How do we prevent the 99% from protesting about this and make them believe that its their fault for not working hard...

How do we prevent the 99% from protesting about this and make them believe that its their fault for not working hard enough?

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zeit.de/wirtschaft/2016-05/einkommen-deutschland-gerechtigkeit-vermoegen-soziale-ungleichheit-arbeitnehmer?cid=6640824#cid-6640824
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Make them docile, lazy and stupid. Probably want to go after the education system and media, and fatten them up a bit. Oh look; it's the current year!

Just say its a conspiracy theory
Wage slaves dont have time to think. Dont worry about it

>lower prices on goods and services to compensate
>give white people welfare

If you think about it it's really a tax on wage earners handed out to whoever receives said monies. Likely capital holders.

Actually I just read a german article that did precisely that.

Einkommen: Wir sind selbst schuld an der Ungleichheit |ZEIT ONLINE
zeit.de/wirtschaft/2016-05/einkommen-deutschland-gerechtigkeit-vermoegen-soziale-ungleichheit-arbeitnehmer?cid=6640824#cid-6640824

The gist is that it's wagecucks own fault for getting low wages for not demanding a higher wage themselves and not being part of labor unions.

They dont care. Most people think of themselves as temporarily embarrassed millionaires, one idea away from being in the 1%. NEETs don't associate themselves with the "wagecucks" who are getting shafted even though they are poorer than them. Wagecucks dont associate themselves with the 99% even though all the odds are drastically stacked them increasing their station in life. Meanwhile the real wealthy elite are pushing for more of a welfare state and socialist ideals to keep the mob dormant.

>2016
>implying unions still have any real power

>Meanwhile the real wealthy elite are pushing for more of a welfare state and socialist ideals to keep the mob dormant.

A World War 5 is more likely than basic income ever happening.

I don't think it will happen soon either but they sure have got the ball rolling in that direction.

Basic income will be the future when robots do all the work

Protest what? There's not an individual or group that can be held accountable for this.

The left is nothing but victim-oppressor issues. they are never not whining

This is the fault of government and their only solution is more government

Pretty much this. You don't really have to placate the middle class as much because raises and promotions give them the illusion of progression. It's the 15% of the population living in poverty you have to worry about because they are the most prone to desperate acts. Take care of the poor and you downgrade uprisings from full on LA riot status to tame "occupy wallstreet" stand arounds (which accomplished nothing).

No need , its already been done. They commodified protests themselves.

Bread and circuses ring a bell? Yeh commercial VR just came out and were legalizing weed - no need to worry about a pesant uprising

No need - theyll just expand the inefficient means tested welfare state.

Instead of just cash like UBI youll get a card loaded with money and it will only be good for certain companies or products - so the tax money will as usual subsidize places like walmart.

>Woah! Real wages have doubled from 1945-2015
>b-b-but how do we convince people that capitalism is bad?
>I know! Let's focus on wages as share of GDP! That ratio has gone down a little over 5% over the course of 70 years!!
>I don't know man...that doesn't really seem much...1.25 Trillion in "lost wages" also only account for 3000$/capita. Isn't the ratio also meaningless if everyone is better off because overall real GDP is much higher?
>Don't worry about that! We'll just use a ridiculous scale for our chart...let's say from 40%-60%. That way tiny fluctuations will seem HUGE!!
>Great idea! Bernie 2016!!

I'm middle class. Not part of the 1% nor your 90%.

Personally. I love the 1% ers.

Absolutely Love 'em.

They're the only people who have ever given me my kick ass job and comfy salary.

The rest of you 90% faggots aint done shit for me or anybody for that matter. Fuck you scrubs.

Exactly. Its a sad fact but any amount of real change is going to come about through violence. If you pacify the part of society who is the most prone to violence, the poor, then you mitigate that risk. The rest of society can be manipulated through the press.

>Woah! Real wages have doubled from 1945-2015
Citation needed.

>We'll just use a ridiculous scale for our chart...let's say from 40%-60%. That way tiny fluctuations will seem HUGE!!
Umm... you do realize it was the Fed that created that chart... right?

