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Assuming a roughly continuous distribution, unless >50% of workers earn the lowest wage, increasing the wage of the lowest-paid worker will do nothing to affect

Assuming a roughly continuous distribution, unless >50% of workers earn the lowest wage, increasing the wage of the lowest-paid worker will do nothing to affect the wage of the median worker, and thus nothing to change the ratio in question. On the other hand, no longer employing the lowest-paid workers will move the median point up the pay scale.

AndrewKemendo 3y ago
Not sure how you got there. The ratio is between highest and lowest paid, not median. So you’re measuring something I’m not interested in targeting for this particular protocol There’s no downside to anyone other than someone wanting outsized pay at the maximum pay level Further, it’s anyone paid by the cooperative for work. So “outsourcing” doesn’t offer a workaround as it’s a contractual agreement that sets a labor wage-price during the contract negotiation.
- InitialLastName 3y ago
  > Not sure how you got there. The ratio is between highest and lowest paid, not median. So you’re measuring something I’m not interested in targeting for this particular protocol From TFA (emphasis mine): > The plan would raise the corporate income tax on a sliding scale, depending on the ratio between the pay of a company's CEO and the median pay of the company's workers.
- gruez 3y ago
  >Further, it’s anyone paid by the cooperative for work. So “outsourcing” doesn’t offer a workaround as it’s a contractual agreement that sets a labor wage-price during the contract negotiation. That's straightforward to enforce if you're hiring a consultant for $500/hr, but what about a consumer electronics company (think Apple) that decides to outsource all of their low paid manufacturing to a contract manufacturer? Or for a tech company to outsource all of their catering and janitorial services to a third party? In both those cases, the exact contract doesn't contain anything resembling an hourly rate. You could argue that wages of the employees that the contractor hires can be used, but that can quickly get out of hand. If Tesla is getting its lithium from a third world mine, and that mine is paying its workers $0.5/hr, should that be used as the "lowest paid" figure?
  - AndrewKemendo 3y ago
    > If Tesla is getting its lithium from a third world mine, and that mine is paying its workers $0.5/hr, should that be used as the "lowest paid" figure? Yeah it should That is exactly the point, to rebalance the power and wealth equation so that we don’t have these extreme disparities
    - gruez 3y ago
      >That is exactly the point, to rebalance the power and wealth equation so that we don’t have these extreme disparities Okay, but what about software firms that only hire highly paid programmers? They'll be allowed to paid their CEOs orders of magnitude higher salary because... ? Why should a CEO's compensation be kneecapped because the company ventured into manufacturing?
      - AndrewKemendo 3y ago
        If we’re at the point where that’s the problem I think we won’t have a problem anymore This isn’t an academic exercise, there are millions of people struggling while a small handful live in extreme luxury, the whole point is to fix this problem The actual number figure is less relevant than having things rebalanced - greed based inequality is like ebola it rapidly destroys families and communities. Just eliminating that alone is a great start
        gruez 3y ago
        > If we’re at the point where that’s the problem I think we won’t have a problem anymore You're making it sound like that's an issue that won't show up for years or decades down the line, but the effects (ie. manufacturing companies being penalized more than high tech/knowledge work companies) will show up on day 1. >This isn’t an academic exercise, there are millions of people struggling while a small handful live in extreme luxury, the whole point is to fix this problem >The actual number figure is less relevant than having things rebalanced - greed based inequality is like ebola it rapidly destroys families and communities. Just eliminating that alone is a great start Easing inequality is a laudable goal, but doing it in an unfair way is no way to get public support for it.

AndrewKemendo 3y ago

Not sure how you got there. The ratio is between highest and lowest paid, not median. So you’re measuring something I’m not interested in targeting for this particular protocol There’s no downside to anyone other than someone wanting outsized pay at the maximum pay level Further, it’s anyone paid by the cooperative for work. So “outsourcing” doesn’t offer a workaround as it’s a contractual agreement that sets a labor wage-price during the contract negotiation.

InitialLastName 3y ago
> Not sure how you got there. The ratio is between highest and lowest paid, not median. So you’re measuring something I’m not interested in targeting for this particular protocol From TFA (emphasis mine): > The plan would raise the corporate income tax on a sliding scale, depending on the ratio between the pay of a company's CEO and the median pay of the company's workers.
gruez 3y ago
>Further, it’s anyone paid by the cooperative for work. So “outsourcing” doesn’t offer a workaround as it’s a contractual agreement that sets a labor wage-price during the contract negotiation. That's straightforward to enforce if you're hiring a consultant for $500/hr, but what about a consumer electronics company (think Apple) that decides to outsource all of their low paid manufacturing to a contract manufacturer? Or for a tech company to outsource all of their catering and janitorial services to a third party? In both those cases, the exact contract doesn't contain anything resembling an hourly rate. You could argue that wages of the employees that the contractor hires can be used, but that can quickly get out of hand. If Tesla is getting its lithium from a third world mine, and that mine is paying its workers $0.5/hr, should that be used as the "lowest paid" figure?
- AndrewKemendo 3y ago
  > If Tesla is getting its lithium from a third world mine, and that mine is paying its workers $0.5/hr, should that be used as the "lowest paid" figure? Yeah it should That is exactly the point, to rebalance the power and wealth equation so that we don’t have these extreme disparities
  - gruez 3y ago
    >That is exactly the point, to rebalance the power and wealth equation so that we don’t have these extreme disparities Okay, but what about software firms that only hire highly paid programmers? They'll be allowed to paid their CEOs orders of magnitude higher salary because... ? Why should a CEO's compensation be kneecapped because the company ventured into manufacturing?
    - AndrewKemendo 3y ago
      If we’re at the point where that’s the problem I think we won’t have a problem anymore This isn’t an academic exercise, there are millions of people struggling while a small handful live in extreme luxury, the whole point is to fix this problem The actual number figure is less relevant than having things rebalanced - greed based inequality is like ebola it rapidly destroys families and communities. Just eliminating that alone is a great start
      - gruez 3y ago
        > If we’re at the point where that’s the problem I think we won’t have a problem anymore You're making it sound like that's an issue that won't show up for years or decades down the line, but the effects (ie. manufacturing companies being penalized more than high tech/knowledge work companies) will show up on day 1. >This isn’t an academic exercise, there are millions of people struggling while a small handful live in extreme luxury, the whole point is to fix this problem >The actual number figure is less relevant than having things rebalanced - greed based inequality is like ebola it rapidly destroys families and communities. Just eliminating that alone is a great start Easing inequality is a laudable goal, but doing it in an unfair way is no way to get public support for it.