[Update]Amazon institutes $15 minimum wage for all US employees AND eliminates monthly bonuses and Stock Grants

[leadeater]

1 minute ago, Razor Blade said:

As in selling a product or service for more than it costs the company to make, produce, pay for, etc.

I include employee wages in that though so I guess that's partly where our context of profit differs. I typically talk about it in that way because everyone else does, when I hear the term profit to me that means all other expenses have been account for and that is the true profit.

[PocketNerd]

5 hours ago, Razor Blade said:

Businesses need skilled labor to make money... You can't expect people to jump on a machinist's position if you're not willing to pay a fair wage for it.

That's just the thing, though. On average wages have stagnated and have been the same since the 1970s (when you account for inflation) while the cost of living has outpaced that. 

[Amazonsucks]

5 hours ago, PocketNerd said:

That's just the thing, though. On average wages have stagnated and have been the same since the 1970s (when you account for inflation) while the cost of living has outpaced that. 

Thats what happens when you enter into trade deals with countries like China and ruin your domestic economy by exporting all your jobs and money and importing garbage made in a communist country that doesnt pay workers a living wage.

 

Combine that with the reduced purchasing power of the currency, which is devalued significantly more than te simply calculated "inflation" rate, and you get what we have now: shrinking middle class and people who become debt slaves starting at age 18.

 

The reduced purchasing power of the dollar is something people almost never take into consideration because its much more complex to calculate it accurately between multiple currencies, which would typically be necessary since most things are not made in the same country that theyre purchased in these days.

 

Cost of living has gone up despite consumer goods getting ever cheaper thanks to the race to the bottom that trade with communist slave labour countries has created. Why? Because in doing those trade deals, the real purchasing power of the dollar was undermined.

[Taf the Ghost]

6 hours ago, PocketNerd said:

That's just the thing, though. On average wages have stagnated and have been the same since the 1970s (when you account for inflation) while the cost of living has outpaced that. 

It should be noted that's fairly explicitly American numbers. Even Canadian numbers have been different.

[dizmo]

IMO they should be lobbying for a higher minimum wage. However, it can't all happen at once. It has to happen gradually, so that people can get used to paying a little more for their daily shopping. More people making more money means more growth. As people get more expendable income, they can spend more, which aids everyone. Really, the number of people making minimum wage generally isn't that high. If anyone thinks that prices don't go up over time, and that the only thing that raises prices is wage, then I'm sorry, but you're simply retarded. Prices on products rise on a continuous basis for many different reasons. Not increasing wages just makes it harder for companies to adapt later on when it becomes a necessity rather than a nicety.

 

Getting rid of the bonuses might very well affect those who were already making more than the minimum wage, but I doubt it affects those that were making the baseline. It's unfortunate, for sure, however you simply cannot please everyone. I'm curious, what jobs do you think will be lost due to a wage increase? Perhaps some shops would run with fewer employees, but if that's the case chances are those employees weren't vital anyway, and a smart business wouldn't have them employed.

 

Interesting point: the average wage in the US and Canada is relatively close, however the cost of goods and services in Canada is significantly higher. Canada has a much higher minimum wage. Our country is doing just fine, I highly doubt a higher minimum wage would destroy the US.

 

Also I sorry (not sorry) to those who can't handle when people use the multi-quote feature. This will be large.

On 10/7/2018 at 2:11 PM, NowakVulpix said:

If a company can increase wages to $15/hour across the board without any major issues propping up from doing so, then perhaps there's no reason to not increase the minimum wage to $15/hour after all.

I don't think the issue is so much raising it to that level, it's raising it to that level quickly. If they'd been raising it bit by bit over the years, it'd be perfectly fine.

On 10/7/2018 at 2:36 PM, imreloadin said:

*uses second trillion dollar company as the metric for the entire country*

 

Yeah...this will work out great

If this were to happen I forsee a large uptick in the unemployment rate. $15 an hour puts the cost of an employee for just wages at $31,200 annually. For that price per employee you're looking at a whole lotta automation implementation.

The calculation would actually put it closer to $40k. Generally you take an employees salary x 1.4 to get their employment cost. In Canada, at least, maybe it's less in the US because you don't pay into as many benefits. Let's be real though, the automation was coming regardless of what you're paying the employee, because no employee is better than an employee every single time.

On 10/7/2018 at 4:08 PM, Arika S said:

I'm not sure how i feel about this.

 

On one hand a higher minimum wage is good...but at the expense of benefits if not great.

 

They should give their employees the option for what suits them best

1. higher wage, no benefits.
2. Keep the same that they have

You generally want to keep things as simple as possible when it comes to paperwork and such, that would create such a clusterfuck. Plus, you'd have people disgruntled over how others are making more money. Honestly though, the higher wage is likely to make them more money than bonuses.

On 10/7/2018 at 4:18 PM, ARikozuM said:

Large corporations should be paying more to their employees. Raising the minimum wage would do more harm to brick and mortar/mom-pop stores that can't really afford or don't have the scope that Amazon does. I'm all for a minimum wage increase for larger corporations, but not for small independents (even though quite a few of them already pay more than Amazon per hour). 

  

This is simply a chess play for Bezos. Eliminate competition by increasing the single highest budget item (man-hours) and swallow the newly released customers. 

 

Also, "eliminating bonuses"? Are we supposed to feel sorry that Amazon won't be giving an extra $100 to an employee on a yearly or quarterly basis? Seriously? He'll make that bonus up in a week or two with this pay-raise. 

