In These Times

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• • 10 Nov 07
  • 11:15 am

  I have lately been thinking that the "free marketeers" are every bit as bereft of reality as their communist nemeses ever were and in exactly the same way: the theoretical structures of both equally ignore the impact of the same all important aspect of human nature -- greed. The communists never appreciated the need for greed (how self-interest motivates efficiency and innovation). The free marketeers never understand the need to rein in greed with an adequate system of checks and balances (which hasn't occurred naturally -- that is without state intervention -- since the beginning of industrialization). The belief that the …

  Posted to The New Road to Serfdom

• • 10 Nov 07
  • 2:42 pm

  I should have finished up above -- given the topic concerned the whole world -- by saying that once American opinion finally accepts the idea that the free market is only the (truly remarkable) OS (operating system) and that the industrial default program has always been the "race to the bottom" since the beginning of the industrial age -- without heavy legislative intervention (most importantly via fairly balancing the labor market as well as via transfers) -- then, the issue will be pretty much resolved world-wide (there being nobody significant left espousing out-of-control market forces).

  Posted to The New Road to Serfdom

• • 13 Nov 07
  • 9:59 am

  Since Adam Smith's "perfect competition world" of small entrepreneurs and skilled artisans was replaced by the industrial world the simple (if catastrophic) problem for (100 times more productive) interchangeable workers has been the RACE TO THE BOTTOM. The simple solution now practiced all over the better paying world is SECTOR-WIDE labor agreements (or some equivalent). This is not ideology. This is merely mechanical. It is that simple.

  Posted to The New Road to Serfdom

• • 14 Nov 07
  • 11:16 pm

  whattheheck, Hate to break it to you (German car fan) but German workers have the most powerful union setup in the world: mandatory, sector wide labor agreements: everybody doing the same job in the same locale must by law work under the same labor contract even though they work for different employers. I am not knocking industrialization -- just recognizing the (easily remedied -- did someone say sector-wide bargaining?) difference in the labor negotiating power between Adam's era and the industrial era: the catastrophic race to the wage and benefit bottom. Today, I had the bright idea that if Adam Smith …

  Posted to The New Road to Serfdom

• • 18 Jun 07
  • 11:41 am

  Here is an "advertising approach" that could quickly get the ideas in this article across to the American public: 25% of the American workforce earns less than the MONETARY minimum wage of modern European countries (not counting Portugal, Malta, etc.). That doesn't count the benefits a European minimum wager gets: 4 weeks PAID vacation, 10-12 PAID holidays, 3 months of PAID maternity leave, a year of PAID sick leave, severance pay (from McDonalds!) -- oh, and don't forget PAID health care. The total must add up to more like 35% or even 40% of American workers earning less than minimum wage …

  Posted to What Vacation Days?