Labor Is The Superior Of Capital

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
41

[quote]hspder wrote:
deanec wrote:
Is this representative of the average liberals logic? Just wondering…

Was that a sarcastic remark in response to my sarcastic remark?

Apparently these guys are right:

"
Sarcasm is difficult to comprehend, and even more difficult to appreciate and enjoy; however, it is doubly more so when an attempt is made to convey sarcasm electronically, through instant-messages, through email, or any written online medium.
"

http://www.sarcasmsociety.com/howtobesarcastic/lessontwo.php
[/quote]

No, I wasn’t being sarcastic. Your illustration was counterintuitive to your argument, as others have tried to point out. Please don’t explain it again, you have made your position quite clear.

Do I think that many companies executive salaries are out of line? Yes I do. But who am I (or you) to say what is out of line? I don’t own the company. If they want to pay stupid salaries that is their business, and to me that is the bottom line. Is it fair? Life ain’t fair. I am also of the opinion that unions have accomplished good in the past but are slow to adapt to the realities of business. The inability of the big three automakers to keep up with wages and benefits is one example of a good thing taken too far.

42

[quote]vroom wrote:
hspder,

Nobody is willing to argue that executives are making too much… because of the myth that everyone has the ability to achieve such income levels.

We all have the chance to win the lottery too…[/quote]

COMMUNIST! BURN!!!

43

[quote]vroom wrote:
hspder,

Nobody is willing to argue that executives are making too much… because of the myth that everyone has the ability to achieve such income levels.

We all have the chance to win the lottery too…[/quote]

Actually, I might argue that one and I don’t really plan on becoming a CEO during the course of my career.

What exactly are we defining as “making too much”? I feel like this is the equivalent of the entire argument of “athletes make too much money” or “rock stars make too much money”. We see some truly large dollar figure attached to the name of a corporate executive and immediately decree it grossly inequitable. But despite the fact that there are very few people who can run a huge corporation [i]well[/i], then I wouldn’t be so quick to just see a salary figure or stock options and say its too much.

This whole argument seems so arbitrary.

44

[quote]deanec wrote:
No, I wasn’t being sarcastic. Your illustration was counterintuitive to your argument, as others have tried to point out. Please don’t explain it again, you have made your position quite clear. [/quote]

Good. Unless you want to debate if it was Comic Irony or Sarcasm, of course, since so many people seem to confuse them these days… :wink:

Maybe I’ve read one too many Jane Austen novels.

(read the first few pages of Pride and Prejudice and you’ll know what I mean)

[quote]deanec wrote:
Do I think that many companies executive salaries are out of line? Yes I do. But who am I (or you) to say what is out of line? I don’t own the company. If they want to pay stupid salaries that is their business, and to me that is the bottom line.[/quote]

That is very naive of you. The actions of these companies have an effect on society. If companies pay a disproportionably high amount of money to their execs, and hence a disproportionably low amount to their workers, that has severe social consequences, and I’m not talking only about wealth distribution. We don’t each live in a bubble, contrary to what Libertarians and some Conservatives like to think.

[quote]deanec wrote:
Is it fair? Life ain’t fair. I am also of the opinion that unions have accomplished good in the past but are slow to adapt to the realities of business. The inability of the big three automakers to keep up with wages and benefits is one example of a good thing taken too far.[/quote]

The reason US automakers have gone down the drain is their inability to innovate, period. If their execs had instilled a culture of innovation – which is THEIR job – they wouldn’t have had their asses kicked in sales by Japanese and even German manufacturers, who make cars that are, by all measures, much better.

What brought them down was bad management, not bad unions.

Seeing Ford admit that they need the know-how of the Swedish engineers of Volvo to innovate – with Sweden being one of the most welfare-heavy states in the world – actually proves my point.

Innovation is necessary for growth in Sales. Innovators are smart people. Smart people want to be have benefits.

45

[quote]Kuz wrote:
But despite the fact that there are very few people who can run a huge corporation [i]well[/i][/quote]

Sure, they are very few people like that – but does that justify blatantly incompetent execs still getting millions in stock options?

[quote]Kuz wrote:
then I wouldn’t be so quick to just see a salary figure or stock options and say its too much.

