[quote author=juliofromny link=topic=177.msg1304#msg1304 date=1224245022]
[quote author=cyberdoo78 link=topic=177.msg1297#msg1297 date=1224222757]
Corporations are unfeeling because they lack the ability to feel, for they are nothing more then a piece of paper with some words on it. The actions that are taken in the companies name are by people who are protected from full liability and like most people when they aren't liable for their actions they make bad decisions which have the appearance of being 'unfeeling'. Without government, and without regulation these people are subject to market forces that tend to stop them from doing that which harms others, makes them more concerned for their customers, and over all people you want to actually associate with.
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But of course for that to work you need to be a proactive and informed consumer and there are so few of those :) You make some strong points that I never considered before. Like I said, I'm still reeling about the idea that government is like any other company and penalties are just products. Still I could just imagine, with your argument, how television would be in a completely free-market. Would it be a lot more propaganda or a lot more grassroots journalism? And how would a consumer stay on top of that much information on anything and everything?
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That may be true, but is it the effect or the cause that is to blame. If the government takes charge of food and drugs and it is the only one who decides if things are safe or not, then to a certain extent people will become lax and not care so long as they see the FDA seal of approval or the USDA seal of approval. This is the same way as UL works, if people see the UL seal of approval then they know the product has been tested. The difference between the two is that one has a stake in actually protecting people, UL, for if it becomes the focus of bad decision making then it will quickly loose its market share.
We already see 'free market' journalism today. While it is true that most of the information consumed today is done by radio or TV a growing percentage is being fostered on the Internet. There are only a few different resources in TV, Radio, and Print, but on the Internet there are hundreds of thousands all trying to get your attention. Blogs are everywhere about everything, some people are making money doing freelance news reporting even.
I don't think that you need to know everything there is to know. That is why so many people trust UL and Consumer Reports to do the work for them, in the same manner that people don't do investigate every story, but listen to a few sources. We you see is a focused approach that people take when looking toward something, generally the time spent in 'research' is equal to the amount of gain or loss. People spend weeks researching their next car purchase, but only minutes picking out the right orange to buy.
In the end it doesn't matter what is or isn't safe because there is a check on a free market, one not currently enjoyed in todays market, that is that businesses are in the business to make money, and you don't make money by harming or killing your customers, because if you do, you will not have any customers to service and there fore will be out of business.
[quote author=Dalebert link=topic=177.msg1309#msg1309 date=1224249095]
Wal-mart was a big supporter of minimum wage. Does that seem odd to you? Not a single Wal-mart employee makes minimum wage. Even if they did, it wouldn't be very many of them. But guess what the single largest expense of the vast majority of companies is? Employee wages. Now, consider that 80% of companies fail. Why do they fail? They just don't make enough money to operate. What do you think raising minimum wage is going to do to potential new competition (and the new jobs they would create and the new choices they would add to products) for the big companies? Ever wonder why 80% of new companies fail? I'm sure there's some bad business decisions in there, but it's clearly not the only reason.
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Speaking of minimum wage. No one can make a decent living on 5.50/hr (or whatever that rate is). So lets say we don't have anything regulating this, who would be able to pay rent and eat and have any kind of living working on even less than this? I'm asking b/c you made some valid arguments and I would genuinely like to know the answer to this
[quote]Speaking of minimum wage. No one can make a decent living on 5.50/hr (or whatever that rate is). So lets say we don't have anything regulating this, who would be able to pay rent and eat and have any kind of living working on even less than this?[/quote]
This is a great question, and a very complex one. Let me first introduce you to a simple concept - the Seen and the Unseen. Too many people focus today on what they see, the minimum wage worker making $5.50 today. You're right, nobody can feed themselves, let alone a family on that. What is unseen is the mental shift in employers. Because employers are forced - at the point of a gun, if needed - to PAY hourly, they essentially always HIRE hourly. Rather than do things like a "bounty" system, for instance, where they need a set task done (Say, clean the bathroom and the floors) and offer a set amount of money to have it done.
Also, it forces employers to take less risks. Even McDonald's, that bastion of no-skills-needed is hit by this. You've got a young man (James) from "the ghetto" who's interested in helping out his single mom by making some money. Because of the various things in his life, he dropped out of school. He's still a smart kid, willing to work and in fact, has a REALLY good reason to do it. Amanda, a preppy snot who has a long list of summer jobs she's taken and quit, submits an application the same day that James does. In the interviews, the employer leans to Amanda, who has more schooling and, even though she's a bit flightly, has some real job experience. James doesn't.
