Lower Labor Costs Now!

Off Topic Politics and World Issues
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Daily Article by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr. | Posted on 8/4/2008

Official data are starting to reveal what close observers have suspected for some time. Layoffs are increasing. Unemployment is on the rise. It now stands at a four-year high of 5.7 percent, which is not high by historical standards, but it stings when you consider that the rate dipped below 4 percent in the late 1990s.

What worries people is the trend line. This is the seventh straight month of reported job declines.

Job instability is the number one factor that leads to public panic. It is more pressing than stock-price declines, general price increases, and a host of other bad trends, because it hits people in the most direct way by threatening to end the flow of money that puts bread on the table.

Don’t blame the employers. They are faced with making cutbacks wherever possible. They have to worry about surviving in the downturn. It is not only labor costs that must be cut. Cutbacks must occur in every area…

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…so what do you want? to lower min. wage or something?

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[quote]tg2hbk4488 wrote:
…so what do you want? to lower min. wage or something?[/quote]

I want to get rid of minimum wage laws and let the market determine price.

It is also a good idea, as the article suggests, that corporations not be required to fund health care, etc. These are all costs that make it more expensive to hire workers.

Of course doing away with minimum wage laws won’t work unless welfare is also done away with. Why would I take a $3/hour job if I can get better than that by not working at all?

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Your comments and the article are pretty common knowledge…

OBVIOUSLY if the companies didnt have cover benefits then it would be cheaper to hire works

I guess you just want this to be a discussion on how the U.S. economy should act retro-actively on its current psuedo-Kenysian principles…

All i gotta say is good luck gettin rid of benefits, unions, and minimum wage and bringing back pure neo-classical economics, conservatives and economists have been fighting that battle for 80 yrs

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[quote]tg2hbk4488 wrote:
I guess you just want this to be a discussion on how the U.S. economy should act retro-actively on its current psuedo-Kenysian principles…
[/quote]

In this looming recession the alternative is mass unemployment.

Ideally, I would prefer if the government just kept its nose out of the economy. They are the cause of every boom and preceding bust.

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[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:

In this looming recession the alternative is mass unemployment.

Ideally, I would prefer if the government just kept its nose out of the economy. They are the cause of every boom and preceding bust.[/quote]

Actually, the market NATURALLY is cyclical…with series of both recession and boom. So even without an government involement, in a true laisse-faire economy, there would still be both recessions and booms.

The government simply gets involved and tries to prevent/minimalize recessions and keep up booms…it sometimes works, but mostly not

The idea of going to a laisse-faire economy is as farfetched as pigs flying. We are so accustomed to government intervention that people would revolt.

Personally, I think government intervention is a neccessity to a point, but that its rule in economy needs to decline and become less socialist

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[quote]tg2hbk4488 wrote:
Actually, the market NATURALLY is cyclical…with series of both recession and boom.

[/quote]
How would you even be able to measure that? The government has been involved heavily in the economy since 1913. It may be true that economic activity is cyclical even without government involvement but it has never been observed that way…EVER.

Also, it is a little naive to think that loose monetary policy does not create malinvestment which is what a boom is. The bust is just the correction that always must happen.

It can only work for so long before the market corrects. The defense from the central economic planners is that economic upswings are necessary to the health of the economy; though they never talk about the corrections that must happen to reallocate capital back into more efficient lines of business.

Nevermind the fact that they cannot give an explanation for the huge busts that follow loose credit.

This really isn’t an argument for anything. Its like saying since we don’t know why something happens there is no point in trying to understand why it happens. Just because people may be accustomed to a particular phenomena does not mean it is a necessary phenomena to suffer.

Government intervention always has a cost. These costs are the long term effects on society as a whole compared to what is gained by the special interests in the short run. Intervention serves only as a veil that gives the allusion of control. What you don’t see are the effects on the rest of society that particular regulations have.

The State employed “intellectuals” do not want us asking questions to the man behind the curtain.

