3 ms·

I have to share this. So my cousin says we need to stop treating jobs as solutions to social problems. Here's more detail on her thoughts, which I think are ki

I have to share this. So my cousin says we need to stop treating jobs as solutions to social problems. Here's more detail on her thoughts, which I think are kind of silly but are interesting nonetheless: "It's hard when the overarching belief is that the unemployed is unemployed 100% because of their own free will. Bad business conditions mean no jobs, and that's often not a worker's fault. A job exists because a business needs it to perform a business function, and that's really the only reason it should exist. But for various non-business reasons, jobs are often favors to be given out and it makes the economy less efficient when you have jobs that don't really need to be done, or could be done better, but exist only as favors to people. Putting the puritan work ethic on a pedestal directly contributes to this and harms our economy as a result. UBI and some form of guaranteed housing (or guarantee against losing your current housing) would be much cheaper than all the fake jobs needed to deliver favors."

vouaobrasil 2y ago
> "It's hard when the overarching belief is that the unemployed is unemployed 100% because of their own free will. Bad business conditions mean no jobs, and that's often not a worker's fault. There's another point, which is even more sinister. The unemployed offer liquidity in the employment pool, which offer more flexibility for the growth of the machine. Local communities that are more self-sufficient would want to take care of their own. The emergent properties of the anonymous machine see unemployment as a variable to be optimized.
quesera 2y ago
What percentage of jobs does she believe are fake/unnecessary? I'd agree that most workers are not particularly efficient. But I have never seen efforts to make them more efficient succeed. So, the fact that there are eight employees doing the work of three at the grocery store does not count, because the missing efficiency is not available to the employer.
- RiverCrochet 2y ago
  She tells me that she's seen the situation most often with older people who "have kids" or "have a family to take care of" - they either keep them in the role despite substandard performance, or covertly or overtly adjust the role expectations, and sometimes they get promoted into roles that seem to have been created for them (like "director of project management") or roles they aren't specifically qualified for (like a manager/team lead role). She really believes any business with more than 50 people has at least 1 or 2 employees of this type, and more so if the culture of the firm tends to skew towards government contracts or older people--but when pressed for data, she said that was just her gut feeling. > the fact that there are eight employees doing the work of three at the grocery store does not count If you know three people could do the work of eight then fire 5 people or modify a process. The business is choosing to be inefficient, or there may be other factors. It may not really be inefficient if the cost of the 8 people is lower than the cost of automation or whatever is needed to improve the process. People are expensive in the U.S. so I tend not to assume that but it is possible.
  - petermcneeley 2y ago
    If you only knew how bad it really is. In capitalism you have N firms "completing" so that usually means you will have multitudes people working on the exact same thing. Imagine that level of inefficiency.
hooverd 2y ago
You want a reserve army of labor, not big enough to revolt but big enough to create precarity.
- RiverCrochet 2y ago
  My cousin ... gosh ... She says a reserve army of labor is great, and that if lawyers and other professionals can receive money for being on retainer and doing nothing, then so should anyone who can be considered a laborer. I hope you have a response that will make her be quiet. I really need some peace in this house.
WalterBright 2y ago
People can always make their own jobs - start a business, like being a handyman, a babysitter, etc. Minimum wage laws, on the other hand, mean a lot of employment possibilities are simply out of reach.
- PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
  If your "business" cannot pay a person 3x [0] the going rate for an appropriate rental property in the market where it operates, then it has no reason to exist other than to extract profit from the labor of the people you hire. Minimum wage laws would not stop you from selling your services as a programmer at any rate you want to. [0] and yes, current minimum wages in most places in the US are actually far below even this threshold.
  - WalterBright 2y ago
    Definitely, making $0 is better than making $10.
    - PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
      A system that allows you to make $10 when you actually need $30 to live is also a system that will frequently go to significant lengths to make sure you never make $30.
      - WalterBright 2y ago
        Giving them $20 in welfare is more practical than $30 in welfare, and the $10 in productivity is lost as well. I.e. minimum wage produces more of a burden on social services to take care of the unemployed.
  - RiverCrochet 2y ago
    > then it has no reason to exist other than to extract profit from the labor of the people you hire. My cousin's lovely response: "So the business paying the insufficient wage and the landlord are not the same entity. The business's job is to run a business, not worry about if landlords are getting paid. It's unfair and inefficient to make businesses submit to the demands of greedy landlords in this manner. Maybe governments could step in and protect businesses but I'm unsure of the best way to do that." Personally I think if we have a system of private ownership then charging whatever I want for rent is my right and the government should not be able to force me against my will, otherwise all property is really the governments. But I think there are grey areas when we talk about corporate/institutional property owners.