This whole argument seems so arbitrary.[/quote]

It’s not arbitrary. One can easily do what Costco did and define a reasonable salary and reasonable contract for a CEO. Yes, I use Costco and CEO James Sinegal, who “only” makes $350k as a good example – in fact, an example to follow:

Is Jim Senegal going anywhere? Running for a higher salary? No, because he makes more than enough money to lead a comfortable life – no need for $20M bonuses at the expense of the employees.

46

[quote]Kuz wrote:
FightinIrish26 wrote:
Kuz wrote:
FightinIrish26 wrote:
DTLV wrote:

Anyway, public employee unions are fundamentally different from private sector unions for two main reasons. First, government does not have the profit motive that private sector employers do, so there is less downward pressure on employee compensation. Second, public employee unions are HUGE contributors to political parties and campaigns. The problem with this is that when the candidate that the union gave millions of dollars to wins (and, though they favor the Democrats, they give to both parties), at the next contract negotiation, the union is effectively sitting on BOTH sides of the table. Again, this is good for the union membership, and good for the politicians, but it’s a disaster for you, because you’re paying for it.

Unions support the Republicans? Really? I think you better check that one out. Organized labor is directly against the Republican agenda. And the AFL-CIO knows this. Watch yourself…

http://www.publicintegrity.org/partylines/overview.aspx?act=con0&linkid=4133

Actually, AFL-CIO was more supportive of Republicans than Democrats in the state of New York. I was sort of surprised myself.

Ha yea I saw that right before you posted it. Unfortunately, its in return for big contracts and what not. Backroom political dealings. Fucking sad.

Well then you and I can actually agree on something politically. The whole system (at times) is sad. I wish I knew what to do to flush the mutha out.[/quote]

You and I both.

47

[quote]Kuz wrote:
People who are great shmoozers but without a shred of strategic vision will inevitably drive their company into horrific financial results… and getting kicked out the door when the stock tanks.[/quote]

There are a couple of holes in your reasoning:

  1. You fail to realize that sometimes the workers keep companies afloat even in spite of bad management – for their own sake of course, but still, it is thanks to their perseverance that many companies survive – in SPITE of bad management.

  2. You are assuming that the stock value has anything to do with good management and nothing with schmoozing. Stock values are driven by professional traders and stock analysts that get called on a regular basis by execs. If you know the right stock analysts you will be able to influence their recommendations, and in many cases keep your stock ratings high even in spite of poor management. The opposite is also true – there are cases where companies are being well managed but because the CEO is not in bed with the stock analysts, and/or because they are thinking long term instead of short term (the bastards!!!) their stock gets a hit.

Finally, I’d like to make sure it is clear that I do understand there ARE good execs out there. My whole point with this thread has not been saying they’re all bad. I even gave a very good example – Jim Sinegal.

My point is that I am very unhappy with execs being idolized and allowed to amass vast quantities of money, while workers are being vilified and having their quality of life lowered year after year.

The respect for the working class has to come back. They deserve it.

48

[quote]hspder wrote:
Kuz wrote:
People who are great shmoozers but without a shred of strategic vision will inevitably drive their company into horrific financial results… and getting kicked out the door when the stock tanks.

There are a couple of holes in your reasoning:

  1. You fail to realize that sometimes the workers keep companies afloat even in spite of bad management – for their own sake of course, but still, it is thanks to their perseverance that many companies survive – in SPITE of bad management.

  2. You are assuming that the stock value has anything to do with good management and nothing with schmoozing. Stock values are driven by professional traders and stock analysts that get called on a regular basis by execs. If you know the right stock analysts you will be able to influence their recommendations, and in many cases keep your stock ratings high even in spite of poor management. The opposite is also true – there are cases where companies are being well managed but because the CEO is not in bed with the stock analysts, and/or because they are thinking long term instead of short term (the bastards!!!) their stock gets a hit.

Finally, I’d like to make sure it is clear that I do understand there ARE good execs out there. My whole point with this thread has not been saying they’re all bad. I even gave a very good example – Jim Sinegal.

My point is that I am very unhappy with execs being idolized and allowed to amass vast quantities of money, while workers are being vilified and having their quality of life lowered year after year.

The respect for the working class has to come back. They deserve it.
[/quote]

Ahh, common ground!