The problem with that is companies would just run fewer employees. Thus, more stress for said employees. Raising the minimum wage will affect them in the short term, but you adapt and overcome. Raise prices, better scheduling, etc. The only issue would be if you went from say $7 to $15 an hour all at once, not if it gradually increased.

 

Aye, I thought that was an odd thing to be mad about. The hiring bonus would hurt a bit,

On 10/7/2018 at 4:26 PM, DrMacintosh said:

Something people must realize is the percentage of people that are negatively impacted by this wage increase is very small. Those who will be losing stock options and benefits and the like are the vast minority of Amazon employees. This wage increase is a good thing by any objective measure. 

 

As for the concerns about the minimum wage increase potentially doing more harm than good......there are a few things you must understand. 

 

The most notable of which is that US wages have not gone up relative to productivity and inflation. Wages should be at about $21 an hour. Corporations and bad politicians have insured that people are used to low wages and fear what could happen if people were paid what they should be paid. 

 

The second issue with people concered about the minimum wage is job security. Automation is taking over, and eventually the US and other nations will have to move to a Universal Basic income otherwise the world economy will be unable to function. 

 

Here are some interesting videos that you should watch if you would like to here this from people with a little more info on the topic:

This comment was created with an economic mindset, not a political one. Though a distinction between the two is rarely possible. 

Wow. Something we agree on. Where's my calendar...

UBI is absolutely something that's going to have to come into play as we eliminate jobs due to automation and AI working it's way into society. 

 

The minimum wage is a huge issue, but I don't think there's an easy fix. It should have been raised gradually; companies and individuals can adapt to that. They have a much harder time adapting to sudden change.

 

Honestly, I feel sorry for anyone living in the US over the next few decades. The US can't even agree on a healthcare system that takes care of it's most vulnerable, sick and dying. Let alone something that essentially pays people to do nothing. There's going to be much unrest, and considering most people's stance on healthcare, there's no way that something like UBI is going to be accepted by the majority. Maybe we'll actually see the JTF2 deployed in US cities to quell unrest.

On 10/7/2018 at 5:41 PM, Clanscorpia said:

No, just... no. Living wage is 18.21 Canadian in Toronto. If you cant afford to live in a big city dont live there. 21 dollars an hour is absolutely abhorrent. My grandpas butcher shop almost closed down when our minimum wage was hiked to 14 dollars, I couldnt imagine what would happen to small business if it was hiked to 27. It's like people want corporatism

Interesting concept, but extremely flawed. How do you plan to have people working in grocery stores, retail stores, restaurants, etc when they can't afford to live in the city? Those people move to outlying areas, or different cities. Then get jobs there, because it's closer to home; few people will commute great distances for a minimum wage job.

I can't imagine that a business can't operate when the minimum wage was increased. He didn't have a similar issue in 2010?

Moreover, how do you expect said people to afford to move, if they can barely make ends meet?

 

Living wages aren't universal, so quoting one and saying $21 is ridiculous is baseless. Though, to be fair, saying $21 is what it should be is just as incorrect.

On 10/7/2018 at 5:44 PM, DrMacintosh said:

I’m talking US dollars. Not Canadian dollars. 

In the US the federal and many state minimum wages are set to $7.25. Not a living wage. 

Well, it is in some areas. It's not in all though. That's why a national minimum wage is such a tricky thing, especially in places like the US where there's such a massive difference from living in say New York City compared to the deep south. Cities like London have shown you can have living wages based on where you are, but that's a hard thing for many to come to terms with.

On 10/7/2018 at 5:59 PM, Razor Blade said:

If people want a living wage, they need to not make a career out of a minimum wage job.

 

If labor costs go up, something must be adjusted to balance. Whether it is eliminating positions, eliminating employee benefits, discontinuing services, raising prices, or some other way it must balance so the business is still profitable.

So, how do they afford school if they can't get a job that pays decently? Not everyone has the luxury of living at home, working for a while, and then going to school. Especially in the US, where schooling is so expensive.

On 10/7/2018 at 6:19 PM, imreloadin said:

This, people have only their own laziness to thabk for not advancing in life. Personally the thought of automation becoming widespread in the food service industry sounds glorious, maybe then I'll finally get my damn food the way I ordered it...

That's a very, very narrow way to view that and is not at all accurate.

Totally agree with the automation though, it's the only way to order. Plus if I want to make alterations (or, let's be real, order 2 meals for myself) I don't feel the judgement!

On 10/7/2018 at 6:22 PM, Dan Castellaneta said:

Something people seem to miss with wage hikes is how small businesses and self-starters cope with it; just because a giant ass corporation like Amazon can handle it doesn't mean a small mom-and-pop shop can, and they usually can't if they're incredibly dramatic.

If not done over time, absolutely. The US should have been slowly increasing it over time; I'm really not sure why they've kept it so low for so long.

On 10/7/2018 at 6:27 PM, Razor Blade said:

Funny you should mention that... There was a news story not that long ago about self service kiosks popping up at fast food restaurants like McDonald's. I wonder how many cashiers will lose their job if $15/hr federal minimum wage becomes a thing?

 

Not just small shops either... paid internships and other entry level positions at larger businesses will likely suffer if companies have to shell out $15/hr... Those many entry level positions could turn into fewer "experience required" positions real quick...

