Writing a column every day is a recipe for making an occasional mistake.
Sometimes the errors are minor, such as when I put Tucson in New Mexico rather than Arizona.
And sometimes they are less trivial, such as when I mischaracterized subsidies for the Postal Service or when I incorrectly criticized the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.
In an event, I always try to acknowledge and fix my mistakes.
And that’s why I want to write today about Oxfam. Early last year, I wrote a column criticizing the group’s statist orientation, asserting in my title that the group was a leftist joke instead of a real charity.
Time to correct the record. But I want to begin by noting that my title was only partly wrong. Oxfam is very much a left-wing organization. In prior columns, I’ve shared critiques of the group’s statist ideology from Tim Carney, Marian Tupy, and Tony Travers.
And before I get to the part about fixing my mistake, I want to augment this list by sharing the views of two more experts. We’ll start with some excerpts from a column in the Wall Street Journal by David Henderson.
Oxfam recently published a 76-page report, “Reward Work, Not Wealth,” that advocates taxing the rich to reduce inequality and help the poor. …There are two ways to close the gap.
The first is to concentrate on making the poor better off. Mostly that has happened, thanks to liberalized international trade and reduced costs for shipping goods. Just as Walmart and Amazon have cut costs for Americans, the introduction of container shipping crushed transportation costs for the world. The second way to reduce inequality is to make the rich worse off.
Needless to say, Oxfam prefer the approach that gives more power and money to government.
Any guess which method Oxfam’s report emphasizes? “Governments should use regulation and taxation to radically reduce levels of extreme wealth,” the authors conclude. …The document’s title, “Reward Work, Not Wealth,” is strange: Wealth is one of the main rewards for productive work. High taxes on wealth and the wealthy reduce the incentive to produce.
And Oxfam, to its credit, understands that confiscatory taxes will require a global tax cartel.
…the report…effectively advocates…the creation of a tax cartel. Since capital is extremely mobile and will go where it is lightly taxed—witness the corporate “inversions” of American companies—the report suggests “a new generation of international tax reforms.” Negotiating tax rates would take place under the aegis of “a new global tax body that ensures all countries participate on an equal footing.”
Reading Henderson’s column, we have additional confirmation that Oxfam is a run-of-the-mill statist organization that myopically believes in class warfare.
So you might think the group is no different that other leftists groups such as the United Nations or the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Or no different than politicians such as Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton.
But Oxfam also has a reputation for beclowning itself with shoddy analysis.
Johan Norberg mocked the group’s ideology-over-results approach when he noted that Oxfam is distressed about an era of “neoliberalism” in the world (meaning, in this case, the European definition of pro-market classical liberalism), yet that’s also the period of time when the poor enjoyed huge gains.
For what it’s worth, I wrote a study 17 years ago debunking some of Oxfam’s sloppy work.
And here’s some of what Tim Worstall just wrote for the U.K.’s Adam Smith Institute.
Buried in Oxfam’s latest report about how disastrously unequal the world is we’ve got an assumption which is so breathtakingly foolish as to kill off any belief in the sense or sensibility of the organisation’s mindset. They’re trying to insist that the minimum wage in a place should be very much higher than GDP per capita in that same place.
…the garment trade in Bangladesh…minimum wage there is…5,000 taka a month, or £50. …Yes, a low sum and most assuredly we’d all like it to be much higher. But Oxfam’s claim is that this should be a living wage of more like £250 a month (perhaps $250). Something which simply cannot happen. GDP per capita in Bangladesh is some $1,500 a year or so. We cannot have a minimum wage twice that. This would be the same claim as insisting that the UK minimum wage should be $80,000 a year (say, £60,000). …It’s a demand based upon the most aggressively stupid misunderstanding of what ails Bangladesh, isn’t it? ……to get this so wrong seriously calls into doubt Oxfam’s right to anything more than a contemptuous sneer. …Sorry folks, but Oxfam is deluded.
Tim concludes with some very wise words.
Bangladesh’s problem is not global inequality, the thing Oxfam is whining about, it’s Bangladesh’s poverty. …The cure for poverty is economic growth, the very thing which has reduced that global absolute poverty from 40% of all humans to under 10% in just these past three decades of that very neoliberal globalisation.
