From: Dan Glover (daneglover@hotmail.com)
Date: Thu Jul 08 2004 - 08:59:31 BST
Hello everyone
>From: Arlo Bensinger <ajb102@psu.edu>
>Reply-To: moq_discuss@moq.org
>To: moq_discuss@moq.org
>Subject: Re: MD the metaphysics of free-enterprise
>Date: Wed, 07 Jul 2004 16:54:42 -0400
>
>Arlo stated:
>
>
>But returning to your example specifically, let me clarify several other
>things.
>
>"They can go home at the end of the day and forget business", doubtful. As
>a real example, I have several friends who work plumbing and heating for a
>business owner back home. They are constantly afraid of losing their jobs,
>this fear is with them 24/7. Similarly, they pour a lot of blood and sweat
>(not sure about tears) into their labor, because they realize that their
>continuation depends on the continuation of the business. It is only
>(perhaps) in positions where "ah, if I lose my job I'll just get another"
>is it possible that you would likely see employees forgetting business. And
>these positions (thinking primarily low-wage retail here, but there are
>many other examples) are primarily those where one type of alienation is
>strikingly profound (what I do is not me, what I make is not me, it has no
>relation to me whatsoever and so I don't care).
Hi Arlo
Thank you for your comments. Yes I see what you mean and perhaps I wrote too
hastily. It's been a rare experience for me--perhaps I'm fortunate in
that--to have to threaten one of my employees with dismissal on account of
their work ethic. But it is certainly an implicit threat any time a person
becomes an employee, I suppose. It's also implicitly understood that as the
owner of the business I'm responsible for providing an agreed upon amount of
money to my employees at the agreed upon time. The quality of the
workmanship can effect my getting paid but it doesn't directly effect my
employees getting paid. Even a world-class screwball (if I'm unfortunate
enough to have him/her in my employ) will get paid. They may not keep
getting paid if their work doesn't improve. The other employees tend to
police this much closer than I do, believe it or not.
In truth though, in my mind I cannot equate worrying about one's job with
worrying about 15 jobs. That type of thinking seems rather self-centered
from a business owner's point of view.
>
>"Could they run it profitably? Again, I tend to doubt it. If they were cut
>out to be business owners they would be already, in my opinion." I agree,
>it takes a certain skill to manage a business, and certainly not everyone
>equivocally has this skill. We will always need those that attend to the
>business, and those that attend to the production. What I advocate is a
>more balanced and connected relationship between the business and the
>production, and between the labor and the product. This is Marxist
>thinking, to be sure, but one I feel resonates strongly with the theme of
>alienation in ZMM.
Do you mean a Ben and Jerry's type of operation?
>
>When you say "I've always made sure my employees get paid first and get
>paid on time. There have been times when I've literally gone hungry and not
>paid my own bills in order to ensure that I've always made sure my
>employees get paid first and get paid on time. There have been times when
>I've literally gone hungry and not paid my own bills in order to ensure
>that", it makes me honored to speak with you. Your statement is a clear
>indication that the accumulation of wealth is not your highest good.
>However, when many families I know personally lost their livelihoods in
>textile factories (in Schuylkill Haven, PA in case you are curious) not
>over the quality of their work, or the demand for product, or over asking
>for ridiculously inflated wages, but simply because the factory owner could
>increase his own personal wealth by moving across the border and paying
>slave wages to a poor population lacking social protections, I am forced to
>believe that there is a real problem in the system.
I think this is an example of global social evolution. By moving the
factories across the border the owners of the companies are lining their
pockets yes but also inadvertantly raising the standard of living even if
just a little. And sure as the sun comes up as time goes by wages will rise.
An old friend once told me a story about how as a young man he worked for $2
a day in the fields, hard back-breaking work from dawn till dusk. One day he
heard of a farmer paying $5 a day! At first he didn't believe it but sure
enough, when he inquired about the job the man hired him right off to work
for a couple weeks digging drainage ditches. My friend told me that after
that, he refused to work for any less than $5 a day and sure enough, that's
what everyone paid him, even those who used to pay him just $2, though they
did so grudgingly and with many grumbles.
Let's try to see it from the other side of the looking glass. Perhaps when
you're living in a cardboard shack with a dirt floor and a dollar a week
coming in to feed and cloth a half dozen kids, a big factory coming to town
can mean the difference in those kids living or dying, even if the factory
wages are only $5 a week.
>
>In your case, I don't think there is a problem.
Thank you for saying so.
>
>Arlo
>
>PS: I should say this too. I am not in favor of closing the borders. I have
>no problem morally with a business moving to Mexico or anywhere else. My
>moral objection is over the way we keep these nations in poverty so that we
>have access to slave labor. Going to Tijuana (in an example I just wrote to
>Platt) and paying workers a few cents per hour only keeps them poor and
>powerless. Coke could easily pay decent living wages to its Tijuanese
>employees, and still sell at a profit, just a "smaller profit". And that is
>my beef with "capitalism".
I understand what you're saying but I believe it's part of the natural order
of things. That doesn't mean we can't change things though.
Thanks for your comments,
Dan
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