28) alleged contradiction between progressive labor law and economic interests Written by Rainer: rainer.lehrer@yahoo.com Learn languages (via Skype): Rainer: + 36 20 549 52 97 or + 36 20 334 79 74

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Alleged contradiction between progressive labor law and economic interests We are in front of a factory. Many workers had gathered. They protest against the installation of machines that can do the work of 10 people. They fear lower wages or even job losses. A small town at the beginning of the industrial revolution. The houses of the factory owners are on the hill. The sewers lead from there to the plain where the workers' houses are near the factory. A small river divides the plain. An infectious disease has just broken out. Only the domestic workers can go up to the wealthy to prevent the rich from being infected. But most of these employees also come from the working classes and come into contact with them every day. A small dirty street in the suburbs of an industrial area, a multistory house with small windows (windows that are too large would make the house structurally quite unstable anyway, even more at risk of collapse.), Small 15 square meters one-room apartments without bathroom, toilet or kitchen, 5 people (3 children, 2 adults) sleeping on straw bags. They didn't take off their clothes because they lie on the floor without blankets. Soon they have to get up, then their shift begins, 12 hours in the factory. The other family, with whom they share the apartment, are in the factory that moment and sleep while they work. Alone, they could not have paid the rent for one of these 50 holes in the house. The children are out on the street during the day begging for their daily bread if they are not lucky enough to get some poorly paid child labor as a bottle washer or in the opencast mine. It is night, 10 people are standing around a small fire. They want to prevent strikebreakers from going to the factory in the dark of the night. In the mornings, many others come back to emphasize their demands. They demand higher wages and regular working hours. Situations from the life of workers. They had left their village hoping to earn a small living in the nearby industrial city, swapping rural poverty with urban misery. In the 1750s, Adam Smith wrote in The Wealth Of Nations that an economy can only work well if the lower classes are doing reasonably well too. Probably led by the realization that one has to sell products to someone to make profit. 100 years later, Marx took up this thought again. Health and training are the basis for a worker to be fully-useful. Not to mention that a worker with normal pay is not forced to steal or rob for survival reasons. Of course, companies must also have the opportunity to make profit. Which entrepreneur or employee would like to work for a minimum wage? Communism focused on heavy industry (industry that produces tools for producing other goods) because it assumed that the consumer industry would automatically follow. Before the industrial revolution, the economy was a provider for the non-working nobility. Today car companies, food chains, furniture manufacturers want to make big profits. So they should all make sure that the small consumer either earns enough, or the goods are relatively cheap, that he is healthy enough to enjoy them. A progressive employment law helps to achieve this goal because these facts are unfortunately not always recognized on the wealthy side. Back to list!

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