Now it’s finally time for my correction. When I wrote last year that Oxfam was “not a real charity,” I was merely implying that the group was a bad charity since it advocated policies that hurt poor people.
But thanks to new revelations about Oxfam’s involvement in horrific sex-crimes scandals, I’ve learned it doesn’t deserved to be called a charity of any kind. Check out these excerpts from a CNN report.
Oxfam’s deputy chief executive has resigned amid a growing sex crimes scandal involving the organization’s aid workers in Haiti and Chad.
…Oxfam announced the resignation after a meeting with UK government officials Monday, at which it had fought to keep millions of pounds in public funding. …Oxfam received about £32 million (about $44 million) from the government last financial year, according to public records.
And the money from British taxpayers is just the tip of the iceberg.
Here’s a shocking bit of information from the conclusion of David Henderson’s column.
Oxfam’s annual budget exceeds $1 billion, and it gets almost half of that from governments and the United Nations. So maybe it’s time for a new name. Oxgov.
Almost half of its budget from taxpayers?!? At best, that makes them a government contractor rather than a charity.
I’ll conclude with two points.
- First, I think Oxfam should lose public funding. But not because some of its employees engaged in sexual predation. Yes, that’s bad, but I certainly don’t think sex abuse was ever part of the organization’s mission. Instead, it should lose funding because taxpayer money should not go to leftist organizations that advocate for bigger government (the same argument I use, by the way, when urging an end to OECD handouts).
- Second, instead of telling people that “Oxfam is a letist joke rather than a real charity,” I’ll have to changes the second part of the sentence. Maybe “Oxfam is a leftist joke and it mooches from taxpayers.” I’m not sure that rolls off the tongue gracefully, so I’m open to other suggestions.
P.S. You probably won’t be surprised to learn that the International Monetary Fund partners with Oxfam. I guess the old saying is right that birds of feather flock together.
International Liberty 
[…] In theory, annual awards should not be bestowed until the end of the year. But I already violated that rule when writing about “2022’s Tweet of the Year” last month (in my defense, anything that mocks Oxfam deserves favorable attention). […]
[…] Which is exactly the opposite of the statist agenda being advocated by the kooks at Oxfam. […]
[…] previously written about the dodgy work of Oxfam. Today, let’s look at the agenda of Christian Aid (they obviously […]
[…] previously written about the dodgy work of Oxfam. Today, let’s look at the agenda of Christian Aid (they obviously […]
Hmm it appears as though your website ate my personal very first opinion (it seemed to be very long) so i suppose I’ll only conclude exactly what I needed published as well as point out, I’m thoroughly experiencing your website.
[…] Oxfam es una organización que ha sido secuestrada por activistas de extrema izquierda. Dado su historial de informes de mala calidad, ahora es una broma en lugar de una organización […]
[…] that Oxfam is an organization that has been hijacked by hard-left activists. Given it’s track record of shoddy reports, it’s now a joke rather than a […]
[…] is that Oxfam is an organization that has been hijacked by hard-left activists. Given it’s track record of shoddy reports, it’s now a joke rather than a […]
Communism is worker owned capital. Can’t own more than you can work. Essentially, this just means that non-working owners are not allowed. Currently, majority stakes are held by people who show up to “work” for a “profit” though that is not to say that there are not plenty of people taking profits from enterprises they do not work in. Communism does not speak to the compensation a CEO gets or any particular “worker” or to what “work” actually is (difference between production and management for example). Those are more or less “free floating” valuations.
Hi there,
This about a new invention to help worker’s rights be properly balanced with their employers.
I know this is long, but solving unemployment and poverty takes a little explaining. Start with the short section in the beginning – hopefully you will see why the idea is worth yours’ and everyone’s time.
The Basic New Concept
This is an invention, a new lever for the government to control unemployment and especially long-term unemployment. The advantages are that the government cost is minimal and that the new lever can be accurately adjusted.
In this invention the jobseekers get the power to demand an interview. They are given ten special interview cards to play each six months. The interview card if played must be given an interview. The special thing is how these cards work together. If 3 or more people that are unemployed request the interview and turn up for it, then these 3 are first in line for the job regardless of qualifications or experience. One of the 3 must be granted the job.
