5 ms·

I'd rather live in a society with strong labor protections than one that is "more innovative", whatever that means.

bryanlarsen 1y ago
You can have your cake and eat it too. It's called the Danish model, although Denmark does not completely implement it. Make it cheap & easy to both hire & fire people, but then take care of people who are fired through a generous safety net. High taxes pay for the safety net. Explicit taxes are better than implicit taxes. Forcing companies to provide social services such as employment guarantees or health insurance to employees makes taxes look lower than they actually are.
- VirusNewbie 1y ago
  How does that work with immigration? Does Denmark allow anyone to receive these benefits?
  - bryanlarsen 1y ago
    You have to live there for 10 years before you qualify. But you get to pay the high taxes regardless of whether you qualify or not.
jstummbillig 1y ago
Do you really? Or do you actually want to sustain your standard of living as safely as you can? Because then the question arises: What if the current way of handling labor protection in the EU (as one of many components) leads to destroying yours and everyone elses standard of living, simply because it's unaffordable? Would you still argue that this is the way to go? Everyone going down with the ship together? I don't know what will happen and what the root causes are (labor laws might not contribute much to the picture, I really don't know), but at least we should be somewhat cognizant of the fact, where the industries of the future are currently built and where they are not, and have a fantastic explanation of why this is not going to be a super big issue.
- Muromec 1y ago
  Why would it become unaffordable?
  - jstummbillig 1y ago
    Because labor protection costs money. If you get something from that, that's net boosting your economy, you have no problem. If not, you get social cohesion, at a price. Somebody is paying that price. If it's companies they are disincentivized to employ people in your market. If companies go somewhere else to employ people, jobs disappear from your market. If the jobs disappear, so does the money.
    - knowledge-clay 1y ago
      > Because labor protection costs money Labor protection does not "cost money". It is a limit on the degree to which workers can be exploited.
      - dzhiurgis 1y ago
        Sorry but 50% tax rate is exploitation. Especially so how inefficient government spending is.
        disgruntledphd2 1y ago
        I live in Europe and pay 52% marginal. I considered moving to California and it turned out that I'd be paying about 50% marginal. So not sure it makes that much difference.
        seec 11mo ago
        Even if this is completely correct, you would be paid more in California, right? Or at the very least have better purchasing power. That would come at the cost of security of course, but considering the state of EU governments it's no clear how long that security will last really...
Muromec 1y ago
There is a small problem -- more innovative society next door will get richer and eat you anyway. So lets enjoy the good times and be weak men while it lasts.
- piva00 1y ago
  Let them get richer, the same people who talk with these threatening remarks also talk how capitalism isn't a zero-sum game, someone else becoming richer doesn't mean someone else getting poorer, right? Just means getting richer at a slower rate, Europe is pretty rich on global standards, let's keep getting a bit richer while others get the chance to reach these levels.
  - Muromec 1y ago
    It's not about being less rich than US, it's about US using all this money to influence politics here, because the can afford it.
    - piva00 1y ago
      That would be, in my opinion, an orthogonal issue, and not clear from your "and eat you anyway" remark. The only good thing coming out of both Trump's terms is the diminishing influence of the US, I can see your point on how US money could influence politics here but at the same time it's also now much harder for that influence to take hold properly. US influence was much stronger back in the late 90s, early 00s, it's been waning since 9/11, and kinda reaching a tipping point with Trump. The next financial implosion, which is inevitable in the boom-bust cycles, can likely cement this diminished influence, the US won't have that much extra money sloshing around to fuck with other countries, they are losing long-time allies which propped them up to recover from the 2008 mess they created. It'll probably be the best time to decouple away from the US, including their financial influence in our politics.
      - Muromec 1y ago
        We already have one broke wannabe empire with nukes, can't wait to have two of them fucking around in a search of lost glory.
dzhiurgis 1y ago
You might. In aggregate far more people wanna move from Europe to US then opposite.

You can have your cake and eat it too. It's called the Danish model, although Denmark does not completely implement it. Make it cheap & easy to both hire & fire people, but then take care of people who are fired through a generous safety net. High taxes pay for the safety net. Explicit taxes are better than implicit taxes. Forcing companies to provide social services such as employment guarantees or health insurance to employees makes taxes look lower than they actually are.

VirusNewbie 1y ago
How does that work with immigration? Does Denmark allow anyone to receive these benefits?
- bryanlarsen 1y ago
  You have to live there for 10 years before you qualify. But you get to pay the high taxes regardless of whether you qualify or not.

jstummbillig 1y ago

Do you really? Or do you actually want to sustain your standard of living as safely as you can? Because then the question arises: What if the current way of handling labor protection in the EU (as one of many components) leads to destroying yours and everyone elses standard of living, simply because it's unaffordable? Would you still argue that this is the way to go? Everyone going down with the ship together? I don't know what will happen and what the root causes are (labor laws might not contribute much to the picture, I really don't know), but at least we should be somewhat cognizant of the fact, where the industries of the future are currently built and where they are not, and have a fantastic explanation of why this is not going to be a super big issue.

Muromec 1y ago
Why would it become unaffordable?
- jstummbillig 1y ago
  Because labor protection costs money. If you get something from that, that's net boosting your economy, you have no problem. If not, you get social cohesion, at a price. Somebody is paying that price. If it's companies they are disincentivized to employ people in your market. If companies go somewhere else to employ people, jobs disappear from your market. If the jobs disappear, so does the money.
  - knowledge-clay 1y ago
    > Because labor protection costs money Labor protection does not "cost money". It is a limit on the degree to which workers can be exploited.
    - dzhiurgis 1y ago
      Sorry but 50% tax rate is exploitation. Especially so how inefficient government spending is.
      - disgruntledphd2 1y ago
        I live in Europe and pay 52% marginal. I considered moving to California and it turned out that I'd be paying about 50% marginal. So not sure it makes that much difference.
        seec 11mo ago
        Even if this is completely correct, you would be paid more in California, right? Or at the very least have better purchasing power. That would come at the cost of security of course, but considering the state of EU governments it's no clear how long that security will last really...

Muromec 1y ago

There is a small problem -- more innovative society next door will get richer and eat you anyway. So lets enjoy the good times and be weak men while it lasts.

piva00 1y ago
Let them get richer, the same people who talk with these threatening remarks also talk how capitalism isn't a zero-sum game, someone else becoming richer doesn't mean someone else getting poorer, right? Just means getting richer at a slower rate, Europe is pretty rich on global standards, let's keep getting a bit richer while others get the chance to reach these levels.
- Muromec 1y ago
  It's not about being less rich than US, it's about US using all this money to influence politics here, because the can afford it.
  - piva00 1y ago
    That would be, in my opinion, an orthogonal issue, and not clear from your "and eat you anyway" remark. The only good thing coming out of both Trump's terms is the diminishing influence of the US, I can see your point on how US money could influence politics here but at the same time it's also now much harder for that influence to take hold properly. US influence was much stronger back in the late 90s, early 00s, it's been waning since 9/11, and kinda reaching a tipping point with Trump. The next financial implosion, which is inevitable in the boom-bust cycles, can likely cement this diminished influence, the US won't have that much extra money sloshing around to fuck with other countries, they are losing long-time allies which propped them up to recover from the 2008 mess they created. It'll probably be the best time to decouple away from the US, including their financial influence in our politics.
    - Muromec 1y ago
      We already have one broke wannabe empire with nukes, can't wait to have two of them fucking around in a search of lost glory.

dzhiurgis 1y ago

You might. In aggregate far more people wanna move from Europe to US then opposite.