One of the most striking successes of the Occupy Wall Street movement has been the “We are the 99 per cent” idea, and more specifically in the identification of the top 1 per cent as the primary source of economic problems.
Thanks to #OWS, the fact that households the top 1 per cent of the income distribution now receive around 25 per cent of all income (up from 12 per cent a few decades ago) has been widely disseminated. The empirical work on tax data that produced this evidence, done most notably by Piketty and Saez, has been slowly percolating into the mainstream consciousness, but “We are the 99 per cent” has hammered it home with surprising speed.
Even more surprisingly, the analysis as it relates to the 1 per cent has been almost unchallenged by the organized right. Having spent decades denying the obvious growth in inequality, and of the wealth and power of the super-rich, the right has implicitly conceded to reality on this point.
Their response to ‘We are the 99 per cent’ has been the snarky claim that ‘We are the 53 per cent’. This line is based on the lame and long-refuted WSJ ‘lucky duckies’ talking point, that low-wage workers ‘pay no income tax’. It is, of course, true that many workers don’t pay the tax called the Federal Income Tax’ , but they do pay the Social Security payroll tax, which is a tax on wage incomes, not to mention sales taxes and many others. By contrast, capital gains, the preferred income source of the ultra-wealthy, are not subject to payroll tax and attract only half the standard rate of the Federal Income Tax.
What’s more interesting to me is the 53 per cent number, redolent of the Buchanan-Nixon plan to ‘tear the country in half and take the bigger half’. It stands in stark contrast to the hypocritical complaints of Republican politicians about class warfare and turning Americans against each other. The fact that anyone could see this slogan as clever politics is an indication of the costs that are eventually incurred in the creation of a hermetically sealed thought bubble like that of the US right.
Coming back to reality, I’d like to think a bit about the relationship between the 1 per cent and the remaining 19 per cent of the population in the top quintile (that is 20 per cent). Most if not all of the bloggers here at CT fall into the latter group. Given our lamentable lack of market research, I can’t say much about readers, but a reading of the comment section suggests that most of our readers also belong to this group.The top quintile as a whole commands the great majority of US income, and virtually all financial wealth – few households outside this group own much beyond their homes and perhaps some money in a pension fund. It follows that any significant improvement in public services, or in the position of the unemployed and poor, must be funded by higher taxes on the 1 per cent, the 19 per cent or both.
The 19 per cent also have a disproportionate political weight, since they are much more likely than Americans in general to register, vote and engage in political activity. So, it makes a big difference whether, as as implied by ‘We are the 99 per cent’ their interests are aligned with the mass of the population or with the top 1 per cent.
Until quite recently, I would have (and did) argued against this view. The top quintile as a whole has done very well over the past few decades, and (despite some silly claims to the contrary), high-income earners have mostly voted Republican, in line with their economic interests. Certainly there are plenty who don’t vote their interests, but that is also true of many people in the top 1 per cent, not to mention bona fide billionaires like Buffett and Soros.
There was always an argument in terms of enlightened self-interest or class-interest, that it was better to give up a bit of (pre-tax and post-tax) income to maintain a stable and relatively egalitarian society. But in an individualistic society like that of the US such arguments don’t go very far.As far as policy is concerned, my implicit assumption, formed in a relatively egalitarian society, was that taxes imposed only on the very rich might be satisfying but couldn’t raise a lot of money. So, for example, I dismissed Obama’s focus on ending the Bush tax cuts for incomes above $250k (roughly, the top 2 per cent). In the ‘Trickle Down’ chapter of Zombie Economics, I looked mainly at the top 20 per cent (or sometimes 10 per cent) of the income distribution rather than the top 1 per cent.
I’m now much more sympathetic to the ‘99 per cent’ analysis. First, a closer look at income growth figures suggests that, while the 19 per cent have enjoyed rising incomes, they’ve only barely maintained their share of national income. The redistribution of the past three decades has gone from the bottom 80 per cent to the top 1 per cent.
That suggests the possibility of a policy response in which the main redistributive thrust would be to reverse this process. This would almost certainly involve higher tax payments, but this would be offset by the restoration of public services, which are in economic terms a ‘superior good’, valued more as income rises. The top 1 per cent can buy their own services, and are largely unaffected by public sector cutbacks, but that’s not true of the 19 per cent.
