Here’s a letter to the New York Times:
Union president Joseph Hansen accuses Wal-Mart of unleashing economic destruction because its innovative retail methods make available at lower prices a wider range of goods – goods that, to be brought to retail markets in the past, required greater numbers of higher-skilled (and, hence, higher paid) workers (Letters, July 28).
In short, Mr. Hansen criticizes innovation that enables us to enjoy more and better outputs from fewer and less-valuable inputs.
To be consistent, Mr. Hansen should also criticize those innovations that, say, improved the quality of televisions and, as a result, destroyed the jobs of t.v. repairmen. Likewise he ought to condemn advances in digital photography that enable amateur photographers today to produce high-quality photographs that once required the skills of professional photographers. And of course Mr. Hansen should protest the polio vaccine for enabling people to survive and move about without the help of workers who produce iron-lung machines, wheel-chairs, and crutches.
Sincerely,
Donald J. Boudreaux
Share
{ 102 comments }
Just another one of the “dey took ar jobs” contingent. Whether they’re screaming about immigrants, off-shoring, or domestic firms who find ways to increase productivity, they’re all pretty much the same–they demand a reduction in overall wealth creation so that they can increase their own personal wealth.
DEY TOOK OAR JAAAARBS!
DER DUK R DERR!!!
Winner
DERK DER DEEERRRRRRRRRRRRR!!!!!!!!!!
de tuhk r jahbz!
muirgeo’s solution: Everyone back to the pile!
heh heh
HA HA HA AH! I just watched that episode last night. “Dem der goobacks took er jarbs!!!!”
I suspect Mr Hansen would praise Wal-Mart if Wal-Mart workers were unionized.
I imagine so – THAT is his problem. Not that WalMart is efficient and makes things easier for people to purchase, enjoy … That, if unionized, prices will go up, efficiencies will go down and WalMart would not have been what it is today is irrelevant to him … ALL he cares about, I imagine is UNIONS – and in his mind, the primary reason anyone should consider opening/growing businesses is to provide jobs for others to enjoy – Profit is a four letter word unless unions can grab all of it – d&^N anyone else
The pyramid scheme of Unions must be protected. It is like the Mafia minus the killing. But, they do intimidate and threaten physical violence.
He is just trying to protect his own job. Should Unions become more irrelevant……. his first class flying days on the dime of others is over.
Might as well have a picture of the union chief and a politician being carried overhead, like royalty, by union serfs wearing their Union labels.
So true….
Walmart destroys good jobs in poverty stricken areas? Would an area be poverty stricken if it had a serious number of good jobs?
I wonder if anyone has ever done a study on the wages paid (if any) by the “mom&pops” supposedly supplanted by Walmart. I wonder if anyone has ever bothered to look at the annual incomes of the mom&pops themselves and asked if mom&pop would rather give up their meager incomes and go to work for Walmart.
Or better yet, a study showing how a Wal-Mart opening in a small town has revitalized that town by providing several stable jobs. I spent a weekend in a small town that had a Wal-Mart. All over town were “Buy Local” posters. I went into the Wal-Mart and it was crowded. Lots of people shopping, lots of people working. I suspect that the mom-and-pop shops in town saw an influence in sales because more people (the ones employed at Wal-Mart) had income to spend at the “local” shops.
increase… not influence.
All over town were “Buy Local” posters
Recently I saw a “buy local produce” bumper sticker on the back of a VW minivan. I laughed so hard.
Reminds me of an old friend of mine from the ’70′s who put a “Boycott Japanese Goods” sticker on the bumper of her new Toyota.
Having grown up in a small town in the 1960′s I can tell you that mom and pop stores sucked. They were expensive, never had much to choose from, and were never open when you needed them.
I remember my Dad keeping me home from school so that I could ride my bike to the only NAPA auto parts store in town. So that I could buy a part that was needed to fix the car, while he hitched a ride to work with another worker. Because the damn auto parts place was closed after 4:00.
Screw mom and pop.
LOL, kinda reflects my youth. Everything closed down Saturday at noon, forget buying anything on Sunday. The only things open after noon Saturday until Monday morning were the beer halls and the movie theaters.
Of course, selection or choice during the week wasn’t anything to write home about either.