Not as many as you'd think. The McDonalds around here added more staff to the kitchen, as well as offer table service. They also keep one till open. It's only reducing maybe 3 or 4 jobs per shift, which have been subb'd in other areas. $15/hr isn't that big of an issue. It will affect certain sectors, but as for the job market as a whole, I'd imagine the actual affected number of people is quite low in comparison to the general working populous.

On 10/7/2018 at 6:50 PM, imreloadin said:

They were in the Fort Lauderdale area when I was there and I always went to them. Now only if I could get a machine to make them for me...

The thing that kills me is when people that are for a higher minimum wage say crap like "Well if they can't provide a "living wage" then they shouldn't be in business"...because you know what is worse than making a low wage? Not making one at all because your employer went under due to having to pay people double the amount for menial labor that middle schoolers could do. I honestly have no words for people who think they're arguing for the "little guy" when all they're doing is screwing them over. Do they honestly think that forcing everyone to pay double the amount as a minimum will help people that have managed to somehow not develop any marketable skills their entire lives?

 

And don't give me any shit about how they're "disenfranchised" and can't get ahead because they're too poor to afford to go college or whatever. Nearly every town has some kind of public library with things full of useful information called books as well as internet access and it's all for FREE! I used to work in a call center making $10 an hour, I didn't like the lifestyle it gave me so I started messing around with computers and LEARNED something useful which got me switched to a different department in that call center doing a level one help desk role which gave me a whopping $4 raise. I continued to learn more and got hired by a different company as a desktop technician making $22.50 an hour. I have never stopped learning and won't ever stop. That's the only way you can get ahead in life. When I go out to lunch and see adults working at the local Wendy's I can't help but wonder how they've managed to stay in that position.

Honestly, in the bigger scheme of things, the entire retail sector is changing. It's something that retailers are going to have to adapt to, and not many are doing that gracefully. So yes, those places will cease to exist. Honestly, I wouldn't be surprised if in the next 10 to 20 years, we see most retail locations for physical goods close, or simply have a couple of showrooms with one or two staff members to make sure people don't walk out the door with their stuff. Even then...something that could be done by a decent security system.

 

$15/hr for a small percentage of the workforce isn't a huge issue, when it's done gradually. All at once, sure, issues. But it's not an issue if it happens over time. Other countries can do it that have similar average wages, so can the US. It's better for everyone; do you think these people making minimum wage are likely to invest much into home repairs? Or high priced electronics? Or any number of things that people that make a higher wage are trying to sell?

 

Call centers are largely outsourced. Not every community has them. So while it worked for you, that doesn't mean it works for everyone, or that everyone has that opportunity. That's a real asinine thing to say. Not only that, even if they all wanted to do that and applied...do you really think they'd all get the jobs? There's just that many call center jobs out there?

 

Believe it or not, not everyone has the same life experiences you do.

On 10/8/2018 at 1:19 AM, AluminiumTech said:

I'm confused.

 

If minimum wage isn't designed to be a living wage then what the hell are they doing? Many people have to live off of minimum wage whether a state has a higher one than the federal government or not.

Minimum wage is a wage set by law that's the minimum amount you can pay someone. It doesn't really factor anything in.

 

Living wage has no universal set definition, however many countries define it as a wage where someone who works 40 hours doesn't need additional income and can cover housing, food, transportation, child care, health care, utilities, and some savings. Some places include the consideration for a family of 4.

 

As you can imagine living wage varies drastically not only country to country, but also region to region, and even city to city.

On 10/8/2018 at 2:52 AM, Deli said:

Wages isn't the only expenses of businesses. Depends on what kind of busness. Labour costs isn't always the biggest expense for a business. Like for transportation, fuels is the biggest one.

 

What happens if petroleum price goes up to $100+ like a decade ago? The cost for transport, the energy bills will go up, the prices of products from distribution will go up. How do you deal with that? If minimum wage increases is enough to close a business. Other factors like increase of energy prices, rent and the upcoming increase of interest rate will definitely kill the business. I mean, if a business is surviving on such thin margin that can't handle a increase of minimum wage. It's such a bad business model. It'll go out of business very soon one way or another.

While you are correct, labor is generally the largest expense that you have direct control over. Since most businesses that are affected by minimum wages are ones that require a lot of staff (retail, restaurants, etc) it has a higher impact on them. Interestingly, a lot of retail stores don't actually have a great margin to them, relying more on volume than margin.

On 10/8/2018 at 2:54 AM, Stefan Payne said:

Depends on the Job.

What people don't seem to get is the "worth of a job". 

And what happens if you increase the payment of a job, although it isn't worth it.

There are two things happening:

a) Inflation

b) getting fired

 

That is what will happen!

 

You can also call a) "cost of living", so in regions with high minimum wages, you will high prices for everything, including toilet paper. Or Rent.

Because you devalue the worth of the money!! In the beginning of the 20th century, people earned like 50 Cents an Hour. If they were lucky. But the Prices of the Rest was according to the hourly wage.

 

So for low skilled work, it means that they will loose their Job!

The Automation of for example McDonalds is a consequence of the feared 15$/h Wage.
Because the work of the cashier (or the people in the kitchen is not worth 15$/h). 

 

So buttom line is:
The higher the wages, the more viable is a Robot.

The lower the wage, the less likely it is to use a Robot because its too expensive and not worth it...

