[extropy-chat] Seven cents an hour? (was: Riots in France)

[Jack Parkinson]

From: "John K Clark" <jonkc at att.net>
To: "Jack Parkinson" <isthatyoujack at icqmail.com>
Sent: Sunday, November 13, 2005 3:13 PM
Subject: Re: [extropy-chat] Seven cents an hour? (was: Riots in France)


> "Jack Parkinson" <isthatyoujack at icqmail.com>
>
> > If, hypothetically, Wal-Mart was replaced by several thousand smaller
> > independent stores, all paying their employees a decent living wage,
> > and all competing to keep prices low, wouldn't the US be better
> > off in overall terms?
>
> NO! I rather doubt that Billy Bobs Pretty Good Hardware Store or any of
the
> thousands of other stores in your hypothetical could match Wal-Mart's
> legendary hyper efficiency; most economists agree that Wal-Mart can take
> credit for a big chunk of the productivity growth America had the good
> fortune to receive over the last 10 years, and productivity is the name of
> the game, it is the generator of wealth. So in your world the pool of
people
> wanting a job would be the same but there would be less money available to
> pay their salary. And consumers would be paying far more than they should
> for goods. That's not a world I want to live in.
>
>    John K Clark

Your remarks do not really make sense.

1) Thousands of stores competing would make for a pretty efficient market
system. Yes?

2) Where is the wealth that is being generated if more than 100,000 Wal-Mart
employees are living in poverty?

3) And if your answer is: in the Walton Family vaults - how is that useful
to America?

4) And if all that wealth was in distributed use across a broad range of
businesses competing for labor in a free market - surely there would be more
money available to pay the pool of workers?

5) How does increased productivity benefit America if it comes at a cost of
increased unemployment and (in today's news here from CNN) 35 million plus
American citizens living below the poverty line?

Jack Parkinson