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Ed Milliband promotes living wage as labours next big thing
Comments
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IveSeenTheLight wrote: »I believe we canacheive whatever we desire if we put our minds to it. Your arguments suggest not putting your mind in trying to achieve the near impossible.
Your suggestions were akin to suggesting that heading via Manchester from Birmingham by car could be the quicker route to London. It is sufficiently unlikely, and counter-productive, as to be unworthy of consideration. You haven't been suggesting economically 'out of the box' ideas but nonsensical ideas and the fact you're continuing to argue otherwise shows you're entirely oblivious to the operation of economies both macro and micro.IveSeenTheLight wrote: »So open your options. Why can't we produce more home grown / manufactured products?
If the products are currently produced by high wage labour, or would be, then we can and should (which I have already stated).
If what you want to do is try and bring back low skill, low value labour from other economies then it can be done but would lead to either decreasing quality of life (paying lower wages to match the wage in China where it would otherwise have been produced) or large increases in cost (paying higher wages).IveSeenTheLight wrote: »Sure, we probably can't produce some things like banana's (although if we created the right conditions why not?)
Why would we want to? We can already grow crops perfectly well without expensive equipment (cereals, oilseeds etc) and trade those with countries that can produce bananas at lower cost.
I could work as a cleaner and a cleaner could do my job but it wouldn't make sense. I would have to take a considerable pay cut to be a cleaner and would probably be bad at it and the cleaner wouldn't have the technical skills required to do my job properly. Countries aren't vastly different. If the UK wants to live well then it needs to do produce things that the world is willing to pay well for, the more time it spends on making low value products that are made cheaply elsewhere the worse off we'll be.Having a signature removed for mentioning the removal of a previous signature. Blackwhite bellyfeel double plus good...0 -
Loughton_Monkey wrote: »But now look at something different. Take a good apprentice carpenter and train him for 10 years to produce high quality solid wood furniture. Pay him £35K a year, and his 'output' is probably £100K a year. Wonderful. But now invest in some high-tech machine doing all the intricate work to exacting tolerance and perfect finish.... It can probably turn out 10 times as much (output £1 million), with just a couple of minimum waged 'yoof' to load up the planks and unstack the finished goods.....
The second example is infinitely 'better' for the economy, despite having de-skilled. [Assuming the cost of the machine was viable].
In a sense; the point you stopped before though is that it would be even better if the company put the machine in Romania to employ two unskilled low wage labourers and then employed the two 'yoof' in roles that justified a decent wage or trained the 'yoof' to improve efficiency and workflow so that their production capacity/quality improved and the company could justify paying them a decent wage.
There are too many people who want to keep a supply of low value jobs in the UK when the only viable solution to maintain a good standard of living is to shed jobs that can be done at lower cost somewhere else and create jobs that pay the premium wages needed to afford the quality of life.Having a signature removed for mentioning the removal of a previous signature. Blackwhite bellyfeel double plus good...0 -
Why should someone who didn't work as hard at school as me earn a decent wage? You remember th types, dossed around at the back of the class and probably are now on a low income or benefits.
Screw em.0 -
The minimum wage in Australia is about £10/hr. How can they afford it?
Australia is a very expensive place to live. £10 per hour over there will be peanuts.Is it not just that high due to the strength of their currency against ours? As I believe it is currently something like £6 or £7 for a pint of beer in the pubs over there.
Precisely.0 -
The theory is (according to Rachel Reeves (Jaqui Smith reincarnated)) that the living wage will ease the pressure on taxpayers' money required to subsidise the low paid. But we will then of course pay the equivalent amount in increased prices of goods and services to the firms who have to pay the living wage. But that will free up tax money for Labour to waste on other rubbish, in its inimitable fashion.
Good thinking, Ed & RachelNo-one would remember the Good Samaritan if he'd only had good intentions. He had money as well.
The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money.
Margaret Thatcher0 -
Your suggestions were akin to suggesting that heading via Manchester from Birmingham by car could be the quicker route to London. It is sufficiently unlikely, and counter-productive, as to be unworthy of consideration. You haven't been suggesting economically 'out of the box' ideas but nonsensical ideas and the fact you're continuing to argue otherwise shows you're entirely oblivious to the operation of economies both macro and micro.
Certainly not. My queries have never been is it economically viable.
