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> didn't want to pay working-class Americans Consumers also like buying cheap products.

szundi 3y ago
Exactly. Either government should kind of ban this, or the ones who do find less cost are going to be quite rich. Of course they don’t care too much about anything else. This is why we have governments.
mhuffman 3y ago
>Consumers also like buying cheap products. Consumers also like having jobs and money to buy products of any type ... presumably.
lenerdenator 3y ago
Consumers like being able to afford things, preferably through increased wages. Since we no longer allocate economic growth towards wages, but instead towards equities, we see the need for cheaper products. If you look at the history of the DJIA, it wasn't really until the 1980s that it began to consistently take off (https://www.macrotrends.net/1319/dow-jones-100-year-historical-chart https://www.macrotrends.net/1319/dow-jones-100-year-historic...). That money previously went to a wider variety of outlets into American society, like taxes paid to the government or wages paid to workers. When Milton Friedman argued that companies exist solely to return value to shareholders, shareholders fought successfully to see the value diverted away from those outlets and towards them. If your consumers are workers who no longer see rising wages, and you want them to buy your stuff, you have to find cheaper ways to sell things, so the argument was made that the PRC would politically liberalize if the world made its products there. The alternative was to not have all of the money go back to shareholders, and that was, of course, unacceptable.
- satvikpendem 3y ago
  Why are you only looking at the DJIA? Look at SNP500 or VTI and you'll see consistent positive growth.
  - lenerdenator 3y ago
    Because they look much the same? They also chart growth that exists purely in theory.
    - satvikpendem 3y ago
      > They also chart growth that exists purely in theory. Not really, unless you think the economy and resultant stock market is purely theoretical with no bearing on reality, in which case, there would be nothing left for me to tell you with such diametrically opposing belief systems.
kmeisthax 3y ago
Consumer is not a job.
- ImHereToVote 3y ago
  It is for the professional managerial class.

Exactly. Either government should kind of ban this, or the ones who do find less cost are going to be quite rich. Of course they don’t care too much about anything else. This is why we have governments.

mhuffman 3y ago

>Consumers also like buying cheap products. Consumers also like having jobs and money to buy products of any type ... presumably.

lenerdenator 3y ago

Consumers like being able to afford things, preferably through increased wages. Since we no longer allocate economic growth towards wages, but instead towards equities, we see the need for cheaper products. If you look at the history of the DJIA, it wasn't really until the 1980s that it began to consistently take off (https://www.macrotrends.net/1319/dow-jones-100-year-historical-chart https://www.macrotrends.net/1319/dow-jones-100-year-historic...). That money previously went to a wider variety of outlets into American society, like taxes paid to the government or wages paid to workers. When Milton Friedman argued that companies exist solely to return value to shareholders, shareholders fought successfully to see the value diverted away from those outlets and towards them. If your consumers are workers who no longer see rising wages, and you want them to buy your stuff, you have to find cheaper ways to sell things, so the argument was made that the PRC would politically liberalize if the world made its products there. The alternative was to not have all of the money go back to shareholders, and that was, of course, unacceptable.

satvikpendem 3y ago
Why are you only looking at the DJIA? Look at SNP500 or VTI and you'll see consistent positive growth.
- lenerdenator 3y ago
  Because they look much the same? They also chart growth that exists purely in theory.
  - satvikpendem 3y ago
    > They also chart growth that exists purely in theory. Not really, unless you think the economy and resultant stock market is purely theoretical with no bearing on reality, in which case, there would be nothing left for me to tell you with such diametrically opposing belief systems.

kmeisthax 3y ago

Consumer is not a job.

ImHereToVote 3y ago
It is for the professional managerial class.