Robert Taylor and idleidolidyll's political debating thread

[idleidolidyll]

I have a question that I wonder if anyone can answer.

We have to pay $2.80-odd for a 2-litre bottle of milk. This is because we purchase in a global market now. The price we pay is because that is the cost of the product globally.

But this same rule is not extended to wages. There is no global market for the average wage.

Am I the only person who wonders about this?

BTW. My results of the Political Compass:

Economic Left/Right: -5.38
Social Libertarian/Authoritarian: -1.49

Yes Riffer, that IS an interesting issue.

Food prices in New Zealand are skyrocketing mainly because Yanks and Europeans can afford to pay more for our own produce than we can. We just can't compete as customers.
We all know that prices have increased markedly but wages have not kept up. That's been going on for a very long time.

The international hunt for the lowest cost producers drives the other end. It's a race to the bottom to provide the cheapest labour.

IMO, protectionism is essential in a tiny economy like NZ. Leaving our currency and economy open to manipulation by far more powerful foreign companies, nations and consumers is stupid; even the 'mighty' USA has a raft of taxes and subsidies to protect its producers.

[davereid]

as for your continued propensity to ask or demand answers from me, you go first and we'll talk about what your opinions are

?? It was the first time I had ever asked you a question. You have mistaken me for someone who thinks you may have an answer !

[Finn]

The international hunt for the lowest cost producers drives the other end. It's a race to the bottom to provide the cheapest labour.

And don't you just love it! It's the free market kicking socialist scum right in the nuts.

Capitalism always wins in the end. But go on, keep trying to control it... it'll just bite harder.

[Hitcher]

IMO, protectionism is essential in a tiny economy like NZ. Leaving our currency and economy open to manipulation by far more powerful foreign companies, nations and consumers is stupid; even the 'mighty' USA has a raft of taxes and subsidies to protect its producers.

I disagree. When the elephants mate, the grass gets trampled. New Zealand is a very small producer of agricultural products at the arse end of the world. Our economic survival depends on free access to world markets. Putting up barriers to imported goods and services is the same thing as removing the Union Jack on our flag and replacing it with a banana.

[riffer]

Cluster B Personality Disorders
1776.0 Americanistic Personality Disorder
The essential features of Americanistic Personality Disorder include pervasive patterns of extreme self-absorption, profound and long-term lapses in empathy, a deep disregard for the well-being of others, a powerful aversion to intellectual honesty and reality, and a grossly exaggerated sense of the importance of one’s self and one’s nation. These patterns emerge in infancy, manifest themselves in nearly all contexts, and often become pathological.
These patterns have also been characterized as sociopathic, or colloquially as the “Ugly American Syndrome.” Note that the latter terminology carries too benign a connotation to accurately describe an individual afflicted with such a dangerous perversion of character.
For this diagnosis to be given, the individual must be deeply immersed in the flag-waving, nationalistic, and militaristic fervor derived primarily from the nearly perpetual barrage of reality warping emanations of the “mainstream media,” most commonly through the medium of television. Typically indoctrinated from birth to believe that they are morally superior, exceptional human beings, these individuals suffer from severe egocentrism, a condition further engendered by the prevalence of the acutely toxic dominant paradigm known as capitalism.
Individuals with Americanistic Personality Disorder are generally covertly racist, xenophobic, and openly speciesistic. They readily participate in the execution of heinous crimes against human and non-human animals, even if their complicity is banal and limited. As long as they are comfortable, safe, and enjoying the relative affluence and convenience afforded by their nation’s economic extortion, cultural genocide, rape of other species and the environment, and imperial conquests, such individuals display an apathetic disregard for the well-being of other human beings, sentient creatures, and the environment.
Individuals with Americanistic Personality Disorder tend to exhibit unabated greed and an insatiable desire for material goods. Fueled by a compulsion to shop and acquire excessive amounts of material goods, a condition sometimes referred to as consumerism, they have no regard for the misery and destruction caused by their pathological need for “more stuff”. When confronted with the finitude and fragility of the Earth, they frequently react with level one ego defenses by denying that their behavior is a part of the problem or by distorting reality by asserting that concerns about Climate Change, resource depletion, and irreversible damage to the environment are over-blown. Their deeply entrenched sense of entitlement renders excessive consumption a nearly immutable aspect of their behavior.
Individuals with Americanistic Personality Disorder are virtually devoid of empathy or compassion. They view life as a game played by “law of the jungle” rules and co-exist with others in a chronic state of hyper-competitiveness, seeking only to advance their careers and “keep up with the Joneses.” Their desire to win, get ahead and “protect what is theirs” has been so deeply etched into their psyches that their capacity to empathize and experience true concern for the well-being of others is severely stunted or extinguished. The pursuit of property, profit, and power rules their malformed psyches, nearly eliminating their capacity for humane behavior.
Individuals with Americanistic Personality Disorder almost always rely on extortion or violence to get their needs met and to resolve conflict. Believing in their inherent superiority, they eschew laws or rules except when they can utilize them for personal gain or when they fear punishment. Given a choice between a just resolution to a situation and the opportunity to humiliate, subdue, or subjugate the other party, they will choose the latter with a high degree of frequency. They have an amazing capacity to justify their unethical or criminal behavior using false pretexts such as self defense, good intentions, ignorance of the consequences of their actions, or asserting that they were merely carrying out orders.
Individuals with Americanistic Personality Disorder tend to manifest traits indicative of two of Erich Fromm’s personality orientations. They thrive on adding to their possessions, and appreciate their acquisitions more when they attain them through coercion, theft, or manipulation, thus showing strains of Fromm’s exploitative type. They also exist at a very superficial level, offering the world the “friendly face” of the marketing personality that Bernays and Madison Avenue have taught them is the most effective way of advancing their selfish agenda. Opportunism, careerism, and narcissism poison nearly all of their interactions and relationships.
Specific Culture Features
Americanistic Personality Disorder appears to prevail in a very high percentage of those in the upper strata of the socioeconomic order in the United States (and to persist tenaciously because these individuals have little motivation to alter their pathological behavior as they are largely immune from the consequences of their actions). While it is epidemic amongst the opulent, this characterological deficiency does not recognize socioeconomic boundaries. Various segments of the middle, working and impoverished classes comprise a notable percentage of those exhibiting this condition, including those practicing deeply conservative Christianity, many residents of reactionary states such as those in the south, Kansas, Idaho, Utah, and Wyoming, and many members of the Republican Party.
Prevalence
The overall prevalence of Americanistic Personality Disorder was recently measured at approximately 35% of the overall population in the United States.
—————————————————————————————–
Diagnostic Criteria for 1776.0 Americanistic Personality Disorder:
A pervasive pattern of greed, selfishness, and lack of empathy, beginning the moment he or she begins to intellectualize and presented in nearly all contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following:
1. lacks empathy due to an excessive degree of self-absorption
2. believes that he or she is exceptional and morally superior
3. frequently engages in exploitative behaviors
4. requires frequent acquisition of goods he or she doesn’t need
5. usually resorts to some form of overt or covert violence, coercion, or extortion to resolve conflicts
6. perceives others as obstacles to his or her “success”
7. disregards laws and rules except as a means to achieve his or her agenda
8. demonstrates deep hypocrisy by projecting a righteous, benevolent image while committing reprehensible acts
9. refuses to accept the consequences of his or her action

