America's most prominent Marxist economist

[PoliticalChic]

What the heck???

Where are all of the Leftist/Liberal/socialist/Democrat Progressives lining up to support "America's most prominent Marxist economist"??????


I gave the his lecture.....I posted his ideas.....and lil' ol' me has to post both the ideas and my the truth!!!


I figured you Lefties would be out there championing the kind of hot air that the Left teaches kids in colleges......
No???






OK...here's another of Dr.Wolff's conjectures...bet you like this one....

8. How did the business community react to this windfall? By claiming that they did so because they were really great entrepreneurs!
How to reward such greatness? Starting in the 1970's, the salaries and bonuses that the board of directors gave themselves went crazy.
They didn't admit that the reason for their success was that they didn't reward workers! No.....it was that they were business geniuses!

a. And they used lots of the money to move more factories abroad. It's expensive...and risky. But they had lots of money.

b. And they used lots of the money to re-shape American politics. The workers lost interest in politics...in the NYC election for mayor, 11% of registered Democrats voted. ...so the rich took over.

They paid expensive lobbyists.
So a tiny part of the population, the wealthy, took over and made politics work for them.

c. Having won the lottery, the business community became hysterical. The result was the stock market bubble of the 1990's. That collapse was the beginning of our financial crisis.

d. But the rich had so much money to play with that the losses in the stock market meant nothing....the hysteria looked for another place to play: housing.
The same thing happened- in NYC there are lots of half completed buildings, because the builders couldn't sell them, or make the interest payments on loans.
The result of real estate crazy.



Summary:
The rich folks stole so much money from the workers that they behaved like Scrooge McDuck...throwing it over their heads, lighting cigars with Franklins,....
....they blew up the stock market....and, no satisfied with that...

...they caused the housing crisis!

Yeah....that's it!




Now, c'mon.....you Lefties agree with all of that......don't you?

 

[PoliticalChic]

So very disappointed in our ersatz Leftists....

Here is the head Leftist theoretician....Richard D. Wolff
"America's most prominent Marxist economist." http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/05/ma...ions.html?_r=0
and none of our Lefties even give him an 'atta boy'!




1. I showed earlier that his fundamental concept....that since the 1970s the worker hasn't received an increase in real wages....is just plain false.

2. And in post #41, Wolff says that the employers who deprived the workers took their ill-gotten gains and caused the stock market crash and the housing crisis....

...and they used the money to lobby politicians and control American politics as well....


This is so easy to skewer.


3. First of all, over 65% of Americans...that includes workers....participate in the stock market, either directly or via pensions.....so decisions by corporations, and any profits they make...are distributed to all Americans.

4. And as far as the wealthy, the employers controlling the politics of America....can you say "Obama," and "you didn't build that."




5. And Lobbyists???
a. In " Demosclerosis:The Silent Killer of American Government", Jonathan Rauch points out that 7 out of 10 Americans belong to an interest group, and one out of four belong to at least four!
That means at least four lobbying groups!

b. And....most lobbying groups are Leftist!

America Coming Together; America Votes; American Constitution Society; American Federation of Labor - Congress of Industrial Organizations; American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees; American Federation of Teachers; Anshell Media; Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now; Association of Trial Lawyers of America; Band of Progressives; Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence; Campaign for a Progressive Future; Campaign for America's Future; Center for American Progress; Clean Water Action; Communication Workers of America; The Constitution Project; DASH PAC; Defenders of Wildlife Action Fund; Democracy for America; Democratic Governors Associations; Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee; Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee; Dog Eat Dog Films; EMILY's List; Environment 2004; Gore/Lieberman Recount Committee; Hotel Employees & Restaurant Employees International Union; the Human Rights Campaign; INdTV; International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers; Joint Victory Campaign 2004; Laborers International Union of North American; League of Conservation Voters; New Democrat Network; The Media Fund; Media Matters for America; Million Mom March; Moving America Forward; MoveOn.org; Music for America; National Association for the Advancement of Colored People; NARAL Pro-Choice America; National Education Association; National Grassroots Alliance; National Jewish Democratic Council; National Treasury Employees Union; New American Optimists; New Democrat Network; Partnership for America's Families; People for the American Way; Phoenix Group; Planned Parenthood; Pro-Choice Vote; Service Employees International Union; Sheet Metal Workers International Association; Sierra Club; The Thunder Road Group; United Food & Commercial Workers Union; United Progressive Alliance; USAction; Vagina Votes; Voices for Working Families; Vote for Change; Young Voter Alliance; and 21st Century Democrats. http://www.churchmilitant.tv/cia/02fake/102.pdf
See also FrontPage Magazine - The Shadow Party: Part II Continued 2



I'm gonna rip him up even further, Lefties......

