Slate's Bizbox
fraywatch: What's happening in our readers' forum.

Bringing Up BabyThe elusive balance between love and discipline.

Compiled by Adam Christian
Updated Friday, Jan. 26, 2007, at 8:44 PM ET

(Continued from page 1)

Ouch. Ouch. Geoff, stop that! More in Family Fray. AC … 5:19pm PST

Sunday, Jan. 21, 2007

Information wants to be free. Labor wants to get paid. Is it any wonder nobody's satisfied these days?

The American worker is sick of getting dumped on, judging from responses to Daniel Gross' articles on Unwilling Americans who won't do any Dirty Work. Sarvis, the Fray's resident Upton Sinclair, expresses the prevailing anger most succinctly:

The government is more than happy to intervene in the "free market" for wages at the low end by allowing a steady supply of low-expectation immigrants to come in, by union busting, by disempowering labor wherever they can, by changing the rule on overtime, etc.

Meanwhile, at the upper income levels.... oh wait, they pretty much intervene there too - by enforcing immigrant quotas at the top end, by blocking out qualified competition for doctors and lawyers via licensing rules, by keeping the rules lax for executive pay accounting and disclosure, by keeping shareholders weak, etc.

The government works very hard to keep low wages low and high wages high. So, the next time you hear some nincompoop neocon bleat about "free markets" feel free to haul off and kick their teeth out.

Revrick, the Fray's resident William Jennings Bryan, lays out his own critique of 21st-century capitalism:

In the grousing of CEOs and their political friends about the supposed shortcomings of American workers, we hear strong echoes of the pornographic mind at work. In the imaginings of these CEOs and their political mouthpieces, labor should be compliant and submissive always willing to give access to their bodies in service of their capitalist desires. And, if need be, any resistance should be beaten out of the laboring masses, using whatever threats or coercions are necessary to win their conquest.

Having served a working-class congregation, where I've heard union workers describe the wage and benefit cuts demanded by bosses as 'getting reamed,' with its thinly veiled allusion to homosexual rape, there is a primitive, but real understanding that this is not just a matter of dollars and cents, but also of violence done to bodies in service of abstract capitalist goals.

I can recall reading in the local paper on an almost weekly basis, the fatalities which occurred in the Pittsburgh area steel mills: the falls from catwalks; the carbon monoxide poisonings in furnaces being relined with bricks; the burns from molten metal.

Closer to home, the son of one of my church's members used to earn his paycheck collecting trash until one foggy morning a driver pinned him against the garbage truck, severing his leg.

Who would willingly perform such work without substantial compensation for the risk? Who would willingly endure loss of fingers and repetitive motion injuries in meat-packing without a pay and benefits package worthy of the risk? Who would descend into mines or break their backs harvesting tomatoes without wages to match the suffering?

In the pornographic mind of CEOs there is a compliant and submissive work force eager to throw their bodies into serving their goals. Illegal immigration is the product of that pornographic mind, because now there is at ready-hand a vulnerable, easily threatened and coerced population which will let the bosses have their way.

A good share of the discussion focuses on the travails of specific trades. Arlington2 looks at the changes in his local construction industry, where "carpentry, framing and roofing are no longer trades that pay living wages." I've written an overflow column to do justice to the debate on the contemporary trucking industry. My favorite post of the discussion comes from therealFerdinanda, who looks at the comparative state of American farm workers:

If you want to talk about why Americans won't work farm jobs […] the real question is, why are we allowing human beings to be treated this way? Backbreaking work, low pay, poisonous chemicals probably every day. It's obscene. We *should* be paying more for our food. […]

Farm workers get dumped on because they have no power, NOT because they have no skills. This economist idea that people get paid what they're "worth" is what we call a partial truth. It's only true if people have the power to organize, and even then it's still only part of the story. […]

Social networks, higher education, references -- all of these things are socially rationed, ie, given only to the rich or connected. […] This is a form of labor organizing too, we just don't think of it that way because we've all been brainwashed by the right. […]

In contrast, in many places there is no freedom to organize, and that's one of the reasons "globalization" is screwing Americans. People in China and many other places are not free. Therefore, it is not free trade. And it's not fair trade either. Willingness to work one's way into an early grave should not be viewed as a "comparative advantage," but rather as proof of injustice. They don't call it the dismal "science" for nothing.

With all these populist firebrands flying, will nobody stick up for the big guy? Leave it to rob_said_that, with his glowing tribute to Budweiser's August Busch III, "a one-man mechanized army."

I'm not personally worried about the labor situation in the United States. I hear there's call-center work to be had in India, so I've got something to fall back on. But for the rest of you suckers, get in on the debate in our Moneybox Fray. Your livelihood could depend on it. GA … 3:15am PT

VIEW AS SINGLE PAGE
Print This ArticlePRINTDiscuss this in The FrayDISCUSSEmail to a FriendE-MAIL
Share on FacebookPost to MySpace!Share with MixxDigg ThisShare with RedditShare with del.icio.usShare with FurlShare with Ma.gnolia.comShare with SphereShare with Stumble Upon
Moira Redmond is a freelance writer and a former Slatester. You can e-mail her at .
Join the Fray: our reader discussion forum
What did you think of this article?
POST A MESSAGE | READ MESSAGES
Washington Post
The Washington Post
OPINIONS
The Great Debate
Marcus | Forget Biden. I'd like to see McCain face off against Palin.
Toles: Another McCain SurpriseStumped: Where's Palin's Baby?