This is all about the number of jobseekers to jobs available. Currently the company incentive is for high unemployment which forces workers to put up with low wages and poor or dangerous conditions. The interview request system gives employers an incentive to keep unemployment numbers low or they will be forced to accept new workers with little choice.
The power of this invention can be adjusted by varying 3 factors :-
1-The jobseekers’ available interview requests – example 10
2-The time in which the requests must be used – example 6 months
3- The number of requests an employer must receive to be forced to employ one of the requesters – example 3
Every country has different economic factors and some have high employment over 5% while others have low unemployment under 1.5%. This system of requests can be adjusted to help regardless of the starting point. It is very important to tackle high unemployment quickly, and so in this situation requests would have just 2 months to be used, and all 3 factors should be adjusted every 2 months.
This system of requests targets the problem of unemployment at the employer level rather than an inefficient economic level as is more common. It also has greatest effect with those that can cause the greatest change. Larger firms have the most incentive to bring jobseeker numbers down because they need people with more qualifications and more experience in general. Also these larger companies have a much greater ability to absorb more employees.
So the more companies look after the entire workforce together and provide permanent well-paying jobs, then the less often their job hiring is affected by a restricted choice, but remember that even in a worst case scenario for a company there is never force to hire a particular person, because the interview request system always gives a choice of at least 2 people.
The Details we need to stop the virtue of the idea being corrupted.
1- What is a job vacancy, and how do people find out about it.
2- We need to define unemployment.
3- We need set out how to get an interview request card, and how to play it.
4- We need to set penalties to both employers and jobseekers.
5- We need to rid the world of labour hire agencies.
What is a job vacancy ?
All job openings must be advertised except in the case of internal promotion within the company. Jobs must be advertised for a minimum of 7 days with a stated closing date, and no priority should be given according to whom responds to the advertisement sooner. Companies with urgent staff needs will learn to have staff hours in reserve by having good wages and hours like say 32 hours a week, giving the chance to increase hours easily. If all workers are already doing overtime then it is harder to get more hours without hiring new staff. If getting new staff takes more than a week, then companies must learn how to get a buffer.
A company when they advertise a job they must actually award a job and the recipient must be from outside the immediate company. All job advertisements must carry full wage and conditions detail. The employer could lower the wage depending on the applicants, or 3 requesters could form a union and push the wage up. Wage disclosure is completely necessary. This is about fairness to both parties and this is only possible with disclosure.
Defining Unemployment
The system of requests tackles the problem of unemployment in terms of job seekers per job vacancy, rather than the normal government position of a percentage of the workforce. People are often blamed in a very vicious way for failing to be successful in a job application. This is always wrong and also deeply irrational when there are many applicants for each job. Even if the average applications to each vacancy were only 2, this still means that half of the people are missing out. Perhaps if the numbers were stacked to other way with say 5000 vacancies and 1000 applicants then a failing applicant should get some blame, but the problem is that asserting this blame to a person that failed in this way will not help them succeed next time, and this blame will contribute more alienation to a person that has already been properly ostracised.
We all know that governments tell lies. They are often most dishonest in describing the real size of unemployment. People are deeply affected by this. We need some real changes so that lies cannot stand. Our countries can afford to employ everyone. There is no need for poverty and homelessness. Even in poor economic times, conditions are made even worse by job losses. An economic recovery is likely much sooner if people work less hours rather sacking many of the workers. Outside of this interview request system governments need to ensure care in the way tax laws are written. The cheaper tax incentive must be to employ more people on a more permanent basis rather than less people as a casual workforce. Also it would be to the advantage of everyone if less people worked more than 35 hours per week, and so any government taxation like payroll tax should be selective to tax companies more if their workers work longer hours.
Governments and companies collude together to force wages low. They use poverty and homelessness to threaten the middle class to continue working hard, and tow the line or else. Everyone deserves the place that a job provides. Most of us are born without wealth and so will need a job to survive. So we need a fair chance at a job, and sometimes the real chance for a new one. Also being born with wealth should not allow the power to dictate terms of employment to those born without.
