Twinkee: Can Survive Nuclear Holocaust, but not Union

These innane comments about how we have the government to thank for things such as the elimination of child labor always annoy me. No one wants to see their children toiling away in some factory instead of in school, regardless of what the law says. We got rid of child labor because we became wealthy enough to do so. What made us wealthy? Capitalism and the free market. That's who you should thank for the end of child labor.

 

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Well we do have government to thank for our child labor law, along with The Great Depression. Child labor was not effectively banned until 1938. So while recognition that government does good things is an anathema to your political ideology, it is reality.

“In 1916, the NCLC and the National Consumers League successfully pressured the US Congress to pass the Keating-Owen Act, the first federal child labor law. However, the US Supreme Court struck down the law two years later in Hammer v. Dagenhart (1918), declaring that the law violated a child's right to contract his or her own labor. In 1924, Congress attempted to pass a constitutional amendment that would authorize a national child labor law. This measure was blocked, and the bill was eventually dropped.” - Wikipedia

It took the Great Depression to end child labor nationwide; adults had become so desperate for jobs that they would work for the same wage as children.[citation needed] In 1938, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Fair Labor Standards Act, which, among other things, placed limits on many forms of child labor. So to the degree that unrestrained capitalism caused The Great Depression, you are correct. Capitalism did effectively end child labor in this country. It caused Congress to enact child labor laws that were upheld by the Supreme Court.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Child_...tates#History_of_children.27s_labor_for_wages

 

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actually it was the unions and the labor movement not the free market.

 

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The unions, the labor movement, monopolies, monopolistic practices, sweatshops, worker abuse and the subsequent reaction - all part of the free market.

 

Free market = if money could be made murdering people someone will get rich doing it, behold Blackwater! Laws need to be placed to protect people from a truly free market, then its not a free market. The question (for those that aren't Micheal) is how much regulation of the market is needed. Now I'm a pragmatist: find how much regulation works for each scenario and adapt from there, do not use generalizations (aka "ideologies") to cover the whole economy.

 

Regulation, law, is the infrastructure upon which free markets grow. Free and competitive markets cannot exist for long without an adequate set of regulation to foment competition and prevent monopolization. Government becomes intrusive and markets are not free when government or some other agency acts upon the market to artificially manipulate price.

 

This is exactly correct.

I will not be surprised one bit to see the rise of child labor in the USA as Progressives and other Statists burn what's left of the furniture/future to heat the house.

The Economics History Association
The figures below give trends in child labor from 1880 to 1930.
Labor force participation rates of children, 10 to 15 years old (percentages)

................1880.....1900.....1930
Males........32.5......26.1......6.4
Females.....12.2......6.4.......2.9
Percentage of 10 to 15 year olds in agricultural employment
Males........69.9.....67.6.......74.5
Females.....37.3.....74.5......61.5

One big show. I can't blame them, if the people are too stupid to understand the difference between causation and correlation - why not ride the trend and pretend to be effecting change to buy more votes from the moronic electorate?



In short, child labor was reduced as free-markets and capitalism increased the overall wealth of our society. As we transition towards socialistic regulated-markets where capital is being destroyed at an unprecedented pace, I will not be shocked one bit to watch as these same Progressives frog march other's children BACK INTO labor camps and factories - you know, for the "Good of the Nation". Mark my words, hell hath no fiery like a moral relativist Progressive. Get between them and their whiny rants and Ninny ideals and you can count yourself done for. These State Ninnies have no problem sending over the Goons in the Blue Clown suits to toss you and your loved ones off to die in the gulags .... if it means they can promise more goodies to the mass of starving people THEY created. A worst Demagogue history has not seen in some time I'm afraid.

War on Communism
War on Poverty
Wars on Drugs
Wars on Terror
Wars on Islam
War is Peace
War on Peace

Theobots and Statebots, pretty much two sides of the same illusion. It's no coincidence that as the religious arguments that used to maintain the Cattle in their little play pens paying their betters falls on deft ears, the oligarchs have switched to State propaganda. One way or anther, humans do like to lick the boot and Worship the State.

 

Free Market isn't Free-For-All.

Why is it you feel you need 'Regulation' instead of Private Property rights and Law? Your example is Blackwater? Really? Blackwater is an excellent example OF GOVERNMENT. Just where the hell do you think Blackwater gets it's money? From the US Government fascist contracts. You DO understand THAT right? Blackwater works FOR the US Millitary Industrial Complex. Our Income Tax pays for Blackwater. When Blackwater murders children in Iraq - WE pay them.