Watch.

 

[william the wie]

PC the philip's curve last worked as expected in 1958.

This was also the approximate date that Moore's law first started to become obvious.

And from a biological viewpoint the environment changed radically with the polio vaccine knocking out the last major infectious disease and birth control pills causing a change in selective pressure also about that time.

The big knock on economic models of all stripes is that they ignore changes in the selective pressure on economic actors.

"Plagues and Peoples", "The Columbian Exchange" and Peter Newman's multi-volume history of the Hudson's Bay Company have much more to say about why the US did so well than any economic history or model that I have seen.

Willie....please relate this post to our "prominent Marxist economist's" thesis.

Marxism even more than other economic schools postulates an unchanging world and other myths such as equilibrium.

 

[PoliticalChic]

PC the philip's curve last worked as expected in 1958.

This was also the approximate date that Moore's law first started to become obvious.

And from a biological viewpoint the environment changed radically with the polio vaccine knocking out the last major infectious disease and birth control pills causing a change in selective pressure also about that time.

The big knock on economic models of all stripes is that they ignore changes in the selective pressure on economic actors.

"Plagues and Peoples", "The Columbian Exchange" and Peter Newman's multi-volume history of the Hudson's Bay Company have much more to say about why the US did so well than any economic history or model that I have seen.

Willie....please relate this post to our "prominent Marxist economist's" thesis.

Marxism even more than other economic schools postulates an unchanging world and other myths such as equilibrium.

Absolutely!

The Occupy shock troops led by Pelosi and Obama seem to have faded into the oblivion they so richly deserve.


I was so hoping that the half of this board who subscribe to Marxist ideas would try to justify this dolt....
....but they left Wolff hangin'....


Actually, a pretty wise move.

Maybe it represents a step away from the Liberal/Democrat/Progressive/socialist thinking that put the wind bag in office.

 

[Freemason9]

As a good Marxist, Dr. Wolff lays out the argument that the greedy business owners are the cause of every societal ill.

In the OP we find the following in his web of deceit:
"6. So....to keep up the consumption, to provide for the kids, the American working class went on a borrowing binge no working class in the history of the world every undertook. Starting in the 1970's, the savings rate collapsed. And we invented the 'credit card.'

a. In 1929 the average debt for an American family was 25-30% of annual income. In 2007 the average debt for an American family was 125% of annual income.

b. The Federal Reserve keeps this statistic: what percent of your income is used to pay off your debt...in other words, cannot be used to buy anything. Today (2009) is about 17%. The lenders are no longer interested in lending to these borrowers."





I don't doubt his stats here in terms of saving and borrowing.


But the implication that workers had to give up the former, and were forced into the latter.....
...this is boilerplate Marxism.
The assumption being that human nature is all about materialism, and not about values and attitudes.



Therefore, once one gets past Wolff's fabrication that real wage increases ceased in the 1970's....

....I suggest more attention be paid to June 25, 1962.
That was the Engel decision that prayers in public schools was unconstitutional.


If more attention was paid to what one is, rather than what one owns, many of society's problems would be alleviated.

Dumb response. How do you expect to support capitalism without a market? And how does a market exist without consumers? And how do consumers exist without spending money?

Hey, genius--consumer savings is a threat to economic health in the capitalist system. If money isn't circulated, the economy tanks--as you might have noticed. But maybe you haven't, I don't know--you're strange and disconnected.

 

[Freemason9]

The basic premise of the Marxist in question is that greedy rich folks have, basically, made American workers their slaves. According to Dr. Wolff, wage increases stopped in the 1970s, and he goes on to explain the following:



"7. In 1970, among industrialized nations, American has the most equal distribution of wealth and income.The gap between rich and poor was smaller in the United States than in other countries.
Today, we are the most unequal.




There are four basic reasons why wages stopped increasing in the 1970's.

a. The first was the computer. As an example, there used to be an army of inventory checkers in the supermarket....now, the computer ticks off one unit every time the cashier runs it by the scanner. The computer meant fewer workers.

b. Next, corporations decided to move production out of the United States. With modern telecommunications, the cheaper factory didn't have to be down the hall.
60% of the goods coming into America from China are produced by subsidiaries of American corporations.

c.and d. And just at a time when there were fewer jobs, massive numbers of women and immigrants were flooding the job market. As a result, employers didn't have to pay higher wages."

YES. This is exactly why capitalism collapses.