Many governments claim unemployment is low and yet job vacancies receive dozens of applications and sometimes hundreds. Also many people cannot even get a sniff of an interview for months and perhaps years. This new system of interview requests changes the system. It demands that the voice of the jobseeker is heard. Every country lists unemployment as a percentage of the workforce. To an individual jobseeker this is almost meaningless. The emphasis should be on the number of applicants per job vacancy. The median average should be used to describe this figure. This number tells us whether companies or jobseekers are able to drive the deal in their favour. When the figure is one applicant per vacancy things are likely to be even between both parties. At this point many more people will have jobs that pay decent wages, much more tax will be paid, and so society overall is much more prosperous.
In recent decades across the world few if any large countries have achieved one applicant per vacancy. No wonder that most people feel powerless, abandoned and increasingly jaded.
It is important to note that even if one applicant per vacancy is achieved, there are still many thousands of both vacancies and jobseekers. Both companies and jobseekers still get plenty of choice.
It may not be best for society to achieve a one to one ratio. Without the security of a wage, poverty and homelessness can be real risks. It could be that ratio of two vacancies per jobseeker or even more is better for society. This is something better evaluated after a one to one ratio is achieved.
Tackling unemployment by considering applicants per vacancy still leaves us with the problem that employment levels are not uniform across different job or industrial sectors. Even with low unemployment some people will be unfortunate in finding a job for a while. Here a change in attitude towards people will help. Too often unemployed people are abused for not trying hard enough to be employed. They already are very vulnerable without a job, yet most governments in most countries target them as not being up to standard. This is deeply uncaring and really ought to stop ( yes should never have happened in the first place ). While the situation is that there are many applicants per job vacancy, any criticism of unemployed people is completely unfounded. The rejection of being without a job, without a place, is quite confronting. As a person struggles through multiple applications and as months or perhaps years pass it is understandable and natural to feel rejection piling up. Regardless of any vacancies available if a person can’t make it, it does not help to tell them they are not trying. Having the authority of media and government shouting this message of rejection begs some ugly questions about our compassion as a species.
In some countries education is used as a way to hide unemployment. For the student a new qualification is not a guarantee of a job, therefore governments can simply hide the number of unemployed people by offering incentives to complete education. It is also deeply exploitative to say here do this education to get a job, then when the education is completed, a job is very hard to find. Sometimes the situation is much worse, in some countries it seems every job no matter how basic requires a qualification of some kind or another, but upon completing the education a job might still be very far away.
What is needed is a green card, yellow card, red card system. Green cards mean the student is guaranteed a job upon completion of the education. Green guarantees priority in hiring over all other jobseekers. This also means that this degree or certificate should be considered above qualifications obtained outside the country and given priority. Orange means second in line behind green in hiring. Green is given the job first, then orange gets the job over everyone else, but orange does not guarantee a job. Orange cards are used because industry sizes may be difficult to predict. Red means no priority is given. The cards are assigned as the student begins their education and remain the same colour regardless of any results during the progress of the education. Green card students should not be counted as unemployed. Both orange and red cards should be counted as unemployed.
Further education is a great effort of students’. This effort and toil should be rewarded with a guaranteed result. The current practice of maybes, and years of degrees and training is deeply taking advantage of people. We need to do better as a society.
There is a need here to set a benchmark as to what is unemployed. Obviously a few hours or perhaps only one hour every 28 days doesn’t cut it. A job represents earning a living otherwise most us would not bother, so the logical standard is a percentage of the average wage. Also governments are very dishonest about who is actually seeking a job and this hides much unemployment. Just because you choose not to try and navigate government bureaucracy in order to receive a welfare payment has absolutely no bearing as to whether someone is actively job seeking. They are different tasks and should not be treated as allied or the same. Many people understandably struggle to combine both tasks.
The clearest definition is to include every breathing person of working age. So now being called unemployed does not require a person to register or jump through government hoops nor seek a government benefit. This way no poverty falls through the cracks. The new definition of unemployed is any person of working age receiving less than half the average (median) wage for the state in which they reside. This is the wage before casual loadings are added or allowances for working late hours, shift work, or working on holidays.
The idea of simply counting everyone will encounter objections. This is what the participation rate is about. The problem is that governments and economists have been changing definitions and hiding facts for decades now. They are continually measuring the size of unemployment wrongly, using figures and definitions that no sensible person would agree with. They get no consequences for these poor actions, but for the low paid and unemployed people the situation is frighteningly real.