In a Free-Market based on Libertarian Philosophy (aka: USA cira 1900) - if Blackwater ever did something to YOU, you'd sue them in a court for violating your private property - beginning with your person, your body. As it is, we instead live in a Fascist State where if the Dear Leader POTUS decides (with his campaigner manager) that you're a 'Threat' to the "Republic" - He or She can send Blackwater a nice fat check and have them put a bullet in any one of us. No shit, a 16 year old American Citizen was put on the Dear Leader's "Kill List" and was murdered with OUR tax money.



You couldn't pick a better example of why we need to LIMIT the government. It's not Apple or Toyota flying drones over Pakistan and Iraq killing women and children. It's the US Government. And we're paying for it.

 

"Private Property rights and Law" = Regulation, there are one in the same! If we make a law saying "No child labor" then companies will need to be regulated and checked for child labor, etc, etc. Blackwater is a corporation that kills, people pay them to kill, other companies pay them to kill, governments pay them to kill. If there was no government there would still be mercenaries, probably more so then ever before as people would need to hire them to fend off the other guys mercenaries! If would be the Wild West but with automatic weapons!

How could I sue them if I'm dead? More so how is there a court of law? what funds it? what enforces it?

 

Not really. Regulations are legal manifestations that, for the most of the time, act against private property rights and are used to 'rewrite' the law. Like shoe leather thickness. This has nothing to do with private property and trade and is simply there to make it hard to compete in making shoes. There are regulations that restrict who can buy professional hair products. There are regulations on what you can plant in your own yard. There are regulations on which professions you can partake in. There are regulations that even restrict who can buy how many bathroom tiles.

Most regulations are there to STOP the free-market from functioning and rig the market in favor of propping up prices or reducing competition in service.

In a prosperous society people will want what is best for their children - the USA is a pretty good example of this.

That aside, there's nothing wrong with children performing some labor. Running a lemon-aid stand as an example. I'd hate to see the day come when child labor laws prevent kids from selling lemon-aid. I'm sure that day will come, sadly.

I don't think that would be the case. Governments ARE Blackwaters and an argument could be made that with enough competition no one company would take over... and IF one did, it's just end up BEING a government! You may not know it, but we're taxed at the highest amount that maintains labor productivity. We are tax cattle. Blackwater would only want to replicate the US Government. And so, if they took over (which I maintain is highly unlikely as people wouldn't let it happen) then we'd just end up where we are now. But, that's really not going to happen anytime in the near future so it's really all academic.

Actually, a lot of international arbitration is done without any governmental oversight at all. It's fairly common to tell you the truth. Private courts rule for two conflicting members. Why do people keep their word with no police to enforce the rulling? Well, they want more business and they don't want to tarnish their reputation.

 

It's only free for some?

 

There are regulations that prevent child labor, that require that employers pay overtime for working workers more then 40 hours, that there should be fire exists, that employees need health care, etc, I'm failing to see what what makes them different from laws, they both protect the people, fuck private property rights if they let you harm others.

And what does that have to do with the free market? In most countries they want what is best for the children regardless of prosperity.

That a little different from working in a factory, child labor laws have been around what 80 years now, haven't gone down the slippery slope yet of ending the lemon-aid stand.

No Blackwater is a corperation. You seem to think that governments = evil, that anything evil must be government. That is merely the symptom not the cause: corruption, greed, selfishness and all that flourishing with those that have power is the cause! That will happen in both corporation and government. Getting ride of one or the other isn't going to solve the cause.

Such as?

Oh you mean like Sharia Law?

A lot of people don't keep there word! Live in a developing nation and find out!

 

no it isn't not that little things like facts matter to a pro power demagouge like your self.

than i suggests you crack a history book. it was the pro labor progressive movement than helped end child labor but of course sense they tried to restrict the abuses of power in the world you hate them and continously lie about them

 

So? Child labor need only partially defray the costs of the child, to become standardized and economically coerced.

And you would have about as much chance as the people who attempted to sue the Blackwater type mercenary thugs of the early 1900s - the Pinkertons, say, hired by private capitalist organizations to beat and abuse and even murder employees trying to get reasonable wages or working conditions. Or the KKK.