 

[PoliticalChic]

As a good Marxist, Dr. Wolff lays out the argument that the greedy business owners are the cause of every societal ill.

In the OP we find the following in his web of deceit:
"6. So....to keep up the consumption, to provide for the kids, the American working class went on a borrowing binge no working class in the history of the world every undertook. Starting in the 1970's, the savings rate collapsed. And we invented the 'credit card.'

a. In 1929 the average debt for an American family was 25-30% of annual income. In 2007 the average debt for an American family was 125% of annual income.

b. The Federal Reserve keeps this statistic: what percent of your income is used to pay off your debt...in other words, cannot be used to buy anything. Today (2009) is about 17%. The lenders are no longer interested in lending to these borrowers."





I don't doubt his stats here in terms of saving and borrowing.


But the implication that workers had to give up the former, and were forced into the latter.....
...this is boilerplate Marxism.
The assumption being that human nature is all about materialism, and not about values and attitudes.



Therefore, once one gets past Wolff's fabrication that real wage increases ceased in the 1970's....

....I suggest more attention be paid to June 25, 1962.
That was the Engel decision that prayers in public schools was unconstitutional.


If more attention was paid to what one is, rather than what one owns, many of society's problems would be alleviated.

Dumb response. How do you expect to support capitalism without a market? And how does a market exist without consumers? And how do consumers exist without spending money?

Hey, genius--consumer savings is a threat to economic health in the capitalist system. If money isn't circulated, the economy tanks--as you might have noticed. But maybe you haven't, I don't know--you're strange and disconnected.

According to you, the lack of savings is a plus....a necessity.
This is the tip of the iceberg of your glacial ignorance.

And the opposite of the view of 'America's most prominent Marxist economist.'

Wolff suggests that low savings rate was due to the greedy employers holding back raises....and the workers had an inexplicable desire for more and more consumer goods.
A sorry view of human nature, and one infused in Marxism.




Sorry you were unable to process the instructions from your mentor.
Perhaps you should have stayed in school......



Let's see if I can bring you up to speed.....
Warning: the following requires thinking....you may be unprepared for same.



a. Enlightenment thinkers laid claim to the realm of “facts,” with many subscribing to a doctrine of materialism, that fundamental reality consisted only of matter….leading to Marxism. The Romantics, on the other hand, wanted to protect “values,” or idealism, wherein reality consists of mind or spirit.


b. The short sighted, i.e., you, will find it difficult to see that economics is a study of more than simply material, consumption.... The consistent view would be to simply challenge the use of the definition, since the separation of facts from values is the basis for the secularization of much of Western thinking.



c. From a historical view, in the sense that history is that which is experienced by ordinary folks, “Victorian values” are actually what we call middle-class values, and include thrift, cleanliness, responsibility, self-discipline, perseverance, honesty and self-reliance…but also those values that are crucial to the “work ethic,” promptness, regularity, conformity and rationality. Note, this constellation is of value to capitalism, and changes agricultural workers into an industrial proletariat.
Gertrude Himmelfarb, “The De-Moralization of Society”

Do you see where saving fits into that pattern?




And so you see, economics is far more than Marx, or Wolff, imagined.....

...and a degree of magnitude more than you can understand.
So sorry......but I can't dumb it down for you the way government schooling did.....

 

[PoliticalChic]

The basic premise of the Marxist in question is that greedy rich folks have, basically, made American workers their slaves. According to Dr. Wolff, wage increases stopped in the 1970s, and he goes on to explain the following:



"7. In 1970, among industrialized nations, American has the most equal distribution of wealth and income.The gap between rich and poor was smaller in the United States than in other countries.
Today, we are the most unequal.




There are four basic reasons why wages stopped increasing in the 1970's.

a. The first was the computer. As an example, there used to be an army of inventory checkers in the supermarket....now, the computer ticks off one unit every time the cashier runs it by the scanner. The computer meant fewer workers.

b. Next, corporations decided to move production out of the United States. With modern telecommunications, the cheaper factory didn't have to be down the hall.
60% of the goods coming into America from China are produced by subsidiaries of American corporations.

c.and d. And just at a time when there were fewer jobs, massive numbers of women and immigrants were flooding the job market. As a result, employers didn't have to pay higher wages."

YES. This is exactly why capitalism collapses.

Why?
Because of technology?
Because folks enter the job market and this depresses wages?

Only if you assume the worst of people...that they won't move to get jobs, increase their education and train for new occupations, ....or take the easy way and rely on 99 weeks of unemployment.

Is that what you would do?
We can only judge others by ourselves.



