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Corporations are unwilling to let non-executive wages become a larger percentage of their costs. They are perfectly willing to spend on other things. It is rath

Corporations are unwilling to let non-executive wages become a larger percentage of their costs. They are perfectly willing to spend on other things. It is rather remarkable that the consumer market works at all, yet it is almost overheating, the key to that is loans, lots of loans, many connected to equity in an intentional housing bubble.

ChrisLomont 5y ago
>Corporations are unwilling to let non-executive wages become a larger percentage of their costs. Because they are competing with other companies. >They are perfectly willing to spend on other things. No companies generally try to lower costs anywhere it makes sense, in order to compete with other companies that will also do so to compete. If companies could simply pay magic wages, out of the tens of thousands in the US, don't you think one would buck the trend and suddenly pay awesome wages and attract the best talent and win all the markets? Either all 10,000 companies are in cahoots, or there are market forces causing a lot of the wages to be similar. Which is more likely? That Apple and Walmart and Rural King are agreeing on wages? Or that each competes against similar companies for workers and sales?
- smorgusofborg 5y ago
  > That Apple and Walmart and Rural King are agreeing on wages? I guess you know more about Apple's more competent co-conspirators than I do: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7449737 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7449737 But there's no need to do anything technically illegal companies discuss how to screw employees and customers as industry groups all the time. They reach agreements not to do various things and to co-ordinate spending on political lobbying. They will for example try to share your salary data using an intermediary to avoid one of them giving you a larger raise. That helps both companies that might lose you and companies that are trying to hire you for bellow what free market wages would settle on if we all had the same information.

ChrisLomont 5y ago

>Corporations are unwilling to let non-executive wages become a larger percentage of their costs. Because they are competing with other companies. >They are perfectly willing to spend on other things. No companies generally try to lower costs anywhere it makes sense, in order to compete with other companies that will also do so to compete. If companies could simply pay magic wages, out of the tens of thousands in the US, don't you think one would buck the trend and suddenly pay awesome wages and attract the best talent and win all the markets? Either all 10,000 companies are in cahoots, or there are market forces causing a lot of the wages to be similar. Which is more likely? That Apple and Walmart and Rural King are agreeing on wages? Or that each competes against similar companies for workers and sales?

smorgusofborg 5y ago
> That Apple and Walmart and Rural King are agreeing on wages? I guess you know more about Apple's more competent co-conspirators than I do: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7449737 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7449737 But there's no need to do anything technically illegal companies discuss how to screw employees and customers as industry groups all the time. They reach agreements not to do various things and to co-ordinate spending on political lobbying. They will for example try to share your salary data using an intermediary to avoid one of them giving you a larger raise. That helps both companies that might lose you and companies that are trying to hire you for bellow what free market wages would settle on if we all had the same information.