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From: mjk@tty3b.UUCP (Mike Kelly)
Newsgroups: net.politics
Subject: Re: Unemployment & the minimum wage
Message-ID: <461@tty3b.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 9-Aug-84 13:40:15 EDT
Article-I.D.: tty3b.461
Posted: Thu Aug  9 13:40:15 1984
Date-Received: Fri, 10-Aug-84 02:19:36 EDT
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 >From: ags@pucc-i (Seaman)
 >It is nice of you to offer to decide for other people which jobs are
 >worth having, but don't you think some people might like to make that
 >choice for themselves?  How would you feel if the minimum wage were
 >suddenly changed to an amount substantially more than you make, with
 >the result that you found yourself out of a job?

(a) I am not deciding for anyone; the Congress has passed this law and
    working people are not mobilizing to oppose it.  Perhaps you believe
    that people should have the "freedom" to "choose" slavery, or the
    "freedom" to buy unsafe products -- that's a common libertarian line.
    It's not my concept of freedom. If there are people dying
    for the "freedom" to take a job at sub-minimum wages,  to me that
    just reflects the utter desperation to which unemployed people have
    been driven.  Also an interesting contrast with Reagan's idea that
    none of those people want to work anyway.

(b) Your second question only points out the inadequacy of the minimum
    wage to really solve the problem of unemployment.  That doesn't mean
    we should abandon the minimum wage.  It means we must go further.

    Certainly if capital has the ability to move across borders without
    abandon, and if dictatorships that oppress trade union organizing are
    around, there will be low-wage havens ("a good labor market", in the
    corporate lingo).  The question is whether we should allow the world
    wage to float to the lowest level (which is the current trend) or try
    to counteract that and maintain a high world wage.  That would take some
    work.  One thing it takes is restrictions on the ability of corporations
    to just pick up and leave at will.  That doesn't mean preventing them
    from leaving.  It just means having them to consider the costs of
    leaving and factor those into the decision.  For example, U.S. Steel
    is about to abandon its South Works plant in Chicago.  Doing so will
    put a few thousand people on the unemployment rolls; that's a cost,
    but one borne by the community.  U.S. Steel should take that cost into
    account.  Businesses around South Works will go under in the shockwaves;
    that's a cost that should be taken into account.  Perhaps after taking
    these costs into account, it will turn out that abandoning South Works
    doesn't look so attractive after all.  Remember that in many cases the
    abandoned plants are not losing money; it's just that the low-wage 
    havens are so attractive that the corporados can't stand to stay.  "Why
    pay $9/hour when I can get it in the Phillipines for $3/hour?"  The
    obvious long-range effect of this will be to drive wages in the U.S.
    down, which means a cut in the standard of living for most Americans.
    I'm sure no one is really for that; they're just caught up in these
    myths about the infallibility of corporate decisionmaking.  The other
    side of this, though, is world development.  I believe that it is both
    in our own interests and in the interest of humanity to help other
    countries with development.  One way to do that is to stop supporting
    dictators that destroy trade unions and stop any effort by average
    people to better themselves; supporting dictators isn't in the long-
    range interest of Americans.  Another way is to provide development
    assistance but in appropriate forms.  Too often our development
    assistance is really just a way of creating overseas opportunities
    for U.S. corporations, not really part of an effort to encourage long-
    term development.  I think we're talking about an effort really directed
    at long-term development with substantial amounts of money involved.  As
    Willy Brandt, ex-Prime Minister of Germany, has pointed out, we can
    give it or they will sooner or later take it.  A system that involves
    wide disparities in wealth is not stable.  Africa, Asia and South America
    are not going to put up with that forever, and the threatened repayment
    boycott is only the first step in a rebellion.   


Well, I've gotten way off track and given everyone a huge target to shoot
at.  My basic points, though, are contained in the first two paragraphs.
The rest is expansion.

Mike Kelly