In a free market, James could offset his lack-of-experience by competiting. James could offer to work for free for a week, to show he's committed, or accept less pay. For James, it's not the MONEY that's the barrier but the ability to get that needed experience. Amanda is typical of most minimum wage workers. In this regard, the stereotype is true. Statistically (I'll turn you to Healing Our World for the hard facts, they're all in there) only about 3% of people making minimum wage are "head of household". The people getting paid minimum wage are almost NEVER the people who have the burden of putting food on the table, but by forcing employers to conform to a rigid, hourly only, money is all that matters system, you're preventing that small percentage from gaining skills that would allow them to earn more in the future. This is even more dramatic when you shift the workplace from McDonalds to a skilled trade, but the same issues apply there. (Though the trades issues open the door to why licensing and regulation are harmful…)
One thing you have, that I as a liberal used to, is the belief that "people suck". Greedy capitalists will take advantage of the poor worker! The thing I like most about liberty, and really understanding the free market, is just how empowering it is! Workers can't be taken advantage of because workers chose to be there. Unlike the government people, who use guns and threats of guns and cages and threats of cages to make people act, companies actually have to find some sort of mutual benefit with the workers, else they'll just go somewhere else. Competition from Target would mean Wal-Mart has to offer something more to the workers than Target does. Maybe it's better hours, maybe benefits or higher pay. If one company is shifted too far, they'll lose employees and in turn, business, until they create those incentives. Of course, with the minimum wage set artificially low, a certain amount of competition has been prevented in the market place and those people (like James) who might be willing to enter in at even below that artificial level because soemthing other than the pay matters more to him. It is people like James that are the most harmed by minimum wages laws and ironically, it's the inability to get those sub-minimum wage jobs that inch him closer to poverty in the first place.
I know the recommendation has been floated already, but please check out Healing Our World. Dr. Ruwart put years of study and research to toss out tons and tons more on this subject that I can cover. I've got the premise in what I wrote up there, but she's got the statistics. She can point to studies where minimum wage increases lead to higher unemployment. She explains why using force to set minimum wages sends ripples through the entire economy that leave the people MAKING minimum wage out to dry (Businesses respond to higher staffing costs by firing or raising prices, neither are good things for minimum wage workers struggling to make ends meet. Without profit, which minimum wage law eat into, business can stay around to hire people or meet people's needs.)
The other thing about the labor market is a market like anything else is that if an employer doesn't pay what the job is worth, then they will see a shortage in workers as well, those with high turn over are seeing a market signal that the need to pay more, however often times they can't without passing that on to the consumer which might not want to pay.
Another thing, the prices in the market are based on what people are paying, not what is wanted. I want to get $4000 a month in rent, but if I can only get $750 a month for rent, then that is what I will get. If there was no minimum wage, then you might see a down ward slope in wages. A teenager isn't worth the same as a 10 year veteran of the labor market, so the teenage might be paid less, the veteran might be paid more. Further if wages slope downward, prices will tend to slope downward as well, the reason being, the cost of production would go down because wages go down, remember competition works. Burger joint A will have to compete with B both in labor and in price of product, by doing so wages will slide down till a medium is found where people are willing to work what the job is worth. Because people are being paid less, the prices of products will also have to come down or else houses will stay empty, products won't be sold, etc.
It's all interconnected.
Good questions. Good answers. Before you continue, Julio, please take our advice and read Healing our World. Then come back with more questions if you have them at that point. 8)
sure thing. will be ordering it tonight. Thanks all for your wonderfully informative answers. And I look forward to hear what the finaly tally in new AMPlifiers for the week that the fellow New Yorker said he'll be matching 
[quote author=juliofromny link=topic=177.msg1318#msg1318 date=1224254024]
Speaking of minimum wage. No one can make a decent living on 5.50/hr (or whatever that rate is). So lets say we don't have anything regulating this, who would be able to pay rent and eat and have any kind of living working on even less than this? I'm asking b/c you made some valid arguments and I would genuinely like to know the answer to this
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Imagine you have a pie and you want to make sure everyone gets a big enough piece, so you decree that everyone must get a certain size slice. So someone starts cutting the pie and handing out slices of the right size to conform to the law and the pie is gone but there are still people waiting for a slice. You cannot pass a law that causes food to magically appear on someone's table. Laws and regulations cannot alter reality. A gun cannot feed people and that's all government is. This is why minimum wage laws hurt the economy and lead to higher unemployment and a bunch of crappy minimum-paying jobs. Help the market by freeing it and letting new businesses create more jobs. Many companies competing for a limited number of employees will lower unemployment and raise wages, i.e. make the pie bigger.
Tried to keep it brief. I chopped it down from several paragraphs. I haven't even read her book yet, but I suspect you're going to hear something like that, only explained much better and elaborated on.
Corporations are chartered by government. They don't make a single move that isn't blessed by the government, whoever he is. Clearly government is the source of the "corporation" problem.