Not just polio vaccine … but vaccines in general – … Kids live without being killed of diseases that used to wipe out large segments of the population … People live longer because of medicines – hence they keep working longer – and worse, keep coming up with ideas for making things better …
The real problem with WalMart is that computers and software allowed WalMart to collect huge amounts of data from suppliers, stores – establish purchasing patterns and design systems to deliver just what the customers wanted – So, I imagine they are cursing computers and software – and the people who learn how to use them …
Oh noes! All those people now living to adulthood drive down the wages of those who would have lived anyway . . .
Actually I believe Sam Walton had pretty well developed his retail sales strategy well back in the 1970s when he had but one or two stores and was in competition with the giants in the retail business, Sears, JC Penny, Woolworth, and Gods knows how many other large chain retailers.
The age of computerization only allowed Walmart to sharpen what they were already doing.
It IS possible that WalMart did indeed have the best retail intelligentsia – and so it was logical that WalMart was the company to see the advantages of using computers/data mining to become ruthlessly more efficient than anyone else and bring prices down … So perhaps the best thing Sam Walmart did was to hire the right people and figure out the plan for the company to grow – good people joined, they had terrific ideas and were allowed to implement then – and presto, a revolution in business -
as a charter member of the elevator operators union, i applaud mr hansen and his defense of skilled labor.
I applaud your lack of punctuation and the credibility that it carries.
Where was Mr. Hansen when the dangum automatic door openers came about. Thousands of hard-working, skilled doormen were shown the…….. uh………. aaww, nuts……. We need more unionized doormen. A living wage for all doormen and ability to strike. See how people will get into structures without the doormen. The cities across America will come to a standstill. Still standing in the rain or heat when those doors won’t open. Doors don’t just open themselves, ya know.
Where is Muirgeo on this subject.. surely, he will throw out some MSNBC website about the need for doormen and how the coporations are putting more people into poverty…. more people starving and dying in the streets……. Call Obama!!! he will save us………
What about the automobile? It put all us livery stable people out of work….
Is Joseph Hansen is old enough to remember when letters to the editor involved paper, ink, stamps, and postal carriers? Just think of all those “good jobs” he is helping to destroy.
I wonder if Mr. Hansen owns a typewriter.
Nope, he uses papyrus
I thought he must scratch it out in the sand with a stick.
Nobody gets paid to produce sand or sticks. Only papyrus yields large amounts of jobs.
Imagine the loss of jobs in the tablet industry – no more jobs for those that could “write” on tablets (No, not the electronic kind!)
The skilled workers of tablet chiselers.
Wheelbarrow inventor will rue the day…………. thousands of laborers put out of work……
The argument never changes. The mom and pop stores that close on Main Street are seen. The thousands of local consumers who benefit from lower prices and wider variety are unseen.
The simpler answer is that he calls “Economic Destruction” ought to be better characterized as “Creative Destruction.”
Build a better mousetrap, and cats will beat a path to your door to picket.
“Build a better mousetrap, and cats will beat a path to your door to picket.”
ooh can I use that?
Noting the long lines at every new WalMart, to fill out employment applications, seems a better reaction to Hansen’s critique than labeling the people in these lines “less-valuable inputs”. These people obviously consider employment at WalMart more valuable to them than whatever they’re already doing, and if WalMart organizes this labor to attract consumers from other retailers, then the laborers are also more valuable to these consumers.
+1
The goal in my letter is not so much to defend Wal-Mart as to drive home the point that producing more with less is a good thing rather than a bad thing.
My father-in-law pointed out to me the other day that tire shops use to do brisk business putting on and taking off snow chains until someone had the bright idea to make an all-season tire.
On the contrary, Mr. Hansen probably praises things like federal subsidies for ethanol, which lead to higher-priced inputs (corn) and filter down into more expensive food stuffs so that consumers have to shell out more money for the same good. Awesome.
More of those damn innovators trying to screw over the working man:
http://www.futurepundit.com/archives/008201.html
I mean imagine how many dentists might be out of work if people can just regrow healthy teeth. Who would want healthy teeth, when a person can just go and have a dentist drill a whole in his tooth?
