Woman that sits next to me works part time in the same job I have. She negotiated it (I know hard to believe) because they liked her. You seem to be confusing free enterprise with unlimited choices. Myself for one. I resisted an initial offer and they came back a few hours later with a better one. My father is employed and gets approached by employers trying to poach him all the time.
Couldn't you also say "The Govt gives corporations a choice to either allow people to go home to their families after 40 hours a week or go operate in another country"??
Why stop at 50 hour work weeks? Lets bring back slavery. If employers didn't have to pay for manual labor, then they will have additional capital to responsibly invest in their never ending attempts to create a better world for all of mankind. Perhaps some have these slaves build new schools around the globe, while using the additional capitol to train and hire more qualified teachers. Maybe If treated reasonably well, the new slave class will learn to passively accept indoctrination. We know that most people are happier with less choice, and a focused inhibition. People just don't know whats best for them, so we would be doing the right thing. There. Now I have matched your series of out of context, asinine assumptions, held together by a cheese cloth strength line of reasoning, with one of my own. These, of course, will cancel each other out.
Because the definition of the words you used contradict each other. Irony - A situation in which there is a sharp incongruity or discordance that goes beyond the simple and evident intention of words or actions The very definition of "free exchange" would be the act of giving something and receiving something in return without limitations. However, this is not enough to qualify on it own. We could only assume you had meant to say these exact words, so being a "fan" of free exchange while also being a proponent of limiting choice and/or the exchange of information, is also a contradiction. And thus...... Irony!! :grin:
Good grief, that's like saying free markets are a place to go where stuff is free. Free exchange means parties A and B are free to exchange goods/services without interference from party C I.E. if party A is willing to work 50 hours for party B at a particular rate, you have no right to stop them from engaging in this free exchange.
Is this serious? Allowing employers to have employees work more than 40 hours a week is somehow similar to slavery? It is amazing how advocating freedom of choice and association is likened to slavery, yet limiting choices is done in the name of freedom.
Major, thank you for the thoughtful reply. We disagree, but I appreciate you being civil about it. Many department stores have full-time being 32 hours per week now, so just because you have a law saying 50 is the max doesn't mean everyone would be working 50. And if an individual did choose to work 50 hours per week, who am I to tell him he is not allowed to do so? There is a certain point at which productivity would decline. Also, this isn't slavery we're talking about. Employees can go elsewhere and employers know that. People in this country value their leisure time. For what it's worth, there is no actual limit on the number of non-OT hours someone in America can work. You can have three full-time jobs at once if you really wanted to. But few do, and the only ones who do are those who really badly need the money. I think it would be better for them if they could just work more hours at one employer rather than having to juggle three. This is news to me. I have never heard of a 5 hour work week improving the standard of living for a given population, but I would be eager to read about it. Also, yes, many people do make bad decisions to help in the short-term that are bad in the long-term. When firms do this, either to a great extent or repeatedly, they go out of business, unless they are given CPR from the state. If they were allowed to go out of business, their resources would then be allocated to a more efficient use, increasing overall productivity. ::EDIT:: Forgot this part: I don't want to put words in your mouth, so please point out if I'm doing so, but it looks like you're saying that if not for the benevolence of the state, we would still be working 15-hour days right now. I would have to disagree with this. The decrease in the number of hours worked each week is due primarily to better technology which leads to better productivity, leaving more time for leisure. I think this is the most important part of this debate. Here's Walter Block on it:
I work basically 10 1/2 hours a day and I don't even get paid (summer intern).....although I actually like the office when there's less people, don't need to be hunched over the screen so much.
These are all true. However, I'd say that your second point would tend to counteract the first approaching the long-run. The lower productivity resulting from more hours worked per person would, at some point, require additional hiring to meet the requisite amount of productivity required to complete a certain amount of work within a certain time-frame. Obviously it wouldn't be a 1:1 effect, but the two would seem to counteract each other. With that in mind, the OT-hourly pay structure seems to promote a more efficient market. In my opinion, the best results would come from labor markets finding a natural equilibrium for what a full-time schedule is defined as and what overtime is defined as. And of course, you could begin to discuss potential for price discrimination, and so on...