Look, I am not here to vilify the working class in any sense. I think that’s plain nuts. However, I think you will find a lot of people who work in non-unionized jobs (and I don’t necessarily mean top level corporate execs) who are incredibly frustrated with unions since they have a lot of rights other worker simply do not have because those other workers cannot unionize by law.

Also, while I recognize the contributions unions have made to this country (I have several family members who were long time union workers), I think their time is truly past [i]unless[/i] they make some kind of changes to prove themselves relevant for today.

For instance, think of all the various protections in place today that protect all workers (sexual harassment, safety regulations, etc.) With all of that in place, why must there still be unions? To protect against what? I think it’s more than a little problematic that unions can force in artificially high wages that then make companies uncompetitive.

In the end, I think that causes everyone to lose because the ultimate duty of public companies are to their customers and their share holders, right? Customers want more for less and with better quality and share holders want higher stock prices and/or increased dividends. So if unions force artificially high wages, you will tend to have more and more companies seek labor overseas which is cheaper and oftentimes (much to my own personal pain) better skilled and educated.

So, maybe we can take the discussion there. I don’t think anyone would argue that the machines of industry do not function without workers of all types. But from a union perspective, what are they going to do to make themselves relevant in the 21st century? I really would be curious to hear some kind of explanation.

49

[quote]Kuz wrote:
Actually, I might argue that one and I don’t really plan on becoming a CEO during the course of my career.

What exactly are we defining as “making too much”? I feel like this is the equivalent of the entire argument of “athletes make too much money” or “rock stars make too much money”. We see some truly large dollar figure attached to the name of a corporate executive and immediately decree it grossly inequitable. But despite the fact that there are very few people who can run a huge corporation [i]well[/i], then I wouldn’t be so quick to just see a salary figure or stock options and say its too much.

This whole argument seems so arbitrary.[/quote]

Kuz,

I agree. There is no way that I could ever be paid too much, not even if I was in charge of my salary and generated millions for my shareholders with my vision and business acumen.

Regardless, since all of us are destined to be CEO’s, no matter our skills and connections, it doesn’t matter anyway… because we’ll all be overpaid at some point.

50

Personally, I’m still not convinced that this is as simple as you claim it is.

While unions may be somewhat synonymous with high wages, unionized companies have been able to roll back wages at times in order to survive during tough times.

It is the job of management to create a successful company. I don’t know how many people have worked for a large company, but it isn’t always the workers, the lower level people, that are unmotivated, unproductive and wasteful.

Finally, not all companies should succeed. They make poor decisions. They make poor products. They compete poorly in the marketplace. They maintain poor relations with their own workers.

These are roads to failure. However, there always has to be something to blame, and the wages of the working employee are an awfully simple scapegoat to point at.

I’ve been involved in some startups. They didn’t fail because we were overpaid. They failed because top management didn’t know how to create products that could translate to value in the eyes of customers.

51

[quote]vroom wrote:
For instance, think of all the various protections in place today that protect all workers (sexual harassment, safety regulations, etc.) With all of that in place, why must there still be unions? To protect against what? I think it’s more than a little problematic that unions can force in artificially high wages that then make companies uncompetitive.

Personally, I’m still not convinced that this is as simple as you claim it is.

While unions may be somewhat synonymous with high wages, unionized companies have been able to roll back wages at times in order to survive during tough times.

It is the job of management to create a successful company. I don’t know how many people have worked for a large company, but it isn’t always the workers, the lower level people, that are unmotivated, unproductive and wasteful.

Finally, not all companies should succeed. They make poor decisions. They make poor products. They compete poorly in the marketplace. They maintain poor relations with their own workers.

These are roads to failure. However, there always has to be something to blame, and the wages of the working employee are an awfully simple scapegoat to point at.

I’ve been involved in some startups. They didn’t fail because we were overpaid. They failed because top management didn’t know how to create products that could translate to value in the eyes of customers.
[/quote]

I agree - those are good points.

I would not be one to solely blame wages of working employees (and by working employees I am taking it we mean unionized) for the failures. But when you have a unionized workforce (in part or in whole) you run into an issue whereby getting rid of an unproductive employee is extremely difficult. In those situations, you end up continuing to pay those wages while they live within the confines of union protection… something a non-unionized employee would not enjoy.