I'm starting to #feelthebern guys

turn the chart upside down and that's called profit

>The rest of you 90% faggots aint done shit for me or anybody for that matter. Fuck you scrubs.
The 90% dutifully consume the goods/services you make for your 1% boss, and don't come round and burn/steal your stuff simply for having more than them - unlike in much of the rest of the world.

Also... as an immigrant... you 'Merican faggots crying about income inequality is comedy to us.

lol at you 'Merican Niggers crying poverty, standing in a soup line with your iphones, $200 sneakers, and bling in your fucking teeth.

"nigga I'm po! how you expect me to feed muh babies when I gots payments on my escalade with them spinning rims!"

>>what is CPI : the post

Oh thank god my real wages in dollar value went up! Oh wait shit , everything I have to buy like housing and groceries are way way way more expensive

Shoot - guess your line of reasoning was as shoddy as the berniebots huh friend?

Christ you a dumb nignog

>Citation needed
pic related
>you do realize it was the Fed that created that chart
so what? doesn't change the fact that it's only the tiny scale that makes the 5% fluctuation seem big.

A good portion of that can be explained with longer life expectancy. Retirement savings depend on capital gains even for the average Joe.

Hi, pls Google what 'real wages' means

1945 is too far back to even discuss in one graph. From 1945 to 1970s most people had blue collar jobs and the decline in wages was driven by declining union membership.
>inb4 hurr durr unions!!one
today most middle class goes to at least some college and works white collar jobs. Productivity is boosted by computers but computers also automate, eliminate jobs and improve communication so Habeeb, I mean 'Brad' from Virginia can take your job for $14k a year which is enough to have a sexy maid slave in Bangalore, I mean Virginia.

Bottom line we're fucked and cucked. Personally I'd rather dream of being 1% with one good idea on Veeky Forums than cry like a pussy faggot millenial baby at a Bernie rally. But it's a choice and I agree probably delusional.

You know why that chart sucks ass? Women really did not work in '45 and have progressively joined the workplace over the last half century. Thats why you cant use "household income" as a good metric because that assumes 2 peoples salary.

>pic related is individual salary

Also this.

Oy vey!

Everyone new to the thread, please read this first.

>ask for higher wage
>get replaced by someone willing to work for less

you cant, because production rates have steadily improved as expected. Its just the yuppies being greedier than they ever have been.

Don't you dare post a meme of Trump or his wife's son ever again.

>Woah! Real wages have doubled from 1945-2015
Nope. Real wages doubled from 1945-1975 and been fairly stagnant ever since. The argument is not that wages are decreasing after inflation but that normal workers are not being compensated fairly when you account for the of the amount of explosive growth to GDP, productivity, overall wealth and expansion that the US has experienced within the last few decades. The reason this is bad is that most of this money is not going back into the economy. Its not a huge issue now but when the next financial crisis hits when the economy stops expanding you end up gutting the working class.

Why do you think workers should receive higher pay for higher gdp? It's like when #occutards cry about entry level pay versus CEO pay. Explain why you think they're connected or should be.

why do you think they shouldnt? are you retarded? It means the ceo's are pocketing the money and the middle class is dissapearing. Who could possibly want this to happen? besides faggots on Veeky Forums of course.

The movement is real, negro!

>work harder and longer hours because "the economy is bad" *wink* *wink*
>get paid less for more work
>company records record profits
Wow, seems totally legit to me. I sure want to work longer hours for less pay!

Not ceo's. The company's share holders. Don't like your slice of the pie, as it relates to your output with your company, buy some fucking shares, and shutup. If your company isn't publicly held and your compensation sucks(assuming you actually work), find a better job, asshole.

>thinks the CEO gets GDP
what country?? lol

thats not how the stock market works at all.

the profits are going somewhere. and its definitly not the workers. see its not rocket science.

>find a better job, asshole.
You're assuming that better jobs exist, which isn't the case since this is a *macroeconomic phenomenon.* You can't just go somewhere else because the network effects acting against you will be present there too.

