Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Awesome parts to the unemployment rate

So there's been some concern about these high rates of unemployment, especially in the service sector, but I'd like to touch on the brighter side. Basically, if we look at labor as a supply/demand situation, the higher demand is, the more things are skewed towards labor. The more supply, the more things are skewed towards management. So, a sustained, high unemployment rate should skew things towards management. This could be considered good for a number of reasons.

1) If you already have money, you'll enjoy price drops. Management will have to spend less money on labor, as they'll be able to drop wages and benefits but still get people because they're desperate.

2) If you're in a position where you hire lots of unskilled labor, you can probably abuse them more than normal because they'll be willing to tolerate abuse and you can easily replace them if they don't.

3) Maybe labor conditions will drop low enough that we can compete with China.

I know it's kind of a dark view, but so much of our policy in this country is formulated on how it will benefit the rich. Now, I wonder what all those rich people I follow in the news are up to. If only I could lead that blessed life!

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