Regards,
Ken
Why am I being taxed to pay for some indigent persons food stamps? The 40,000,000 adults and children who rely on the government’s dole to eat have to spent their “stamps” somewhere. The agribusinesses and the retailers that sell their foods to poor people are making big profits. Let THEM be taxed to pay for the food stamps. Stop the government from stealing from me to give charity to the poor. The governments efforts to make me poor will soon have the predictable result of forcing ME to go on food stamps in order to eat. Question: Who will pay for my beer and cigarettes? Anheuser Busch and RJ Reynolds philanthropy? Also, who will pick up the tab for my lung cancer and alcoholism treatment, not to mention my 2 DUI’s?
ObGuy,
“The 40,000,000 adults and children who rely on the government’s dole to eat have to spent their “stamps” somewhere.”
No one “relies” on the gov to eat. Without gov handouts, these people would still eat fine.
“Let THEM be taxed to pay for the food stamps.”
You do realize that all costs imposed on producers are passed onto the customer, right? If the gov simply taxes food manufacturers, those taxes are simply added to the price of food. Since everyone buys food, everyone gets to pay the extra prices.
“The governments efforts to make me poor will soon have the predictable result of forcing ME to go on food stamps in order to eat.”
I’m pretty sure that’s the goal of most politicians: make as many people dependent on the gov as possible. All ready 60% of Americans receive a paycheck of some sort from the federal gov. Why would this majority EVER vote to reduce the size of gov? And almost 50% pay no income tax. Once that number actually reaches 50%, the country is pretty much cooked.
But Americans deserve it. For almost 100 years, Americans have been voting to reduce their personal liberty for the illusion of a gov guarantee of a comfortable life. There’s a saying about this; something about chickens and roosting.
Regards,
Ken
“A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.” – George Bernard Shaw
Shut your pie hole you ignorant bastard!
I am an idiot. Please do not respond to my foolish rants!
The Wealth of Nations;
American Household Net Worth
Before free trade;
1980 to 1995 ~tripled from $9.5 trillion to $27.9 trillion
After Free Trade;
1995 to 2010 ~doubled from $27.9 trillion to $57.1
I have to say that this is one of the most confusing posts ever… What on eartg are you tryong to say?
If free trade is a big part of building the wealth of a nation why did our wealth growth slow SIGNIFICANTLY after committing to “free trade”?
Again the real world facts do not support the claims.
Composition of fallacy……
You are good at building fallacious ideas.
Keep it up. Maybe, a coffee table book on misinformation and ideas.
Wanna tell us about govt jobs again and how Federal jobs are up, due to demoncrats, while state and local jobs have been decreasing, rightfully so, under mostly Republicans and the basic fact of having to keep balanced books…….they don’t need those workers…….
US automakers before 1978 were profitable
After 1978 US automakers were less profitable and ended up in bankruptcy by 2008
What changed? CAFE standards
Therefore……. CAFE standards have bankrupt the US auto industry…….. real world facts….. Muirgeo style
Free trade happened in 1995? What day was that? I must have missed the news.
Gaahhh, txsir,
What’s wrong with you? I can’t believe you don’t know about the magical day muir is talking about. The world didn’t exist before 1980 either. Where would we all be without muir here to guide to through history.
Regards,
Ken
And 1980?
NAFTA January 1, 1994
GATT Uruguay Round/WTO 1994
China granted most favored nation 1994
http://www.itulip.com/images/currentbalance.gif
You should probably get out a little more… or maybe read a little more.
muir,
Why start at 1995 if NAFTA started in 1994?
The WTO replaced GATT, which commenced in 1948.
How does granting ONE nation a “favored” relationship equal FREE trade?
Do you know any history or economics at all?
Regards,
Ken
Dammit!!!! Pencil making should be done in the US!!! Handmade!!! place 900% tariffs on Chinese imorted pencils…. or Tawaiin.. Malyasia…… whoever is not American making Pencils…….
All of your stuff is fallacious……
1920′s= no wars
while FDR in office = war
Therefore FDR is responsible for US war….. If only the populace had voted for another, then there would have been no war.
What is there to say except your neoliberal policies are failures compared to progressive policies…. except for the very wealthy. To be a neoliberal requires that you are ok with a plutocratic society of privilege. It has NOTHING to do with promoting liberty.
To be a progressive means you are for authoritarian govt under an aristocracy of eltist pigs who say ‘do as I say, not as I do’.