Another important factor is the growth of economic insecurity. The myth of the US as a land of opportunity for upward mobility has been replaced by Barbara Ehrenreich’s Fear of Falling (another good source on this is High Wire by Peter Gosselin). Even if people in the top 19 per cent are doing well, they are less secure than at any time since the 1930s, and their children face even more uncertain prospects.
Finally, there is the alliance of the 1 per cent with the forces of rightwing cultural tribalism. The 1 per cent can only rule by persuading lots of people to vote against their interests, and that requires a reactionary and anti-intellectual agenda on social, cultural and scientific issues. As a result, educated voters have increasingly turned against the Republican Party.
I don’t want to make too much of this last point. As Allan Grayson said during his memorable takedown of PJ O’Rourke recently, the 1 per cent own the Republican Party outright, but they also own much of the Democratic Party, and can rule satisfactorily through either. Also, having a college degree isn’t the same as being educated – Tea Party supporters are more likely than the average American to have a degree, and college-graduate Republicans are even more prone to various delusional beliefs on issues such as climate change.
Nevertheless, taking account of all the factors listed above, even the most comfortably affluent members of the professional class, looking at the alliance of plutocrats and theocrats arrayed to defend Wall Street could reasonably conclude that it was in their own interests to support the 99 per cent and not the 1 per cent.
We are therefore (surprisingly to me) suddenly back in a situation where a progressive movement can reasonably claim to act in the interests of a group that is (I’m quoting Erik Olin Wright from memory on the Marxist conception of the working class0
(a) the overwhelming majority of the population
(b) responsible for nearly all the productive activity (as against the 1 per cent’s incomes drawn from a parasitic financial sector)
© economically desperate or at risk of becoming so.
Can all of this be sustained? I don’t know, any more than anyone else. But #OWS has already achieved things that most people would have regarded as impossible a month ago, and for the moment at least, the momentum is still growing.
(Hopefully links to come when I get a bit more time)
John Quiggin 
Dan – that you regard it as a tautology says a lot about your ideology.
People who are poorer do worse? It’s a no-brainer.
Yes and people who are richer do better.
Well obviously, Terje, you endorse CEO’s who charge 343 times the median workers pay. That is an 8 fold increase over 30 years. You’d like a piece of that action, Terje, wouldn’t you!
“Among the 299 companies listed in the S&P 500 Index, the average CEO’s compensation was $11.4 million in 2010, or 343 times more than the median pay ($33,190) of American workers. The ratio of CEO pay to median worker pay was just 42:1 in 1980, and is currently 25:1 in Europe”
@BilB
Excellent facts.
This would usually put a stop to much of the trolling we are witnessing.
http://www.cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=957 was particularly interesting and definitive.
So if Alan Joyce is getting only 5 million a year and the median income of Quantas workers is 60 thousand then his income is just a mere 83 X factor over his workers.
So that is what it takes. Balls 83 times the size of everyone elses to say “Your all fired”.
@BilB
Excellent facts.
This would usually put a stop to much of the trolling we are witnessing.
the site: cbpp.org/cms/?fa=view&id=957 was particularly interesting and definitive.
The key one in Australia is Indigenous and remote disadvantage.
The findings of AIHW, COAG Reform Council, Australian Institute of Family Studies, much academic literature (including Deaton) is the now-familiar: the people who most need greater opportunity – economic, social, health-wise, are least able to access it.
If that doesn’t have reform implications, I don’t know what does.
(No, the market won’t fix it – for example, delivering health services remotely is, from a capitalist’s perspective, a mug’s game).
A poppy article, but nonetheless, here’s a strong quote:
“Social class is simply the best predictor of health,” says Nancy E. Adler, Ph.D., a professor of medical psychology at the University of California at San Francisco. “If you could know only one thing about a person and predict that person’s health and longevity, you’d ask about social class. It’s even more important than family history.”
http://www.menshealth.com/fiscally-fit-man/healthy-and-wealthy
@Jarrah
I am not going to waste much time with this. But if you start with different endowments $10 and $15 and increase them to $20 and $30 – then there is no capitalism. You only have capitalism if there is an expropriation from one to the other, so you end up with $18 and $32.