The start-up example you provide is a pretty interesting one. I worked at two different Internet start-ups before coming to work at my current job in “Corporate America”. Both start-ups failed for the EXACT reasons you point out - management really did a bad job.

I just happen to firmly believe that a union factor brings an entirely different dynamic which can be hugely problematic. Maybe not always though.

But again, I think that unless union leadership becomes more creative about (1) how they serve they membership and (2) how they work with the companies providing jobs for their membership, I think you are going to continue to see some big problems at a lot of companies (U.S. auto industry, airlines, etc.)

52

Many executives are making too much…

Many union employees are making too much…

Someone born without hearing will never take advantage of opportunity knocking on their door… unless they’re smart enough to have one of those doorbells that makes your indoor lights flash on and off - then again maybe the poor, deaf, shmuck was hit in the head by a baseball when he was a kid and is half retarded. Opportunity doesnt like retards unless they can beat other retards at sports or work a register at Toys R Us.

The point is that no matter how much opportunity is available it’s better not to be retarded.

53

[quote]hspder wrote:

I have to hand it to you, thunder: you do a great job of regurgitating the party’s spiel. “Entitlement”? “Special Interest”? OMG.[/quote]

Which party is that, Hspdr? The one I have come out and said I have considered departing from? I need to call the RNC and start paying them royalties - after all, there is no conceivable way I came to these ideas on my own.

And is the best the Left can do around here? When presented with a countervailing point of view, they reflexively charge that someone is parroting the ‘party line’?

By whom? Reasoned disagreement not what you are used to? I don’t think arguing that labor is a problematic special interest group is particularly radical - so who would find it hard to people to listen to me?

I know, your usual echo chamber is quite self-affirming, but my point - again, a fairly mainstream one, evidenced by the declining interest in unions - is that labor is a myopic special interest causing more harm than good. Labor does, in fact, lobby.

54

If you can develop the reasoning to support the talking point language, then you can use it.

By this, I simply mean show that it is your own thinking… otherwise people will always believe they are just talking points that you are regurgitating.

This works for both left and right viewpoints.

55

[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
And is the best the Left can do around here? When presented with a countervailing point of view, they reflexively charge that someone is parroting the ‘party line’?[/quote]

I think Vroom already gave you a good answer on that one; nevertheless, I want to add something:

You continuously resort to attacks that are much more personal than idealistic, i.e., you also attack me and my work rather than restricting yourself to my social-democratic ideals.

You also seem to like anecdotal evidence a lot.

Do you really want me to take your “countervailing point of view” seriously and respond in a serious manner, or are you just trying to pick a fight? If the former, stick to arguing the ideals, and stop bickering and using anecdotal evidence.

56

[quote]vroom wrote:
When the strike finally ended the union pension plan did not happen.

The union workforce was reduced from about 50 to 10 people.

This place was known for paying the highest wages for machinists and welders in the county.

The union ruined it through greed.

As I said the unions have done good in the past but now they often take things too far and are just as bad as big business.

So, you give us a tale of the union failing to abuse the company, and yet complain that unions are too powerful?

Hell, isn’t business adjustment to the situation, via outsourcing, simply finding a more economical means of doing business? Where is the problem here… the system works… an idiot working for his own self-interest, supposedly, failed in that endeavor.

Do you think self-interest does not drive the actions of company management, employees, unemployed and the rest of the world?[/quote]

I don’t claim unions are too powerful. They are not as powerful as they used to be in the private sector.

I think they they are too powerful in government run monopolies.

I think unions are run for the benefit of the uniuon officials and often to the detriment of the workers and the company.

If the uniod didn’t fuck up a good thing there would still be 50 people employed not 10.

My example was a firsthand example of exactly that.

57

[quote]vroom wrote:

If you can develop the reasoning to support the talking point language, then you can use it.[/quote]

So, I am intrigued - what happens when I argue a point, introduce reasoning or ideas to support it, and my opponent doesn’t bother addressing the merits of my claim, but insteads sidesteps counterarguing in favor of a lazy claim that my argument might happen to coincide with that of the administration, regardless of whether my opponent has any idea of whether I came to that conclusion myself or decided to regurgitate something I read somewhere else?