From the accused pedophile of Wu, pervert Weiner, minimum wagelaw scoffer Pelosi, bigotry of Holder, Communism of Van Jones, associating with Anti-Americans and bigots of Obama, etc.,….. Progressives are horrible people.
http://news.yahoo.com/nasa-data-blow-gaping-hold-global-warming-alarmism-192334971.html
Before Carter= no American hostages in Iran
Carter= American hostages in Iran
Progressive Presidents equal American Hostages
Four legs good, two legs BETTER!
Don’t bother, George has an endless supply of stupid.
I think you’re missing the point of free trade. If I want to buy a Sanyo radio from Japan, I don’t need a government treaty (agreement actually) to tell me to do so.
In “Economic Sense”, Chapter 87: The NAFTA Myth, Murray Rothbard stated: “In the first place, genuine free trade doesn’t require a treaty (or its deformed cousin, a ‘trade agreement’; Nafta is called a trade agreement so it can avoid the constitutional requirement of approval by two-thirds of the Senate). If the establishment truly wants free trade, all it has to do is to repeal our numerous tariffs, import quotas, anti-’dumping’ laws, and other American-imposed restrictions on trade. No foreign policy or foreign maneuvering is needed… Yet Nafta is more than just a big business trade deal. It is part of very long campaign to integrate and cartelize government in order to entrench the interventionist mixed economy” (http://mises.org/econsense/ch87.asp).
1980? Thanks Uncle Ronny!!!
1995? only doubled? Damn Clinton, Bush, Obama…….
Well no because actually the 15 years BEFORE 1980 saw the Wealth of Our Nation increase 4 fold…. OK junior.
Do mess with me because I deal in real world facts… and you just got clubbed over the head with them.
You dabble in BS!!!! you are a lightweight, here.
Nice big education as a doctor……. and I with no piece of paper hanging on my wall destroy your arguments……
You bring nonsense and high school arguments to the table.
Just sit back and let the adults talk. Go play with your dolls.
You haven’t destroyed anything. You simply reply that I am wrong never trying to rebutt the facts I post. Explain why gains in The Wealth of Our Nation has slowed over the last 3 decades when the supposed free trade crap you peddle says it should be increasing?
Thats a simply fair request. You have no legitimate reply… you’re a soulless piss ant and nothing more…. incapable of earning your own way actually doing something productive.
All you have done is create fallacies.
Sun comes up.. sun goes down….. sun revolve around earth.
Duuuuhhhhhh!!!!!!!
Fallacies, fallacies, fallacies……… I am amazed at how dense your arguments are. They are 17yr old to 22yr old compositions. The kind of reasoning that is void of digging deeper into information. Quite sophmoric at best!!!
“Do mess with me because I deal in real world facts”
Said the man who doesn’t think Hoover increased gov spending by 50%.
Said the man who doesn’t understand that the WTO replaced GATT, which commenced in 1948, hence has nothing to do with 1995.
Said the man who thinks a trade agreement with ONE nation and giving ONE other “favored” status equals free trade, but before that there was NO free trade of any kind.
Said the man who ignores all the legislation and backroom deals James A Johnson with congress from 1993-2000.
You deal in fantasy and know nothing of facts.
Regards,
Ken
Yes… and damn Clinton indeed because he DID push those agreements along with passing the banking deregulations…. I don’t care about party or politicians…it’s ALL about policy for me…. I and progressives are consistent with that. Our policy works… libertarian/republican policy is a failure.
Progressive policies do not work. Progressive Housing policies destroyed our economy. Progressive ideas assist brutal dictators. “let’s talk to them”…… “nobody ever did that”……”if we just talk to them”………. jackasses… how stupid!!!!
Use of words like ‘fair’….. what a crock!!!
FDR as a hero? He was a filthy adulterer. He was a Constitutional Usurper. He was a bully. He should have been jailed for causing all of the harm to Americans.
No the company you are a serf for destroyed our economy… you weasely worthless piss ant of a person. Your mind and your body are not your own… you are a corporate shill… a drag on the real productive good people of this country.
Productive good people like politicians? *snorts*
Dan J,
Who do you work for that’s got muir’s panties in a twist?
Regards,
Ken
He works for one of the biggest mafia corporations, the giantess of rent seekers, a casino finance company and the huge peddlers of fraud and deception. He takes military families houses away from them while they are off dying to protect and keep said companies massive fortunes safe. He works for a company in which every employee will tell you they are philosophically libertarians but pragmatically high ticket rent seeking vampire blood sucking giant squid people bilking the federal coffers and the hard working productive class of good Americans.