"Under capitalism, the standard of living of all was improving: prices falling, incomes rising, health and sanitation improving, lengthening of life spans, diets becoming more varied, the new jobs created in industry paid more than most could make in agriculture, housing improved, and middle class industrialists and business owners displaced nobility and gentry as heroes."
From a speech by Rev. Robert A. Sirico, President, Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty.



Marxism?
“Culture is a stubborn opponent. The Soviet Union attempted to create the New Soviet Man with gulags, psychiatric hospitals, and firing squads for seventy years and succeeded only in producing a more corrupt culture.”
Bork, “Slouching Toward Gomorrah,” p. 198



History indicts you as a dolt, doesn't it.

 

[Freemason9]

The basic premise of the Marxist in question is that greedy rich folks have, basically, made American workers their slaves. According to Dr. Wolff, wage increases stopped in the 1970s, and he goes on to explain the following:



"7. In 1970, among industrialized nations, American has the most equal distribution of wealth and income.The gap between rich and poor was smaller in the United States than in other countries.
Today, we are the most unequal.




There are four basic reasons why wages stopped increasing in the 1970's.

a. The first was the computer. As an example, there used to be an army of inventory checkers in the supermarket....now, the computer ticks off one unit every time the cashier runs it by the scanner. The computer meant fewer workers.

b. Next, corporations decided to move production out of the United States. With modern telecommunications, the cheaper factory didn't have to be down the hall.
60% of the goods coming into America from China are produced by subsidiaries of American corporations.

c.and d. And just at a time when there were fewer jobs, massive numbers of women and immigrants were flooding the job market. As a result, employers didn't have to pay higher wages."

YES. This is exactly why capitalism collapses.

Why?
Because of technology?
Because folks enter the job market and this depresses wages?

Only if you assume the worst of people...that they won't move to get jobs, increase their education and train for new occupations, ....or take the easy way and rely on 99 weeks of unemployment.

Is that what you would do?
We can only judge others by ourselves.



"Under capitalism, the standard of living of all was improving: prices falling, incomes rising, health and sanitation improving, lengthening of life spans, diets becoming more varied, the new jobs created in industry paid more than most could make in agriculture, housing improved, and middle class industrialists and business owners displaced nobility and gentry as heroes."
From a speech by Rev. Robert A. Sirico, President, Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty.



Marxism?
“Culture is a stubborn opponent. The Soviet Union attempted to create the New Soviet Man with gulags, psychiatric hospitals, and firing squads for seventy years and succeeded only in producing a more corrupt culture.”
Bork, “Slouching Toward Gomorrah,” p. 198



History indicts you as a dolt, doesn't it.

The trend toward increased production with less human input necessarily results in higher gross unemployment--so long as fulltime employment is defined using arbitrarily fixed definitions. The U.S. could achieve full employment in the current economic environment by redefining the fulltime work week to fewer hours (e.g., 35 hour weeks).

There is no reason to continue with 40 hour weeks--however, a full employment environment would result in higher median wages, and capitalists will do ANYTHING NECESSARY to suppress wages. This is exactly why "our" government is much more concerned with "inflation" than with full employment.

It's all about power, and a labor force that is free to select employment at good wages gains power. Capitalists do NOT like that idea.

 

[PoliticalChic]

YES. This is exactly why capitalism collapses.

Why?
Because of technology?
Because folks enter the job market and this depresses wages?

Only if you assume the worst of people...that they won't move to get jobs, increase their education and train for new occupations, ....or take the easy way and rely on 99 weeks of unemployment.

Is that what you would do?
We can only judge others by ourselves.



"Under capitalism, the standard of living of all was improving: prices falling, incomes rising, health and sanitation improving, lengthening of life spans, diets becoming more varied, the new jobs created in industry paid more than most could make in agriculture, housing improved, and middle class industrialists and business owners displaced nobility and gentry as heroes."
From a speech by Rev. Robert A. Sirico, President, Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty.



Marxism?
“Culture is a stubborn opponent. The Soviet Union attempted to create the New Soviet Man with gulags, psychiatric hospitals, and firing squads for seventy years and succeeded only in producing a more corrupt culture.”
Bork, “Slouching Toward Gomorrah,” p. 198



History indicts you as a dolt, doesn't it.

The trend toward increased production with less human input necessarily results in higher gross unemployment--so long as fulltime employment is defined using arbitrarily fixed definitions. The U.S. could achieve full employment in the current economic environment by redefining the fulltime work week to fewer hours (e.g., 35 hour weeks).