People are falling through the cracks. The problems of poverty and homelessness are widespread and abundantly common. It simply is not fair to require people to submit to the bureaucracy required to be a number counted in the welfare system. Also if you go the other way and allow people to opt out of the workforce ‘freely’, then in practice you can be sure that the action would not be free, and nor would the process be simple and rational. Given the modern widespread acceptance for all people to have the right to enter the workforce and given the laws which protect people from discrimination, it is time to count everyone as part of the workforce.
The new interview request cards should be used to monitor unemployment, because as they are used they also give information about particular job sectors and how long a person has been unemployed. Well-designed random surveys can also be used to determine unemployment figures. They must include at least 2000 people as a sample size and the definitions of unemployed should be as stated earlier at half the average state wage.
There is a need for an accurate view of unemployment because the new interview request card allows much adjustment to solve this problem.
Interview request cards
The first point to make is that with an interview request and its power, many people that might otherwise need to seek a welfare payment, will find it much easier to land a job. It is likely that the number of people using the welfare system will reduce.
Among the virtues of this new employment measure is the ease and low cost of administration.
The interview cards need no checking, anyone that wants one can get one or more. This is a vital measure. Welfare checks and payments require people to jump through hoops and many people fall through the cracks into poverty, mental illness and suicide. We really can do a whole lot better. Instead we check how the card is used and this is much cheaper and simpler than regulating the supply of the interview cards. The only thing the card needs is a time limit on its use.
This is about making life simpler and giving people less bureaucracy to have to put up with.
The card only has power as it is played. So if you get extra cards or give them to someone else so they have a surplus, it doesn’t matter. The cards only count when registered as an interview request. So it is easy to see if you play too many in 6 months.
The card is played by both requesting the job interview and registering the card being played with a government agency. The requester must follow through and report if they received an interview and perhaps got the job. Companies can also report receiving cards and whether an interviewee got the job. The government agency matches records to monitor what is going on, and they will therefore know if 3 cards are played, and can then list this job specially so that an interview requester can see that only they or another requester gets the job. Obviously the employer can also see this record of cards played in applying to the job and will thus know the number of cards played. Governments should remember that the more people are in jobs, the more taxes they receive. It should be in their interests to run an agency like this honestly.
Penalties
The following is a list format of penalties and scenarios:-
1- Now if anyone can get an interview card then someone at some point will do the wrong thing. If the interview requester was employed or a tourist or something similar they should be charged $200 per hour for the interviewers time.
Anyone receiving less than half the average wage is considered a genuine jobseeker and can use an interview request card. Anyone else can still get a request card, but it is much more efficient to catch them out as they play the card. An invalid requester is a person on more than half the average wage or someone with no right to work such as a tourist or similar.
If a jobseeker uses 11 cards inside 6 months, and the allocation is to only have 10, then the government agency should receive the registration but pick up the fault and hopefully not waste either parties’ time with an interview. This first misuse should perhaps be counted as an honest mistake, but beyond this if an interview is attended then the penalty is $200 per hour, however a job seeker is likely to be near poverty without a wage. Even if the jobseeker could pay the penalty out of savings this would penalise people whom save money responsibly. The fairer punishment is a deferred penalty. The cost is deferred with no interest accrued until 3 months into a new job is served, and then the penalty becomes due.
2- If the company does not comply with the simple rules to give one of the 3 requesters the job, or fails to grant an interview, then the top manager/owner of the company concerned retains their job, but the penalty is that their wage is split for 12 months with all the interview jobseekers so they receive an equal share of wages with the manager. The combined total of the wage must remain equal to at least as high as the previous year’s pay. Obviously if 9 people interview as unemployed then they all receive 1/10 and so does the manager. If the manager is replaced, then the nine are still paid out for the year, and the manager cannot be re-employed by the same company.
3- A corruption of the system could happen. A bank wants a new CEO. 4 jobseekers request the interview and so one of the 4 must be chosen. The bank doesn’t like the 4 and so instead bribes them so the bank is not investigated. In this case the system still works because the poor unemployed 4 people now have a large bribe to supplement their welfare payment.
4- To ensure that the jobseeker in a new position is retained, the company can only sack them if illegal conduct is proven or the jobseeker may agree to an internal transfer job of similar wage that is just as close to home for the jobseeker.