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[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:

How would you even be able to measure that? The government has been involved heavily in the economy since 1913.[/quote]

There was an economy and recordkeeping before 1913…hate to break it to you. While there has always been SOME form of government involvement. During the the ealry 19th century it was at bare minimum. The US govt didnt tax, they stayed out of the way, and just let things run its course under the Articles of Confederation…this did not work however, and the system was changed

[quote]
It can only work for so long before the market corrects. [/quote]

I never argued this point

[quote]

This really isn’t an argument for anything. Its like saying since we don’t know why something happens there is no point in trying to understand why it happens. Just because people may be accustomed to a particular phenomena does not mean it is a necessary phenomena to suffer.[/quote]

It wasn’t meant to be an arguement. It was a statement, or comment if you will, that speaks the truth. It has no arguementative value. People, both conservative and liberal realize, the value of having government intervention involved in the market.

[quote]
The State employed “intellectuals” do not want us asking questions to the man behind the curtain.[/quote]

Please tell me you aren’t one of those conspiracy guys…

Look I can tell you are a hardcore Libertarian. But government invertention needs to occur at some point. I agree that not all Keynesian principles work, and I perfer the current neo-classical approach that was adopted in the 1980s. But to some degree government intervention needs to occur. Examples of this that EVEN YOU must value is government product qualitity control (FDA, USDA), workplace safety (OSSA), and allocation/funding for public goods, and funding of unprofitable markets in the economy (i.e. pharmacetical research)

I understand your arguements about interest rates, credits, and such. But the idea to get rid of EVERYTHING and just have a naked market is ridiculous, unrealistic, and harmful to society

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[quote]tg2hbk4488 wrote:

Look I can tell you are a hardcore Libertarian. But government invertention needs to occur at some point. I agree that not all Keynesian principles work, and I perfer the current neo-classical approach that was adopted in the 1980s. But to some degree government intervention needs to occur. Examples of this that EVEN YOU must value is government product qualitity control (FDA, USDA), workplace safety (OSSA), and allocation/funding for public goods, and funding of unprofitable markets in the economy (i.e. pharmacetical research)

[/quote]

No, no, yes and most definitely not.

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That makes no sense…

So you dont care if your food is tainted, you get your arm cut off at your job, or care that if you develop cancer - that there will be medicine to help you

absolute retards

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[quote]tg2hbk4488 wrote:
That makes no sense…

So you dont care if your food is tainted, you get your arm cut off at your job, or care that if you develop cancer - that there will be medicine to help you

absolute retards[/quote]

Oh no, I do care.

In fact I care so much that I watch what I put into my mouth and where I work and I do not need any government agency to do that for me.

I also do not want agencies like the FDA driving prices up and delay the development of urgently needed drugs because they err on the side of caution by default, not even letting people who have no other hope whatsoever try unapproved drugs.

Moron.

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The solution is simple. Tax those that produce wealth and jobs. Use the taxes to fund more welfare babies and crackhouses. Eventually the rich will be as poor as the nonrich and then we will finally have equality.

YES WE CAN!

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[quote]orion wrote:

Oh no, I do care.

In fact I care so much that I watch what I put into my mouth and where I work and I do not need any government agency to do that for me.

I also do not want agencies like the FDA driving prices up and delay the development of urgently needed drugs because they err on the side of caution by default, not even letting people who have no other hope whatsoever try unapproved drugs.

Moron.

[/quote]

Do you grow your own food? Doubtful…

then you need government regulations to keep food producers in line with health codes. Food could be rotten, contian Ecoli, covered in shit, they could be illegal substances in food to cut cost. But since you eat healthy I guess your above all those concerns

Oh wait. There would be no companies to develop drugs if it were not from the government. Medical research is too much of financial risk for a company to persue. If it were not for government grants and other funds, then the medicial research industry would have no reason and no way to fund such research. But thats ok, when you get cancer and need medical attention, I dont wanna get the government involved and make you angry

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[quote]tg2hbk4488 wrote:
orion wrote:

Oh no, I do care.