There is no reason to continue with 40 hour weeks--however, a full employment environment would result in higher median wages, and capitalists will do ANYTHING NECESSARY to suppress wages. This is exactly why "our" government is much more concerned with "inflation" than with full employment.

It's all about power, and a labor force that is free to select employment at good wages gains power. Capitalists do NOT like that idea.

"New capital equipment financed by new savings and investment increases the productivity of workers. Workers are far more productive with computerized, mechanized, steam shovels, for example, than with mere hand shovels. That increased productivity provides the funds to pay workers more. The increased demand for labor resulting from that increased savings and investment also bids up the wages of working people to the level of their productivity. This just shows that under capitalism, capital and labor are complementary, not adversarial, exactly contrary to the misunderstanding of Marxists."
Obama and the Pirates | The American Spectator

 

[PoliticalChic]

And, more form Dr. Richard Wolff, "the most prominent Marxist economist in America"....



9. Now for a solution to capitalism.... How about we have a new dynamic in business. Instead of having a corporation's major stockholders, usually 15 or 20 people, select the board of directors, usually another 15 or 20 people, who tell you what to do, how to do it, when to do it..

...we reorganize business in America, so it worked like this:
Monday thru Thursday you do your usual job...but Friday, you and all the other workers sit around and have meeting and decide what to produce, how to produce, where to produce, and what to do with the profits. No board of directors, and no share holders.


a. If we would have done things like that in the 1970s, would workers have no longer gotten raises? Would workers have moved production out of the nation?


b. And that's exactly what workers have been doing in Silicon Valley. Software engineers quite the big companies that have traditional organization, and form these new kinds of companies where nobody tells anyone else what to do or how to do it. Most of them are Republicans, but here they are forming collectivist enterprises pretty much as suggested by Karl Marx.


c. Many of the great breakthroughs and inventions are the results of these communal enterprises.

 

[Freemason9]

Why?
Because of technology?
Because folks enter the job market and this depresses wages?

Only if you assume the worst of people...that they won't move to get jobs, increase their education and train for new occupations, ....or take the easy way and rely on 99 weeks of unemployment.

Is that what you would do?
We can only judge others by ourselves.



"Under capitalism, the standard of living of all was improving: prices falling, incomes rising, health and sanitation improving, lengthening of life spans, diets becoming more varied, the new jobs created in industry paid more than most could make in agriculture, housing improved, and middle class industrialists and business owners displaced nobility and gentry as heroes."
From a speech by Rev. Robert A. Sirico, President, Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty.



Marxism?
“Culture is a stubborn opponent. The Soviet Union attempted to create the New Soviet Man with gulags, psychiatric hospitals, and firing squads for seventy years and succeeded only in producing a more corrupt culture.”
Bork, “Slouching Toward Gomorrah,” p. 198



History indicts you as a dolt, doesn't it.

The trend toward increased production with less human input necessarily results in higher gross unemployment--so long as fulltime employment is defined using arbitrarily fixed definitions. The U.S. could achieve full employment in the current economic environment by redefining the fulltime work week to fewer hours (e.g., 35 hour weeks).

There is no reason to continue with 40 hour weeks--however, a full employment environment would result in higher median wages, and capitalists will do ANYTHING NECESSARY to suppress wages. This is exactly why "our" government is much more concerned with "inflation" than with full employment.

It's all about power, and a labor force that is free to select employment at good wages gains power. Capitalists do NOT like that idea.

"New capital equipment financed by new savings and investment increases the productivity of workers. Workers are far more productive with computerized, mechanized, steam shovels, for example, than with mere hand shovels. That increased productivity provides the funds to pay workers more. The increased demand for labor resulting from that increased savings and investment also bids up the wages of working people to the level of their productivity. This just shows that under capitalism, capital and labor are complementary, not adversarial, exactly contrary to the misunderstanding of Marxists."
Obama and the Pirates | The American Spectator

And YET--contrary to the implications of this diatribe--increase productivity has resulted in less employment and lower wages. Fuck, it seems almost like capitalists don't give a shit.

 

[Freemason9]

And, more form Dr. Richard Wolff, "the most prominent Marxist economist in America"....



9. Now for a solution to capitalism.... How about we have a new dynamic in business. Instead of having a corporation's major stockholders, usually 15 or 20 people, select the board of directors, usually another 15 or 20 people, who tell you what to do, how to do it, when to do it..

