Shopping! Always The Answer!

[trubble]

But I would also want the real working wage to be enough to support a family so that one parent, (not necessarily the father), could afford to stay at home if they wanted to and provide the stable upbringing and parenting

So would we all but as the lowest wages in society have never been able to provide that so far and the middle and higher wages have provided that but people wanted a better lifestyle so in effect chose to need to keep two jobs per family unit, I don't see where women working for rubbish-pay in low-skill jobs in today's workplace fits in to the demise of the manufacturing industry or serves to lessen the chances of that ideal.

I repeat for the sake of hearing my own voice women have always been working in such conditions, from the earliest manufacturing plants to taking in washing.

The most blatant example is the coal mining industry. The Victorian mines were full of women and children working in some area or another, and for a pittance.





Are you being nostalgic about steel working and coal mining?

The workingman or workingwoman's wage was never enough to keep a family in any sort of style, families were dirt poor, weren't they??


The industries were also subsidised, which I am not necessarily against btw, but even so, imho getting rid of home production/manufacturing industries leaves the nation with no self-reliance. The service economy was a way out of a trap for many individuals and families (both poverty and life endangering) even if as a national economic strategy it is a flimsy and a false security.


And returning to the quote..

But I would also want the real working wage to be enough to support a family so that one parent, (not necessarily the father), could afford to stay at home if they wanted to and provide the stable upbringing and parenting

I don't see how this will ever be the case for everyone. I don't even see how this will be the case for most people for any length of time.

At least, not without compromising standards of living.

[Patrick]

The change in the country as a whole from manufacturing to "servicing" has been reflected on a small scale in towns and cities as I've outlined elsewhere. I don't understand why we've just written it off - "It's cheaper to import so there's an end to it" the politicians seem to be saying. A little bit of subsidy would have gone a long way to keep thousands employed. Other country's happily add tariffs to certain imports to protect their own interests, and I'm afraid to admit I'm a firm believer in that.

Look at the number of ex factory sites now awaiting redevelopment, I expect a large number of them have lost out through their company being bought out and the parent company then moving production either to it's home country - or to China or India.

If we had a company that took on a factory in France or Germany through a merger and then closed it down to move production to Bridlington or something you can bet the EC would be on us like a ton of bricks! It never seems to work the other way though.

[trubble]

But then it's back to same old cause again. The fat cat owners. The only reason that swl's dream -- for a decent living wage to support full time parenting as a solution to the breakdown of society -- doesn't happen is that it would squeeze the profits. The company owners and top management, be it Tesco, Ford, Lloyds bank or the local chippy, has to expect a smaller wage or profit margin and share the wealth.

Let's all have a revolution and overthrow the royal family. Huzzah!

[Patrick]

Or as the saying goes:

"Keep Britain Tidy! Eat the Rich!"

This is beginning to merge with the French thread! vis reports of people looking for their own (to coin a crap phrase) "Third Way" out of the current crises - albeit via Communism or Socialism! Trouble is - they both have big flaws where the system is manipulated in much the same way.

I was thinking earlier about the Corporate types you get, for whom, where work is concerned they are 100% behind the company. the sort being churned out in droves by the universities these days - but most particularly the sort of clone that Best Beloved is currently battling with - if they were to sit down for a minute and begin to question the effect the running of their business and the unswerving loyaly to profit and targets has on the humanity of their organisation - they might be part way to getting people to work more happily.

You know, they do say that there is enough money floating around the economy to pay everyone a living "minimum" wage without doing any harm to anyone or anything?

[swl]

Jan 29, 2009 15:11:03 GMT trubble said:

But I would also want the real working wage to be enough to support a family so that one parent, (not necessarily the father), could afford to stay at home if they wanted to and provide the stable upbringing and parenting

So would we all but as the lowest wages in society have never been able to provide that so far and the middle and higher wages have provided that but people wanted a better lifestyle so in effect chose to need to keep two jobs per family unit, I don't see where women working for rubbish-pay in low-skill jobs in today's workplace fits in to the demise of the manufacturing industry or serves to lessen the chances of that ideal.

