Rich people stopped buying yachts. So everyone who maintained, built, crewed, and docked them were put out of work.
All because politicians thought they could stick it to the rich people.
You heard that, lads? Wanting to reform the system so that a CEO can't make 100000x as much as their employees means you want people to be unemployed! We're basically taking the jobs right out of people's hands! Gosh, why didn't I think of that.
I think there’s validity to the historical context of a yacht text. Not as a reason to avoid reform, as a reason FOR reform and a cautionary tale. These giant and wasteful burdens to the world- yachts- and the consolidation and inequality in wealth that makes them possible are signs of the fundamental rot in our economic system. It’s exploitive and unbalanced. If we look at other history- slavery is a terrible blight of man kind. The American economy had slavery as a foundation. Abolishing slavery to tru and clean the rot from the foundation shook the whole house. It wasn’t just slave owners and traders who lost fortunes or struggled- industries removed from slavery also felt the ripples and for a time there were fluctuations in availability or costs of goods etc etc.
Even among slaves the abolition of slavery wasn’t all roses. People with a place to stay and some form of support in food etc. found themselves jobless and without any support in a society that had recognized they aren’t slaves legally (on paper anyway..) but hadn’t recognized them as human equals.
That isn’t revisionism or a justification for slavery- as I said- the practice is a stain on the human soul. The point is that historically we have to recognize that when we build a system on rotten and exploitive foundations- cleaning that up isn’t going to be all sunshine. It should be a priority when making these types of changes to mitigate the suffering or provide support to bridge the gaps of those exploited in positions where they rely on those systems.
Simply put- the exploitive CEOs and industries and economy are designed so most people suckle their teet or feed their families with scraps from the tables of the wealthy. That isn’t something we should be ok with- we shouldn’t keep the 100000x salary CEO in power just to avoid hardship for the thousands of workers being exploited and making below living wage to generate that wealth- but we do need to approach the situation in ways that redistribute resources to those in need or more evenly.
A simple and flawed example might be something like legislation stipulating that no single employee can make more than X percent more than the lowest paid employee at a company when we consider benefits and contractors and all these other forms of compensation.
I mean… that’s on view point sure. I’m not sure how legislation equals tyranny when there are tens or hundreds of thousands of laws governing your everyday life. We can skip a lot of restrictive laws I’m fairly certain you are happy exist- but we have laws about minimum wages for employees, laws preventing employers from withholding wages for reasons of their own devising, laws for employee protections such as requiring rest periods and such. We have laws on how a landlord must keep a property, who or why they may refuse service, protecting renters from being thrown out arbitrarily or suddenly… are they all tyranny? I’d argue it’s supporting tyranny to protect a system of entrenched wealth where a minority hold disproportionate power. To each their own I suppose.
@guest_ "I’d argue it’s supporting tyranny to protect a system of entrenched wealth where a minority hold disproportionate power." – very well said. Supporting a system which would without regulation devolve into, well basically a modern version of feudalism, isn't very anti-tyranny.
@ewqua- thank you. And I agree. We are IMHO, not so ideologically far from a sort of feudalism as is- being “landed” is still a primary source of wealth. We’ve made lots of great progress- people aren’t essentially property to land owners, they are now product- which is I suppose a step up. I am controversial in that I adore capitalism- socially responsible capitalism. I’m not exactly opposed to different systems or combination systems that work- but I do think that a competitive capitalism is one of the best systems in practice- keywords “socially responsible” and “competitive.” There are too many monoliths in the market to really allow competition let alone independent participation in a meaningful way.
I liken it to video game design- game designers generally create systems where players progress by following the “rules”- this is much like our system in that regard- but our system not only doesn’t give everyone equal opportunity to play the game as designed, it also Differs by making the difficulty easier as you “level up.” With a few million dollars a person can invest in such ways they never need to work again to live a “middle class” life. The more money you have- the easier it becomes to make money- even without producing anything- which goes against the spirit of innovation and hard work that I love in capitalism. I believe it should be exponentially harder to make increasing sums. If someone has a billion dollars- you’d know that person was a freaking prodigy and not just someone who paid the right firm to invest the fortune they inherited etc.
Speaking as a (relatively) poor person who sometimes plays videogames. The capitalist structures are often inherent in the structure of the games as well. As a kid I couldn't afford a NES and Mario Bros so I ofc "was bad at video games" and other kids thought I wasn't any fun to play with. As an adult I've stopped playing multiplayer because I simply cannot compete with the kids who has their parents credit cards, no matter how skilled I am.
It does suck- I mean to an extent Childress games have often been hampered to some degree by money- it’s possible to play baseball or ride bikes etc. with old, outdated, substandard or improvised equipment because you don’t have money for the newest or best or even non home made versions- but it’s magnified severely in an age where not only is the digital world a major social touchstone for culture and relationships, but the costs of hardware and software especially for multiplayer are so high and often require additional costs like audio equipment, subscription based services etc. and that is before the introduction of paid add on content you may need to be comparable or even play (such as expansions.)
All because politicians thought they could stick it to the rich people.
That isn’t revisionism or a justification for slavery- as I said- the practice is a stain on the human soul. The point is that historically we have to recognize that when we build a system on rotten and exploitive foundations- cleaning that up isn’t going to be all sunshine. It should be a priority when making these types of changes to mitigate the suffering or provide support to bridge the gaps of those exploited in positions where they rely on those systems.
A simple and flawed example might be something like legislation stipulating that no single employee can make more than X percent more than the lowest paid employee at a company when we consider benefits and contractors and all these other forms of compensation.