5- Another scenario would be that the interview requester a job gets the job, but then the company behaves badly. They may abuse the new employee, or perhaps change the work that the job contains, say making a carpenter fit sewer pipes or getting a physical education teacher to teach Shakespeare, all in order to force them to resign rather than put up with the abuse or strange work requirements ( this is about resigning only before 12 months is served). In the event of a resignation the company must payout the rest of the years’ wages. This must include all holiday and sick leave. In addition the employer may only hire one of the other requesters in place of the resigned employee. Some companies churn through workers fast. So if they manage to churn through the 3 requesters, then all 3 receive a bonus payment of one year’s wage equivalent to the managers pay. This system would encourage employers to offer permanent positions and deals which ensure future employment as the employer is punished harshly for resignations.
6/ If a company advertises a position but then fails to hire someone and have them start work within 14 days of applications closing for the job, then interview requesters are pooled together and one is chosen at random to fulfil the job, if there are no requesters then all applicants are pooled at random. If this new worker struggles to be allowed to start, for instance the employer refuses entry to the worksite, then the new worker is paid regardless of whether they turn up for work or not for at least 12 months. If a company still struggles to sincerely hire a new employee, then all applicants are awarded one years’ wages of the advertised position as a lump sum and required to do no work to receive this payment.
Labour Hire
Obviously outhire and labour agencies must be outlawed. This way companies and managers can be accountable with penalties.
Hiring a new employee via a labour hire agency costs more than a company directly hiring the employee themselves. Labour hire agencies don’t provide a free service. Mostly the agencies are used so that employers can pay wages below that is which legal and/or offer unfair or unsafe work conditions. Sometimes the employer may be seeking to dodge tax or hire immigrants normally ineligible to work in the country. The use of labour hire allows companies to dodge responsibility for employees that are clearly working for them. This dodging needs to stop.
Some labour hire has been used to recruit highly qualified and experienced workers for high paid jobs ( some may call this head-hunting ). Apparently using labour hire allows the hirer to avoid the trouble of finding the employee themselves. This idea belongs where it originated back in the pre-internet world. Jobsearch engines now advertise and find the worker for a busy company. Yes the company must still choose the employee themselves from those available, oh what a struggle such a task may be !?! With interview request cards there should be less unemployed people and so many less applicants.
Using a jobsearch engine to find a new employee compared to a headhunting agency is likely to hire a person out of work rather than someone already employed. It is hard to see how this is bad for society.
Often labour hire is used to hire workers on a more temporary basis. Society is all the poorer for this practice. Some companies and industry sectors are notorious for deliberately churning through workers and this has seriously undesirable effects. Poor health, high crime rates, and a poorer attitude of employees to their company, all relate to stability of a workers ability to hold a job for years and decades rather than months or not at all.
Labour hire agencies cause disadvantage to individuals. Their use means that companies may behave more poorly towards workers. They allow companies to take greater advantage of high unemployment rates. So thus their operation drives the poverty stricken into to worse work arrangements. We the people and society in general should not tolerate the existence of labour hire agencies.
Long Term Unemployment
The interview cards can have a particular use to tackle long term unemployment. This is a measure which is more onerous on employers and should be used sparingly. The measure of 3 cards together forcing an employer to take on one of the requesters ought be enough to bring down both unemployment and long term unemployment, but if needed an extra measure can be introduced. The requester card becomes special every tenth or twentieth card ( the number is adjustable). As someone is unemployed, playing more cards means that the requester is in more danger of being long term unemployed. On the tenth card there is more force. The requester is given a 50/50 chance of getting the job. This mechanism works depending on whom applies for the job. If other people play request cards for the job then the highest card number is chosen to be against the 50/50 requester. If there is only the 50/50 requester playing a card then all the other jobseekers without cards are pooled and one only is chosen at random to go against the 50/50 requester.
This is onerous on companies but if they don’t like it they can pay executives a more realistic wage and employ more people. If unemployment is truly kept under 1.5% then very few companies will be compelled to a limited choice in choosing new employees. Full employment can get rid society of homelessness and poverty. We all ought be able to agree that full employment is more important than executive high wages, shareholder dividends, and profits hiding from taxation in overseas tax havens.