Not really. Where I live now cost of living is substantially lower than where I lived before. Know what costs the same? Pretty much everything in terms of consumables. Clothing costs just as much, as does food. So does toilet paper. Rent is also not tied to minimum wage. Rent where I live is almost half where I lived before, but the minimum wage is $4 higher. Rental pricing is tied both to desirability and housing costs.

 

Automation in McDonalds and other sectors like that isn't due to fear of raising minimum wages, it's coming because it's not feasible. Those jobs were never going to be around forever, and as more things become automated, fewer and fewer jobs will exist. It's also not confined to the entry level either; we're nearing a time when highly educated people will be displaced by AI and automation because they can simply do a better job.

 

Where your argument holds true is small business, where a robot is expensive. However that's a very small percentage.

On 10/8/2018 at 6:53 AM, Drak3 said:

When introduced, minimum wage was 'living wage,' which was the wage which one could live in a reasonable amount of comfort.

Now, minimum wage is just the absolute minimum required to survive.

Even then it's not always true. It's so dependent on where you live.

On 10/8/2018 at 8:43 AM, Podo said:

Raising the Minimum wage in my belief will have negative affects on low skilled workers.  Why should a business pay someone $15/hr($31,200/yr) to print tickets at the movie theater?  Say they Spend $50,000 on a kiosk to print those tickets.  They just broke even on their investment after 1.5yr.  

I acknowledge minimum wage jobs aren't all filled by 15 and 16yr olds.  There are also plenty of jobs out there where you don't need a college level education to achieve $15-20/hr starting and $20-30/hr after a few experience. Sure those jobs may involve manual labor, landscaping, construction, etc.  But they offer good pay and some even offer pretty good benefits. Minimum wage jobs are more to simply show a potential employer, "hey I can show up on time, do the job I'm asked to do, and keep on coming back." once that is established someone should either seek more responsibilities and thus become more valuable to their current employer (shift lead, manager, store manager, etc.) or find better employment opportunities.

 

By increasing the minimum wage you reduce wage competition between employers.  If all employers are locked into a base wage level it is now ILLEGAL for an employee to ask for a lower wage to simply gain experience.  How is a 16yr kid with zero experience supposed to convince an employer he is worth the higher minimum wage.  Lets talk about a person who did something dumb which got them thrown in jail (something non-violent, like drug possession) now they have a mark on their record and can't get employment because of it.  Even if they were willing to work for below the minimum wage to just show they are a good citizen now and are responsible, they can't because it is ILLEGAL to be paid under the minimum wage, which the employee is WILLING to take.  I'm not going to say the minimum wage hurts the poor because that is a straw man argument.  I will say it reduces the marketability of unskilled/non-skilled workers.  Why does Wal-mart have to pay their greeters (someone who literally stands at the front and says "Hi") $15/hr?  What if that person is willing to do it for $5/hr?  That would be ILLEGAL for Wal-mart to pay them so low.

I am not ignoring there are people who currently try to live off of a minimum wage job.  I acknowledge this fact.  Yet I believe for the majority of those doing so, they can get themselves out of that position.  And I acknowledge there are those with medical issues which hinders their marketable skills which can stunt their potential wage growth.  But they are the exceptions to the overall rule, and you shouldn't make laws and regulations because of the exceptions.

They're going to replace those workers with kiosks regardless of how little it costs, because kiosks will always be more cost effective down the line. That's a rather irrelevant argument.

 

Yes, there are lots of jobs like that. However, you must realize that they're not infinite, and once filled, there will still be a demand for other work. Also, not everyone is capable of physical labor, or has the intelligence to do construction work. Not only is there a percentage of people with medical disabilities that prevent them from working better jobs, there is a large percentage (somewhere around 7% IIRC) that can't be gainfully employed at all. Considering that, it's not hard to imagine that there's about 10%+ of people that can only work minimum wage jobs due to their IQ.

 

Just because the wage goes up doesn't mean that those locations no longer need employees. They will still hire people. Also, statistically fewer and fewer teens are looking for employment before going off to college so the pool of people that affects is even smaller. You done fucked up and got a criminal record? Sorry, that's your own fault, and your own fault alone.

 

Walmart pays their door greeters higher wages because they double as store security.

 

It really depends how low the minimum is, and this is where I think the fault is. Even at $12/hr, you can generally save and get education to get a better job. However at wages as low as $7.25, in a lot of places that's simply not possible. I don't understand why you keep saying it's illegal to pay people less. That's always been true, that's nothing new.

21 hours ago, Amazonsucks said:

You know what would help people economically even more than bs minimum wage laws? If companies like amazon that are on taxpayer funded corporate welfare, whose workers are often on food stamps, with a CEO whose the richest man in the world were replaced with something better.

 

Instead, its the other way around, where a shitbag company like amazon has replaced everything good. Its taken the role of walmart for: going into a community, wrecking local business with the help of taxpayer funding, then making the same people who got screwed over so dependent on them that, not only is it the only place they can afford to shop but a lot of them end up working there and hating it.

 

People manufacture the weapons for their own destruction every time they shop at a place like amazon or buy shit from countries that theyll likely be at war with soon like china.

While in some ways your points make sense, they seem to ignore one of the most important aspects of Amazon; the face of retail is changing. People are going online to purchase things more and more often, as it saves a great deal of time and spent resources. Retail stores will continue to close, and fewer and fewer will exist as we go forward. Amazon, while part of the reason, is not the sole reason that this is happening. I know several chains that are actively working towards online only models, with maybe one or two display locations in major cities. As a business you can adapt to the changing landscape, or cease to exist.