...we reorganize business in America, so it worked like this:
Monday thru Thursday you do your usual job...but Friday, you and all the other workers sit around and have meeting and decide what to produce, how to produce, where to produce, and what to do with the profits. No board of directors, and no share holders.


a. If we would have done things like that in the 1970s, would workers have no longer gotten raises? Would workers have moved production out of the nation?


b. And that's exactly what workers have been doing in Silicon Valley. Software engineers quite the big companies that have traditional organization, and form these new kinds of companies where nobody tells anyone else what to do or how to do it. Most of them are Republicans, but here they are forming collectivist enterprises pretty much as suggested by Karl Marx.


c. Many of the great breakthroughs and inventions are the results of these communal enterprises.

I have always believed that anyone that has an ownership share (in the corporate sense) of a company should be an active, contributing employee of that company as well. Otherwise, it's simple theft by advantage.

Ideally, I think the current corporate structure should be outlawed in favor of purely privately-owned companies, and/or employee-owned companies. That makes ethical and moral sense, and rightly appropriates the fruit of productivity to the producers.

 

[PoliticalChic]

The trend toward increased production with less human input necessarily results in higher gross unemployment--so long as fulltime employment is defined using arbitrarily fixed definitions. The U.S. could achieve full employment in the current economic environment by redefining the fulltime work week to fewer hours (e.g., 35 hour weeks).

There is no reason to continue with 40 hour weeks--however, a full employment environment would result in higher median wages, and capitalists will do ANYTHING NECESSARY to suppress wages. This is exactly why "our" government is much more concerned with "inflation" than with full employment.

It's all about power, and a labor force that is free to select employment at good wages gains power. Capitalists do NOT like that idea.

"New capital equipment financed by new savings and investment increases the productivity of workers. Workers are far more productive with computerized, mechanized, steam shovels, for example, than with mere hand shovels. That increased productivity provides the funds to pay workers more. The increased demand for labor resulting from that increased savings and investment also bids up the wages of working people to the level of their productivity. This just shows that under capitalism, capital and labor are complementary, not adversarial, exactly contrary to the misunderstanding of Marxists."
Obama and the Pirates | The American Spectator

And YET--contrary to the implications of this diatribe--increase productivity has resulted in less employment and lower wages. Fuck, it seems almost like capitalists don't give a shit.

When the language falls to that level, it's a give-away that you know you've been defeated.

 

[PoliticalChic]

And, more form Dr. Richard Wolff, "the most prominent Marxist economist in America"....



9. Now for a solution to capitalism.... How about we have a new dynamic in business. Instead of having a corporation's major stockholders, usually 15 or 20 people, select the board of directors, usually another 15 or 20 people, who tell you what to do, how to do it, when to do it..

...we reorganize business in America, so it worked like this:
Monday thru Thursday you do your usual job...but Friday, you and all the other workers sit around and have meeting and decide what to produce, how to produce, where to produce, and what to do with the profits. No board of directors, and no share holders.


a. If we would have done things like that in the 1970s, would workers have no longer gotten raises? Would workers have moved production out of the nation?


b. And that's exactly what workers have been doing in Silicon Valley. Software engineers quite the big companies that have traditional organization, and form these new kinds of companies where nobody tells anyone else what to do or how to do it. Most of them are Republicans, but here they are forming collectivist enterprises pretty much as suggested by Karl Marx.


c. Many of the great breakthroughs and inventions are the results of these communal enterprises.

I have always believed that anyone that has an ownership share (in the corporate sense) of a company should be an active, contributing employee of that company as well. Otherwise, it's simple theft by advantage.

Ideally, I think the current corporate structure should be outlawed in favor of purely privately-owned companies, and/or employee-owned companies. That makes ethical and moral sense, and rightly appropriates the fruit of productivity to the producers.

Outlawed?

The typical Liberal/Marxist/Progressive solution?



So, you- vaguely- agree with Dr. Wolff...and you're way of organizing business would be.....what?...more profitable?....

....efficient?

...make for happier worker?

....and should be mandated!

 

[william the wie]

Actually FreeMason has a point PC. Between taxes, mandates and regulation employees are becoming highly expensive relative to automation. It seems likely that five or more blue states will glide into default because of Ocare and pensions and tax bases will simply be collateral damage.

 

[editec]

Richard D. Wolff
"America's most prominent Marxist economist." http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/05/magazine/economic-doomsday-predictions.html?_r=0

I just had a great time studying a lecture by Marxist economist Richard Wolff. A really bright guy, the lecture was without notes nor teleprompter.
According to Dr. Wolff, every current ill of society is because rich guys cheated their workers.

Following are some of the things Dr. Wolff said in his lecture...
Capitalism Hits the Fan - Richard Wolff - YouTube

If he is correct....we on the Right are wrong.
Here's an interesting exercise for those on the Right; see if you can find the glaring errors in his thesis.