In fact I care so much that I watch what I put into my mouth and where I work and I do not need any government agency to do that for me.

I also do not want agencies like the FDA driving prices up and delay the development of urgently needed drugs because they err on the side of caution by default, not even letting people who have no other hope whatsoever try unapproved drugs.

Moron.

Do you grow your own food? Doubtful…

then you need government regulations to keep food producers in line with health codes. Food could be rotten, contian Ecoli, covered in shit, they could be illegal substances in food to cut cost. But since you eat healthy I guess your above all those concerns

Oh wait. There would be no companies to develop drugs if it were not from the government. Medical research is too much of financial risk for a company to persue. If it were not for government grants and other funds, then the medicial research industry would have no reason and no way to fund such research. But thats ok, when you get cancer and need medical attention, I dont wanna get the government involved and make you angry

[/quote]

A) The assumption that a company would willfully poison its own customers is ridiculous, almost all so called “food-scandals” are companies calling back products that might have been tainted in order not to lose customers.

B) That the development of drugs is too much of a risk to pursue by a company is a totally unfounded fabrication, however since it is government interventions that drive drug prices up and make development unnecessarily expensive I do not feel that I need to be grateful that they finance some research in return.

However, there is a government role for you. To insure that patents are protected so that companies can earn the money back they put into R&D.

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[quote]orion wrote:

A) The assumption that a company would willfully poison its own customers is ridiculous, almost all so called “food-scandals” are companies calling back products that might have been tainted in order not to lose customers.

B) That the development of drugs is too much of a risk to pursue by a company is a totally unfounded fabrication, however since it is government interventions that drive drug prices up and make development unnecessarily expensive I do not feel that I need to be grateful that they finance some research in return.

[/quote]

A) I did not mean willingly as in they are trying to kill people, but in order to save money, consumers can and sometimes do jeopordaize the safety and qualitity of products. It is a lot less common today, particularly due to the lawsuit happy society we live it, although it does occur.

B) How is completely unfounded? Developing of drugs is really hit or miss. To waste all that time, energy, and funding on something that probably will not work it a huge risk. Any sensable company would agree with this. Prices arent driven up only by government but also over monopolization of the product. You need a drug, you cant find it anywhere else, and you cant make it yourself, they can charge what they want.

I am not saying that the current system is right by anymeans. I am saying the complete DE-INVOLVMENT of the governemt from the market is just sensless and not practical

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[quote]tg2hbk4488 wrote:
That makes no sense…

So you dont care if your food is tainted, you get your arm cut off at your job, or care that if you develop cancer - that there will be medicine to help you

absolute retards[/quote]

They just trust business will police itself. I do not.

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[quote]orion wrote:

A) The assumption that a company would willfully poison its own customers is ridiculous, almost all so called “food-scandals” are companies calling back products that might have been tainted in order not to lose customers.

[/quote]

Because the FDA testing found potential problems. Why weren’t the companies testing every lot and just doing the minimum mandated by the FDA?

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[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
Because the FDA testing found potential problems. Why weren’t the companies testing every lot and just doing the minimum mandated by the FDA?[/quote]

Now Zap, do you really need someone to hold your hand and tell you life is risky and to be careful?

Why do you think the government has any more incentive to protect you than a business who relies on your continued consumption of their products.

We don’t need more regulations that could be covered by malpractice and fraud.

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[quote]tg2hbk4488 wrote:
Please tell me you aren’t one of those conspiracy guys…
[/quote]

Conspiracies happen all the time.

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[quote]LIFTICVSMAXIMVS wrote:

Now Zap, do you really need someone to hold your hand and tell you life is risky and to be careful?

Why do you think the government has any more incentive to protect you than a business who relies on your continued consumption of their products.

We don’t need more regulations that could be covered by malpractice and fraud.[/quote]

We aren’t saying we need more or that we even need it in its current state. We are saying that it needs to EXIST in some form