 

[Nowak]

5 minutes ago, dizmo said:

I don't think the issue is so much raising it to that level, it's raising it to that level quickly. If they'd been raising it bit by bit over the years, it'd be perfectly fine.

So like what we're doing here in Massachusetts. Gradually raising the minimum wage from $11 to $15.

[dizmo]

Just now, NowakVulpix said:

So like what we're doing here in Massachusetts. Gradually raising the minimum wage from $11 to $15.

Exactly. I think in Canada the minimum wage is raised roughly every 2-3 years (depending on the province).

[Amazonsucks]

50 minutes ago, dizmo said:

Exactly. I think in Canada the minimum wage is raised roughly every 2-3 years (depending on the province).

Im not going to quote your wall of text but literally everything you said about minimum wage, canada's economy and healthcare are diametrically opposed to reality.

 

 

[Trixanity]

17 minutes ago, Amazonsucks said:

Im not going to quote your wall of text but literally everything you said about minimum wage, canada's economy and healthcare are diametrically opposed to reality.

 

 

Oh boy...

[Amazonsucks]

50 minutes ago, Trixanity said:

Oh boy...

Dud you just assume a gender?

 

Also, this thread is full of "ooh Amazon is just doing a better job and is 'capitalism at work'".

 

Which is complete BS. Amazon relies on corporate welfare, government subsidies that enable them to operate at a loss, overworking their employees Foxconn lite style, poaching and a myriad of other unethical and totally anti capitalist business practices which are well documented.

 

Amazon is not capitalist at all. Bezos is not a capitalist. Hes the richest welfare queen of all.

[ARikozuM]

1 hour ago, Amazonsucks said:

Im not going to quote your wall of text but literally everything you said about minimum wage, canada's economy and healthcare are diametrically opposed to reality.

 

 

Does Ben Shapiro really think a company would pay more if these people didn't have a social program helping them?

[imreloadin]

1 hour ago, dizmo said:

The calculation would actually put it closer to $40k. Generally you take an employees salary x 1.4 to get their employment cost. In Canada, at least, maybe it's less in the US because you don't pay into as many benefits. Let's be real though, the automation was coming regardless of what you're paying the employee, because no employee is better than an employee every single time.

Hence why I said "for just wages" ergo no other benefits being taken into account...

 

1 hour ago, dizmo said:

Call centers are largely outsourced. Not every community has them. So while it worked for you, that doesn't mean it works for everyone, or that everyone has that opportunity. That's a real asinine thing to say. Not only that, even if they all wanted to do that and applied...do you really think they'd all get the jobs? There's just that many call center jobs out there?

 

Believe it or not, not everyone has the same life experiences you do.

Ok, so the area someone is in doesn't have a call center. So what? It's not like that is literally the only way for someone to get into the IT industry. Obviously paths will vary based on your local area. What the real asinine thing here is that you're trying to take my personal experience and extrapolate that to everyone, and to think you said I had a narrow point of view earlier in your post. In that post I was talking about MY life, there are a plethora of other fields out there that people can take to make a decent living. Believe it or not there are other careers that people can choose to get ahead in life, not just IT. You know how much master plumbers or master electricians make? On average $53,664 and $56,596 respectively with the top 10 percent making over $80K. It all depends on what you like/want to do.

[Amazonsucks]

19 minutes ago, ARikozuM said:

Does Ben Shapiro really think a company would pay more if these people didn't have a social program helping them?

Not sure, and i dont agree with everything he says about economics. Like many others, i think he fails to realize the impact that often ignored factors have on real purchasing power.

 

Our society has been morally and financially bankrupted to the point that slavery is legal in 2018 and so long as its done in another country, buying the products of slave labour is acceptable.

 

Not only that, but the companies that engage in the MOST anti capitalist behavior are cited as "capitalism at work" in both a positive and negative connotation.

 

Bezos is seen as a hero to aspire to, while he tries to institute a Foxconn like dehumanization of his expendable workers. While he puts legitimate businesses that DONT get BILLIONS in government assistance like Bezos does, idiots cheer and say that "those old businesses didnt adapt!"

 

To anyone who says something as blatantly psychotically out of touch with reality as that, please go study economics through the lens of complexity theory instead of the brainwashing they do in university. Learn what a fitness landscape and phase space is, then come back and see if you can keep a straight face when you say that.

 

To them i ask: adaptation involves exploiting taxpayers or workers now? When has that been considerd "capitalist"? 

 

 

[Taf the Ghost]

Just now, Amazonsucks said:

Not sure, and i dont agree with everything he says about economics. Like many others, i think he fails to realize the impact that often ignored factors have on real purchasing power.

 

Our society has been morally and financially bankrupted to the point that slavery is legal in 2018 and so long as its done in another country, buying the products of slave labour is acceptable.

 

Not only that, but the companies that engage in the MOST anti capitalist behavior are cited as "capitalism at work" in both a positjve and negative connotation.

 

Bezos is seen as a hero to aspire to, while he tries to institute a Foxconn like dehumanization of his expendable workers. While he puts legitimate businesses that DONT get BILLIONS in government assistance like Bezos does, idiots cheer and say that "those old businesses didnt adapt!"

 

To anyone who says something as blatantly psychotically out of touch with reality as that, please go study economics through the lens of complexity theory instead of the brainwashing they do in university. Learn what a fitness landscape and phase space is, then come back and see if you can keep a straight face when you say that.

