31
submitted 8 months ago by grte@lemmy.ca to c/canada@lemmy.ca
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[-] avidamoeba@lemmy.ca 8 points 8 months ago

Two points I found interesting:

The labour movement has long understood that raising output per hour of work through more investment in machinery and equipment (as opposed to work intensification) lays the basis for negotiating rising wages and living standards and investing in social programs and public services. Higher productivity can also support the reduction of working time.

In the US, governments have more often let the economy “run hot.” Low unemployment results in higher wages which pressure companies to invest in new capital equipment and skills, raising productivity.

I don't know if there's data but it could explain why the correlation between wage growth and productivity decoupled over the last 40-50 years. The standard assumed causation is productivity -> wage growth, but that's shown to be false by the decoupling. If however we assume wage growth -> productivity causation then at least that doesn't violate the decoupling data.

[-] m0darn@lemmy.ca 7 points 8 months ago

If however we assume wage growth -> productivity causation then at least that doesn't violate the decoupling data.

You're saying that our economy is addicted to using low wage earners (like TFWs) keeping businesses profitable without having to invest in improving labour productivity.

this post was submitted on 12 Apr 2024
31 points (87.8% liked)

Canada

7280 readers
298 users here now

What's going on Canada?



Related Communities


🍁 Meta


🗺️ Provinces / Territories


🏙️ Cities / Local Communities

Sorted alphabetically by city name.


🏒 SportsHockey

Football (NFL): incomplete

Football (CFL): incomplete

Baseball

Basketball

Soccer


💻 Schools / Universities

Sorted by province, then by total full-time enrolment.


💵 Finance, Shopping, Sales


🗣️ Politics


🍁 Social / Culture


Rules

Reminder that the rules for lemmy.ca also apply here. See the sidebar on the homepage: lemmy.ca


founded 4 years ago
MODERATORS