From: nelson_p@APOLLO.HP.COM
Newsgroups: sci.econ
Subject: Re: Wage Slavery (Was: BIG LIE about the market)
Date: 10 Apr 92 15:04:49 GMT


From: yodaiken@chelm.cs.umass.edu (victor yodaiken)

>>  I've advocated for libertarians, communists,
>>  etc that they set up small experiments first as proof of concept
>>  before they start telling us how 240-million-person nations ought 
>>  to organize themselves.
>
>Note that such experiments in worker self-management and radical 
>syndicalism as the C.N.T. control of Catalonia in the mide 1930's have
>been interesting but cut short by the intemperate reaction of those
>who disagreed with the experimental goals.

  Nonetheless there are ample opportunities for a very wide range
  of perfectly legal experiments at the level of the town or state.


>So, everyone who takes a moral stand is, by your logic, an intellectual
>fraud. That's a pretty interesting stand itself. Do you have any
>rigorous scientific backing for it?

  In logic it's up to the person making a positive assertion to back it 
  up.   All I'm saying is that I've never seen any evidence that any 
  moral position can be defended on rigorous grounds.  Indeed, except
  for Randians, I didn't think anyone in 1992 seriously believes that
  an intellectually rigorous underpinning for any of various ethical
  positions can be stated.   Morality seems, to me, to be a social
  construct like music or language.  


>people of the "developing nations" etc.). It's not particularly "rational"
>or brave to conclude that since one is personally doing quite well at this
>moment, things are working quite well.

  Actually, it is, since ultimately rational self-interest would compel
  me to analyze events in terms of their impact on me personally.  But
  that aside, it is in no ways clear that because my standard of living 
  depends on cheap IC's made in Maylasia or oil imported from Saudi
  Arabia, or office cleaning services provided my mexivan immigrants, 
  that all of those nations would be better off it we DIDN'T employ 
  them. 

  "Quite well" is RELATIVE.   I'm not saying that things are "quite
  well" in the 3rd world.  All I'm saying is that I see no evidence
  that any proposed alternatives are likely to do better.


>>  variety of cultural and historical contexts.   So purely on the
>>  basis of logical empiricism I am predicting that this will remain the 
>>  dominant and most successful model in the years to come.   Those
>
>Using your methodology would have lead an inhabitant of Pharonic Egypt or
>2cd century Rome into error. Using your methodology proved to be a mistake
>for the administrators of the Chinese empire, and they had thousands of
>years of success to fall back on, not a measly few hundred.

  It depends on *when* they made that assessment.  If they made it
  300 years into a 500 year empire it most certainly WOULD have been
  right. 

  I'm not saying this kind of system will dominate forever; indeed
  I've stated many times on the net that a major crisis for our
  entire concept of the relation of *work* to *wealth*, which is
  the cornerstone of our economy, will come when technology becomes
  so advanced that a machine can do just about anything a human
  can.  I expect this to occur in a century or two and it will promote
  a serious cultural and economic crisis.   There may be a few tiny
  things which machines won't be able to do, but this probably won't
  be enough to employ everybody, even a few hours a week. 


>>  is in a genuinely desperate situation.  But it is unclear WHAT sort
>>  of government or economic scheme might address that situation given
>>  that many of the problems he faces are due to individual CHOICES that
>>  people in his community make (drugs, crime, pregnancy, etc).  If we
>
>This is remarkably ignorant. I suggest that those who grow up in a
>neighborhood without civil law, educational or economic opportunities, 
>basic services, or adequate nutrition, might not be in the best position
>to make choices about which graduate school to attend or whether to go for
>an M.B.A. or a M.S.

  Hyperbole.   Consider a poor, black person living in a ghetto.  Being poor
  he has (by definition) no money.  Being poor and living in the city he
  has limited access to health care; and being poor, black, and living in the
  city he can expect limited help from the police.   Consider then this
  person's decision to use heroin or crack:  They cost money, which he 
  doesn't have; they risk his health, for which he can expect little help,
  and they put him into contact with dangerous criminals, from whom he can
  expect little protection by the police.   He may not be an MBA but is it
  unreasonable to expect *a little* rational self-interest?    Consider
  that 60% of all black babies are born out-of-wedlock (source: US HHS)
  or that 15% of ALL babies born at Boston City Hospital in 1990 were
  crack babies.   

  These social wounds are self-inflicted!  It's hard enough being poor
  and just surviving.  Most poor people, in most societies throughout
  human history have not engaged in the orgy of self-destruction that
  poor people in the US do, despite the fact the even poor Americans 
  are better off than the poor of most other nations.   There is 
  something *cultural* going on and it is very unclear WHAT sort of 
  government response might correct it.


---peter



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