My query was akin to asking "What would you do if had £1million?"
I'm not suggesting it will happen, indeed it's unlikely I will have this ever as available cash.
You can still speculate what you would do with it.If what you want to do is try and bring back low skill, low value labour from other economies then it can be done but would lead to either decreasing quality of life (paying lower wages to match the wage in China where it would otherwise have been produced) or large increases in cost (paying higher wages).
How does it lower quality of life if in theory we could lower wages and product costs.
If your paid £20k and you have £20k outgoings, what is different to being paid £5k and having £5k outgoings.
I'm painting a scenario where Britain becomes globally more competative , increasing employment etc and asked if people would consider this with the obvious detriment being the cost of imported goods or exchange rates when travelling.I could work as a cleaner and a cleaner could do my job but it wouldn't make sense. I would have to take a considerable pay cut to be a cleaner and would probably be bad at it and the cleaner wouldn't have the technical skills required to do my job properly. Countries aren't vastly different. If the UK wants to live well then it needs to do produce things that the world is willing to pay well for, the more time it spends on making low value products that are made cheaply elsewhere the worse off we'll be.
My point is, your technical paid job. Could we export more if it was cheaper to produce.
If your cost of living reduced, could your wages match the same, thus making the UK more competative in the technical market.
I work in an industry that is very well paid, purely because other nationalities do not have the expertise.
Companies capitalise on this and charge over the top (in some cases)
I have contracts where we charge overseas $3,000 per day for a man, whilst in the UK we charge £800 per day.
This is a situation where we can capitalise on the inexperience overseas, however in areas where overseas is able to do the same job, we are uncompetative because of our country costs.:wall:
What we've got here is....... failure to communicate.
Some men you just can't reach.
:wall:0 -
Who owns those companies? Mostly workers' pension funds.
Not a lot of good if 1.) you haven't or can't afford a pension 2.) Pass away before being able to claim said pension 2.) Lose many jobs in the process so you have to be taxed personally and through the fund to allow people to subsist."If you act like an illiterate man, your learning will never stop... Being uneducated, you have no fear of the future.".....
"big business is parasitic, like a mosquito, whereas I prefer the lighter touch, like that of a butterfly. "A butterfly can suck honey from the flower without damaging it," "Arunachalam Muruganantham0 -
This the point endlessly missed by the left.
Reduced profits = reduced pension and ISA returns for all.
All don't participate in pension and S&SISAs and never will.
I don't know the answer but how many people have S&S ISAs, what is the population penetration for instance?
At the end of the day a pot of money goes through various processes and comes out the other end. The line between public/private is nebulous.
The question is how efficiently that pot of money is circulated and distributed and how hard work is recognised and rewarded and the welfare state supported. There are vast inequalities on both sides of that equation."If you act like an illiterate man, your learning will never stop... Being uneducated, you have no fear of the future.".....
"big business is parasitic, like a mosquito, whereas I prefer the lighter touch, like that of a butterfly. "A butterfly can suck honey from the flower without damaging it," "Arunachalam Muruganantham0 -
I'm always argueing we should make purchasing decisions based on how well workers are tret.
Yet this very forum is dedicated to reducing costs which will often mean workers being paid less.
Just because you buy something for x -20% doesn't mean people are being paid less. It just means that you have found the least expensive way of acquiring it.
I take my car for a service, it needs mechanics it doesn't need a franchised showroom, coffee machines, plasma TV in reception etc to provide that service. The mechanic at the end of the day will get the going rate or there about for being a mechanic.
Many products and services contain bloat that is unproductive. If someone is selling a product or service consistently below cost then they will fail.
If I choose to buy NOLOGO, obtain the similar quality for a lower price than buying BADWET again I doubt the exploited workers will get a worse deal in reality.
Many of branded goods operate fixed pricing purely to maintain a margin whilst still sourcing at cost. In some cases buying a branded good may reduce your TCO it depends.
Many of the so called caring retailers/distributors still purchase at the bargain basement price regardless of what they cream of the top - milk for example.
Most of the profits go to the broker rather than the supplier."If you act like an illiterate man, your learning will never stop... Being uneducated, you have no fear of the future.".....
"big business is parasitic, like a mosquito, whereas I prefer the lighter touch, like that of a butterfly. "A butterfly can suck honey from the flower without damaging it," "Arunachalam Muruganantham0
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