Author: skzb

It’s been forever since I’ve posted here.  Sorry, fighting off personal crap.  Anyway, I found myself making a long-ish comment on facebook, and I think I got it more or less right (enough qualifiers there?), so I’m going to copy it to here.  The issue was the claim by another commenter, and I hope I’m summarizing him correctly, that capitalists mistreat workers because they’re morally corrupt, whereas in my opinion the problem is systemic, not personal.  If I’m correct, it brings up the question: why, exactly, must a corporation treat its workers as poorly as possible while still keeping them coming back the next day?  If it isn’t greed, and I contend greed is more of an effect than a cause, then why is it?  Here’s what I said:

I’m going to take on your assertion that capitalists have a choice about how to treat workers, because it’s important. Please bear with me as I try to work through this.

The issue is competition. Not in the simple, straightforward sense (lower wages = lower prices = underselling the competition) because, in fact, the connection between wages and prices doesn’t work like that.

It’s a bit more complex. Lower wages (and the equivalent in reduction of benefits &c) put more money into the pocket of the capitalist. Some of this goes into supporting his life style, but for most of these people, that’s pretty well set. Instead, the extra money becomes capital, much of which, in practice, goes into the financial markets of pure speculation, some of which becomes investments in other companies, often competitors (the degree to which the major capitalists have their hands in each others’ pockets is mind-boggling), and some of which goes back into the business.

It can go into the business in various ways: a greater sales force, more investment in advertising and marketing, even research or new manufacturies. Maybe even a temporary massive “loss leader” (which looks like lowering prices, but the temporary nature makes it a different animal). In any case, all of these translate to the same thing: the fight for market share.

The fight for market share is brutal, constant, vicious, and, in the end, a fight for survival. A two percent loss of market share can send the board of directors into a panic. And, by their standards, it should: market share represents your power, your security, and your freedom to maneuver and take chances.

In short, a major corporation ( smaller companies, niche companies, or those like entertainment in which market share is less dependent on financial might can and sometimes do treat their workers well) that puts a significantly greater percentage of its working capital into labor than its competitors, is putting itself into a very dangerous position.  Thus, the constant drive to put less into things like health care, a comfortable environment, safety precautions, and, of course, wages.

This is one half of the class struggle. The other half, obviously, is the desire of the labor force to have as much as possible of those things. But the point is, that is why I disagree with your position that capitalists are free to treat workers as well as they want. And if you’ve stayed with me for all of this, whether you agree or not, you have my thanks.

I heard NPR talking about mental health today, as if that were the big issue with gun violence.  I get more disgusted with them each time I listen.  A little while ago, a tweet came by from Counterpunch that was pretty spot on.  It quoted a tweet from the DOD in which they were gloating about their new gunship.  Counterpunch said: “The Department of Defense tweets about actually killing people like it is a sport, and some people still wonder where this country’s violence problem stems from.”  Ayep.

Of course, the reaction against the mental health obsession leads to confusion, but part of it is “mental health” and “emotional health” tend to get thrown into a big bucket that most of us don’t understand, leaving us talking about we know not what.  And this leads to places where it sounds as if disability advocates are saying that, yes, someone who opens up in a school with a semi-automatic rifle is emotionally healthy, which I’m pretty sure isn’t what they mean.  At least I hope it isn’t what they mean. But we live in an unhealthy society, one in which our leaders gloat about violence. “We came, we saw, he died,” said the Secretary of State, gleefully praising the cold-blooded murder of Gaddafi.

At the same time, police shoot down anyone they happen to feel like without punishment.  Do you know how many murdering cops were prosecuted by the DOJ over the last 16 years? Zero.  The message is clear, and you can hardly blame some poor over-stressed bastard for hearing it.

The illness of a society is, as always, manifested through individuals, some of whom, for various reasons, express it in horrific ways. Sensible gun laws? Sure. I’m pro Second Amendment, but I don’t have a problem with some reasonable limitations on military-style weapons, and making sure anyone with a firearm knows how to use it.

Also, cut it out with the idiotic arguments: Anti-gun people: pointing out that the Second Amendment was “passed by slaveholders” therefore we can get rid of it is reckless and stupid. So were the other nine. Also, you might want to remember that the most stringent gun laws this country ever saw were passed in California as a direct attack on the Black Panther Party for Self Defense.

Pro-gun people: Oh, come ON.  Thinking you can defend yourself against “the gummint” with a rifle makes as much as sense as the Dutch folktale of the woman trying to hold back the flood with a broom. And, if the Founding Fathers had somehow had the foresight to say, “A well regulated highway being essential for liberty, the right of the people to keep and drive cars shall not be infringed,” I don’t think that would have prevented states from requiring drivers licenses.

But the essential point is the one I started with: how can we expect to take on the violence in our society when it is praised, extolled, and demonstrated day after day, year after year, by those at the very top?  For the last 17 years, there has not been a day in which this country was not bombing people, and hardly a day in which a cop wasn’t shooting someone.  If you think this has nothing to do with the violence in our society, let me indulge in understatement by saying I think you are incorrect.