Flat Wages for the middle and working class - what to do?

[Conaeolos]

Wages and benefits are the terms of negotiation.

Yes. I am just pointing out an inherently uneven negotiation in most cases and moving it to be on equal footing is impossible and can only be done in name through sanctioned coercion.

The reasons are that you are getting rich off of the labor of the workers. We will share in that wealth or strike.

Then walk away and start your own venture with your labor. Oh wants that? You need my capital investment and management experiecne…

In est, your labour is voluntary in exchange for your agreed benefits and wage and you are in fact not a slave. Yet you feel you need more but can’t make a reasonable argument why so instead you revert to emotionalism and sabotaging my business out of jelousy instead of working out a fair agreement with me based on logic or starting your own venture and putting me out of business.

That’s not a reason.

Unions will prevent you from dropping workers that have invested their lives in your company. Sorry....we don't trust your good will.

So it’s my job as mommy employer to support a worker because they have invested their life in my company?
You don’t see how that is entirely emotional and devoid of reason?

You know what happens when mommy employer can’t afford to keep that dead weight anymore? We are all going to stave and die!

My employees are encouraged to invest, educate and save for themselves for a reason. It’s their lives and their money when I pay them. They've got to take care of themselves.

It is only a costly war if you fail to negotiate in good faith. Europe has figured this out. We need to take our power back

You mean live off my savings because I am privileged enough to afford to wait out your emotional sectioned criminal behaviour taking my source of income hostage to your emotional demands? No that is fully in good faith. I think de facto criminals should suffer. I willing to take the hit gladly but I most assure you we all suffer for your choice.

Then go to Europe where they will take your emotional arguments. I promise you though their unions & governments are lying and its part of a plan to incite you, use you as pawn to overthrow their checks and balances, justice and liberty then when everyone has diluted power enough, in your name they will seize back all that control and horde it as an elite few. It's one of the oldest of human stories.

 

[vegas giants]

You don't know what I'm talking about? Decertification. You've never heard of this? Google it.

I'll get you started. National Right to Work Foundation » Decertification Election

Are you saying workers can never vote to decertify their union?

 

[Neomalthusian]

Are you saying workers can never vote to decertify their union?

The following link is to another thread whose links express exactly what I'm saying:

https://www.debatepolitics.com/general-political-discussion/290917-curtains-union-coercion-employee-rights-act.html

 

[vegas giants]

Yes. I am just pointing out an inherently uneven negotiation in most cases and moving it to be on equal footing is impossible and can only be done in name through sanctioned coercion.


Then walk away and start your own venture with your labor. Oh wants that? You need my capital investment and management experiecne…

In est, your labour is voluntary in exchange for your agreed benefits and wage and you are in fact not a slave. Yet you feel you need more but can’t make a reasonable argument why so instead you revert to emotionalism and sabotaging my business out of jelousy instead of working out a fair agreement with me based on logic or starting your own venture and putting me out of business.

That’s not a reason.


So it’s my job as mommy employer to support a worker because they have invested their life in my company?
You don’t see how that is entirely emotional and devoid of reason?

You know what happens when mommy employer can’t afford to keep that dead weight anymore? We are all going to stave and die!

My employees are encouraged to invest, educate and save for themselves for a reason. It’s their lives and their money when I pay them. They've got to take care of themselves.


You mean live off my savings because I am privileged enough to afford to wait out your emotional sectioned criminal behaviour taking my source of income hostage to your emotional demands? No that is fully in good faith. I think de facto criminals should suffer. I willing to take the hit gladly but I most assure you we all suffer for your choice.

Then go to Europe where they will take your emotional arguments. I promise you though their unions & governments are lying and its part of a plan to incite you, use you as pawn to overthrow their checks and balances, justice and liberty then when everyone has diluted power enough, in your name they will seize back all that control and horde it as an elite few. It's one fo the oldest of human stories.

Whatever it takes to make it on equal footing works for me

Or we could just unionize which is our right

You will treat workers that have invested their lives in your company fairly or they will punish you for it. Your choice.

No I think we should bring unions here and make them more powerful. And if they treat us badly we elect new leaders.

 

[vegas giants]

The following link is to another thread whose links express exactly what I'm saying:

https://www.debatepolitics.com/general-political-discussion/290917-curtains-union-coercion-employee-rights-act.html

My god you are simply terrified of unions. The idea of having to bargain in good faith is simply terrifying to you

 

[Surrealistik]

The burden is not on me to produce evidence that Scandinavia can't be replicated in the United States, which is over 15 times its size and vastly more capitalistic by nature.