You can find the original article here.

[Robert Taylor]

I disagree. When the elephants mate, the grass gets trampled. New Zealand is a very small producer of agricultural products at the arse end of the world. Our economic survival depends on free access to world markets. Putting up barriers to imported goods and services is the same thing as removing the Union Jack on our flag and replacing it with a banana.

I think we should have a good old fashioned right wing military coup and reset the goalposts!

[Bass]

I disagree. When the elephants mate, the grass gets trampled. New Zealand is a very small producer of agricultural products at the arse end of the world. Our economic survival depends on free access to world markets. Putting up barriers to imported goods and services is the same thing as removing the Union Jack on our flag and replacing it with a banana.

I agree with every word Hitcher says and I think that it puts us in a very vulnerable position.
Back in the days that III refers to (when I also grew up) our agriculture was much more in demand than it is now. Also our producers got a bigger slice of the final sale price and so we could raise tariff barriers to protect our own industry and get away with it.
I guess we could go back to that, but the supply of consumer goods that we are all well used to would dry up smartly.

Is there anything we can learn from places like... say ... Singapore? (genuine question)

[scumdog]

[B]and presented in nearly all contexts, as indicated by five (or more) of the following:
1. lacks empathy due to an excessive degree of self-absorption
2. believes that he or she is exceptional and morally superior
3. frequently engages in exploitative behaviors
4. requires frequent acquisition of goods he or she doesn’t need
5. usually resorts to some form of overt or covert violence, coercion, or extortion to resolve conflicts
6. perceives others as obstacles to his or her “success”
7. disregards laws and rules except as a means to achieve his or her agenda
8. demonstrates deep hypocrisy by projecting a righteous, benevolent image while committing reprehensible acts
9. refuses to accept the consequences of his or her action

You can find the original article here.

Hey, that sounds like a large part of South Auckland and other suburbs of similar ilk.

Surely THEY aren't American too???

[terbang]

Is there anything we can learn from places like... say ... Singapore? (genuine question)

Often wonder about that. Aussies dig holes and become richer. Arabs bore holes and, same thing. However there are those like Singapore and even the UK to a lesser extent, who no matter how much digging of drilling they do, are unlikely to get rich. They also haven't got enough space to grow stuff either (other than buildings). So I guess all they really have is whats between their ears. Now multiply that by many millions, and in comparison to our 4 mill, they seem to do OK.

[terbang]

Surely THEY aren't American too???

Nope, but they could learn that sort of behavior or attitude from the TV..

[riffer]

Ah. You missed the point SD.

It's not that they are American. It's the name of the Syndrome.

[scumdog]

Ah. You missed the point SD.

It's not that they are American. It's the name of the Syndrome.

Sorry, too subtle!!!!

NZ is escalating rapidly in getting its Sydrome to match that of the USA imho if you measure it by the increasing homicide/violence/robbery/drug offence rates.

