If men do not grow in their knowledge of life and in their intelligent judgment of the rules of right living as rapidly as they gain control over physical resources, they will not win happiness at all. FULL ARTICLE by William Graham Sumner
Source link: http://blog.mises.org/11360/the-philosophy-of-strikes/
The Philosophy of Strikes
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I think that there is a legitimate role for strikes in a free market. Units of labor that are organized in production may create more value than the sum of the individuals, and I see no reason why they can’t leverage that for optimum pay.
However, I think in a normal free market, it is highly incentivized for strikes to be minimal and highly incentivized for value of to be maximized. That rarely happens in todays markets because companies can be forbidden to hire outside the union, and can be forced to negotiate with unions “in good faith”. In sum, they can sit on their lazy stinking but and demand more pay not because of any merits or value created by their organizing, but because they can use the force of law to insure that there are no competing options.
That was written in 1883, but it sounds like it could have been written by any old timer today. “Lazy youth… Lazy youth”.
There seems to be a pervasive notion that leisure is ‘evil’ and that work is ‘dignified’. I ask those of that persuasion, what are you working for? Some people work for the sake of it I guess, that is their joy. I can only fathom that work is neither dignified or indignant, it is the means to an end. Some would argue the journey is more important than the destination though. Take your pick.
Stunning article. This could just as well have been written today, only that it would be titled: “The Age of Disenfranchisement”.
I had thought this whole notion was a product of the 2nd half of the 20th century. After growing up with stories from one grandfather about trying to farm during the great depression, or my other grandfather who worked a potato farm during one summer for FREE just so that he could work the next summer and get paid 25 cents per day.
This really shifted how I look at the last century and a half.
Telpurion
I hope I have not taken your post in the wrong way, but are you attributing a “labor over leisure” view to Sumner? If so, you must have missed this paragraph from half way through the article:
“Leisure, not labor, is dignified. Nearly all of us, however, have to sacrifice our dignity, and labor, and it would be to the purpose if, instead of declamation about dignity, we should learn to respect, in ourselves and each other, work which is good of its kind, no matter what the kind is. To spoil a good shoemaker in order to make a bad parson is surely not going “up”; and a man who digs well is by all sound criteria superior to the man who writes ill.”
If I’ve misread your post, I do apologise. I too do not understand the addiction some have to work, other than perhaps seeing in it a way to avoid life’s difficulties by becoming an automaton and losing oneself in a regular routine. Not much of a life, that, but not Sumner’s point, either.
Jon Lecke,
Thanks for pointing out the problem with my post. I must have read what he said backwards. Still, my point about the old dissing youngsters stands.
Telpeurion
I think your point will always be true! Damn punk kids, with their stupid haircuts and worse music!
There is one paragraph in the article that I think superb:
“The power to appreciate a remote, future good, in comparison with a present one, is a distinguishing mark of highly civilized men, but if it is not combined with powers of persevering industry and self-denial, it degenerates into mere daydreaming and the diseases of an overheated imagination.”
That’s one bit of advice that transcends generations.
Best
Jon
David C wrote:
“Units of labor that are organized in production may create more value than the sum of the individuals, and I see no reason why they can’t leverage that for optimum pay.”
Firstly, the sum producing more than the individuals is usually not due to the individuals, but to the organizing skills of the managers that they work for. Since the excess is due to the company’s organizational skills, I see no reason why part of the excess shouldn’t go to the company.
Secondly, if they have a contract stating that they work for X amount of time, and they violate that contract, they should be fire-able. That would be a “reason why” they can’t “leverage” that; it would be a violation of their contractual obligations.
I think a strike is legitimate as long as the strikers understand that they are breaking a contract. The employer should then have the choice of enforcing that breach, i.e. firing/replacing them, or writing a new contract. If the labor contingent is as valuable as they think, the managers will probably know this and a strike can be avoided by simply negating the old contract with a new one or adding an adendum, otherwise known as “a raise.”
Of course, this “naïve” and “simplistic” view doesn’t have much standing in today’s legal environment where property rights are of only minor importance, if at all.
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