And please do not make some rightwing trolling comment such as – but you can get the $18/$22 outcome under feudalism etc etc.
If international inequality is decreasing, this has NOTHING to do with the export of oppression from OECD economies.
Completely irrelevant. It would be a consequence.
Dan – are you saying that the problem in indigenous communities is a lack of income and/or wealth equality. And further more are you saying that any measures that lead to an increase in income inequality in these communities would be a bad thing.
No! I’m not talking about the distribution of wealth within the communities themselves at all. (Are you deliberately misreading me?)
I am saying that social and labour market inequity and disadvantage go hand in hand with income and wealth inequity and disadvantage. I recognise it’s important not to conflate inequity and disadvantage, but the arithmetic truism is, given a certain *national* level of wealth, it’s got to be distributed somehow. A progressive redistribution (including such measures as the government as employer of last resort, for instance) would result in better outcomes for the most disadvantaged. Which is what building a decent society is supposed to be all about.
So what you are saying, Dan, is that we need a “A progressive redistribution””of wealth” to “result in better outcomes for the most disadvantaged”. Presumeably this means that the most needy get paid the most and the less needy get paid the least.
That is very revolutionary thinking there, Dan. If you can pull it off there will a Nobel Prize in it for sure.
Heh. Do the words “reductio ad absurdum” mean anything to you?
@BilB
I expect that the more modern churches, unions, progressive political parties and community activists will be able to pull this off, when the need becomes clearer.
There will be no Nobel prize because the theory was all produced by Ricardo and Marx.
However we can still give out Ignoble awards to Paul Krugman (and Gregory Mankiw ) for his finding that:
See: chron.com/opinion/outlook/article/Falling-down-a-rabbit-hole-on-the-economy-Paul-2219532.php
This is flying-pigs economics.
You make it sound like rations on a ship where wealth was packed before the journey and no more can be created. However that isn’t how an economy works. In so far as we need a system to distribute wealth and income I’d suggest we use a market. Markets are great. Not only do they distribute stuff they facilitate the creation of new wealth and income.
I was thinking, Dan, more along the lines of “salus populi suprema lex esto”, but then what the hell do I know.
Terje – largely agree – I’m not anti-market *per se* – just have massive reservations, backed, I think, by economic history, about their ability to deliver equity and indeed effectiveness alongside efficiency. It’s about getting the balance right, “civilising capitalism”, saving the market from itself. The other thing is that of course public expenditure can generate wealth as well – just ask any capitalist who has benefited from publicly-provided infrastructure.
Bil – heh, nice one.
As all growth falters and the darkness looms
we billions watch, our fear growing each day.
Some sit in their homes in their empty rooms
stare at their screens and have nothing to say,
or cry their tears of rage and rising fear
through powerless words that their fingers spray.
And others, their numbers growing each year,
complain bitterly and head for the street
while politicians and the rich all sneer.
And well they might those who have life so sweet.
They live in a dream blind to what will come.
Huge numbers suffer, resources deplete
and all of your plans to what will they sum?
To revolution and a boundless slum.
http://thepeakoilpoet.blogspot.com/2011/10/revolting-ode.html
Rarely does it create wealth. Mostly it transfers wealth from one group in society to another. Just ask any capitalist who has benefited from public expenditure.
@TerjeP
Ridiculous,
The New South Wales government rail network created massive wealth, as did the Federal Snowy Mountains Scheme and the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Scheme.
When wealth transfers it goes from one less preferred point to another more preferred point – so there is usually some wealth (extra utility) being created.
@Jarrah
Ceteris paribus, which in practice, will probably not be the case, society wide.
If the prices of essential goods and services have doubled, neither is better off in absolute terms, and in relative terms one is worse off. If goods that wwere hitherto free or part of thje commons are now charged, then the poorer person is worse off in absolute terms. If the poorer one has to work longer to double his/her income than the richer one, then again, he or she is worse off.
Ceteris paribus Jarrah, but that’s almost never true of whole communities. Economies are dynamic and interconnected things and the relative wealth of one section of it authors the operation of and relationships between other sections of it.
oops … the first post returned an error … didn’t mean to post twice …
Chris – I notice you chose examples that are arguably rare and also from low tax eras.