>Record profits, that you believe are vacuumed off by ceos, aren't actually reflected in share value or actual dividends.

Are you sure you didn't mean to post a response on or ?

>I can't handle hard evidence that I'm wrong so I'll just tell him to go away

why is everyone here completely retarded. Go buy some meme stocks while your at it. you actually think the money the company makes goes into stocks. A very small percent maybe by insider trades but thats it.

But the CEOs are workers. You're not making sense at all.

hey who's ready for Hillary to take the DNC nomination? How will you celebrate Veeky Forums? I'll probably take a week off to golf in Scottsdale. relaxing.

>the profits are going somewhere

The share holders... stupid. It's literally the most democratic system on earth. You can even buy a share of production/profits of a company you don't work for, if you don't like your own. (Again, and the implication could not possibly be stronger, assuming you work.)

why are so many people trying to discredit the facts? ceo's collect the money while the workers get screwed harder and harder every year. houses cost more now than they ever did. food costs more. everything you buy costs more than ever yet there hasnt been an increase in wages in close to half a century. Ya na its the common workers fault right?

you are so fucking stupid I cant even believe there are people out that believe that. That is not remotely close to how the stock market works.

Can we all take a minute to point at this thing and laugh?

>ceo's collect the money
but high level executive pay is only a tiny fraction of what companies are spending

I just want to point out to people ITT that the cause of this change is largely (though not solely) due to the US' transition from a labor-based economy to a capital-based economy. Suddenly the returns on capital far outweigh the returns on labor. This is partially due to globalization, partially due to the decline of labor unions, etc. But generally it's just the logical progression of a free market economy. There's a positive feedback loop wherein the rich have an increased opportunity to make money with their capital, which gives them more opportunity to make money, etc. The poor who lack the capital no longer have the value of labor to work enough to obtain any sizable amount of capital as they may once have had.

Ultimately, the wealth will become ever-more concentrated in the hands of the wealthy. This is simply how things are. The only solutions are to a) assume the rich are generous and their wealth will trickle down or b) have the government focus on more distributive policies for laborers. One of these is the obvious choice, but unfortunately you can't say anything about redistributive policies in the US without the temporarily-embarrassed millionaires flying off the handle calling you a commie. And before someone strawmans me, no. I do not support Bernie Sanders.

>says the ignoramus that thinks a companies profits are divided up by the shareholders.

Hey guy. If the CEO took all the money out of the corp then the board would probably fire him/her, no? What about board member salaries? Or the corporate lawyer salary? Are you worried if those guys make more than the entry level worker?

It has little to do with GDP specifically. Gross domestic product is just another metric that determines the overall expansion and economic health of the US. It is just one number that paints an overall picture of unprecedented financial prosperity.

The reason that large corporations are only concerned about the bottom line is because they can barely see past their noses. They are beholden to boards and shareholders that demand short term results and ever improving earnings reports or CEOs and executives heads get put on the chopping block. The reason this is bad is that they are cutting their legs out from under themselves. The working class consumer is the gas that fuels the economy. When the economy grows and expands, workers wages need to grow along with it or you stall the economy. As of right now the only thing propping the whole thing up is quantitive easing. When the economy crashes, and it will, it will be the working class that takes the hit.

That's literally how it works though

Oh fuck no. how many people here believe this retarded garbage. lets see a show of hands I need to know what the fuck I'm looking at here.

Are you from a different reality? Sadly, I'm being completely serious with this question, because you either know absolutely nothing (NOTHING) about our system, or you are from a place where the very base fundamental rules are completely different.

As an aside, if you are transdimensional, start your own thread so we can all learn of your ways.

>The working class consumer is the gas that fuels the economy.
Exactly this.

a very small percentage of stock worth is from shares bought and sold by the company itself. what changes the worth of the stock is people buying or selling the shares. I knew biz knew absolutely nothing about business but I thought at least a couple of you knew how the stock market works.