vouaobrasil 2y ago

> "It's hard when the overarching belief is that the unemployed is unemployed 100% because of their own free will. Bad business conditions mean no jobs, and that's often not a worker's fault. There's another point, which is even more sinister. The unemployed offer liquidity in the employment pool, which offer more flexibility for the growth of the machine. Local communities that are more self-sufficient would want to take care of their own. The emergent properties of the anonymous machine see unemployment as a variable to be optimized.

quesera 2y ago

What percentage of jobs does she believe are fake/unnecessary? I'd agree that most workers are not particularly efficient. But I have never seen efforts to make them more efficient succeed. So, the fact that there are eight employees doing the work of three at the grocery store does not count, because the missing efficiency is not available to the employer.

RiverCrochet 2y ago
She tells me that she's seen the situation most often with older people who "have kids" or "have a family to take care of" - they either keep them in the role despite substandard performance, or covertly or overtly adjust the role expectations, and sometimes they get promoted into roles that seem to have been created for them (like "director of project management") or roles they aren't specifically qualified for (like a manager/team lead role). She really believes any business with more than 50 people has at least 1 or 2 employees of this type, and more so if the culture of the firm tends to skew towards government contracts or older people--but when pressed for data, she said that was just her gut feeling. > the fact that there are eight employees doing the work of three at the grocery store does not count If you know three people could do the work of eight then fire 5 people or modify a process. The business is choosing to be inefficient, or there may be other factors. It may not really be inefficient if the cost of the 8 people is lower than the cost of automation or whatever is needed to improve the process. People are expensive in the U.S. so I tend not to assume that but it is possible.
- petermcneeley 2y ago
  If you only knew how bad it really is. In capitalism you have N firms "completing" so that usually means you will have multitudes people working on the exact same thing. Imagine that level of inefficiency.

hooverd 2y ago

You want a reserve army of labor, not big enough to revolt but big enough to create precarity.

RiverCrochet 2y ago
My cousin ... gosh ... She says a reserve army of labor is great, and that if lawyers and other professionals can receive money for being on retainer and doing nothing, then so should anyone who can be considered a laborer. I hope you have a response that will make her be quiet. I really need some peace in this house.

WalterBright 2y ago

People can always make their own jobs - start a business, like being a handyman, a babysitter, etc. Minimum wage laws, on the other hand, mean a lot of employment possibilities are simply out of reach.

PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
If your "business" cannot pay a person 3x [0] the going rate for an appropriate rental property in the market where it operates, then it has no reason to exist other than to extract profit from the labor of the people you hire. Minimum wage laws would not stop you from selling your services as a programmer at any rate you want to. [0] and yes, current minimum wages in most places in the US are actually far below even this threshold.
- WalterBright 2y ago
  Definitely, making $0 is better than making $10.
  - PaulDavisThe1st 2y ago
    A system that allows you to make $10 when you actually need $30 to live is also a system that will frequently go to significant lengths to make sure you never make $30.
    - WalterBright 2y ago
      Giving them $20 in welfare is more practical than $30 in welfare, and the $10 in productivity is lost as well. I.e. minimum wage produces more of a burden on social services to take care of the unemployed.
- RiverCrochet 2y ago
  > then it has no reason to exist other than to extract profit from the labor of the people you hire. My cousin's lovely response: "So the business paying the insufficient wage and the landlord are not the same entity. The business's job is to run a business, not worry about if landlords are getting paid. It's unfair and inefficient to make businesses submit to the demands of greedy landlords in this manner. Maybe governments could step in and protect businesses but I'm unsure of the best way to do that." Personally I think if we have a system of private ownership then charging whatever I want for rent is my right and the government should not be able to force me against my will, otherwise all property is really the governments. But I think there are grey areas when we talk about corporate/institutional property owners.