Originally Posted by
gordonfvckingramsay
Beautifully condensed and written CT.
My mates think I’m mad but I can sense the pendulum swinging. We do live in bubbles of our own industry but the entire economic system hinges on the workforce being meek and mild, and thinking about retaining their jobs. For decades we accepted that we were powerless against multi million/billion dollar corporations. Simple workplace minimalism from your staff can bring you to your knees and I feel we are at a turning point where, simultaneously but independently, we are all united in returning some of the pain to these corporations.......secretly they know this.
It is even more fundamental.
There are two periods in recent history where income distribution is flat: World Wars.
In the intervening periods, asymmetry develops and unions are captured by the same lobby dollars. Ever wonder why nothing changes whether red team or blue team are the 'government'?
Declining real wages and
concentration of income in small segments of economies and industries creates a
break down of an implied social contract: No longer does hard work, prudence and other virtues matter. If to quote Gordon Gekko,
" If you aren't inside, you are outside". Sadly there are less inside, than out.
As the asymmetry between the haves and have not rises, debt is the result: People borrow to keep up. This has limits.
Idiots like Australian treasurer Morrison lament wages growth, but the lobyyists donate good money to ensure high immigration keeps downwards pressure on wages. Fearing wage growth is precisely why airlines are allowed to obtain foreigners to do Australian jobs. The 'Labor' party is as silent as the LNP.
Eventually we return to what Henry Ford detailed in his 1926 book "Today and Tomorrow"
“The owner, the employees, and the buying public are all one and the same, and unless an industry can so manage itself as to keep wages high and prices low it destroys itself, for otherwise it limits the number of its customers. One’s own employees ought to be one’s own best customers.”
Businesses end up eating their own tail.