 

 

They use a fake opposition, Divide & Conquer approach to control the narratives around this stuff. You applaud the new "Robber Barons" when the only "viable" option is full blown Venezuela-style destruction of the economy. It's a rather common practice. Render the 2 loudest voices as "not great" and "Hell on Earth", then attack anyone that tries to improve the "not great" option. You eventually leave only two available choices, so suddenly everyone really only has one option to choose from.

 

It's worked wonders on Trade, certain social topics and general Political Order approaches. It tends to fail badly when the "not good" option is run by nutjobs. "Climate Change" is the biggest, most recent example. Yes, the Climate is in continuous flux, but screaming "THE END IS NIGH!" while being wrong constantly shoots whatever solutions you're offering in the foot. At worst, it's an engineering problem that could be dealt with, but we got another round of "you have to become Communists to stop the end of the world!" just this week. Note how the narratives have collapsed around that? Don't let the nutjobs run your engineered "only viable option".

 

The ones that's are rapidly falling apart is the interrelated "Free Trade" and "Globalism". Free Trade is actually a subset of Globalism, even if Ricardian "Free Trade" actually could never work logically. But, Free Trade was never about the "Free" part or really even the "Trade" part. It was a wonderfully constructed narrative for extracting the wealth from the productive sectors and moving it to the Financial sector via financing & interest payments. It was far more about hiding the creation of a world-wide Cartel System, such that nearly every raw product is operated within controlled markets. It's a weird combination of the East India Trading Company and the New York Mafia circa 1960.

 

At some level, I can appreciate the impressive deviousness of the approach. It's theft on a generational scale and it's going to be driving wars for the next century, so I have little sympathy when it starts to blowback on the groups that implemented it. But it's still impressive what some planning, high-level coordination and shameless lying can accomplish. Though once you realize that the Economies are engineered by small factions for their massive benefit, at the direct cost to the mass majority, it's a lot easier to understand why these same factions really are the cause of most of the troubles. There's a reason "Nationalism" is rising almost everywhere. It's a prelude to removal of the Globalists, who really haven't grasped that's going to happen far sooner than they expect.

 

This is also why the Internet Censorship is so important to these factions. Via the Internet, it's quite easy to get around the narrative and question the assumptions. Can't have 65% of the population realizing they've been screwed to benefit 5% of it. Or that their leadership have been utterly corrupted by foreign actors. Local corruption is one thing; treason is a very different one.

[Amazonsucks]

@Taf the Ghost well said

[Taf the Ghost]

28 minutes ago, Amazonsucks said:

@Taf the Ghost well said

Thanks. One could find it depressing that this will be the dominant political issue across the globe for the rest of the lives of everyone reading this. Barring a comet impact. However, I tend to view it as being useful to know what's coming. It's extremely valuable to know what the future holds with pretty good certainty. It also let's you get the Hell out of Dodge before things get too bad.

[Amazonsucks]

2 hours ago, Taf the Ghost said:

Thanks. One could find it depressing that this will be the dominant political issue across the globe for the rest of the lives of everyone reading this. Barring a comet impact. However, I tend to view it as being useful to know what's coming. It's extremely valuable to know what the future holds with pretty good certainty. It also let's you get the Hell out of Dodge before things get too bad.

Exactly why ive dedicated much of my life to studying just that. 

 

Most people either cant see that theyre being used, and essentially laughed at by the ruling class(like Bezos, Gates, Zuck) or they suffer from the false consensus that its good to be ignorant. 

 

They end up being part of the destructive feedback loop.

 

"Oh you dont like Apple for using brutal slave labour or Amazon for destroying legitimate businesses? Youre a tinfoil hat nut job!"

 

Then they go off to learn about how evil slavery is in school or how evil moderately wealthy or upper middle class people are. While using literal slave made electronics, sweatshop clotges and shoes, living in a house made of toxic Chinese drywall.

[TacoSenpai]

I have to wonder.  How automation and the potential for that to effectively eliminate most if not all of the minimum wage jobs at a place like Amazon figured into their calculus of this. 

[dizmo]

18 hours ago, Amazonsucks said:

Im not going to quote your wall of text but literally everything you said about minimum wage, canada's economy and healthcare are diametrically opposed to reality.

 

 

I think his argument is more for jumping to $15 right away. Which I agree with, would be detrimental. It has to be done over time. I don't think anyone who thinks reasonably would argue that point. At the same time, I don't see how one could say that giving the lowest members of the employment rung more money is a bad thing. He ties it to economic growth, while the President claims it's the best it's ever been. Therefore one could assume with a booming economy, there'd be room to give the lowest earners more money. Though, Trump's numbers are a bit skewed, and a lot of people have pointed out the decline of the US over the past 50 years.

 

The US healthcare system is broken. Virtually every other country does a better job.

17 hours ago, Amazonsucks said:

Dud you just assume a gender?

 

Also, this thread is full of "ooh Amazon is just doing a better job and is 'capitalism at work'".

 

Which is complete BS. Amazon relies on corporate welfare, government subsidies that enable them to operate at a loss, overworking their employees Foxconn lite style, poaching and a myriad of other unethical and totally anti capitalist business practices which are well documented.

 

Amazon is not capitalist at all. Bezos is not a capitalist. Hes the richest welfare queen of all.

