[sighsigh]

Bombastic click bait morality.

IPhones are affordable because of wealth inequality. Oil is cheap because of wealth inequality. Organic food is purchasable because of wealth inequality. Hipster clothes can be owned because of wealth inequality.

And yet, none of these goods are targeted because those who use them are susceptible to pro-union shilling.

Stop the painfully forced guilt complex from this out-of-touch middle class white perspective. I wish I could have easily sold my spare time for more money when I first moved here with P2P labor systems like Uber... but I had to wait for a central bank's liquidity push to eventually intice small business hiring, some union to not bump a new guy for someone's seniority, or some corporation wonk to figure out a new growth market. Oh, yes, I just felt so equal in that system of waiting for people "smarter" than me to justify needing me.

People should have access to the means to sell their time and labor where ever and when ever they want. Period.

[sp332]

I don't know how you missed the recurring outrage about the wages and conditions of iPhone workers. And the article isn't against your last point. In fact the article isn't even blaming Uber for the problems. It's just pointing out that Uber (and other services like it) only work where inequality is pervasive.

[sighsigh]

Globalism works due to inequality. Nationalism works due to inequality. Tribalism works due to inequality. The dirty secret of civilization is that someone has to dig the graves. Why pretend it's an evil from your middle class morally righteous soap box instead of allowing people the means to participate as simply as possible?

[sp332]

Why don't I pretend it's an evil from the bottom of someone else's grave I just dug?

[sighsigh]

Because that would make you... a believer of an out-of-touch white middle class moral framework that has failed to predict anything.

[samman]

So, I'm kind of ambivalent about this thread so far, but it sounds like you have thought about this a bit. What sort of moral framework do you find preferable over the 'out-of-touch white middle class' one?

[happyscrappy]

I can't believe the comment you are responding to was flagkilled. I just don't understand HN sometimes.

[noarchy]

Agreed. I don't see why that comment, in particular, got killed. I think some groupthink was at work, in that case. This is an unfortunate trend on HN.

[sighsigh]

Notice a pro-union/pro-mercantilist/pro-nationalist comment is at the top, while this comment was flagkilled. It is very possible some entity outside of the community hivemind is intentionally crafting a narrative... and this isn't the only thread they are targeting. Why? Because this post isn't even on the front page anymore.

[swatow]

In my experience (on HN and other places) economics orthodoxy is always unpopular. People like to believe "if only if weren't for X assholes, the world would be much better". Economics teaches that the assholes are us: the primary thing preventing the world from being much better is the political and economic barriers to redistributing wealth.

Redistributing wealth is hard. Much easier is to invent schemes like unions which enrich certain lower class people, while (silently) making other lower class people poorer.

As you point out, globalization and outsourcing has made Chinese and Indians much richer. But they are not very visible, so who cares about them? They should have waited their turn, and eventually Western unions would have granted them jobs with "fair" wages ;-)

[uptown]

It's fine to believe that. It promotes an economy that essentially looks like this:

"Change in median net worth 1983-2013"

Upper income families $321k

Middle income $2k

Low -$2k

Source: https://twitter.com/conradhackett/status/545260970256252929

[sighsigh]

Are you going to factor in China and India from the same time period?

[dropit_sphere]

I don't know why this keeps being brought up. Do China and India cheer when the economy picks up in the U.S., for reasons other than the increased demand they'll experience? Does GE include Microsoft's performance in its reports to shareholders?

I mean, fewer people starving is always awesome. But it is not the question being asked.

[refurb]

Considering that the time period of 1983-2013 catches the tail end of the worst housing crash in recent history kinda skews the numbers.