This

Also this.

However, it is extremely difficult for a company to develop a product, supply chain, finance it, achieve a return higher than the cost of capital, fend off competitors and grow. AND top of all that, somehow farm generations of citizens to be future customers. And I don't think that's government role either.

If any user knows how to farm wealthy citizens IRL, then you should publish and sell the ideas to China. They're trying their asses off to make it work and they end up with massive empty cities of unsold condos so hurry they need help.

Zero percent of the worth is from shares sold. 100% is based on present or projected earnings per share available. There's speculators aplenty that shift the price up and down by nearly imperceptible amounts (ctrl-f "robinhood thread"), but ummmm... yeah... I share a board with you. Im a little embarrassed.

you literally were arguing the point that the company puts all of its profits into the shares. keep moving those goalposts though eventually you might win the argument.

No he was arguing that the shareholders decide what to do with the profits which is correct because the shareholders appoint the CEO.

Money =/= wealth.

That's like saying the American voter decides what to do with his tax money.

Are you implying that somehow workers have more in assets than they used to?

Or did you mean to say wage=/=wealth, in which case are you implying that they have more wealth despite lower wages?

Either way, I can't think of a scenario where you're not stupid.

That would be correct if the amount of taxes you contributed detemined how much percentage of the US you owned and you also owned a large percentage.

Yes. That is, if the president could be fired from his job and replaced at any time by a voting system that is weighted by tax paid per individual voter divided by overall tax revenue.

Isn't it the board anyway who generally directly determines dividends, not the CEO?

occutards would trigglypuff rage

>Why do you think workers should receive higher pay for higher gdp?
Because their work is worth more.

Just tell them the gdp has risen in general and their stupid peasant asses arent 10x more special than international competition.

Seriously, anybody who makes over 30 grand a year is in the 1% and they still think they're special fuckinf snowflakes that are offering exceptional service to justify that salary.

Iget the heartiest keks when adds coming showing blue collar goys saying they deserve to paid over 40 times the wage of shitskins bwcause they put "actual heart" into their product.

Your solution implies a mis-allocation of resources. How bout we stop incentivizing people to pop out hordes of useless eaters if we don't need hordes of people to man machinery and factories anymore? Redistributing wealth at this point would do nothing but destroy any semblance of prosperity in the US. Not saying this because I am a 'temporarily embarrassed millionaire,' I'm saying this because I understand that the way capital has flowed has created the greatest opportunity for the largest number of people. I think we are just temporarily out of equilibrium as we have a glut of people relative to the amount of actual labor needed in the post industrial America. It will correct itself in time.

>the way capital has flowed has created the greatest opportunity for the largest number of people
Those are some hot opinions you've got there.

He's 100% right. We're in a cycle. Enough capital isnt being deployed to raise wages significantly because if the uncertain regulatory environment. Once Obama and his agency directives leave office, the environment should stabilize. Every two months for the last 7 years, the federal government has been issuing or threatening to issue regulation after regulation. Why hire people or expand your business until it all settles down?

De-regulation and lack of regulation is part of the issue that caused the last few crises. You think they really issue regulation as a means to hinder small businesses and create monopolies? Of course not. It's the lesser of two evils. Having a less regulatory environment creates instability in other realms. It would be like removing patent / copywright laws so that individuals inventors have less barrier to entry. It seems like a good thing until you see China and what a shitbox lax regulations has created. There is always 2 sides to every coin.

>Enough capital isnt being deployed to raise wages significantly because if the uncertain regulatory environment.
Lmfao. What a copout.

I didnt say deregulate. I said uncertainty is what is causing the problem. Remember, for almost 3 years, employers didnt know a thing about how Obamacare would affect them. Why would you hire if you had no idea what the total cost of the employee was going to be over the coming years? Why hire a woman when no one knew what action Obama was going to take on the pay gap? Or a man for that matter? What new agency directive is going to come out of the EPA next? It's been the most uncertain regulatory environment in our history.

Wait. Why are you talking about hiring new employees now? I thought the discussion was about issuing fair wage increases to existing employees?