While that might be some people's argument, it's valid...in a way. Retail sales are moving online, and retailers need to adapt to that. Some are doing it in odd ways, like The Gap (I can go online and order it for 40% off...but they don't offer the same discount in store), but it's something all retailers at least need to start moving towards.

Amazon is simply offering what people want. Retail needs to realize this.

 

I'm assuming the "assuming gender" bit was a joke

17 hours ago, imreloadin said:

Hence why I said "for just wages" ergo no other benefits being taken into account...

 

Ok, so the area someone is in doesn't have a call center. So what? It's not like that is literally the only way for someone to get into the IT industry. Obviously paths will vary based on your local area. What the real asinine thing here is that you're trying to take my personal experience and extrapolate that to everyone, and to think you said I had a narrow point of view earlier in your post. In that post I was talking about MY life, there are a plethora of other fields out there that people can take to make a decent living. Believe it or not there are other careers that people can choose to get ahead in life, not just IT. You know how much master plumbers or master electricians make? On average $53,664 and $56,596 respectively with the top 10 percent making over $80K. It all depends on what you like/want to do.

Aye, but it still reflects an even higher cost to the employer.

 

No, it's not, and it's not the only career path either, but what I'm saying is there are many, many parts of the US that simply have no alternative. There's nowhere to go except minimum wage jobs (or I suppose the military, which is used as a mechanic to boost those with few options) and they're left with a dead end. I'm actually not, you're trying to take your personal experience and use it as a "why can't others do this, I don't understand." You literally said you don't understand why people stay in minimum wage jobs. Just trying to point out that advancement isn't always as easy as it was for you.

[Taf the Ghost]

6 hours ago, LordOTaco said:

I have to wonder.  How automation and the potential for that to effectively eliminate most if not all of the minimum wage jobs at a place like Amazon figured into their calculus of this. 

The little thing missed in the automation pushes is that most of the jobs that can be actually automated have left the Western countries over the last 30 years. This is what "offshoring" actually did. The big threat from automation is in large scale factories out of China, not the Western countries. 

 

Then people don't really want to discuss the Capital Expenses required for further automation in most fields. Automating something requires a lot of engineering time, and a lot of that engineering time doesn't scale well for the results. It makes it far more effective to have a nimble production approaches in a lot of fields, as a result. Good engineering is always expensive and we're already at the limits of how many good engineers can be produced. (It's a fairly small fraction of any population set that can do it well, so there isn't some wave of millions of new engineers you're going to find anywhere.) 

 

The problem with the "disruption model" that most of Silicon Valley is currently settled into funding is that it really isn't economically productive for an economy. World-wide shipping systems are incredibly effective & efficient already, even the taxi service clearance costs haven't changed from the Uber/Lyft approach. Granted, the SV model is more about burning up inflation, now, than it is about improving the world via technology. Not that they'll tell you that.

[Trixanity]

A country doesn't necessarily need a minimum wage by law but that's a huge asterisk. Like so many other things, if the market doesn't regulate itself the law needs to step in at some point. If the bottom of society gets stuck while the rest is on an upswing then something's wrong especially if inflation isn't accounted for.

If Amazon can swim in cash, then the least they could do it skim some off the top and throw the scraps to their employees making it possible.

 

No minimum wage here but I reckon you'd struggle to find a job making less than $15/hr.

[Trixanity]

2 minutes ago, Taf the Ghost said:

The little thing missed in the automation pushes is that most of the jobs that can be actually automated have left the Western countries over the last 30 years. This is what "offshoring" actually did. The big threat from automation is in large scale factories out of China, not the Western countries. 

 

Then people don't really want to discuss the Capital Expenses required for further automation in most fields. Automating something requires a lot of engineering time, and a lot of that engineering time doesn't scale well for the results. It makes it far more effective to have a nimble production approaches in a lot of fields, as a result. Good engineering is always expensive and we're already at the limits of how many good engineers can be produced. (It's a fairly small fraction of any population set that can do it well, so there isn't some wave of millions of new engineers you're going to find anywhere.) 

 

The problem with the "disruption model" that most of Silicon Valley is currently settled into funding is that it really isn't economically productive for an economy. World-wide shipping systems are incredibly effective & efficient already, even the taxi service clearance costs haven't changed from the Uber/Lyft approach. Granted, the SV model is more about burning up inflation, now, than it is about improving the world via technology. Not that they'll tell you that.

I know some businesses have decided that it's better to move everything back home and do it with automation. Less risk, more control and generally better quality. 

 

I suspect this is highly industry dependent though. If I recall correctly this was for highly specialized equipment. 

 

It's easy to get burned in China if you lack experience and networking. I've heard quite a few stories of being screwed over with no recourse.

[TacoSenpai]

13 minutes ago, Taf the Ghost said:

The little thing missed in the automation pushes is that most of the jobs that can be actually automated have left the Western countries over the last 30 years. This is what "offshoring" actually did. The big threat from automation is in large scale factories out of China, not the Western countries. 

 

Then people don't really want to discuss the Capital Expenses required for further automation in most fields. Automating something requires a lot of engineering time, and a lot of that engineering time doesn't scale well for the results. It makes it far more effective to have a nimble production approaches in a lot of fields, as a result. Good engineering is always expensive and we're already at the limits of how many good engineers can be produced. (It's a fairly small fraction of any population set that can do it well, so there isn't some wave of millions of new engineers you're going to find anywhere.) 

