Why is FAIR TRADE better than FREE TRADE?

[DBT]

You repeat things that are either not relevant or shown to be wrong. I could repeat and provide more information but I suspect that it would make no difference to your beliefs.

You defend the excess wealth and power of the super rich while seeking to keep workers down. You defend a situation that is unsustainable in the long term.

You still aren't rebutting anything.

That's not an argument. It's nothing more than offering your opinion.

[laughing dog]

You repeat things that are either not relevant or shown to be wrong. I could repeat and provide more information but I suspect that it would make no difference to your beliefs.

You defend the excess wealth and power of the super rich while seeking to keep workers down. You defend a situation that is unsustainable in the long term.

You still aren't rebutting anything.

To be fair, neither are you.

[DBT]

You repeat things that are either not relevant or shown to be wrong. I could repeat and provide more information but I suspect that it would make no difference to your beliefs.

You defend the excess wealth and power of the super rich while seeking to keep workers down. You defend a situation that is unsustainable in the long term.

You still aren't rebutting anything.

To be fair, neither are you.

How so? "Neither are you" implies that I am in the same boat. Maybe an unintended implication? Given that I'm basically pointing out the power imbalance between the individual workers and management. What is there to rebutt? The imbalance is a reality. Exploitation of workers is a reality. The flow of wealth to the big end of town is a reality.

[Loren Pechtel]

Workers, like suppliers, service providers, etc, need to be paid. If suppliers and providers do not get paid for their goods and services, they can withhold supply or take a company to court.

Individual workers offer a service to a company, their skill, time and labour, for which payment is necessary, just like anything else.

The problem being, too repeat yet again, individual workers do not have the clout of companies that supply goods and services, they cannot set their price of labour unless they join together and engage with collective bargaining, ie, they form a company of their own.

Once again you're using ideology as an attempt to rebut facts. It doesn't work.

If the workers had better options they wouldn't have taken the sweatshop jobs. If the workers had better options the sweatshop would never have opened in the first place.

Your bible-thumping won't change the facts.

[Jarhyn]

Workers, like suppliers, service providers, etc, need to be paid. If suppliers and providers do not get paid for their goods and services, they can withhold supply or take a company to court.

Individual workers offer a service to a company, their skill, time and labour, for which payment is necessary, just like anything else.

The problem being, too repeat yet again, individual workers do not have the clout of companies that supply goods and services, they cannot set their price of labour unless they join together and engage with collective bargaining, ie, they form a company of their own.

Once again you're using ideology as an attempt to rebut facts. It doesn't work.

If the workers had better options they wouldn't have taken the sweatshop jobs. If the workers had better options the sweatshop would never have opened in the first place.

Your bible-thumping won't change the facts.

You're literally defending wage slavery. The very definition of wage slavery, and here you are defending it. Because it's "someone's best option".

Unions are the response. Fair trade is the other response: not trading with countries whose workers aren't getting paid, and paying more for the privilege of seeing work ethically compensated.

It is fucking disgusting that the people who work in sweatshops can't afford to even have the things they make day in and day out.

[DBT]

Workers, like suppliers, service providers, etc, need to be paid. If suppliers and providers do not get paid for their goods and services, they can withhold supply or take a company to court.

Individual workers offer a service to a company, their skill, time and labour, for which payment is necessary, just like anything else.

The problem being, too repeat yet again, individual workers do not have the clout of companies that supply goods and services, they cannot set their price of labour unless they join together and engage with collective bargaining, ie, they form a company of their own.

Once again you're using ideology as an attempt to rebut facts. It doesn't work.

If the workers had better options they wouldn't have taken the sweatshop jobs. If the workers had better options the sweatshop would never have opened in the first place.

Your bible-thumping won't change the facts.

You have no facts that need rebutting. It is you who continues to defend right wing ideology. The facts are that - as with everyone else - workers need to be paid for their services and the wealth they help to generate, unless you are supporting slavery?

The facts are that individual workers are easy to exploit, that employers are known to exploit workers....examples have been given but ignored or dismissed.

The facts are that workers have been losing their market share of profit and wealth, which has been freely flowing to the big end of town, that the divide has grown significantly in the last four decades.

All of this has been supported by stats, figures and examples. For you, an inconvenient truth.

[Lumpenproletariat]

Answer: Because they're employers, who have to be scapegoated (according to "fair trade" doctrine)

No one has denied there are three pieces to the pie. You continue to deny that the upper management/ceo piece of the pie is getting larger while the worker piece of the pie is getting smaller. And everytime this is pointed out to you you bring up your three pieces BS again.

The data is looking at worker share and pretending the rest goes to the owners--de facto ignoring the third piece of the pie.

The fact is that employers seek to keep running costs down.

Which is what they should do. Whereas "fair trade" tries to impose higher costs, like wage levels higher than that necessary to attract the needed workers. You're showing how "fair trade" is worse than "free trade" because it drives costs up higher than necessary = higher prices = higher cost of living for all.

It is not in their interest to increase wage rates for any reason other than to attract and retain key staff.

Yes, to pay the minimum increases required to keep the operation running at maximum performance level, and no higher labor cost than this amount. E.g., to attract or retain the highest-performing producers/wage-earners, at only the level needed for this, meaning lower levels for those who are the easiest to replace, e.g., those higher-paid who can more easily be replaced by someone or something which could do the same function at lower cost.

It's not in the interest of a business to maintain market value incomes for workers and . . .