It all goes hand in hand. I'm talking more about expanding businesses, which results in higher wages, hires, etc.

For the years Obamacare was being tossed around, why would you give an employee a raise, when you could be facing a huge increase in health insurance costs?

Say you own a business that employs 2 people, a man who has been with you for 10 years and a woman who has the same experience but has been with you for 2 years. They both perform the same duties. You want to give the man a raise to reward his loyalty. But Obama's Lilly Ledbetter Act says a woman can sue a current or former employer at any time in the future if she discovers she was not making the same pay as her male counterpart for the same work. Knowing this, are you as likely to give him the pay raise?

And keep in mind that for years, no one knew what the law would even be, just that Obama had "promised to close the pay gap."

Total copout and load of bullshit from those in the government who are in favor of deregulation. I can give you 100 examples why this is not true.

>The most common general studies are of environmental regulations, and these have consistently failed to find significant negative employment effects. Moreover, studies suggesting that regulations have broad negative effects on the economy offer little persuasive evidence.

>Some well-executed studies have found that certain regulations led to job losses in particular areas, but most studies of various industries suggest that regulations had either a close to neutral or small positive effect on employment levels.
-Shapiro and Irons

I can go on for days providing proof that this is a tall tale.

>It's been the most uncertain regulatory environment in our history
Bullshit. Pic related.

>regulations arent bad for business
How can anything that vague be accurate?

I'm sure certain regulations don't and some do.

You are telling me Obama's self-proclaimed "war on coal," did not contribute to every single major coal mining company filing for bankruptcy in the last year and a half.

Fucking hogwash. You do realize that raises are reversible right? You can decrease someones pay just as easily as increase it. I would feel better if you said something like "hey the business exanded 30% but they just felt like keeping the money without raising wages" rather than this load of crap. Regulation has always been uncertain. That is the nature of regulation. Obviously strugging businesses should not be tremendously cutting into profit margins when they may have extra regulatory expenses the next fiscal year but we are talking about major companies that have unprecedented growth who adjust wages to barely even outperform inflation. Come on.

I don't see that as regulatory guidance or an attempt to reign in the coal industires. I see that as a full on attack due to the EPA and environmental standards. It's not like they want coal to play nice, they want it gone. I consider that a big difference. There is no uncertainty as to what the end goal is.

Why are we just talking about major companies? The problem with you regulation happy big government people is you act like everyone works at Walmart. In reality, Walmart is going to eat the extra cost of providing healthcare and still be around years from now. But it will kill the small grocer's margins and drive him out of business.

Here's an example of what Im talking about:

There is currently a strong push from certain regulatory agencies and attorney general's offices to sue Exxon Mobil for not disclosing to investors the possible effects future regulation would have on profits.

So in essence, a company is being told to try to figure out what regulations might be passed at some point in the future and how these hypothetical regulations may affect future business or face enormous fines.

How is this environment at all business friendly?

Its simple. Major companies have the most employees. If there is going to be any major change in wages its going to come from the large companies, not the small ones. The small companies are almost negligible. I don't think anyone expects the smaller companies to be the driving force behind wage increases. I don't even support a major minimum wage increase because it will be the small companies that get hit the hardest, not to mention the fact that large companies will just pass the cost back to the consumer in the form of higher goods and services.

No, the problem is that the companies who have recently had the most growth in capital rarely ever translate even a portion of the extra revenue along to employees. Stagnant wages are a major issue when the rest of the economy is expanding. The best way to stunt plant growth is to constrict the growth of the roots.

>mis-allocation of resources
A literal meaningless string of words.

