People Power

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Originally Posted by BDunnell

To that I must say that it's difficult to define 'hard work'. Someone may work extremely hard as a cleaner, but I wouldn't expect or wish for them to receive as much as someone working just as hard at what I would define to be a skilled job.

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Fair point.

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Originally Posted by chuck34

Define "harder". Have I done something that means he can not earn the same as me? Perhaps I had the stones to ask for a raise and he did not. Should he automatically get a raise if I asked for it?

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Perhaps as you brought up the term ("if someone chooses to work harder and makes more...") maybe you could provide your own definition.

One of the problems here is some seem to see the issues in narrow, individual terms. i.e. why should anyone care whether the next person is earning more or less than me? If it doesn't affect me it doesn't concern me.

It's that view of the world which, in my view has to change. We simply cannot isolate ourselves in that way from our neighbours, or those halfway across the world whether we are individuals or governements.


No man is an island entire of itself; every man
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main;
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as
well as a manor of thy friends or of thine
own were; any man's death diminishes me,
because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
"Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions" by John Donne

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Originally Posted by chuck34

With this I pretty much agree. But my point is to try and see what these people who think it's unfair, a tragedy, a crisis, etc. want to do about it. Do they genuinly want Communism, or is there some other way they see?

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100% Correct :up: Asking for equality without putting in the effort is the same as communism. People can stand on their heads and shout otherwise, but it doesn't change what it is.

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Originally Posted by ArrowsFA1

If someone chooses to work as hard or harder than you and makes a lot less does that matter to you?

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There is a big difference between working hard stupidly, and working hard smartly.

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Originally Posted by ioan

How many management positions paying 1.000.000 + per year are available in your opinion? What about those getting over 10.000.000/year for making a few decisions, based on analysis done by much smarter people, and whom will get another 10.000.000 in case something goes wrong and they have to leave to another company?!

So let's be realistic, and believe me I am anything but a communist/desperate socialist, there is a problem, a huge one out there and it should be solved before the bubble burst and heads fall like it happened in France a few centuries back.

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One word sums up peoples problems with the wage gap...jealousy. Besides the riches man in the world, there is always someone richer than you. Should the whole world be jealous of each other? No, work for the things you want then.

People always want what they don't have / cant afford, but don't appreciate the things they do have.

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Originally Posted by chuck34

Economics is not a zero sum game. If person A makes x% more this year than last year, it does not mean that person B must make x% less. And besides, what business is it of your's if someone makes wild amounts of money, as long as they aren't stealing it from you? I just can't wrap my head around this type of jealousy.

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A zero-sum game is one in which one participant's gain (or loss) of utility is exactly balanced by the losses (or gains) of the utility of other participant(s). Since accounting for losses, gains, profits and expenses is always balanced, the net result and any given time is ALWAYS zero.

Who's not to say that management isn't stealing money from their workers buy not paying them for the rewards of their labour? Productivity has risen immensely over the past 50 years yet nominal wages have barely budged since 1965.
Jealousy might be a driver but what about equity?

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Originally Posted by chuck34

How about we just come in and take away your money until you make the same as the poorest people in Africa. Would that be fair to you?

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Isn't that precisely what companies are trying to do currently?
History has shown in the past that if people could get awat with it, then they would play their workers nothing. Heck, the United States fought a war over this subject (among others).

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Originally Posted by chuck34

Yes individuals set salaries. So if someone takes a job at a company that pays their CEO 1000000x as much as them, who's fault is that? Damn skippy it's in their own interest to maintain a gap. I'm sorry to break it to you but the sole purpose of a business is to create profit, not ensure equal results.

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Yes, the purpose of a business is to create profit but because people who offer labour inputs to the firm have a lower ability to negotiate wages (because firms are generally price makers whilst individual workers are price takers), then the net benefits that profits generate are increasingly being distributed less equitably. Since the firm would prefer to pay people the same as the poorest people in Africa, then that's who other workers are competing against.
Workers are playing a levelling down auction, which is quite unlike bosses further up the chain, who seem to be paid bonuses even if the companies are making losses and yet you think that's fair?

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Originally Posted by chuck34

If it is such a concern to all of us, what do you propose to do about it?

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It's not what I propose, it's more by way of warning:
all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.

When people reach the point where they feel that they have been made to suffer by the system of government (and yes, firms do engage in the fiscal administration of a country because they have a very big say in the basic economic question "what to produce") then they'll do what they've always done, fight for equity.

Remember, the French Revolution was mainly an economic one caused in part by rising national debt, aristocrats skimming the wealth off of the top of society and large portions of the populace facing poverty and a decreasing say in how the country was run (sounds familiar no?). History tells us that great sections of Paris were burned, civil disobedience and theft and violence soon found a home on those streets.
Suppose an echo of the French Revolution were to break out, where would it start and which buildings would be attacked? 11 Wall Street? 200 West Street? 33 Liberty Place? How hard would it be to pack a Ford E-Series van full of explosives and just sort of leave it parked outside?
I think that this would be terrible and despicable but given the civil disturbances across the Arab World and now Greece and possibly Italy, how far away is the US from following suit?

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Originally Posted by 555-04Q2

There is a big difference between working hard stupidly, and working hard smartly.

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Not in pay there isn't. Profits from their work in either case aren't distributed to them. Salaried workers in particular work all sorts of unpaid overtime and receive zero benefit.

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Originally Posted by 555-04Q2

One word sums up peoples problems with the wage gap...jealousy.

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Originally Posted by chuck34

...what business is it of your's if someone makes wild amounts of money, as long as they aren't stealing it from you? I just can't wrap my head around this type of jealousy.

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Grasp the fact that the motivation for highlighting the wage gap issue is not jealousy then try to look at things again.

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Originally Posted by Rollo

Not in pay there isn't. Profits from their work in either case aren't distributed to them. Salaried workers in particular work all sorts of unpaid overtime and receive zero benefit.

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When I worked for a boss I worked thousands of overtime hours (while also studying via correspondance) and never recieved a single cent for it! I never moaned once as I was grateful just to have a job that put a roof over my head and food on the table! It built my character, stabilised the company I used to work for which grew consistantly and in turn saw my salary go up to the point where I was able to save up enough money to start on my own. I still work overtime if required, right next to my workers.

If workers work for a company that does not remunerate them properly at present or in the future for efforts put in, then they have the choice to complain and try and sort it out, leave for greener pastures, or suck it up and live with it.

We are the masters of our own destiny. Don't rely on others to get what you want or you will never get it.

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Originally Posted by ArrowsFA1

Grasp the fact that the motivation for highlighting the wage gap issue is not jealousy then try to look at things again.

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I beg to differ and this is my opinion, yours is obviously different to mine :)

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Originally Posted by 555-04Q2

When I worked for a boss I worked thousands of overtime hours (while also studying via correspondance) and never recieved a single cent for it! I never moaned once as I was grateful just to have a job that put a roof over my head and food on the table! It built my character, stabilised the company I used to work for which grew consistantly and in turn saw my salary go up to the point where I was able to save up enough money to start on my own. I still work overtime if required, right next to my workers.

If workers work for a company that does not remunerate them properly at present or in the future for efforts put in, then they have the choice to complain and try and sort it out, leave for greener pastures, or suck it up and live with it.

We are the masters of our own destiny. Don't rely on others to get what you want or you will never get it.

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P.S. My personal experience mentioned above is why I remunerate my workers so well if they put the effort in.