Burden of proof defaults to the person making the assertion. You are asserting that Scandinavian unionism (and similar unionism successfully employed elsewhere) cannot be replicated in the US specifically due to differences in scale in response to clear cut evidence that global unions can be and have been greatly successful in championing the interests of the average individual; such a bold assertion clearly requires supporting evidence.

That wasn't my question. And by the way, no it isn't.

Contrary to your opinion, yes, it is generally the case. You can certainly have rigged and corrupt union institutions, and any can point to the dregs and cherry pick, but typically, they are democracies answerable to union constituents.

Yet American unions are enormous fans of statutory minimum wages, because such policies reduce the difference between the cost of unskilled and skilled labor, the latter of which is more likely to be unionized (and provides more money from which to skim dues), thereby promoting union membership.

Three assertions:

One, that Americas unions both on average support minimum wages AND

Two, that because of a reduction in cost between unskilled and skilled labour union membership is consequently promoted AND

Three, that because two is true (assumed), said unions do support minimum wage specifically because this generates more dues get to be 'skimmed'.

Any evidence?

Tolerating unionism at all is a government measure, going all the way back to the union exemption from anti-cartel laws that was granted to them over a century ago. The NLRB and our court system protect unions and are required by unions for them to have any effect on anything. There is nothing unions can do or should be able to do that government cannot simply do itself.

While government has an important role to play in setting minimums in terms of work conditions and workers rights, it simply cannot take into account the particulars and granularity of each particular workplace; on this basis, if no other, is the union invaluable for representing the worker.

Furthermore, there is a substantial difference between the government's capacities in theory and practice, particularly in America where it is largely captive to monied interests at the federal level, and increasingly captive to said interests at the state level, leaving its integrity as an honest actor and mediator highly dubious (incidentally this is a big part of the reason the legislative environment has become increasingly hostile to unions).

In summary, though I have no doubt that an integral government could certainly take over most of a union's responsibilities, America's government presently isn't integral, and the granularity of individual workplaces is too great for any government involvement to practically mediate even if it were.

 

[Neomalthusian]

My god you are simply terrified of unions.

No I'm not, I just take great joy in advocating for the complete elimination of them.

The idea of having to bargain in good faith is simply terrifying to you

How would it be terrifying? As an employer, what happens if I "bargain in bad faith?" Worst case scenario, they file some paperwork with the state labor board and the board finds I committed an "unfair labor practice" and what's the remedy? They wag their finger at me and say "go back to bargaining in good faith." That's it.

Because the "remedy" for bargaining in bad faith is so toothless, unions do it constantly. They engage in regressive bargaining and surface bargaining all the time. Most of the time, employers don't do anything about it, because it just costs more time and money to file an unfair labor practice claim with the state labor board, and for what? What will the employer get out of it? Nothing. The board will tell the union "bargain in good faith this time." Unions don't care.

 

[vegas giants]

No I'm not, I just take great joy in advocating for the complete elimination of them.



How would it be terrifying? As an employer, what happens if I "bargain in bad faith?" Worst case scenario, they file some paperwork with the state labor board and the board finds I committed an "unfair labor practice" and what's the remedy? They wag their finger at me and say "go back to bargaining in good faith." That's it.

Because the "remedy" for bargaining in bad faith is so toothless, unions do it constantly. They engage in regressive bargaining and surface bargaining all the time. Most of the time, employers don't do anything about it, because it just costs more time and money to file an unfair labor practice claim with the state labor board, and for what? What will the employer get out of it? Nothing. The board will tell the union "bargain in good faith this time." Unions don't care.

And I take great joy in promoting them. Especially public unions

No the remedy for bargaining in bad faith is strike. Build your own widgets.

 

[MTAtech]

It isn't the 1950s anymore. The economy is global. Labor will be, and is done, elsewhere when it gets too expensive here. Also, higher wages drive prices up, making products uncompetitive. Sorry, but that's the economic reality that no union can change.

Ever wonder why CEOs never argue that executive salaries 1,000 times what the average worker earns make products more expensive but raising worker salaries...?

The U.S. isn't really losing manufacturing to foreign workers -- they're losing it to the microchip. The problem then becomes, when the masses have no jobs, who can buy the products that the robots make? That's the role of government, to explore new ideas, like a guaranteed income.