 

The problem with the "disruption model" that most of Silicon Valley is currently settled into funding is that it really isn't economically productive for an economy. World-wide shipping systems are incredibly effective & efficient already, even the taxi service clearance costs haven't changed from the Uber/Lyft approach. Granted, the SV model is more about burning up inflation, now, than it is about improving the world via technology. Not that they'll tell you that.

Still even if stuff gets off shored to cut the costs of a high minimum wage I can see a trillion dollar company like Amazon still automating what it can domestically to further reduce costs and I doubt most engineers out there would mind working for Amazon.  Either way its all gasoline on the fire and I don't think anyone in the world is ready for it and yes it will impact the highly populated countries the worst (China, India, US). 

 

I would be pretty surprised if this did not factor into their decision in some way. 

[Taf the Ghost]

24 minutes ago, Trixanity said:

I know some businesses have decided that it's better to move everything back home and do it with automation. Less risk, more control and generally better quality. 

 

I suspect this is highly industry dependent though. If I recall correctly this was for highly specialized equipment. 

 

It's easy to get burned in China if you lack experience and networking. I've heard quite a few stories of being screwed over with no recourse.

"On-shoring". It's already a "thing", and the ones that got into early will reap the benefits because trade barriers are going to continue to go up. And, as you mentioned, it's because of automation. If you need 100 people to manage a factory, it's a lot better to have it near you, in the same time zones, speaking the same language and with the best HVAC & C&C system infrastructure available. Most offshoring wasn't actually a productivity increase. It was a cost-base decrease from Currency Differential. If you develop a system of production, you can replicate between 85-95% of the productivity in another country. (Assuming sufficient infrastructure; you aren't building a car plant in the Sahara, for instance.) That's really what happened. The multi-nationals were able to keep the USA from imposing proper adjustments on a major amount of import categories, thus a company could move production off shore and make a line-item "profit" as a result. (In net economic activity, it was normally negative and notice many of those big manufacturers barely exist anymore. Huh.)

 

There's a reason Tesla has built its factories were it is. There's a reason Foxconn, one of the top-tier Chinese companies, is opening huge production facilities in the USA. There are some products that'll never be cost effective to produce all over the world. (LCD panels is a pretty good example of this.) These are usually physically light products that ship well, as a result nearly all world-wide production can be done by a small number of companies in 1 location. Anything physically heavy, slow to produce or requiring huge capital expenses will normally favor local production with a moderate amount of export. 

 

This is why Export Economies are always weak, as the exports are built off refining products that others produce. It's a slightly more effective version of a Tourist Economy. What makes the USA such an oddity is that the export is in raw materials, food & energy. The core American industries are *always* necessary and economically viable, which is what makes the internal American Market so important for all manufacturing exporters. And why so much effort has been focused on making sure Americans get pillaged.

23 minutes ago, LordOTaco said:

Still even if stuff gets off shored to cut the costs of a high minimum wage I can see a trillion dollar company like Amazon still automating what it can domestically to further reduce costs and I doubt most engineers out there would mind working for Amazon.  Either way its all gasoline on the fire and I don't think anyone in the world is ready for it and yes it will impact the highly populated countries the worst (China, India, US). 

 

I would be pretty surprised if this did not factor into their decision in some way. 

Engineering is a field of mercenaries now, but they still don't like moving their families if they can avoid it. Amazon will automate what it can, but they still package products and ship them. They're a logistics company at their base, which is why everything revolves around that, but there is always limits on how efficient they can get at things. As it stands, they've been hiring around the country as they expand their local distribution network.

 

Companies have always been trimming where they can. Only in the best of time are margins "great" in an industry. And, if they are great, you'll have competition really fast. A look at the amount of employees that used to be necessary for Steel production is a good study. The core industry, steel, is still economically important, but the physical requirements necessary to produce it has shifted from physical labor to specialized industrial tasks. That still takes a lot of humans, but it comes through secondary industries that filter into the core industry. As much as the actual companies that produce the steel employ less than 20% of the people at their peak (but produce far more steel), all of those secondary industries necessary to make that more efficient production employee a lot of people in a more spread out region. 

 

This is the discussion that gets hidden when discussing these topics. The issue isn't if GM employees less people but makes more cars, the problem is when all of the part production has been moved to other countries. The economic activity leaves the local economy and those productivity improvements aren't realized within the local economy. This is one of the reasons productivity measures keep rising, but wages stopped moving in tandem. (There are other reasons that go with this, but that's a bit too far most, at the moment.) It's literally exporting economic growth to other countries, but the Financial Sector gets to make money on all sides of the transactions. That's much of the "game". It moves money into some very isolated industries in the few big financial cities, but they use that money to further extract wealth from more people. Finance never creates wealth; it either protects it or is a vehicle so it can be produced. This is also another divide that's starting to show up within politics across the globe. Where does that Financially Engineered Wealth get centralized? What do political fault lines look like in most countries? You'll rapidly notice the relationship. 

[Mooshi]

On 10/8/2018 at 12:19 AM, AluminiumTech said:

I'm confused.

 

If minimum wage isn't designed to be a living wage then what the hell are they doing? Many people have to live off of minimum wage whether a state has a higher one than the federal government or not.

 I've never fortunately had a job that paid minimum, but I knew people who did and that little amount is atrocious. No, flipping cheeseburgers isn't worth $15 an hour, especially when my damn receipt said no onions and the donkey put onions on it anyway. But a little above 7 usd an hour is a joke.