Untold numbers of American workers sweated blood over generations to get the 40 hour work week and overtime. Why on earth would anyone wish to end it? If anything, we should strive to reduce the number of hours worked, increase annual vacation time, increase benefits.
Nope. The irony lies within the fact that in your incessant clinging to a placeholder value (freedom being only non-interference from third parties---read the government), you more or less disregard "interference" from free exchange from other factors. If you define freedom as merely non-government intervention, rather than freedom for all parties, than the irony of your position lies in the fact that you incessantly use the word free; while disregarding the fact that free exchange with the aid of the government in levelling somewhat the information assymetry actually allows both parties more freedom, as they are equipped with the true information and choices that should be availble to them. You also disregard intervention from private credit agencies/other private contracts in the process of employment-hunt or the intervention of macroeconomic conditions such as high prevelant unemployment. Of course, life for Randians is simple. You toss out the word freedom, and you maintain an ideological commitment to opposing government for no good empirical reason. Carry on if you wish.
I, for one, advocate the return to the life of indentured servitude and slavery. Damn Americans are too lazy now a days! Obviously that's why we're in a recession the plebeians aren't working hard enough!
I likened nothing to slavery. What I did was sarcastically argue it's benefits by using the same line of reasoning you applied to the benefits of 50 hour work weeks. Making various references to random fact/theory which support the argument in the context I chose, ignoring all likely negative effects, observing these "conditions which led to greater wealth and prosperity for all," and all along maintaining a massive degree of conjecture. "There wouldn't necessarily be any drawbacks," is akin to saying that the wind could spontaneously blow sand in the desert into a pyramid. On a country-wide scale, there would be plenty of business owners who pay employees hourly wage, and would only look at this as a way to increase personal profit. Even more often when employees work on commission. It doesn't have to happen across the board to be massively detrimental. Nobody was suggesting that production would decrease if overtime started at 50 hours as you stated. What they are suggesting is that the quality of life for those who are now working 50 hours a week would be reduced, while also reducing the number of jobs available in a market that is already short on them. With even fewer jobs, we would also have even less competition for labor. If there is no competition for labor, employers are even more likely to demand 50 hour weeks, because the workers are unlikely to find work elsewhere and they can't afford to fall behind in productivity. Assuming that this would lead to more jobs in the long run is baseless. I might agree with some of your arguments, but my point was that it's crazy to claim there would not be drawbacks. And freedom of choice has nothing to do with it. We were talking about a very specific change to a "soft-cap" on hours worked before receiving overtime. No additional freedoms are granted by increasing the number of hours the average person works in a given week.
I was reading his quotations out of context. I assumed you were speaking of a 3rd party when mentioning a limitation of choices and/or available information. Even without 3rd party restrictions, there is no free market without full disclosure of any information that may be pertinant for either of the two parties to properly assess value. If value cannot be accurately assesed, then the market can't work as intended. It's skewed by the ability of one side to take advantage of the other in the same of self interest. That's why the free market myth is a joke. In a total economy significant and sometimes critical choices that once belonged to individuals or communities become the property of corporations. Real freedom is then only available to those with the substantial power required to be free.
Right now most businesses are face overtime issues are ones that are not cash strapped. Corps are sitting on records amounts of cash right now. Issue is demand vs. expansion - borrowing costs are cheap so I doubt this would translate into any expansion in the current demand weak environment.
It would but management decisions don't have perfect info. They may think they are getting more productivity out of 50 hours than 40 even if it results in a net loss. Businesses aren't perfect engines. The idea that tired and exhausted employees make poor ones is still a relatively progressive concept. Overtime is the only counter-balance for many businesses to be incentivize to hire more people instead of working people to death.
