Oddbean

I think trade and mutual exchange are the bedrock of capitalism. I think capitalism gets confused with government. In many ways I see capitalism and government as forces work in opposition to each other. Society’s choice, then, is how we balance between them.

I don't see mutual exchange happening much in the form of capitalism I participate in. It's not a value4value experience. I often feel forced to pay for something that is worth less than I am paying. But I do perform many of the duties of what is deemed "unskilled" labor myself for my household. And that work is extremely more difficult and took me years to learn (for example, cooking, sewing, or gardening) than what I get paid to do at my day job. Which is essentially writing emails. But capitalism says I'm more valuable writing emails than making high quality meals to feed people? Or raising a child. Or building something with my hands. No government nor business benefits from paying the true price for this kind of work. "Society" will never get the choice under capitalism. This is the work that makes the world run. The pandemic proved this when all the "unskilled" labor force were suddenly our essential workers. And everyone else was told to just sit tight at home.

I hear you and empathize with what you are saying but I maintain it sounds like a conflation of capitalism and authoritarian government. The corruption of money, the destruction of saving and purchasing power makes it nearly impossible to pursue domestic responsibilities (as the price or “wage” for this is internal and can only be defined by the family unit and with respect to their specific resource). Therefore everyone is pushed into superfluous bullshit in a workforce that is, due to its money, designed to steal the human soul. What you are point out is not wrong, but I feel that you’re speaking to political problems whereas capitalism is an economic rather than political.

Capitalism drives greed and exploitation. It sets the goal to maximize profits for those at the top regardless of the human cost. It ultimately encourages the elimination of competition. I haven't spoken on a single political problem. This is how capitalism is supposed to work by design.

The corruption of money degrading ability to prioritize domestic focus - that is a political problem, capitalism didn’t do this, as the individual capitalism would want to hold the best money (money that is not corrupt) possible and self interest would drive that better money in all hands. This is part of the reason we are both bitcoiners, I would believe. Essential Worker / Stay at home mandates - again that was the government, not the economic system. Market capitalism would have favored people making their own choices and assessing their own risk - i.e. TX / FL / Sweden - and in the end these places fared no worse than anywhere else - meaning that the government restrictions were pointless, at best. In any case, if capitalism is the problem, what solution do you propose and what does it look like?

Now I think you've just missed the point of my post. I'm not solving or presenting a new economic theory. My point is that there is no such thing as unskilled labor. These jobs are hard and add great value to our society.

Oh, I never disagreed about “unskilled labor” I tried to make that clear in my first comment, perhaps I failed in that. As I said “unskilled labor” is a term used to denigrate essential work that society chooses to look down on. That said, that wages are often low in these work areas is a function of labor competition rather than capitalists or capitalism seeking an excuse to pay poverty wages. That such low wages exists and insomuch as the workers can join and leave voluntarily (ie they are not slaves, waged or otherwise) suggests that there are people who can achieve more than subsistence on such pay. This is simply the nature of labor competition. So perhaps we are in argumentative agreement here overall 😂

How are wages set then? How would you explain all the fast food chains having to dramatically raise their wages (at least in nominal terms)? A company that is operating in even a quasi-free market cannot say “you have no skills, the wage for this job is peanuts” in a vacuum. They set a wage and if there are enough people who are voluntarily willing to sign up to do the work, those people are signaling that the wage rate is worth their time. If not enough people who can do the job at sufficient quality appear, the wage rate must increase unit the gap is closed. I am interested in your alternative to how wages are set.

So then why would McDonalds ever have to raise their hourly pay to $17/hour. They are one of the largest corporations in the world. I’m not trying to argue, I’m genuinely interested in hearing an alternative model of how the world works. How do you believe wages are set? Why would McDonalds ever raise wages? What do you propose in place of capitalism and would that work?