1. Starting with 1820, until 1970, the average level of real wages, based on what you got for an hour's work, rose every decade. This included during the depression...because prices fell. No other capitalist nation in the world can boast of a record like that.

For 150 years, the rest of the world learned that in America you could earn more, buy more, than anywhere else on earth.

2. In the 1970's that ended....it hasn't resumed since. Working harder, working longer....but not earning more in earning power. The end of rising wages.

3. You are producing more goods and services, so the employer is happy. But he isn't paying you any more. This is a dramatic turn of events....but nobody talks about it. We pretend it isn't going on.






4. How has the worker tried to solve the problem? By working more hours...and by sending the wife out of the home to work, too.
Right now, the average number of hours worked by an American worker is 20% more than the number worked by a Swedish, French, German or Italian worker. These people have the time for leisurely dinners.....we invented fast food!

a. The largest change: in 1970 40% of American women worked outside the home for income....today, double. The fundamental change: they may have thought of it as women's liberation...but they had to earn that money to maintain their standard of living.


5. But did it work? Did the extra hours provide an improvement in standard of living, allow us to give more to our children? Actually, no...mom had to get another car to get to her job, more extensive wardrobe, no time to cook, so bought prepared food, so the extra expenses took away the extra income.

6. So....to keep up the consumption, to provide for the kids, the American working class went on a borrowing binge no working class in the history of the world every undertook. Starting in the 1970's, the savings rate collapsed. And we invented the 'credit card.'

a. In 1929 the average debt for an American family was 25-30% of annual income. In 2007 the average debt for an American family was 125% of annual income.

b. The Federal Reserve keeps this statistic: what percent of your income is used to pay off your debt...in other words, cannot be used to buy anything. Today (2009) is about 17%. The lenders are no longer interested in lending to these borrowers.

So, because employers refused to continue the earlier design....sharing the profits via raises, the dynamics of the traditional American family has been destroyed.

No mother at home to raise Johnny, no father with free time to instill values.....



All of the breakdown can be traced to the greedy business owners and employers.
And the nature of capitalism.

You do not need to be a MARXIST to see the truth of some of the above.

IN fact nothing in the above has anything at all to do with MARXISM.

Everything that you read above is also stated frequently by non-communist economists.

Only a person blinded by right wing ideology would not already know that.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Richard D. Wolff
"America's most prominent Marxist economist." http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/05/magazine/economic-doomsday-predictions.html?_r=0

I just had a great time studying a lecture by Marxist economist Richard Wolff. A really bright guy, the lecture was without notes nor teleprompter.
According to Dr. Wolff, every current ill of society is because rich guys cheated their workers.

Following are some of the things Dr. Wolff said in his lecture...
Capitalism Hits the Fan - Richard Wolff - YouTube

If he is correct....we on the Right are wrong.
Here's an interesting exercise for those on the Right; see if you can find the glaring errors in his thesis.

1. Starting with 1820, until 1970, the average level of real wages, based on what you got for an hour's work, rose every decade. This included during the depression...because prices fell. No other capitalist nation in the world can boast of a record like that.

For 150 years, the rest of the world learned that in America you could earn more, buy more, than anywhere else on earth.

2. In the 1970's that ended....it hasn't resumed since. Working harder, working longer....but not earning more in earning power. The end of rising wages.

3. You are producing more goods and services, so the employer is happy. But he isn't paying you any more. This is a dramatic turn of events....but nobody talks about it. We pretend it isn't going on.






4. How has the worker tried to solve the problem? By working more hours...and by sending the wife out of the home to work, too.
Right now, the average number of hours worked by an American worker is 20% more than the number worked by a Swedish, French, German or Italian worker. These people have the time for leisurely dinners.....we invented fast food!

a. The largest change: in 1970 40% of American women worked outside the home for income....today, double. The fundamental change: they may have thought of it as women's liberation...but they had to earn that money to maintain their standard of living.


5. But did it work? Did the extra hours provide an improvement in standard of living, allow us to give more to our children? Actually, no...mom had to get another car to get to her job, more extensive wardrobe, no time to cook, so bought prepared food, so the extra expenses took away the extra income.

6. So....to keep up the consumption, to provide for the kids, the American working class went on a borrowing binge no working class in the history of the world every undertook. Starting in the 1970's, the savings rate collapsed. And we invented the 'credit card.'

a. In 1929 the average debt for an American family was 25-30% of annual income. In 2007 the average debt for an American family was 125% of annual income.

b. The Federal Reserve keeps this statistic: what percent of your income is used to pay off your debt...in other words, cannot be used to buy anything. Today (2009) is about 17%. The lenders are no longer interested in lending to these borrowers.