I repeat for the sake of hearing my own voice women have always been working in such conditions, from the earliest manufacturing plants to taking in washing.

The most blatant example is the coal mining industry. The Victorian mines were full of women and children working in some area or another, and for a pittance.





Are you being nostalgic about steel working and coal mining?

The workingman or workingwoman's wage was never enough to keep a family in any sort of style, families were dirt poor, weren't they??


The industries were also subsidised, which I am not necessarily against btw, but even so, imho getting rid of home production/manufacturing industries leaves the nation with no self-reliance. The service economy was a way out of a trap for many individuals and families (both poverty and life endangering) even if as a national economic strategy it is a flimsy and a false security.


And returning to the quote..

But I would also want the real working wage to be enough to support a family so that one parent, (not necessarily the father), could afford to stay at home if they wanted to and provide the stable upbringing and parenting

I don't see how this will ever be the case for everyone. I don't even see how this will be the case for most people for any length of time.

At least, not without compromising standards of living.

Trubbs - your examples seem to go back to before the war. The effects of two decades of full (male) employment after the war and also unionisation largely negated that.

We hear a lot of stuff about how it's cheaper to make things in China & India, well in a global context yes and with some goods, yes. But with heavy industry, the costs of shipping from the other side of the planet soon balance things out and as the cost of living & wages rise over there through time, the country that produces quality over cheap will be well-placed. For Britain, the market for our products is Europe but the Catch 22 of being in the EU & able to supply is the fact that other EU countries are happily protectionist whilst Britain plays by the rules.

An argument against high wages is that they make us uncompetitive. Doesn't stop Sweden selling Volvo cars or Germany making BMWs. Nor does it stop Norway making oil rigs or France making ships. If you make a quality product, you can charge a premium. British-made used to be a sign of quality, until the 70s anyway.

One of the problems with a service economy is it's an ever-decreasing circle. Everybody's out to make cheaper burgers or the cheapest quote so wages are driven down to cut costs. Because the buyers are also being paid less, the demand to drive down prices increases.

Sure, we'll always have the low-paid. As ever, they'll tend to be the uneducated or feckless. We've got the idea of what constitutes "skilled" arse about face. Did you know that the starting wage for qualified IT "experts" has remained the same as it was in the early 90s? That's cos uni's are chucking them out by the lb, along with meedja studies and philosophy "experts". We don't train engineers and scientists the way we used to and modern apprenticeships aren't worth a toss - because the industries aren't there for jobs at the end of it.

I don't know what the answer is, I'm just having a whinge, but it certainly isn't more and more identical shopping malls.

[Patrick]

One answer would be to make life easier for small businesses? It p's me off that the likes of the big chains can say "We'll have 900 new shops by next Tuesday". Yet such is the red tape, that someone setting up on his own will struggle to keep one shop going. The big boys could afford it if their rents were put up to subsidise the little people. They obviously have it far too easy as it is!

This idea is looking more and more ridiculous by the month..........

[trubble]

I don't know what the obstacles for small businesses are. I suppose that a chain is offering more value to the government because it's setting up 900 not 1 or 2 outlets and so it makes sense to have a different level of red tape for them. ?

Rent should be the same, shouldn't it? Tax is where we're supposed to relieve the chains of their cash. ;D

[Patrick]

At the moment I think there should be a bit more redistribution between the large shops and the small ones. At the moment my town centre hasn't filled some of it's empty shops for over five years - and some of these are within shopping arcades! Yet the council is currently trying to push through an additional shopping "mall" development - which they think will compliment the existing - but current evidence shows it will kill it off! Some of these landlords obviously aren't au fait with the basic laws of buisiness - if you can't sell it at y price - better to sell it at x price and actually sell something rather than nothing at all!