Terje:
“Rarely does it [government] create wealth. Mostly it transfers wealth from one group in society to another. Just ask any capitalist who has benefited from public expenditure.”
Wrong on so many levels, Terje.
As one of many possible examples, think about the limited liability companies that are a major feature of modern capitalism. Such companies only exist because Government has paased law to allow them. Put simply, companies like BHP and News Limited are able to hide behind the skirt of the Nanny State if they get into too much debt and this transfer of risk to the public allows them to take on risk both directly and through spin off companies that would otherwise render many ventures untenable.
Your libertarian ideas are cartoonish and ignorant.
Mel – my comment was clearly in the context of public expenditure not legislation. Your attempt to refute my comment is cartoonish and ignorant and a little bit churlish and rude also. Try and be nice.
Mel’s right though – free markets don’t exist except micro textbooks and libertarian wishful thinking. I think you need to get real about the extent to which economies are embedded in societies and indeed cultures, and how much of a crucial enabling role the state plays, whatever its specific shape might be. Once you’ve acknowledged that, you can move on to issues that are interesting and relevant, like responding sensibly to macro shocks, equality of opportunity, provision of decent basic services, sustainable development, etc. etc.
All of this stuff about individual freedom arising from economic freedom is a chimera – first, because there’s bugger all relationship between the two – liberalised economies have not infrequently had tragically repressed populations – and secondly, because *true* economic freedom is kind of a myth – economies are inescapably ensconced in legislation and history.
Often libertarians at this point say okay, but there’s this (often selectively applied) non-coercion principle at stake here – all transactions should be voluntary. Great(ish) principle!* When do you think Big Money and Ruthless Dictators will begin abiding by it? They won’t. It’s up to us, as *political* actors, to build a decent society served by a sensible economy; they don’t just spontaneously emerge.
Markets are wonderful, clever things that often solve problems. However, there are problems they don’t solve, and they often cause problems too.
*Though there are other worthwhile principles as well. Incidentally I’d be able to take non-coercion more seriously if it came from a vegan who works in the charity sector.
Well said, Dan.
Terje: “my comment was clearly in the context of public expenditure not legislation. ”
Once again you are making a fool of yourself. Low to almost no public expenditure countries like Somalia have not been able to develop successful capitalist economies.
“You only have capitalism if there is an expropriation from one to the other, so you end up with $18 and $32.”
100% untrue. Capitalism creates economic growth (as does communism and a bunch of other isms, but they tend not to do as well over the medium to long term). Regardless, my thought experiment wasn’t anything to do with capitalism or any other ism, but simply to show that inequality, in and of itself, is not a problem (this applies to Fran’s comments as well). In fact, it may be the result of unambiguously good things like a doubling of everyone’s income, as in my example.
“The other thing is that of course public expenditure can generate wealth as well”
In the sense that any investment that gets a profit generates wealth, this is a truism. However, on average and in aggregate, centralised decision-makers (governments) tend to not do as well as decentralised ones (the wider market). This is due to a number of factors. For example, governments are using other people’s money, so don’t operate under the same incentives. They sometimes aren’t using return on investment as the reason for spending money. They suffer from diseconomies of scale. There’s the unavoidable deadweight loss. The list goes on, I won’t bore you. The point is that the money they take to invest on the nation’s behalf, right or wrong, takes away from the investment others would make.
*sigh*
After semi-conceding that governments provide public goods that allow capitalists to create wealth, you then go on to say government expenditure takes away from the investment others would make.
Apart from being at least borderline self-contradictory, this demonstrates that you have no conception of how a well-performing government department runs – tight and with a view to both a budgetary and broader bottom line, is the answer. Given the profligacy of and mistakes made in the private sector all the time, you’re just being a True Believer here.
And governments suffer from *diseconomies* of scale!? They’re the private sector’s biggest client!
So to what extent is it possible for Australia to act to reduce income inequality?
When I was young (mid 70’s), I worked summers in a soft drink factory. There were people there whose employment was subsidised – in a more competitive environment the company could not afford to employ them.
Things became more competitive during the 80’s and 90’s. Government pensions and superannuation became much less generous. Contractors replaced employees. Real pay rates stagnated after the 1989 recession.
