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Comment by naming_the_user | Hacker News Reader

From a personal perspective -

I don't care that much about "labour issues" because it seems like a logically flawed avenue to explore to begin with.

To be financially successful under any market system I can think of requires you, in a mathematical sense, to be close enough to the top within a company that you get a greater proportion of the profit than simply 1/employees.

In simple terms - I can't employ a maid unless I earn more than a maid, a maid can never be paid enough that I would want to be a maid (being the maid's employer, or at least having that optionality, is strictly superior).

Some jobs have comparative advantage, e.g. I might enjoy working on my car but know that a mechanic can do the same job in 1/10th the time. But a lot of stuff is just straight - I earn more than you, you do it for me, so I can get more things done.

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No, it is not mathematically ordained that conditions must suck on the bottom of the pyramid in an absolute sense. In a relative sense, your argument isn't wrong, but in an absolute sense, the failure of our economy to bring modest levels of comfort on the bottom despite truly astonishing advances in fundamental capacity is a scathing indictment.

In the absolute sense, from my perspective as someone who was born with not much (I often have a sense that this discussion is driven by people who were always fairly well off and see "the poor" as a different species) the primary issue is excessive regulation, resulting in things like property being hilariously expensive, so that it's difficult to afford a house or start a business.

Wages and hours for low level jobs feel like a distraction, barely anyone needs more toys, the issue is that the necessary items for life are monopolised.

So from my perspective the only thing that labour regulation can achieve is to basically just compress that experience, we still won't build more housing or make it easier to do so etc.

> Wages and hours for low level jobs feel like a distraction, barely anyone needs more toys, the issue is that the necessary items for life are monopolised.

They’re related. Unions aren’t just labor movements, they’re efforts to reduce the power of corporations.

Monopolies form because they make a lot of sense for the people on top. Competition is cool, but mostly a fools errand. The true winners know how to work together to widen the gap between their in-group and everyone else.

What’s evident to me about market theory is that it naturally tends to monopolies. To me, it is human nature. So therefore, we need extra structures, extra systems, to keep it in check.

Can you employ a doctor even if you don't make more than a doctor? I would hope so.

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