 

[Harshaw]

Ever wonder why CEOs never argue that executive salaries 1,000 times what the average worker earns make products more expensive but raising worker salaries...?

Pick any CEO. Distribute that salary among all the workers. How much does each get? Show your work.

The U.S. isn't really losing manufacturing to foreign workers -- they're losing it to the microchip. The problem then becomes, when the masses have no jobs, who can buy the products that the robots make? That's the role of government, to explore new ideas, like a guaranteed income.

Totally different topic.

 

[Neomalthusian]

And I take great joy in promoting them. Especially public unions

No the remedy for bargaining in bad faith is strike.

Striking is not a remedy. You don't even know what you're saying.

 

[vegas giants]

Striking is not a remedy. You don't even know what you're saying.

But it is very effective. Use any word you like

 

[Conaeolos]

Okay. Here one for you - how much value does the average employee create for their company? You may be shocked at how little that is when looked in comparison to their benefits and wages they receive. It often takes many layer from your average input to make a profit.

When you can produce for your company millions of dollars by your direct actions you’ll see very quicklyhow happy they are to pay you handsomely a fraction of what you bring in.

Jealousy is a hell of a drug.

 

[Surrealistik]

Okay. Here one for you - how much value does the average employee create for their company? You may be shocked at how little that is when looked in comparison to their benefits and wages they receive. It often takes many layer from your average input to make a profit.

When you can produce for your company millions of dollars by your direct actions you’ll see very quicklyhow happy they are to pay you handsomely a fraction of what you bring in.

Jealousy is a hell of a drug.

A CEO like Buffet, Gates, or Steve Jobs almost certainly mandates extremely high compensation.

The vast majority of CEOs aren't any of those, or even remotely close. The fundamental injustice is that caretaker senior executives get bloated pay for mediocre or even negative results, nevermind things like golden parachutes. The US is unique in having excessively high compensation even for mediocre or worse CEOs, CFOs and so on.

This line of argument would have something resembling authenticity if you were able to demonstrate the value that a top executives are responsible for (not at all a simple task when you have variables like seasonality, macro and microeconomic conditions and business cycles to account for, existing tends and so on) that is commensurate to their compensation in at least a majority of cases. To my knowledge no one has yet succeeded at this. Not one person has demonstrated mathematically why CEOs and others of that echelon now deserve to make tens of times as much as they used to vis a vis past decades; after all productivity, profits, and other relevant metrics certainly haven't gone up that much as a %, nevermind the fraction that can actually be attributed to senior management.

 

[Lord Zerg]

Downward pressures compared to the past:
1. Full inclusion of woman to the workforce (increase supply of labour)
2. Automation increasing production power per employee (reducing needs of labour)
3. Foreign trade (eliminating many local industries)
4. Higher specialized training thresholds (can’t just train new employees limiting labour choice)
5. Increased population especially in skilled foreign labour (increase supply of labour)
6. Increase competition (pushing down prices and available customers)

Upward pressures compared to the past:
1. Fast Rate of innovation (many new emerging industries and the rate only seems to be increasing)
2. Increase education have a more broder-minded labour force (adaptability in labour)
3. Availability of advance training (most people can be train in any speciality)
4. Opening of global markets (huge new consumer bases coming aboard)

Feel free to expand upon or talk about any particular area of upward or downward middle class wage pressures.

The next waves of the middle & working class are looking like it going to struggle to buy homes, retire, pay their bills on 40 hour weeks etc.

One major reason for this is wages are not going up like they use to be and buying power is not going up to make up the difference. Youth unemployment and longer required education periods is also leading to later and later entry into the workforce delying everying.

My question is what do you see as the policies (left or right) which will start to see either wages raising or prices dropping to allow for a comfortable middle class?

The problem is that technology is replacing people and computers are now readily replacing people in all walks of life without creating enough software developer jobs to replace all the jobs that have been replaced with machines. The solution is:
1. More student aid and only for in-demand jobs, lets train a high-skill workforce.
2. A 35 hour workweek and a time and a half pay for any time over it.
3. Taxes to redistribute income from those at the top who own the machines to those at the bottom whose jobs are slipping away.

 

[MTAtech]

Pick any CEO. Distribute that salary among all the workers. How much does each get? Show your work.



