Retribution not enough

Julian Assange proff at iq.org
Sun Oct 21 23:58:47 PDT 2001


> I'm actually surprised to see Steve launch into a critique of laissez-faire 
> capitalism here on cypherpunks, of all places. One can admit that 
> globalization has ill effects (mostly, bricks through windows of Starbucks 
> thrown by bored, upper-middle-class, college-age protesters), certainly. 
> But when responding to claims that factory workers in poorer countries are 
> only being paid $2/hour or whatnot, it makes sense to ask: Is this worse 
> than their other alternatives, like mud huts in villages?
> 
> To argue against people voluntarily entering into market-based transactions 
> with each other is so a-economical and contrary to cypherpunk philosophies* 
> -- wlel, I just don't think it's worth taking the time to go any further in 
> a response.

Declan, Declan.

Put away your straw man. There are alternative's other than huts
and two dollars an hour (which is high, btw).  Nobel ecconomic
laureates have been telling us for years to be careful about
idealised market models and to start looking at players not as mere
as capital and labour but as information processing nodes.

This years Nobel for Economics won by George A. Akerlof, A.  Michael
Spence and Joseph E. Stiglitz "for their analysis of markets with
assymetric information" is typical.

You don't need a Nobel to realise that the relationship between a
large employer and employee is brutally assymetric. One entity
knows far more about the rules of the negotiation than the other.
There's you as a prospective employee and then there's the local
workplace monopoly with hundreds of industrial relations lawyers,
psychologists, and other assorted strategists who'll hand you a
document thick with legalese and tell you where to sign. Without
a legal team, you'll never understand it or the political connections
backing it up.  And even if you do there's a million other mugs to
choose from who won't.

To counter this sort of assymetry. Employees naturally start trying
to collectivise to increase their information processing and
bargaining power. That's right. UNIONS Declan. Those devious entities
that first world companies and governments have had a hand in
suppressing all over the third world by curtailing freedom of
association, speech and other basic political rights we take for
granted.

--
 Julian Assange        |If you want to build a ship, don't drum up people
                       |together to collect wood or assign them tasks and
 proff at iq.org          |work, but rather teach them to long for the endless
 proff at gnu.ai.mit.edu  |immensity of the sea. -- Antoine de Saint Exupery





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