The soft drink company was taken over, and I’m sure the idea of “subsidised” employees vanished.
We are told that Australia would have gone to the dogs without these changes.
To what extent is that true? That is, how much leeway do we have to create a more equal society without the price being too high?
@Dan
sheesh is that so untrue
i’ve worked in government – and the one thing i’ve learned is the concept of “vote right spend left” – where right wing elite types (from North Sydney) working in senior positions spend enormous amounts of tax payers money – just because they can – on things that are not needed and in ways that are totally inefficient – whereas something we had done in my own companies might be done in a week using 2 or 3 people the same level of achievement in government would take a year and involve 50 contractors – and often be curtailed at the last minute for one reason or another.
Anyone who thinks that government offices are more efficient than the private sector has never run a company with their own money.
On top of that you have people employed for years beyond their use by dates – whereas talented people might find themselves in government positions their talent will lead them to the private sector – leaving much of what is left behind the dregs – talented people will have faith in themselves and their ability and so will take risks with their careers – less talented people know full well they have no chance of getting anything like the same kind of job in te private sector and so stay and eventually become the “core” of the government offices. Not all of these are inept but sufficiently large enough percent such that if the whole crew had to compete on even ground with the private sector they would last like all of one financial accounting period before they’d be gone.
Fortunately (kindof) there’s so much fat in the government sector that there’s enough for companies to make a profit from the stupidity and expressiveness of government. Maybe that’s the whole point – and maybe that’s where “trickle down” actually works.
pop
Hah. Well, I work in a tiny office in a central agency and my gig is government accountability and program evaluation. It punches *way* above it’s weight. I’ve also worked in a larger agency that put run after run on the board, month in month out (ABS)… and I’ve worked in the private sector too, and I wasn’t blown away by how much cleverer and harder they worked. Spent a lot of time tripping over themselves, frankly. Like the state gov’t agency I worked at, briefly.
(You’ll note I did say “well-performing”.)
@Dan
ever run your own company?
like use your own money to make money?
that’s the bottom line
pop
Yeah, I run a record label. It’s a hobby though, breaks even just about.
I might add that that’s not relevant to how Big Capital does its thing. OWS aren’t mad at mum and pop running the corner store.
Looks like the Percentiles are going to worsen as (believe it or not) in America they are reducing unemployment benefits.
see: 247wallst.com/2011/08/04/the-nine-states-slashing-unemployment-benefits/
No wonder they are occupying various cities.
@Dan
“After semi-conceding that governments provide public goods that allow capitalists to create wealth”
When did I mention public goods? That is a different topic altogether.
“you then go on to say government expenditure takes away from the investment others would make.
Apart from being at least borderline self-contradictory”
What is borderline self-contradictory about it? It’s a mathematical reality. Government expenditure comes from taxes and loans, which means taking resources from society that would otherwise be used in other ways. It’s another truism. That you don’t recognise it as such is deeply worrying.
“this demonstrates that you have no conception of how a well-performing government department runs – tight and with a view to both a budgetary and broader bottom line, is the answer.”
I’m sure that’s the ideal, and rightly so. However, the problems I identified – incentives, deadweight loss, diseconomies of scale, etc – are inescapable. They’re built into the institutional architecture.
“Given the profligacy of and mistakes made in the private sector all the time”
There is plenty of waste and mistakes in the private sector, but because there are millions of people and thousands of firms all making different decisions, the mistakes only affect some of the decisions. It’s called diversification, as important in economies as it is in ecologies. When government makes mistakes, it’s on a national scale.
“And governments suffer from *diseconomies* of scale!? They’re the private sector’s biggest client!”
Of course they do, as do all large organisations. Don’t you know what they are?
“Anyone who thinks that government offices are more efficient than the private sector has never run a company with their own money.” Source: The Peak Oil Poet @31, p3
Here we have a lovely piece of obfuscation. “The private sector” is characterised as operating on “their own money”. I wish it were the case.
There are indeed a few examples found in the “private sector” where people “run a company” on “their own money, although the term “company” is a bit overstretched. Even tiny ‘private sector companies’, in terms of any measure of size (turnover, number of employees, market share, public exposure, profit) use other people’s money (loans). The “private sector” in question regarding this thread is run, more often than not, by people who get paid a lot for “running a company” (often into extinction) on other people’s money (getting equity shares for free or at a discount due to an interest free or low interest rate loan or via share options).
