[dyauspitr]

Why though? For a business owner I can’t imagine a better situation than his workers working for free and having to do 16 hours a day under pain of death. This probably wouldn’t work with 80% of the populace enslaved but would work very well with 10-15% enslaved.

[kbenson]

It's not quite as straightforward as that though. You're also required to pay a large sum up front to get the worker, have to pay for room and board and health for the worker, including children of workers which while they are investments that may eventually pay off, are mostly cost sinks until at least a few years have passed. There's more of a trade-off that might be immediately obvious when you dig into the reality of what it took.

[lazide]

Slaves aren’t free.

You still need to feed them, clothe them, and house them.

You need to do basic medical care.

And now you have the problem that most of them would happily murder you in your sleep/if your back is turned, or run away never to be found. So the tend to be a pretty big security risk.

Oh, and also they’re slaves so good luck getting them to care about their work - way worse than a typical new hire retail employee even. So you need to do heavier supervision.

Oh, and you had to pay to acquire them - instead of give them an offer and pay them after they’ve worked for you successfully. So add that to the ‘risk’ pile.

[GuinansEyebrows]

> For a business owner I can’t imagine a better situation than his workers working for free and having to do 16 hours a day under pain of death

you really can't imagine a better situation than humans owning humans?

[dyauspitr]

Obviously horrible from an ethical and moral perspective. But for a morally decrepit factory owner, free/extremely cheap labor is the dream.