So, because employers refused to continue the earlier design....sharing the profits via raises, the dynamics of the traditional American family has been destroyed.

No mother at home to raise Johnny, no father with free time to instill values.....



All of the breakdown can be traced to the greedy business owners and employers.
And the nature of capitalism.

You do not need to be a MARXIST to see the truth of some of the above.

IN fact nothing in the above has anything at all to do with MARXISM.

Everything that you read above is also stated frequently by non-communist economists.

Only a person blinded by right wing ideology would not already know that.

Except that #2 is false.....so the attempt to hang the blame, as you and Wolff are attempting, falls apart.



I'd be happy to recommend some reading, books that Santa might bring you.

 

[PoliticalChic]

Actually FreeMason has a point PC. Between taxes, mandates and regulation employees are becoming highly expensive relative to automation. It seems likely that five or more blue states will glide into default because of Ocare and pensions and tax bases will simply be collateral damage.

He, and Dr. Wolff may have points about the economy....but the entire thread, the lecture, is designed to make the argument that capitalism is the reason for the problems.

Now....take "taxes, mandates and regulation".....none of those can be attributed to employers, to the business community.

They are the result of big government.
Marxism.

And people know it.


"In U.S., Fear of Big Government at Near-Record Level
Democrats lead increase in concerns about big government
by Elizabeth Mendes
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Americans' concerns about the threat of big government continue to dwarf those about big business and big labor, and by an even larger margin now than in March 2009. The 64% of Americans who say big government will be the biggest threat to the country..."
In U.S., Fear of Big Government at Near-Record Level


A little later I'll add Dr. Wolff's solution......

....see what you think, Willie

 

[PoliticalChic]

This is the final point in Dr. Wolff's lecture to students at Brown University. I've numbered all of his points throughout the thread; this is number ten.

It is instructive that this is the kind of economics that students are exposed to in Liberal bastions....every one of the items in his, "America's most prominent Marxist economist's" lecture are easily shown to be false.




10. Under capitalism there is a core of animosity...the interests of the workers is at odds with those of the employers. This damages society. If democracy is a good idea in our community, why isn't the basis of operations in our workplace?

a. In the next generation, give Americans the choice: have businesses that operate in the traditional manner....and let's also have collectively organized businesses.

And let's have choice of buying a product produced by a traditional manufacturer, and one produced by a collective.
How? Easy...the government would subsidize and set up such enterprises. Isn't that what Roosevelt did? The WPA, CCC, NRA, etc.







First....what's stopping any group from doing so right now?
Go ahead....collectivize.

If it works so well there should be tons of 'em.
Why aren't there? Because it is a sham to believe that groups of workers would work effectively and efficiently.
Some are managers, decision makers, experts....most are not.

I'd like to see the argument that all of the members of this collective deserve the same pay.


There you have the Marxist's plan: "...the government would subsidize and set up such enterprises."


So, the plan is to take taxpayer funds, accrued via capitalism, and use it to form collective enterprises....sort of ObamaCare exchanges for every industry.
How has that worked out in the past?



Earlier efforts at collectivation led not to success and profitability, but to gulags and revolution and enforced famines.




Further, the motto "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need" ended with the 'Stakhanovite Revolution."

1. "On August 31, 1935, Aleksei Stakhanov, a thirty-year-old miner working at the Central Irmino Mine in the Donets Basin, hewed 102 tons of coal during his six-hour shift. This amount represented fourteen times his quota,...."
Year of the Stakhanovite


One would think that "America's most prominent Marxist economist" would have known that history has proven that the profit motive was far, far more successful than Marxism.


2. " They called for the general adoption of these techniques via socialist competition and, to bursts of applause, thanked Comrade Stalin for, as Stakhanov put it, "the happy life of our country, the happiness and glory of our magnificent fatherland." Many referred to their increased earnings, which, thanks to the progressive piece-rate system according to which output above the norm was remunerated at higher rates of pay, reached dizzying heights."
Ibid.



So....Dr. Wolff's thesis is, as is all of Marxism/communism/socialism/ Progrssivism.....

...a lie.




To verify that this thread is based on exactly what this Marxist economist said, here is the lecture:
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TZU3wfjtIJY]Capitalism Hits the Fan - Richard Wolff - YouTube[/ame]







BTW....FDR changed his tune here:
On May 26, 1940 his Fireside Chat signaled a new relationship with business: he would insure their profits, and assuage their fears that he would nationalize their factories....endorsing capitalism over socialism.