Another Australian mathematical economist, Frank Milne, wrote a nice paper at least a couple of decades ago in which he showed that the decision problem of a corporation with multiple shareowners is akin (under realistic conditions identical) to that of a public sector decision maker. Milne was not the only economist who analysed the decision making problems. It seems, all this work as well as that of various institutions and writers concerned with ‘accountability’ is wasted on the author of the quote in my first paragraph. Myths die slowly if at all, don’t they?
In SA electricity production was so fractured and ineffective that it was socialised by Sir Tom Playford’s LCP. It ran well and trained many young men who added to the wealth of the state. It was sold by the Liberal Party and as a result makes a lot of money for its overseas investors while the infrastructure is being run down and will almost certainly require state funding – socialising the losses only. There is precious little training on offer to build the skills base either.
An enterprise like Qantas was an icon in government hands but now it is in private hands it is being taken off shore and staffed by those in other nations and seems to be on the skids in general. The Commonwealth Bank was a highly profitable enterprise in government hands and is still doing well. Big government however is often easier for a population to control than big multinational business. Government may not manage well but at least it can be voted out whereas a multinational company controlling essential services is not going to act in the national good at any time unless it aligns with its own goals.
@Ernestine Gross
Quite right. In the private sector as is the case in the public sector, organisations are run by bureaucracies. The problems in both sectors are much the same. The organisational form exists because it is typically, in many situations, more efficient than a little owner operated enterprise, but still, large organisations bring their own problems and due to the efficiencies they can carry a lot of bagage for a long time without going bust.
As Jill suggests, public sector organisations have been very important historically by providing solid training that former staff often take with them into the private sector. In the bad old days, some people used to be attracted to the public service because they wanted to make a positive contribution to society. That was rarely the reason people decided to work in a private business. Unfortunately, in the era of market worship too many people in the public service nowadays are simply out for themselves in as ruthless a way as many are in the private sector. And that mentality shows in some of the results.
Markets don’t ‘produce wealth’. Working people make stuff, and capitalists accumulate wealth by stealing as much as possible of the value created for themselves. It’s pure parasitism, and on this planet it has reached the stage where it has become not just immoral and pernicious, but toxic as well. Despite the obvious disaster that market capitalism and literally insatiable parasite class greed has wrought, the bloodsuckers and their toadies absolutely refuse to act differently. And it has reached the point where the destruction caused by this parasitism has so deranged the planet’s life support systems that an era of mass death is upon us. And the Right is not just unconcerned, it sees a Malthusian ‘final solution’ as very much to its advantage.
@Ernestine
Yes. That in the context of the continuing reverberations of the global *financial* crisis there are still people acting as if the market is as pure as the driven snow, composed only of little companies with low barriers to entry, all spending their own money and nothing but… shameless.
Anyway, none of the right-wingers have even acknowledged, let alone challenged, my characterisation of the historical and political context of economics. As usual it seems like they are just arguing in favour of a normative fantasy, which is incorrect but moreover irrelevant.
The bureaucracy is an important and necessary part of large organisations; they coordinate the organisation’s operations. However, they can also reap a significant amount of the surplus created, with the plunder going mainly to the upper echelons. By surplus in this context, I mean the surplus due to efficiencies when compared to alternatives, plus the premium gained by the creation of market power in their input and output markets. They do create wealth but they also appropriate wealth. The question of how to deal with them appropriately is non-trivial and still seems open.
Organisations create wealth. And markets do to some extent also, by facilitating more efficient allocation of resources to organisations, so that production is more efficient. Without some market-like mechanism efficiently allocating resources (including outputs) would be difficult indeed, if not impossible.
Although there are problems with details, and significant problems at that, markets are important and their benefits should not be forgotten.
POP doesn’t know about the huge range of rip-off’s perpetrated by commercial, profit-maximising, businesses. Greedy entrepreneurs will fire-bomb their competitors and murder their rivals. They will also misrepresent their valuations and products.
POP’s ‘efficiency’ is merely private ‘efficiency’ irrespective of the cost to others.