You and Hspdr seemed to have elevated it to an art form - do tell.

Here is a hint: http://www.nizkor.org/features/fallacies/ad-hominem.html

Bill: “I believe that abortion is morally wrong.”
Dave: “Of course you would say that, you’re a priest.”
Bill: “What about the arguments I gave to support my position?”
Dave: “Those don’t count. Like I said, you’re a priest, so you have to say that abortion is wrong. Further, you are just a lackey to the Pope, so I can’t believe what you say.”

Looks like the priest has been accused of ‘regurgitating talking points’ from the Pope in this example.

So are my arguments wrong? Or are they merely parallel to something someone else said? There is a difference - figure it out.

58

Thunder,

My point was self-explanatory. This applies in general, not just to you…

Demonstrate it to be your own thinking… as opposed to a regurgitation that coincides with a talking point and you should be home free.

Of course, everyone arguing down here in the politics forum has run into this issue, on both sides of the fence.

Personally, I usually try to outline the principles involved that were used to come to my viewpoint, but I’m sure that sometimes I don’t.

I know that even so, when I do that, that people still try to proclaim talking points, even though I’ve shown development of an opinion from principles.

59

[quote]hspder wrote:

You continuously resort to attacks that are much more personal than idealistic, i.e., you also attack me and my work rather than restricting yourself to my social-democratic ideals.[/quote]

Let’s see - you open this thread with this:

So, rather than open up the topic as food for thought, sounds like you just want to ‘pick a fight’. Certainly it isn’t the stuff of high-minded debate, which you seem to think is a good thing, and it is much more personal than based in idealism. No problem, I am not offended, but spare me the sanctominious lecturing - it is a two way street.

‘Customary right-wingnut fit’, you say? Well then, expect a little rough and tumble, Hspdr.

As for attacking your work, I am not familiar with your work.

Actually, I like anecdotal evidence when it supports something personally, as I suggested in my first post here - I said that my personal experience shaped my pro-immigrant stance.

[quote]Do you really want me to take your “countervailing point of view” seriously and respond in a serious manner, or are you just trying to pick a fight? If the former, stick to arguing the ideals, and stop bickering and using anecdotal evidence.
[/quote]

The bulk of my original post addressed why I thought unions were harmful than good in this day and age - again, not a particularly controversial stance. And this fascination with ‘anecdotal evidence’ is misplaced - I specifically discussed anecdotal evidence with regards to personal experiences.

As for bickering, I have no desire to do that - but when you set the tone of antagonism in the first post, it doesn’t look good when you start complaining just because someone hits back.

60

By the way, if you want some other sources for the numbers…

For the CEOs:

http://quote.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=10000039&refer=columnist_crystal&sid=a2lC5UYqKkSI

(article from Aug 2003):

"
U.S. CEO Pay Averages $12M Annually

[…]

Looking at the 30 companies, it seems as though high pay destroys high performance.

The average three-year excess return over the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index for the 15 most overpaid CEOs was 3.1 percent a year, while the return for the 15 most underpaid CEOs was 11.7 percent a year. However, because there was so much variation in returns within each group, a statistical analysis of the 30 companies showed there to be no significant difference in performance.
"

To compare with workers in CA:

http://www.bls.gov/ncs/ocs/sp/ncbl0680.txt

(note the interesting detail that union workers make LESS money than nonunion workers, invalidating the argument that unions inflate salaries)

And the averages for workers in the whole USA – which I must say, I made a mistake on previously:

ftp://ftp.bls.gov/pub/suppl/empsit.ceseeb10.txt

Yes, I made a mistake – The $65k figure I presented was for California. Sorry for that.

So, here’s my correction: last month (Jan 2006) the average salary in the private sector of the USA of a worker who works 40 hour weeks was be $16.41 x 40 x 52 = $34.133.

Compared to $12M for a CEO in 2003 (today it is $20M).

So going back to the brain example, which I must now correct:

Company making $4.46M a year.

  • 98 Workers get 75% of the money = $34k each
  • 2 Execs get 25% of the money = $557k each, or $1.1M in total.

I guess that the “brain” getting 25% of the “energy and resources” wouldn’t be too bad after all – since, in reality, CEOs get TEN TIMES more than they would in that analogy.

And for no good reason.