone is mentally and physically able to work and contribute to society, they should reap what they sow. I do think it’s governments’ role to make its best effort to put people in a position to contribute to society (through education opportunities) and to provide for those who aren’t expected to contribute (kids under 18) so that they can grow into contributing members of society. But at that point, it should be up to the individual to work to attain the level of wealth they want, without any guarantees of success. I guess safety nets could be a minimum standard of living, but those do exist to some extent (unemployment and one could argue bankruptcy is a reset for those with major financial issues). They are an insurance policy and can’t exist if everyone is using them at the same time.

LesZedCB 5y ago
> There will always be edge cases, disabilities, and people who truly need the governments support. But if someone is mentally and physically able to work and contribute to society, they should reap what they sow. ultimately this is your philosophy condensed into a paragraph, so what common ground do we have to argue with? if you don't fundamentally see how absurdly false this statement is, that the vast majority of people will never have the opportunity to "reap what they sow" because they are destined to play economic catch-up for the rest of their lives, you are completely blinded by your meritocratic ideology and privilege. labor is not the same as work. labor is necessary for life, and not an objection of socialists. work is the relationship of the worker to the labor, where labor is paid according to market wage, and the surplus value is expropriated by the employer/owner. > If you have enough people who don’t find building houses, studying medicine, researching, and farming to be what their life is about, then those resources become scarce and more expensive (basic supply and demand). breaking things down into basic supply and demand is so outrageous. we bulldoze housing or artificially keep it empty in order to prop up market values, to the detriment of society at large. we throw out food by the truckload, because it's better to keep its value artificially high instead of feed people who need calories. healthcare... supply and demand? fucking seriously? look around you. > Resources are scarce, and there are not enough to go around, especially in a sustainable way, to provide what some would consider a “dignified” life, because some people view “dignified” as equal, and others view it at all different levels. Ask 10 people and you will have 10 definitions. Almost none of them will be sustainable for 7 Billion people. In fact, it would mean that the US drops its standard of living and starts providing charity to the rest of the world. resources are kept artificially scarce. this happens over and over and over again. we have common ideas of what a dignified life is: human rights. we are clearly moving as a society towards health, education, and food as universal human rights, as well as the other traditional ones. also, given climate change and the US's insanely eco-unfriendly lifestyle, we need massive shifts to rebalance our carbon heavy lifestyle. > I guess safety nets could be a minimum standard of living, but those do exist to some extent (unemployment and one could argue bankruptcy is a reset for those with major financial issues). They are an insurance policy and can’t exist if everyone is using them at the same time. safety nets have been being cut down since many of the ones we know were first instantiated in the new deal of the 1930s. instead, we have settled for corporate safety nets (2008 bail outs, 2020 bail outs) except the savings aren't passed down to workers, they are used to buy back stocks and inflate shareholder value. supply and demand is literal bullshit, we live in a massively rigged economy.

by mlac 5y ago

LesZedCB 5y ago

> There will always be edge cases, disabilities, and people who truly need the governments support. But if someone is mentally and physically able to work and contribute to society, they should reap what they sow. ultimately this is your philosophy condensed into a paragraph, so what common ground do we have to argue with? if you don't fundamentally see how absurdly false this statement is, that the vast majority of people will never have the opportunity to "reap what they sow" because they are destined to play economic catch-up for the rest of their lives, you are completely blinded by your meritocratic ideology and privilege. labor is not the same as work. labor is necessary for life, and not an objection of socialists. work is the relationship of the worker to the labor, where labor is paid according to market wage, and the surplus value is expropriated by the employer/owner. > If you have enough people who don’t find building houses, studying medicine, researching, and farming to be what their life is about, then those resources become scarce and more expensive (basic supply and demand). breaking things down into basic supply and demand is so outrageous. we bulldoze housing or artificially keep it empty in order to prop up market values, to the detriment of society at large. we throw out food by the truckload, because it's better to keep its value artificially high instead of feed people who need calories. healthcare... supply and demand? fucking seriously? look around you. > Resources are scarce, and there are not enough to go around, especially in a sustainable way, to provide what some would consider a “dignified” life, because some people view “dignified” as equal, and others view it at all different levels. Ask 10 people and you will have 10 definitions. Almost none of them will be sustainable for 7 Billion people. In fact, it would mean that the US drops its standard of living and starts providing charity to the rest of the world. resources are kept artificially scarce. this happens over and over and over again. we have common ideas of what a dignified life is: human rights. we are clearly moving as a society towards health, education, and food as universal human rights, as well as the other traditional ones. also, given climate change and the US's insanely eco-unfriendly lifestyle, we need massive shifts to rebalance our carbon heavy lifestyle. > I guess safety nets could be a minimum standard of living, but those do exist to some extent (unemployment and one could argue bankruptcy is a reset for those with major financial issues). They are an insurance policy and can’t exist if everyone is using them at the same time. safety nets have been being cut down since many of the ones we know were first instantiated in the new deal of the 1930s. instead, we have settled for corporate safety nets (2008 bail outs, 2020 bail outs) except the savings aren't passed down to workers, they are used to buy back stocks and inflate shareholder value. supply and demand is literal bullshit, we live in a massively rigged economy.