Marx and Adam Smith both highlighted this fundamental characteristic of capitalism, but it still rarely fails to blow Americans’ minds when I explain it to them.
Here the point is not to have an underclass of long-term, exploitable unemployed but to have some slack, ie. a minimum number of people available to ensure the system runs smoothly without shortages and hindrance to business growth and change.
Low unemployment is good and desirable but shortages are not.
The slack can be heirs forgoing the size of their profits, by boosting wages where needed, as opposed to slack in the wages if the people doing all the work and creating all the wealth.
If a society had a basic income for everybody, the unemployed wouldn't be poor, and would still be available for work if the demand for extra labour was high enough.
Although ultimately, I do think that eventually automation should lead to less people having to work. Or perhaps preferably: people having to work less; we should also get rid of the 40+ hour work week, so we can divide the available work more equally, while also making sure everybody has enough time to enjoy the fruits of their labour.
And part-time work also provides the needed slack in the system without condemning anyone to poverty.
A lot of people that are not technically unemployed are also not working fall into a few groups: those that are dependent on others to work; those that are too young or too old to work; and those that have simply given up on the whole notion of working because they are no longer able to physically or mentally (or both).
And there is of course a big problem with poverty even among those that work. So unemployment figures look great. Poverty figures, not so much. IMHO basic income would be a fair and simple way to ensure we get rid of poverty that should not break capitalism.
"Full employment" absolutely builds in the reserve army of labor power into the definition.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNS11300001
Was 86% or above before 1950, never above 70% over the past 5 years. The trend has been downward the whole time.
From 2000 to 2020, the labor participation for men from 20 to 44 has fallen. Labor participation for men 45 to 54 varies from flat to down. The labor participation rate for men 55 and older has risen. Working age men are less employed than they were, retirement age men are more employed than they were.
https://www.bls.gov/emp/tables/civilian-labor-force-particip...
Ideally, we would have a bigger safety net so that this would never happen.
There will sprays be a certain percentage of people where work is not a good option due to physical or mental disabilities. It is society’s role to help these people, and the wealthier society becomes, the easier this should be.
And a second point, in my home country the government introduced rules where to have government benefits you have to work a little, painting your community, cutting grass in public places etc.
People on the left were outraged. How dare you give work to people on a government mandate, and tie unemployment benefits to it?
Yet that is precisely what Stalin just argued for there. A government can create full employment by creating jobs and forcing people to work. Why don't modern socialists support that?
It can easily be benefit for example if you work 1/8 time for 1/2 of pay.
In the Soviet Union, which declared itself a workers' state, every adult able-bodied person was expected to work until official retirement. Thus unemployment was officially and theoretically eliminated. Those who refused to work, study or serve in another way risked being criminally charged with social parasitism
If you think you’re making the USSR appear less reasonable than the US, maybe think again.
So, if I plan to live from rents that i earn from my past work i am a parasite?
Wages are attained by selling your labor to someone else.
Which is it?
Wrt “earning capital,” you may have purchased capital, but you sold your labor for wages.
Compensation paid as stock options are an exception, and are a result of New Deal reforms to get more working people bought into the capitalist system, which has been successful, so far. But owning stocks is not the same as owning capital because you still do not control the capital and therefore cannot collect rents. Realize capitalists never directly trade the capital for the labor to operate that capital, unless forced. Historically, only communists have ever forced such a thing.
If people want to be homeless due to mental health issues, there is no easy way out if the government is allowed to overrule someone who says ‘No! Don’t help me!’
Very difficult ethical issues all around.
In our area, we have shelter beds open and people sleeping in the cold outside of the building…
Are you seriously suggesting that so many millions of Americans just happen to love being homeless? Is this a joke?
The person you're replying to didn't say any such things. Your replies on this post have followed a pattern of lazy swipes, and degrade the quality of discussion here.
House ownership was limited per-square-meter (varies on exact period and location). Most rooms/apartments were technically state property and you just rented them. Building „cooperative“ apartments where one would own it was a rather late development. And even then I believe limits of apartments-to-own were in place.
On the other hand, room-renting was tolerated in two cases. Resorts (no enough spots in hotels) and university towns (no enough places in dormitories). In resorts locals would move to, for example, garages to make money from renting their own apartments to holiday goers. Students renting was usually old lady business where after your kids are gone and husband dies you rent spare rooms.
Regardless, the USSR was heavy on the “you don’t carry the water, you don’t drink”.
Socialists don't say that socialism would suddenly lead to less work for everyone, a revolution and rebuilding after a revolution is a lot of hard work, but the work is done for the collective good, not to make a few even richer. It shall have meaning and be valued by society. And yes, eventually - even Marx talked about it already - work that is not necessary and labour that can be automated will become more free time for everyone.
Does this ever happen in reality though?
Even the American Revolution was essentially a tax evasion scheme by the wealthy merchant class.
Secondly, tying unemployment benefits to community service is a blunt tool, that can directly hurt those trying to get unemployment. Some people need more time to find a job or improve their own skills, and spending time mowing the lawn may be counterproductive to that. Some people can work, but they may have disabilities that prevent them from doing whatever community service jobs are available. And finally, some people just can't work at all, and they shouldn't have to go through hoops to prove that to receive the benefits they need to live.
Finally, many on the left (including myself) reject the notion that living necessities should be tied to employment at all. Everyone should have access to food, shelter, clothing, and healthcare, regardless of their employment status. This includes people who can work, but choose not to. Work should not be a requirement to live a comfortable life.
_Someone else_ will we working to give you a comfortable life.
Robots, preferably.
We're not there yet, but it would be a nice goal. And certainly a lot better than having robots do all the work but the fruits of their work going only to the rich who own them.
Maybe read your sentence again. Carefully...
Bad actors start using ai to do bad things. Good actors use ai to counter bad actors.
Or is that not what you meant?
That could also be because he was a murderous dictator, and not necessarily have anything to do with his economic ideas. (Although some of his economic ideas, and they way they were implemented in particular, lead to lots of death too.)
I am myself a politically active Marxist and we do say this, but we also understand that this isn’t going to happen. Keynesianism was not a sustainable solution. It only bought time. Ultimately states in capitalist societies are in service of capital. In the US, realize the 1970s financial overhaul, including the Bretton Woods System, was the capitalist response to the New Deal giving workers too much power. 1960s inflation hit the ruling class and they responded by brutalizing the economy. See: https://wtfhappenedin1971.com
The heirs who expropriate surplus labor time from those of us who work and create wealth are the ones who not work. Their wealth is from government mandate - the government was created by them to do this and enforce it. When are they to work?
In what part of his works does Adam Smith says something like that?