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roachboy · 06-30-2006, 08:55 AM

i had considered posting stuff to this thread before, but held off because i did not find the way the arguments were presented to be useful--but the last posts to come extent change this, so here goes....

1. i should say that i find no argument compelling against raising the minimum wage to the level of a "living wage" however that is defined. a business is a social activity--economic action is social, it is not separate, not discrete, not a wholly private sphere within which "rational actors" pursue the infantile notion of "self-interest". as a social activity, business comes with obligations to the social context within which it operates, that enables it to generate a profit (to function at all). i do not buy the ideological focus that comes from the right on small business when the fact of the matter is that theoverwhelming majority of economic activity in the states is undertaken by large-scale operations.

this last point is one where pan and cyn/stevo talk past each other. if pan uses terminologies particular to corporate action, cyn/stevo respond with terminology that links theur positions to small businesses. i wonder about this choice, where it comes from and why it is compelling. i dont see this as self-evident, and it seems to me that entire arguments here hinge on which example you choose to think about.

2. another level problem: when pan, for example, talks about a living wage (or its functional equivalent) in economic terms, cyn responds with a parable concerning motivation. these are not the same type of argument. a living wage-type argument involves questions of economic position, which involve questions like food costs, rent or mortgage levels, etc. and something on the order of a cost of living index. these are social matters.
cyn's story avoids social questions, focussing rather on what he apparently take to be the subjective motivation absurdly low wages provided him as a person--which is fine--except that he seems to assume there is something generalizable about his story--the implication is that if everyone were more like him, things would be hunky dory. that seems kind of presumptuous to me.

further, it does not constitute a statement about anything social or structural at all---there is no attempt to understand factors like poverty as social phenomena or social problems---there is no consideration of the range of possible responses to poverty---there is only a story about motivation, which reads like it is also a story about virtue, the implication of which is that folk who work very low paying jobs do so because they lack motivation--that is they lack virtue--and so, by extension, they deserve to be poor. because, in the end, poverty is their fault and can be explained by this lack of an inward characteristic of virtue.

that seems to me meaningless if you take it at all seriously as a conversation about anything to do with poverty or with low wage levels.

to head off the international comparisons---in amartya sen's book "development as freedom" you can find very interesting arguments about poverty--he uses mortality rates to pose questions about false comparisons between poverty levels in different contexts (pp. 22-23 for the data itself). one target of the information is the routine (and false) claim that folk who are poor in the us are less poor than those in other places. these claims usually rest on data concerning income levels and nothing else.

if you look at mortality rates, the story changes: as of 1995, 82% of white males could expect to live to 75 yrs; 74 % of males in china, 71% of males in kerala, india; 67% of african-american males.

what to make of this?

there is a way in which the answer is obvious--measured in terms of income to the exlcusion of other factors, the poor in the states are not as poor as those in other countries; but if you think about poverty in relation to life expectancy, you have to think differently--while income levels may be higher, poverty in america operates in a different cultural environment within which the delightful consequences of the american intertwining of class and racism crystalize....poverty in the states is more dysfunctional than poverty in very poor countries as a function of the cultural context within which it operates.

this would seem to me a pretty strong argument for not only a living wage, but also for a radical equalization of educational and other forms of cultural resources that shape opportunity, a radical reform of the health care system and so forth.

another way: arguments against a living wage seem to me ethically wrong. i see no reason to not think about poverty as a social problem, not as the result of some lack of virtue on the part of the poor. i see no justification for firms of any size paying only the lowest possible wages.

yet another way: i think milton friedman is full of shit.

06-30-2006, 08:55 AM	#76 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	i had considered posting stuff to this thread before, but held off because i did not find the way the arguments were presented to be useful--but the last posts to come extent change this, so here goes.... 1. i should say that i find no argument compelling against raising the minimum wage to the level of a "living wage" however that is defined. a business is a social activity--economic action is social, it is not separate, not discrete, not a wholly private sphere within which "rational actors" pursue the infantile notion of "self-interest". as a social activity, business comes with obligations to the social context within which it operates, that enables it to generate a profit (to function at all). i do not buy the ideological focus that comes from the right on small business when the fact of the matter is that theoverwhelming majority of economic activity in the states is undertaken by large-scale operations. this last point is one where pan and cyn/stevo talk past each other. if pan uses terminologies particular to corporate action, cyn/stevo respond with terminology that links theur positions to small businesses. i wonder about this choice, where it comes from and why it is compelling. i dont see this as self-evident, and it seems to me that entire arguments here hinge on which example you choose to think about. 2. another level problem: when pan, for example, talks about a living wage (or its functional equivalent) in economic terms, cyn responds with a parable concerning motivation. these are not the same type of argument. a living wage-type argument involves questions of economic position, which involve questions like food costs, rent or mortgage levels, etc. and something on the order of a cost of living index. these are social matters. cyn's story avoids social questions, focussing rather on what he apparently take to be the subjective motivation absurdly low wages provided him as a person--which is fine--except that he seems to assume there is something generalizable about his story--the implication is that if everyone were more like him, things would be hunky dory. that seems kind of presumptuous to me. further, it does not constitute a statement about anything social or structural at all---there is no attempt to understand factors like poverty as social phenomena or social problems---there is no consideration of the range of possible responses to poverty---there is only a story about motivation, which reads like it is also a story about virtue, the implication of which is that folk who work very low paying jobs do so because they lack motivation--that is they lack virtue--and so, by extension, they deserve to be poor. because, in the end, poverty is their fault and can be explained by this lack of an inward characteristic of virtue. that seems to me meaningless if you take it at all seriously as a conversation about anything to do with poverty or with low wage levels. to head off the international comparisons---in amartya sen's book "development as freedom" you can find very interesting arguments about poverty--he uses mortality rates to pose questions about false comparisons between poverty levels in different contexts (pp. 22-23 for the data itself). one target of the information is the routine (and false) claim that folk who are poor in the us are less poor than those in other places. these claims usually rest on data concerning income levels and nothing else. if you look at mortality rates, the story changes: as of 1995, 82% of white males could expect to live to 75 yrs; 74 % of males in china, 71% of males in kerala, india; 67% of african-american males. what to make of this? there is a way in which the answer is obvious--measured in terms of income to the exlcusion of other factors, the poor in the states are not as poor as those in other countries; but if you think about poverty in relation to life expectancy, you have to think differently--while income levels may be higher, poverty in america operates in a different cultural environment within which the delightful consequences of the american intertwining of class and racism crystalize....poverty in the states is more dysfunctional than poverty in very poor countries as a function of the cultural context within which it operates. this would seem to me a pretty strong argument for not only a living wage, but also for a radical equalization of educational and other forms of cultural resources that shape opportunity, a radical reform of the health care system and so forth. another way: arguments against a living wage seem to me ethically wrong. i see no reason to not think about poverty as a social problem, not as the result of some lack of virtue on the part of the poor. i see no justification for firms of any size paying only the lowest possible wages. yet another way: i think milton friedman is full of shit. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 06-30-2006 at 08:59 AM..