No, IT IS IN THEIR INTEREST to pay market value. Your stats have shown that they have let wages stagnate ONLY for those of lower market value, which might be a large % of the workforce, as those wage-earners' market value has declined, as they have become less necessary and more replaceable. So business has maintained the market value for workers, meaning in some cases (many/most cases perhaps) even reducing the wage level as their market value has decreased. So, "to maintain market value" means in some cases reducing the wage (as the worker value decreases) as well as increasing it as the worker value increases (perhaps for a small % of the workers in some cases).

. . . and individual workers are most likely not in a position to ask for pay rises.

There are millions (billions) of individual producers "not in a position to ask for" higher compensation (from their employers or from their customers or whoever pays them) because they're already paid their market value, even though probably 100% of all producers of any kind believe they're worth more than they're paid. Bummer!

CEO and executive salaries, of course, are a different matter.

Maybe. This might be a problem in some cases. And there are some rich celebrities, entertainers, pro athletes, etc. who are overpaid somehow. Maybe we can solve this if we first get cured of our obsession on employers as a class to hate and scapegoat.

A double standard if ever there was one.

"double standard" = illogical. So let's find a LOGICAL solution for a change.

Some kind of higher tax on the super-rich is the way to fix it, not scapegoating all employers. Like the sweatshop owner, e.g., many of whom are struggling to survive.

A logical solution (in contrast to a "double standard") is one which targets the problem and fixes that, not one which eliminates some viable jobs, reduces needed production, and punishes all of society by driving up the cost of living for everyone.

[DBT]

Answer: Because they're employers, who have to be scapegoated (according to "fair trade" doctrine)

The fact is that employers seek to keep running costs down.

Which is what they should do. Whereas "fair trade" tries to impose higher costs, like wage levels higher than that necessary to attract the needed workers. You're showing how "fair trade" is worse than "free trade" because it drives costs up higher than necessary = higher prices = higher cost of living for all.

It is not in their interest to increase wage rates for any reason other than to attract and retain key staff.

Yes, to pay the minimum increases required to keep the operation running at maximum performance level, and no higher labor cost than this amount. E.g., to attract or retain the highest-performing producers/wage-earners, at only the level needed for this, meaning lower levels for those who are the easiest to replace, e.g., those higher-paid who can more easily be replaced by someone or something which could do the same function at lower cost.

It's not in the interest of a business to maintain market value incomes for workers and . . .

No, IT IS IN THEIR INTEREST to pay market value. Your stats have shown that they have let wages stagnate ONLY for those of lower market value, which might be a large % of the workforce, as those wage-earners' market value has declined, as they have become less necessary and more replaceable. So business has maintained the market value for workers, meaning in some cases (many/most cases perhaps) even reducing the wage level as their market value has decreased. So, "to maintain market value" means in some cases reducing the wage (as the worker value decreases) as well as increasing it as the worker value increases (perhaps for a small % of the workers in some cases).

. . . and individual workers are most likely not in a position to ask for pay rises.

There are millions (billions) of individual producers "not in a position to ask for" higher compensation (from their employers or from their customers or whoever pays them) because they're already paid their market value, even though probably 100% of all producers of any kind believe they're worth more than they're paid. Bummer!

CEO and executive salaries, of course, are a different matter.

Maybe. This might be a problem in some cases. And there are some rich celebrities, entertainers, pro athletes, etc. who are overpaid somehow. Maybe we can solve this if we first get cured of our obsession on employers as a class to hate and scapegoat.

A double standard if ever there was one.

"double standard" = illogical. So let's find a LOGICAL solution for a change.

Some kind of higher tax on the super-rich is the way to fix it, not scapegoating all employers. Like the sweatshop owner, e.g., many of whom are struggling to survive.

A logical solution (in contrast to a "double standard") is one which targets the problem and fixes that, not one which eliminates some viable jobs, reduces needed production, and punishes all of society by driving up the cost of living for everyone.

You are not saying anything new. Just offering the same irrelevant excuses in defence of the exploitation of workers. A functional business has to pay a fair price for the goods and services it receives, including wages.

A business should not under pay its employees just because it can. Wages, as with suppliers and service providers, needs to be paid at market value so that everyone does well, including the economy as a whole

[Loren Pechtel]

Workers, like suppliers, service providers, etc, need to be paid. If suppliers and providers do not get paid for their goods and services, they can withhold supply or take a company to court.

Individual workers offer a service to a company, their skill, time and labour, for which payment is necessary, just like anything else.

The problem being, too repeat yet again, individual workers do not have the clout of companies that supply goods and services, they cannot set their price of labour unless they join together and engage with collective bargaining, ie, they form a company of their own.

Once again you're using ideology as an attempt to rebut facts. It doesn't work.

If the workers had better options they wouldn't have taken the sweatshop jobs. If the workers had better options the sweatshop would never have opened in the first place.

Your bible-thumping won't change the facts.

You're literally defending wage slavery. The very definition of wage slavery, and here you are defending it. Because it's "someone's best option".

Unions are the response. Fair trade is the other response: not trading with countries whose workers aren't getting paid, and paying more for the privilege of seeing work ethically compensated.

It is fucking disgusting that the people who work in sweatshops can't afford to even have the things they make day in and day out.

You're continuing to preach rather than address the facts.

Unions "worked" for a while when there was no real competition for US products.

[Loren Pechtel]

You have no facts that need rebutting. It is you who continues to defend right wing ideology. The facts are that - as with everyone else - workers need to be paid for their services and the wealth they help to generate, unless you are supporting slavery?

You're still trying to use ideology as a rebuttal. It's not.