Tim Gurner, the viral Australian multimillionaire who wants more workers to be unemployed, was debunked by an economist in 1943.
Great article, thanks for posting. I also left a donation.
Why do you think 5% unemployment is considered “full” employment? Why are billionaires and treasury appointees also so horny for raising unemployment?
Structural unemployment is fundamental to capitalism. He is a psychopath, because behind every great fortune is a great crime.
Why do you think 5% unemployment is considered “full” employment?
I’ve sometimes seen it written as 3%, but generally that’s included to provide a more accurate estimate of overall employment. It represents the people who are currently between jobs and are actively searching for a new one. I probably would have been included in that stat when I left an abusive employer and searched until I found my current one.
It isn’t some kind of capitalist conspiracy.
It’s just market dynamics. In order for there to be a healthy capitalist economy there must be people between jobs i.e. people without jobs i.e. the reserve army of labor. Structural unemployment is built in to the system, there isn’t a literal cabal of people that actually enforces it (although the Fed is trying to boost unemployment with tight fiscal policy, so its not the market is natural and exists on its own without human manipulation)
Quoted from the article: Australia’s GDP, after falling in 2020 during the first year of Covid-19, has bounced back vigorously and appears on track to grow at about the same rate as it has over the past 20 years.
Here’s the thing, we either accept that COVID is still a thing and follow measures to mitigate it resulting in probable negative economic effects, OR we continue down our current path resulting in a labor shortage. The bourgeoisie can’t have it both ways, but they don’t want to accept that.
That’s the fucked up thing about the system. It builds excuses for itself so that people can shrug it off. It’s the guilt avoidance, a way to keep members of a cult docile. It’s only by accepting the guilt that you understand what to do with it (help the people who are harmed, and stop the harm).
If you take the time to learn about trauma response in survivors and the various ways trauma manifests then extrapolate that out to the macro level, everything becomes much clearer. And sinister.
It’s all just abuse. Society doesn’t want you to be self sufficient, critically thinking and debt free. Then it would have to persuade you thru rational discourse.
If your broken and in need, well, the old saying applies; the power to relieve pain is 1000x greater than the power to inflict.
It also helps when you’re the one inflicting the pain, then rationing the salves.
it’s not stupid; having a “reserve army of labor” of desperate people in unemployment willing to work for less than employed people is intentional.
Having all these people desperate to work for less wages than already-employed people do serves to drive down wages and therefore drive up profits for the employer class
Part of it is wealth disparity. Basic necessities take up a lot of the average persons income and they canot afford to higher someone like themselves to do things while those of great wealth can hire many with at most trivial impact to their income. It does not help that so few are involved in food production now so much of the disparity is disparity in production of necessities.
This is also the real reason why conservatives are again pushing to do away with child labor restrictions in the US. If a child is allowed to do the job for a lower wage, it lowers the wage for adults, too.
thanks for posting this, great read
It’s not a secret people are just daf.