Real efficiency only exists when the price of a commodity = average costs, but only socially responsible producers will ever structure and maintain production at this point.
When you get wacko arguments from the dregs like POP, one can see why all our global incompetent capitalists are desperately turning to government to save their souls.
In the final analysis, other forms of efficiency (Pareto, MB=MC, etc) are just convenient word-play to justify higher prices or commercial cartel imposts on the community.
In general, it is the dregs who prattle-on like this POP.
If POP wants to brag about its own company, then it had better provide the details. Running a fish and chip shop is not like building the harbour bridge.
While government enterprises may or may not be best in most circumstances – we need much more business with social purpose ahead of profit maximising. But this can be cooperative entities and family non-profit businesses and farms etc.
When I worked for government I met a lot of private enterprise people and industry leaders. They were mostly slow-witted, uninformed except for being informed on their own narrow commercial tunnel, uninterested in the long-term future, empty of vision, ignorant of history, and with chips on their shoulders the size of boulders.
When we advertised for mundane jobs – we were inundated with people desperate to get out of the hell holes of working for pathological business bullies, and when they did get through the competition and entered the public service relayed so many tales of mistreatment at their hands of their previous employers that your heart would weep.
@Chris Warren
vicious little viper aren’t you 🙂
actually my companies were international telecoms companies (and in australia we were the first company to track and recover a stolen vehicle using GPS, first email to mobile phone and other firsts)
not big companies but we did work all over the world – sold to many of the worlds largest telcos (no US customers though)
and i stand by what i have learned – though of course there was variation in pretty much everything including levels of corruption (mostly in post communist countries where corruption is endemic and deeply ingrained into the fabric of society)
private companies – especially small ones – live or die by their efficiency – and they are much more efficient than government orgs – by orders of magnitude
of course efficiency can equate to harsh – letting people go because you don’t have the income is never easy
the dregs here dear boy are those who will, like Stalin, lead the people to bloody class warfare – pretending it’s about fairness when it’s more to do with desperation – when there’s not enough to go around we start to look for those who have more. Hitler targeted the Jews because they had a lot of nice juicy assets that could be stolen. It’s a pattern we humans repeat often.
If you want to attack anyone you should attack Government – Corporate incestuousness – and stop confusing the private sector in total with the evil capitalist running dogs you are seething to murder
because you and many like you would happily drive the masses to murder anyone you point to and label a capitalist
it is those who are like you that terrify everyone
because at your core is a terrible hatred of human kind
bloodthirsty desire to kill (your father image?) and rip flesh and scream your blood curdling yell of “down with the capitalists”
in small village culture we’d just off you and bury you in a ditch and go back to working the fields – simply because you’d be seen to be much like a rabid dog – to be destroyed and forgotten
pop
@The Peak Oil Poet
You are bawling for no good purpose.
Dry your eyes and get over it.
If you want to know about corruption try finding decent private enterprise in Africa or South America.
At best 1/3rd of private enterprise is worth salvaging, depending on debt levels and corporate culture.
I would imagine the employees “you let go” would have a very different story to tell.
@Chris Warren
it’s not about bawling (strawman)
it’s about correctly identifying your murderous violent nature
which you can not escape by accusing me of anything (other than being equally violent by virtue of my being like you – human)
whereas i call a spade a spade
you worm your way around your dishonesty and virulence
and frankly – there is no better support to be found for keeping our crappy system than looking at people like you – who lack any subtlety and all see as “commies” calling for the downfall of everything
let’s see how well you do walking the CBD with a sandwich board with the slogan “kill the capitalists – bring back Stalin”
i’m an Anarchist by nature – i detest all forms of government – but i’d rather have bad government than the bloody change of power you call for
and will never get
pop
“It’s pure parasitism”
I guess you haven’t been reading the Sandpit, Mulga?
“Anyway, none of the right-wingers have even acknowledged, let alone challenged, my characterisation of the historical and political context of economics.”
While not right-wing myself, you are probably lazily lumping me in with this description. The reason I haven’t challenged your characterisation is because I agree with it. That’s what makes me a moderately libertarian liberal democrat, and not a doctrinaire libertarian. Also, I’m still waiting for you to answer #38.