> And about the reaction time - politics is in a way expression of the will of the masses.
Then you go on to list all the astroturfing that people are “waking up to”. You just contradict yourself. Politics writ large is astroturfing that you get gaslit into thinking is da will of da masses.
> And that depends on how they are informed. They are maybe not yet on point, but they are getting there.
Assuming large-scale automation[1]: workers have in aggregate automated themselves. It takes labor to automate. And yet those former workers are now a “burden”? We’re assuming automation, so was the making of the food stuff, the transportation of the food stuff, the automation of the infrastructure maintenance... was that done or not? Where is the burden being felt?
You’re gonna call the people that built everything a burden?
Either we are talking in terms of propagandistic guilt assignment, or we’re talking realpolitics. Either:
1. we can trivially support the “burden” because of automation (no burden); or
2. billionaire resource hoarders (a burden?) do not need the vast majority of their underlings (maybe just a few for Epstein 2.0) and can let them fend for themselves or die off. (It’s literally not even a question of whether they have a big red Automation Button that would sustain the “burden” indefinitely. What incentive do they have to press it?)
More jobless are a burden in a capitalism based social security system.
Has nothing to do if those build something useful or not. Caputalism doesn't care.
In the end the upper 0.1% get the profit and those who still have jobs have to finance the social security systems. More jobless and less working means the jobless become a burden and in the long run the system will fail.
So you either need to tax automation or the rich.
Guess if that will happen.
I know you are speaking in real terms about how the system works. But I don’t need to describe that system in such utterly system-serving (for lack of words) terms.
> In the end the upper 0.1% get the profit and those who still have jobs have to finance the social security systems. More jobless and less working means the jobless become a burden and in the long run the system will fail.
Is it an insult to human dignity? Let’s go through the thought process.
Commodities are used in an enterprise. Some of the commodities are labor. That labor commodity does work. Involving automation. Eventually (so we are told) those labor commodities manage to automate some forms of labor. Making those other labor commodities redundant.
The labor commodities are discarded. Because why (sigh) use a cart when you now have a car? And you don’t even own a horse.
All of the above is presumably not an insult to human dignity. No. The insult to human dignity is being “kept busy” instead of letting billionaires hoard automation made through human labor.
Of course the real solution is not busywork. But the part about busywork was not on the top of my mind with regards to dignity in this context.
> Personally, unless the alternative is literally starving,
The reason why we are even talking about it is what they said: people with a lot, lot of resources can prey on people. What’s one individual against an industry of psychological research?
That's an interesting parallel. I suspect the point is that entering all relationships with the expectation that all men are pigs carries certain benefits, but then it also likely has costs, such as an inability to form truly deep connections.
Many societies are deeply partiarchal and misogynistic. Men can mistreat their wives with impunity. So is the solution to eschew men? Not if your somehow healthy existence is predicated on having a male companion.
Still there might be private spaces to speak frankly about such a state of affairs.
That employment is exploitation is evidenced by profits. Employment is a commodity. Any business expects to get more value out of a commodity. Not to break even.
> If employment is violence, we should end it. But then almost everybody would die.
Everyone would die? Are you assuming that employment gets eliminated and nothing is replaced by it?
Anyone who is against the employment relation wants something different. Not something farcical like voluntary self-elimination.
Can you accept that two parties can make an exchange that leaves them both better off? If you can’t accept that, there’s no real point in any further discussion.
It is correct that the business expects that your time and energy is worth more to them than it is to you. Profit.
But then literally every trade between two people—trading four sheep for one cow, say—is exploitation in both directions. I expect to benefit more from the product I receive than I can profit from what I give away. I have plenty of milk but need some wool for clothes. But to improve my own situation is somehow to abuse the other person!?
You’ve seemingly declared every form of economic transaction immoral.
> But then literally every trade between two people—trading four sheep for one cow, say—is exploitation in both directions.
No. That could be a win-win. One might be a sheep farmer, the other a cattle/cow farmer. They both gain from exchanging these livestocks.
For an employee? See the value produced versus the wages earned. There’s the exploitation.
The nice thing about one single universal value—money—is that it makes things like this obvious. Just look at the numbers. It’s just one, single currency. Much easier than comparing livestock...
Part of the profits come from employment of capital. Almost no company relies solely on labor, they typically rely on both labor and capital (machines, buildings etc.). Owner of capital wants compensation for their investments, and he gets it via profits. Meanwhile, workers want compensation for their work, and they get it via wages. The exact split between compensation for capital and for work is a subject of negotiation (and often laws).
> The difference is that a government can take personal liberty away from people in the most direct way. A private company can't decide to lock somebody away in prison or send them to death row. (Hopefully anyway.) So we put a higher standard on government.
We put higher standards on the government because companies have the biggest propaganda coffers.
It’s not some rational principle. Money goes in, beliefs come out.
Then you go on to list all the astroturfing that people are “waking up to”. You just contradict yourself. Politics writ large is astroturfing that you get gaslit into thinking is da will of da masses.
> And that depends on how they are informed. They are maybe not yet on point, but they are getting there.
But you have the uncorrupted view from God.
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