Muirgeo,
I work for JP Morgan… NOT Dan J!
Rent seeker? JP Morgan turned down the bailout money dummy! Barney Frank forced them to take it.
He can’t even distinguish between posts.
Muirgeo Logic: A ‘Dan’ who posts on CafeHayek works for a financial institution, therefore ALL ‘Dans’ work for financial Institutions.
I assure you, Muirgeo, that out of 300 million+ people in the US, there are other ‘Dans’.
Yet, another contradiction of the ‘Dr’s’ reasoning. Like shooting fish in a barrel. You might want to try CafeHayek Jr. The blogger is the 6th grade class president.
muir,
Show me a city in American that has been dominated by libertarians/Republicans the way Detroit has been by leftists/Democrats, then explain to me how this city is somehow worse of than Detroit. The largest one is Houston, TX, a city that is thriving, in a state that is thriving, while the rest of the country is engulfed in a recession.
Regards,
Ken
I am from Detroit area. And, it is the epitome of progressivism. IF you call that success……which I think Obama and others do, then shame on you.
Detroit is 100% the work of progressivism. This is absolute!!!
Oh, I like the word “epitome”, although, I like to pronounce it with a long o and a silent e.
muir,
Why not look at per household wealth, instead of total? Better yet, why not look at per capita wealth? Why not reference where you got these figures? Are they even controlled for inflation?
Regards,
Ken
Because you are a proven unthinking intellectually dishonest DS and I don’t reply to you.
For once we agree.
Please explain to me where I’ve been intellectually dishonest.
Regards,
Ken
Or are you still pissy about me slamming you over your anti-military bias?
Regards,
Ken
Said the man… Well just check out my comment above.
I’m sorry if I see that there is a bit of intellectual dishonesty in recognizing politicians to be the lowest scum of mankind, and then worshiping the men and women who kill for the benefit of said scum.
I do understand that those men and women believe that what they are doing is for the benefit of The People™, but the sad fact is that they are only benefiting the scum who do what is necessary to attain political office.
As for your signature, there is another bit of intellectual dishonesty.
Please.
Go masturbate in the mirror.
In 1980, the U.S. public debt was $909 billion – or an amount equal to 33.3%
By 1990, that number had more than tripled to $3.2 trillion – or 55.9% of GDP
Based on the 2010 U.S. budget, total national debt will grow to nearly 100% of GDP, versus a level of approximately 80% in early 2009.
~wikipedia.org
Your numbers. Your ‘progressive’ Obama.
Maybe we should to into a World War with a draft….. that will take care of unemployment……… just send people off to get killed…… A sure fire unemployment fix…. just like FDR….. the murderer!!!!
Or possibly stop giving corporations like the shit hole you work for tax breaks for offshoring.
That’s right, Yasafi.
Corporate welfare for GE, GM, Chrysler, and ADM, but none for Goldman-Sachs!
Don’t forget Whirlpool and Tesla.
Muirgeo is ALL for tax breaks, so long as it fits his approval of his ideology.
Ah, yes.
But we’re corporatists because we oppose all corporate welfare.
Didjya read some of the spewed nonsense on his page…….. Good God, man!!!! I am now stupider from reading his page.
I refuse to visit Yasafi’s web page.
He’s so stupid, he hasn’t figured out how to cut-and-paste, so he re-types the drivel from Kommie Kos and HR Huff-n-post with all of his misspellings and grammatical errors. I can just read the more grammatically-correct tripe at the source blogs.
The most fundamental fact about the ideas of the political left is that they do not work. Therefore we should not be surprised to find the left concentrated in institutions where ideas do not have to work in order to survive.
Thomas Sowell
If there are less people… there are less people COMPETING FOR OUR JARBS! DEATH TO AMERIC….
DEATH TO ISLAM!!!!!
The Socialist which leads to Communism/Marxism solution……. kill off the excess. When the collectivism fails and people are left starving, homeless, and without bare necessities….. kill them off……… Way to go Stalin, Mao(rgeo), etc.,….
“And of course Mr. Hansen should protest the polio vaccine for enabling people to survive and move about without the help of workers who produce iron-lung machines, wheel-chairs, and crutches.”
Nice touch!