A Final Few Thoughts
Much of the problem of individuals with their governments is that the democratic vote really doesn’t count. For governments there is the problem of donations from large employers to political parties creating influence. This is why governments listen to companies and even actively break laws to give them advantage while ignoring people and their rights and needs. This problem is described by other authors in hundreds of pages and perhaps volumes. I will briefly say that the answer is sortition, and by that I mean all politicians being selected at random from the entire voting population, rather than our current system of a closed secret selection and a popular vote that you can pretend is honestly counted.
This new system of interview request cards will give more power to individuals. Companies will feel some compulsion to act. Due to the high unemployment, and great numbers of hidden unemployment in many countries ( especially in larger countries ), the balance is very strongly in favour of companies (political donations). The cards allow a tuning of unemployment to create a balance of power between jobseekers and companies. This is not about socialism of any kind, rather just a very low bar of morality. This is not about trying to force equal wages or wealth, but simply to just give everyone a place, a chance to contribute, and an attempt to remove poverty and homelessness as a consequence if you fail to earn a wage or to be born into wealth. With truly low unemployment someone in danger of poverty has a much better chance of finding a job. In the event that they fail to get a job then governments can afford to spend more in welfare support for individuals because so few people are out of work.
Nearly every country in the world ( perhaps all ) has poverty and homelessness as a consequence for people that have committed no crime, nor intended any malice to anyone. We really are an appalling species to allow this. We have had this problem for centuries and economic growth and government policy have not solved it. Actually in some countries government policy has clearly caused poverty to dramatically increase. These interview cards are a way to greatly reduce, control, and monitor unemployment. They really don’t cost the government much to administer, and every person getting a job is less cost to the government in welfare. Employers will quickly realise if they want free choice in their new employees then they must change their structures so that they can employ more people.
Everyone likes to have a place and the chance to find a new one if the old one is lost. Society needs to be inclusive and stop rejecting people into poverty. Billionaires show us just how cosmic the money available is. The more people there are employed, the more money moves around the economy, the more healthy everyone can be. Poverty affects everyone in one way or another. This interview request card is a new tool to deal with it. It is more direct and more adjustable than any current government policy.
Jobseekers, companies and employment interact though laws of supply and demand. Governments and their people often have arguments about how immigration really affects the supply of labour, and therefore perhaps causes unemployment. But before we jump to a wing on this argument we need to see the most understated thing about it. I don’t have a desire to write a book about this but just to make one very important point. Immigrants overwhelmingly move to economies that are already growing and booming. This fact clouds much of the certainty about the real effect of immigration. Saying that immigrants cause growth and jobs, is a deeply ignorant statement which ignores how immigrants always choose the attractive destinations where wealth and opportunity are already growing.
End
Kind Regards, and thankyou for helping workers everywhere,
Charlie Douglass
[…] Wow, it’s like the Pope is applying for a job at the IMF or OECD. Or even with the scam charity Oxfam. […]
[…] Wow, it’s like the Pope is applying for a job at the IMF or OECD. Or even with the scam charity Oxfam. […]
Top-GUN: The poorer half need just a bit larger share of family wealth so the government does not have to “take care of them in their old age…” Inverse taxation only helps those with income so you are right about working – but there is no law that says work must be hard.
TAXBLEND the Covetousness Liberal once again suggesting that those of us who have worked hard, sacrificed, done without and saved for a lifetime should not only pay more taxes than our indolent, lazy, life’s a party, riotous living bretheren… but subsidize their lazy Ness and take care of them in their old age..
The Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget is a DC joke. Its board includes many former DC politicians who supported federal deficits year after year, decade after decade. The CRFB never met a federal deficit it didn’t like. It has never ever proposed a federal surplus or even a balanced budget. It’s idea of success is to find the budget proposal in DC with the largest deficit and reduce the deficit by 2%.
The DC media obscenely use CRFB as “experts” on responsible fiscal policy.
HA!
Oxfam is right that the rich keep getting richer while the poor get poorer. The solution to tax net wealth is also correct – but only if it is an option. Consider inverse taxation so those families with low wealth can elect to pay a wealth tax in exchange for reduced income tax rates. Over time wealth would be more fairly redistributed without harming investment.