Totally different topic.

Asking me to do a math problem is like walking into a propeller. Let's do the math.

This was back in 2013 from WaPo:

Robert L. Nardelli has abruptly resigned as chairman and chief executive of Home Depot, pocketing a lavish severance package and leaving shareholders with a stock that has languished even as sales have nearly doubled during his six-year tenure.

In a statement released yesterday, Home Depot's board of directors and Nardelli said they "mutually agreed" to the resignation, which took effect Tuesday. Under the terms of a separation agreement negotiated when he joined the company in 2000, Nardelli, 58, is to receive about $210 million in cash and stock options, including a $20 million severance payment and retirement benefits of $32 million.

Let's see, $210 million is equal to the entire annual wages of 16,457 minimum wage workers. That means if Nardelli 'only' got a measly $100 million, instead of $210 million, you could give 16,000 workers a 50% salary boost without increasing payroll.

 

[fmw]

Very difficult to do (successfully) when contrasted with a backdrop of weakened and weakening unions (which is part of this problem), and a growing excess of labour supply vs labour demand. Where's the negotiating power?

I was referring to people who are not union members. The negotiating power is in good job performance. People who belong to unions are stuck with what the union does.

 

[Harshaw]

Asking me to do a math problem is like walking into a propeller. Let's do the math.

This was back in 2013 from WaPo:

Let's see, $210 million is equal to the entire annual wages of 16,457 minimum wage workers. That means if Nardelli 'only' got a measly $100 million, instead of $210 million, you could give 16,000 workers a 50% salary boost without increasing payroll.

That's great. But you didn't actually answer the question:

Pick any CEO. Distribute that salary among all the workers. How much does each get? Show your work.

Home Depot has 406,000 employees.

$210 million -- and that's considering it all in CASH, and no stock options -- divided among them is about $517 per year each, which, if full-time, based on 2,000 hours, is 26 cents per hour.

 

[Surrealistik]

I was referring to people who are not union members. The negotiating power is in good job performance. People who belong to unions are stuck with what the union does.

Good performance only counts for so much if the labour context is that there's 10+ people willing to do your job for the same or less. Ultimately and in practice, supply and demand of labour are going to take its toll on your pay, and the amount you can negotiate for.

 

[Conaeolos]

Let's do some highly simplified calculations:

Home Depot:
52 Week Range $119.20 - $160.86
Meaning a potential market cap between 141 Billion and 191 Billion

To a 50 billion Dollar question a company paying $210 million and some guareetees for who steers the ship is reasonable.

meanwhile:

Revenue $88.5 billion / 385,00o Employees = $228,000

Minus the huge amount of costs and difference in real impact

$12,760 or 5% seems like fair compensation for what may equate betwene $30-150,000 in actual revunue generation.

If unions came to the table generating higher revenues or reducing costs they would get their higher wages instead they use coersion.

 

[vegas giants]

Let's do some highly simplified calculations:

Home Depot:
52 Week Range $119.20 - $160.86
Meaning a potential market cap between 141 Billion and 191 Billion

To a 50 billion Dollar question a company paying $210 million and some guareetees for who steers the ship is reasonable.

meanwhile:

Revenue $88.5 billion / 385,00o Employees = $228,000

Minus the huge amount of costs and difference in real impact

$12,760 or 5% seems like fair compensation for what may equate betwene $30-150,000 in actual revunue generation.

If unions came to the table generating higher revenues or reducing costs they would get their higher wages instead they use coersion.

If employees generate higher revenues and reduce costs they do not necessarily get higher wages and benefits. A company is under no legal obligation to do so. But they might do so if a union pushed for it because the company wants to avoid a strike

 

[Conaeolos]

If employees generate higher revenues and reduce costs they do not necessarily get higher wages and benefits. A company is under no legal obligation to do so. But they might do so if a union pushed for it because the company wants to avoid a strike

If your answer is telling me a lot of management are selfish and devious people that often don't take into account human impacts of their decions. I don't disagree, some of the worst I’ve every met although its a mixed bag. I think a lot of good employees get underpaid and undervalued especially in high-skill areas like computers, engineering and the sciences where management plays on employees high contentiousness and lower ambition. I don’t think its fair or equal or right for them to not have job security and decent incomes they earn however I also see that is not genreally the fault of bad managers but the overall market conditions. Unions as they have operated since the 1930s are more a hindrance then a help in the area of creating overall fairness because they make those condtions worse to teh benefit of a few. We want fairness we need to improve the market condtions which is the dicussion of this thread.