 

Nonsense. In a libertarian utopia, the KKK would drop their grievances, join hands with the blacks and sing hymns.

 

Sometimes Michael I have to wonder how you manage to get out of bed every day.

 

It's not regulations that prevents child labor, it's prosperity. As for working more than 40 hours a week, I sometimes work 80 hours a week - I am not paid overtime. Steve Jobs wasn't paid overtime. No one has a 'right' to be paid 'overtime' at some magical number called 40 hours a week. In a well functioning economy I would have two additional people (or more) working with me. The lost prosperity thanks to government overreach is hidden from view. Mainly because the Asians at this time in history are working 80 hours a week so Westerns can enjoy a life they do not deserve.

Offering someone the opportunity to work is not 'harming' another person. Both people agree to the work contract. As a matter of fact, it's not possible to, in a free-market - to do something you do not agree to do. Sure, some people don't "like" working - at all. Maybe they perceive their dislike of having to work as being harmed - but no, they are not being physically harmed. But, unless they have someone willing to work for them, they'll have to do something. I know plenty of people who hate working. They think it's 'unfair' they 'have' to go to work - and do a job they don't really like doing. Of course, they didn't like studying either. They didn't really like not living at home either. Well, too bad. How many Americans on welfare could just as easily being picking fruit? Fruit isn't paid for by the hour but by the bushel. Is that 'unfair'? Is that harmful? No!

That's not 'harming' a person. What IS harming a person is getting together with a group of other people and hiring a gang to go over and beat the money out of grandma and grandpa. What IS harming other people is selling their labor by promising THEY'LL pay with interest (aka: Bonding their labor) sometime in the future for your good times now. AND then forcing them to do so - and if they don't, you'll send the same goons over that beat the shit out of grandma to beat the shit out of them when they turn 18 and have to go to work in the mines.

This is real harm. I mean, real people ARE physically beaten and caged.


I'll take my chances with the volunteerism, the free-market, private property rights, law and competitive money.


In a prosperous society, children don't HAVE to work. In a poor society, children MUST work - or they don't eat. They die. We're heading towards a day when you will see American children put to work to pay the debt the last generation, which will be dead and gone - created for themselves because they didn't think it was 'fair' to work 40+ hours a week without more pay on top, or they didn't want to pay for their own education (or save for their kids' education) or they wanted a boat, house, second house, rental property, four cars, jet skis, and a lot of vacation time - because anything less, was 'Harming' them and were more than happy to borrow on their children's dime.



As they say: The Road to Hell is paved with Good Intentions.........

 

Actually, they might not - but then again, they just might. Of course, we all know what the last 40 years of Socialism brought in terms of 'race' relations in the USA.


Imagine you're a white guy, you own a business. You hire a white dude at $10 an hour or a black dude at $8 an hour. If you hire the white guy, you think you will probably go bankrupt and lose your life's savings you sunk into your small business - you simply can't afford to. And without an employee you also can't manage to compete against competition. You decide to hire the black guy - even though you're a bigot, at the end of the day, this is your only shot at success and at least you'll have a fighting chance. So, you negotiate with and hire the black guy. Both of you work hard, the business thrives. The black guy is indispensable - you recognize his skill set now. He also learns what the market is worth and his value in it. With the thriving business the black guy makes his move, he wants to be a partner. You know to do so will cut your profits in the short term, but he's a great programmer and you think in the long run it'll be a win-win. You agree. You both become wealthy billionaires, buddies, and he one day asks for your daughters hand. You agree.


OR, the State forces you to pay $10 an hour. You hire the white guy because you never really had any black friends and you're a closet bigot who likes to post on blogs but probably never dated an African girl unlike the person whose words you are presently reading. The white guy is a slob, a waste of money, and a cheat. You go bust. The black guy meanwhile ended up on welfare. He never got that chance in life. He commits a petty crime selling some mary jane and is sent to prison where he's stabbed and dies.


Right now, 1 in 4 black Americans will be sent to prison for non-violent crimes.
You can thank your Social Paradise and the State - because that's who's sending them there.

 

Coffee

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And that genre of facepalm is what that brand of ideology depends on, completely, as physical reality. That is what American history looks like, through rightwing "think tank" optics - it's not even aimed at children, it's the bedrock of intuition and judgment for adults in positions of power and responsibility in this country.

ye gods, we're in trouble.