Wrong. Small businesses make up 50% of private sector employment and 65% of new jobs created.

as the welfare state grew the market reacted by placing a downwards pressure on wages

the only ways I can think of realistically to secure higher wages without market forces working against it are

1: widespread unions, unions are compatible with a free market if they don't use the state to enforce their demands or break any agreements made with a business

2: a complete change in how unions operate, no more restricting innovation in business or flexibility in employment, rather than strike, employees sign year long contracts or such and to renew contracts and gain access to skilled labor, businesses must negotiate, the focus being to increase wages rather than mess with the business that pays those wages, possibly unions could also provide education and training services

3: more workers saving and investing, capital shifting from big hedge funds to a middle class and mutual funds (or index funds)

It's not. I don't even agree with all regulation but I see regulation as an overall good thing. I spend an extra half hour in traffic because I can't take the car pool lane. I could bitch about how it gives an unfair advantage to vehicles with 2 people or I could understand that carpool lanes are there to incentivize less waste and a cleaner environment. It costs me extra fuel economy because I legally can't drive in a lane that would minimize those costs. I didn't have to choose that highway. I didn't have to choose that particular location to work at. Because I do choose that highway, however I realize that there are rules (good rules that mostly have good purpose) that I should abide by. That's regulation. If I don't agree with those rules then I should have made it my lifes goal to be a policymaker or someone with influence over them.

Of course. The point wasn't that small companies don't (collectively) have a lot of employees. It was that small companies don't (individually) have a lot of employees. Obviously I am spitballing since I don't have exact numbers but the principle is that it would take half a million small companies to all collectively accompish what one Walmart can.

The wage stagnation started in the 70s because that was the end of the New Deal consensus and Bretton Woods era, which had supported decades of mass redistribution of wealth.

After the United States inevitably lost competitiveness due to the rise of allied economies in Europe and Japan (both of whose economies were actively boosted/subsidized by the US for Cold War reasons), the whole system collapsed because the US eventually could not afford the costs any longer, especially once these foreign allies began trying to actively game the system by demanding gold redemptions for the dollar. The end of Bretton Woods and the labor/capital market readjustments during the 1970s and 80s were American attempts to defend its international competitiveness and top economic position against encroaching rivals, since the strong labor unions, manufacturing industry, and overvalued gold-fixed dollar that had helped to reduce inequality and ensure stability since the end of WWII could not be sustained in the new global economy.

With a little help from the energy crisis of the 70s, which hurt everyone but hurt the US a lot less than Europe and Japan, the US succeeded in reasserting economic dominance at the cost of middle and working classes wages. This was achieved through weakening union bargaining power, deregulations, and a move toward financialization in an increasingly capital-centered world economy (there's a reason that movies about Wall Street become a thing only since the 1980s). The forced savings of widespread defined benefit pensions, which put uncompetitive burdens on American business, vanished to give way to defined contribution plans like the 401k/IRA that moved responsibility to workers, which had a terrible impact because most people are bad at saving.

All those editorials crying about the broken link between productivity and wages treat the problem as something entirely solvable domestically by the United States when it's rooted in a global phenomenon.

Not sure what carpool lanes have to do with anything. I'm not "pro regulation" or "anti regulation." Those are ridiculous stances. You need to look at each law and agency directive on an individual basis and judge them accordingly.

I guess this whole thread is so vague it's hard to figure out what the hell you guys are talking about.

The current environment is bad for business. I dont think anyone would argue that Obama hasnt used regulatory powers to attack sectors of the econony (namely energy and electricity producing companies). When the government is using its power to knock down certain companies and prop up others, there is no level playing field and the result is a bad business environment resulting in a stagnant economy

In any case, the American electorate has shown a historical tendency to balance out these cycles over time. The huge inequality from the Gilded Age and the 1920s eventually became objectionable to enough people that there arose political responses that promoted income redistribution and thereby reduced the inequality in question (Populist Party, Progressives, New Deal, etc).

The rise of Trump/Bernie and the focus on inequality as a central political issue today is just the latest in that long tradition. Even if Trump or Bernie lose, as the Populists did, the political conversation has shifted so much that it's a fairly certain bet there will in time be similar efforts to redistribute income/wealth as in the past. Ever since the crash, corporate profits as a percentage of GDP has been ~50% higher than its long-term average of 6%, and there is always a backlash when this happens. That backlash is happening now.