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[SalmonGod]

What someone else (Muz? I think?) said in life advice: prove your worth, negotiate afterwards your working conditions, and if they don't play ball, hit the road. That's my view of the matter nowadays. Accepting stuff like (as a friend did) signing up for a 50% contract and end up doing more like 150% for the same pay is self-destructive. If you start bending over even dwarves will take a turn at your butt.

That takes unions to be effective, and those have been so marginalized throughout most of America.  Otherwise, you're just giving someone else a shitty job.

[Reelya]

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-01-12/meet-smart-restaurant-minimum-wage-crushing-burger-flipping-robot

This is the most offensive take on the robot-burger making machine ever. I don't know if Poe's law is at work (EDIT: the site seems completely serious about this), but the writer blames workers for being replaced by burger robots because humans:

- take rest breaks
- only work 6 days per week
- expect that their job will provide enough to live on

The site uses this as an anti-minimum wage argument.

Well, excuse me, if someone works 7 days a week for a wage you've yourself explained isn't enough to live on, that's not something that any amount of minimum wage cutting is going to fix. Those jobs are clearly being subsidized by state welfare already. In other words: businesses who pay their taxes are being taxed to make up the living-wage shortfall for those who refuse to pay a viable wage and demand workers work 7 days a week.

[Graknorke]

"Maybe if people weren't so lazy and so demanding about 'work conditions' and 'breaks', they could get jobs in a mill smashing the grain with their bare hands, instead of having it automated by querns."

[wierd]

I am convinced that corporate accountants do not understand capitalism.

Seriously.

"Big big profits", which are NOT reinvested back into the economy expediently, DO NOT improve the economy! Instead, it forces governments to institute economic life support, like the stimulus plan.

[Bauglir]

I'm given to understand that the plan is that every other corporations will reinvest into the economy, because it's the rational thing to do in the long run, allowing them to ride the wave of prosperity and retain their tremendous profits. Plus, they know every other corporation's accountants are thinking the same thing, so they need to stay safe and not be the one corporation that sinks its money into the economy at large while everyone else is hoarding, which would prevent a return on the investment.

[wierd]

....

Hello race to the bottom. Somebody add some water, and put a plastic sheet down. At least the splashdown into the sewerage at the bottom can be mitigated with a little fun first that way.

...

Seriously, If they honestly think in doublethink like that, the world is doomed.

[Bauglir]

In their defense, or rather not at all, I would wager that it's different actual accountants each adopting those viewpoints. The only thing they agree on is that spending money is "too risky".

[Mictlantecuhtli]

Too bad the engine of growth and especially corporate growth is investment.

[LeoLeonardoIII]

This sounds like the typical Tragedy of the Commons. This isn't new-news.

[Frumple]

I am convinced that corporate accountants do not understand capitalism.

Seriously.

"Big big profits", which are NOT reinvested back into the economy expediently, DO NOT improve the economy! Instead, it forces governments to institute economic life support, like the stimulus plan.

The problem, in general, is that the goal of corporate accountants (and the people they're working for) isn't to improve the economy. It's to make a short-term profit.* That's it. That's the whole of it. Just about the only thing that matters is improving dividends this quarter/fiscal year. Many of them understand capitalism just fine, it's just that it's not their job to keep capitalism running, and they're usually not paid to arrange things for society's benefit -- and indeed, sometimes are incentivized to do the exact opposite, if it increases short term profits and isn't sufficiently illegal. Even beyond that, much of the work is compartmentalized (so it's few that are actually seeing the whole picture) and it's relatively rare that you actually get a full-blown accountant calling the shots.

... basically, blame it on the CEOs and the shareholders (especially the latter) before you blame it on the accountants. The accountants are usually just trying to do their job, not decide what the company's going to do.

*Actually, it's usually not even that. It's usually strictly to, y'know, account. The majority of accountants collect and present fiscal information, with a side of communicating it to decision makers and occasionally offering advice on how to accomplish whatever their boss's goals are. They only have so much influence, barring the occasions they are the boss.

[wierd]

I can see that angle, but failure to account for the trend in predictions presented to the CEOs is still a form of negligence in that respect.

I have yet to read any headlines or even blog posts about fortune 500 accountants telling CEOs that the need to invest in the economy to continue reaping profits, and that if they don't, then "here is the projected downward forcast as the economy collapses, and what the estimated vaue of the company's accrewed assets will be, in relation to what those assets can obtain from what is left of the market."

I agree that share holders are idiots. I personally feel that day trading should be illegal. (It would solve a LOT of problems.) However, the share holders are not the board of directors, and often times the public stock is less than 50% of stock held, meaning even if 100% of public stock holders unified in action against the directors, they would have difficulty forcibly changing leadership or policies.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

I agree that share holders are idiots. I personally feel that day trading should be illegal. (It would solve a LOT of problems.) However, the share holders are not the board of directors, and often times the public stock is less than 50% of stock held, meaning even if 100% of public stock holders unified in action against the directors, they would have difficulty forcibly changing leadership or policies.

The majority of day traders are retail investors, not the Warren Buffets and the Carl Icahns.

And stock voting rights are skewed by the fact that there's 'preferential shares' which means a certain amount of shares get a 1000:1 voting right compared to common stock. Essentially allowing 1% of the authorized shares to control all of the voting rights.

Shareholders do not have say in what the vast majority of businesses do nowadays. That's why 'Activist investors' are even a thing. They buy a large chunk of shares and threaten to ruin the public image of the stock unless they get board positions.

That's essentially like having 1000:1 'preferential voting' on 1% of people in the US, and blaming the voting populace for having hackjob kleptocrat leadership that they can't do much of anything about.

[Zangi]

One of the many reasons why capitalism is not working for everyone else:
Corporations are legally obligated to make maximum profits where possible for shareholders.

[Mictlantecuhtli]

Which, once again, may be the case, but the control of the company still lies in the preferred shares and the board and insiders.

[SalmonGod]

So... what are people's thoughts on the Cecilly McMillan case?