Wages and benefits are not set based on arbitrary parameters. There is no doubt flexibility but the market determines far more than the individual smaller manipulations of certain members of management. If you go to your boss and say you feel like a raise, your chances of success are low for a reason even beyond his horrible personality. You want a raise you need to create the conditions for a raise, if you doing that and still getting shut down we have a differnt problem. The problem with unions is they go in and the muscle the conditions where in wages and benefits are really are set by feelings and agreements(rarely respected) that are more often than not agreed to out of distress. Those artifical condtions ripple.

 

[vegas giants]

If your answer is telling me a lot of management are selfish and devious people that often don't take into account human impacts of their decions. I don't disagree, some of the worst I’ve every met although its a mixed bag. I think a lot of good employees get underpaid and undervalued especially in high-skill areas like computers, engineering and the sciences where management plays on employees high contentiousness and lower ambition. I don’t think its fair or equal or right for them to not have job security and decent incomes they earn however I also see that is not genreally the fault of bad managers but the overall market conditions. Unions as they have operated since the 1930s are more a hindrance then a help in the area of creating overall fairness because they make those condtions worse to teh benefit of a few. We want fairness we need to improve the market condtions which is the dicussion of this thread.

Wages and benefits are not set based on arbitrary parameters. There is no doubt flexibility but the market determines far more than the individual smaller manipulations of certain members of management. If you go to your boss and say you feel like a raise, your chances of success are low for a reason even beyond his horrible personality. You want a raise you need to create the conditions for a raise, if you doing that and still getting shut down we have a differnt problem. The problem with unions is they go in and the muscle the conditions where in wages and benefits are really are set by feelings and agreements(rarely respected) that are more often than not agreed to out of distress. Those artifical condtions ripple.

I think employees should just have a level playing field. Companies need employees and much as employees need jobs. If we are equals we can negotiate on equal terms. Unions were created for a reason. We have lost sight of that in the US and if we want to rebuild the middle class then we need to take back the power that comes from organizing as a group. You can abuse one of us but you can't abuse all of us.

 

[Neomalthusian]

But it is very effective. Use any word you like

I've managed through a strike, an actual strike is actually not effective for unions at all, or at best, it comes with major risks to both the public's perception of unions as well as to the union members' sentiment for their union. The employees often can scarcely afford to go without wages, which they must if they're striking, members often find it extremely embarrassing to have to go marching and holding signs, hence unions often fly in highly paid "business managers" to keep the troops marching and keep employees from sitting by idly and talking or, worse, just going home. Many employees would simply not strike were it not for fear of the union ordering them fired if they simply continue working in their job (this is only an issue in non-Right-To-Work states though).

Economic strikes allow the employer to find permanent replacements, hence unions avoid economic strikes and instead try to find excuses to call their economic strike an "unfair labor practice strike" so that employers are not allowed to find permanent replacements, but then what resolves the unfair labor practice? Oh, yeah, the state labor board's decision about whether one was actually committed, which can take weeks. Most employees can't easily go that long without pay. So it's really a self-defeating, self-sabotaging tactic to actually engage in a strike.

Unions don't even want to strike, because they know their members will quickly run out of steam, hate what they're having to do, and eventually turn against the union because it sucks so much ass to have to actually go through with it.

Striking is not a power. It's an empty threat, a humiliating charade, and a union vulnerability. More employers (especially public sector ones) should dig their heels in and dare unions to strike. It's awful for unions when they strike.

 

[Neomalthusian]

I think employees should just have a level playing field.

Buyers and sellers of anything never have "a level playing field." No matter what it is, there is zero way to ensure "a level playing field" when anything is bought or sold.

Companies need employees and much as employees need jobs.

Sometimes companies need employees more than employees need them. Sometimes employees need jobs more than employers need those particular workers. The market for a particular type of labor is as variable as the market for any good or service. Sometimes it's competitive, sometimes there's a glut.

If we are equals we can negotiate on equal terms.

No one is "equals." Anywhere. You're just imagining a notion of equality because it makes you feel warm and fuzzy. When something is bought and sold, there is no way to create "equality" in the negotiation of its price.

Unions were created for a reason.

So was the women's suffrage movement. Movements end. They end because laws are passed which prohibit the abuse.