[riffer]

You're not wrong mate.

Jebus, I wouldn't want your job. At least you got nice weather today.

[The Stranger:Me]

Well seeing as you are KTM orange, I'll run with Yamaha Blue.

Way I see it is this.
Macs give us, the consumer, choice, prior to this we had fish & chips.

Not at all: Prior to Macs, we had big juicy burgers and a wide choice from lots of locally owned and run outlets with the profits staying in NZ. I clearly remember the introduction of McD. It was with great fanfare but pretty soon after the initial opening, great burgers started disappearing and we were left with speed and hype as opposed to quality.

Yes my reference to fish & chips was mostly referring to the establishments rather than the scope of options, my bad, and yes I realize that there were other options, however, fewer. Personal experiences aside, by definition a new player on the market is actually additional choice for the consumer. Burger bars did survive and the selection of items over all increased, ergo choice did increase
The consumer had the choice of voting with their feet, and they did at times, the Browns Bay store opened then went out of business - I assume due to poor patronage, no amount of advertising was going to drag the poms away from their fish and chips.


The bring competition. I must admit, I have not done any study on this, but anecdotally I doubt it is much dearer to eat out these days than to shop, purchase, store, prepare and cook your own food and do the dishes etc after. Either way I think it would be hard to dispute that competition does tend to benefit the consumer on a cost basis. Accepted there are other measures, however, given the choices we now have you can soon vote with your feet.

Cost is one measure but to focus only on cost is to miss much of the point. At what cost does the cheap price come? In NZ it meant the closing of awesome little burger bars serving great food for good prices in favour of a product that was cheap but about half the mass. (burgeres before McD’s were much bigger) Add to that the loss of NZ$ to offshore companies and the common practice of McD’s to offer minimum wage (bare minimum using kids as staff) and to actively prevent unionism and the eye they keep on staff abuse etc and the picture becomes a bit clearer.

Did it really mean the closing of awesome little burger bars? How many of the awesome ones actually closed as a result of McD? If the consumer truly valued them as awesome, they would not have closed. Indeed the trend has been to more and more eating out (witness the obesity epidemic) it does not hold that one had to die for the other to survive.
As to using kids for staff. Is this inherently bad? I do this too perhaps in the misguided belief that I am helping them. I must admit, I have never forced a kid to work for me and if McD are doing this then I must concur with you, it is indeed a bad situation.

Macs assembles it's product apparently from materials sourced locally, so a lot of local business profit from supplying milk, meat, breads, packaging, rubbish collection etc etc. Things like achitectural, engineering and IT and construction are of course sourced locally also.

Yep, that’s what they say they do. I won’t argue with that point except to say that they didn’t increase purchases from NZ businesses, they just monopolised them by forcing individually owned businesses out of the market.

As a building contractor in a previous life I worked at every KFC store between Orewa and Pukekohe. All work was tendered in what would appear to have been a fair and reasonable process, usually involving at least 6 tenderers and in each case the work went to the lowest conforming bid. As far as I could see it was fair and equitable, in fact my experience is that they would go out of their way to ensure there was no impropriety in our dealing, I figured that was because they knew word would get around and they need to deal with those they could trust in the future. I realize that KFC is not McD however I do believe that we are talking principals here, not specifically about McD. Again has a supplier really been forced out of the market as a result of dealing with or not dealing with McD?

In addition to the indirect employment means mentioned above, Macs supply a lot of jobs directly. Now many of these are low paid and perhaps minimum wage jobs. That said, someone somewhere has to earn the minimum wage and as I see it one likely alternative to minimum is no job. No job probably means on the dole. So Macs potentially help the country enormously by taking a percentage of people that would otherwise cost us a lot (of dole) and turn them into contributors (tax payers).

Actually MOST are low paid. There is a will by McD’s to use student labour and a lot of that is FOREIGN student labour. I once did some volunteer work for the Union that finally got into McD’s (Unite) and saw first hand how that works. Many of those students had very very dubious rights to work in NZ and were afraid to speak out for fear of loss of their job. This is first hand experience not hearsay. As a side note; as you can see from this statement, i do more than just talk about issues.
Students of that age (still at high school) don’t generally draw the dole and neither do foreign students so much of the argument above is moot.

In order to survive in competition with the next business I want my overheads as low as possible. I have put a lot into my business, I have risked my saving, my arse is on the line if it goes south. If I could refine my business processes such that they can be run on student labour I would (and do where possible). As to the hiring of people with dubious rights to work, is it McD or the local franchise owner whom is hiring these people? Students desire money, some require money and they still contribute to the economy. You say they feared speaking out, however, you do not say what it is they would say, were they able.

So the profits go overseas. Well not all of it. The suppliers presumably profit, the salary and wage earners profit, I am sure the franchisee profits and presumably they all pay some taxes that otherwise would not have been collected. But even with a portion of their turnover going overseas how is this inherently bad.

Yes, local suppliers do profit but they also profited BEFORE McD’s. There IS a nett loss both in tax income and money sent offshore. The ability of big companies to avoid tax or pay minimal tax is well known as is the propensity for governments in NZ to give them tax breaks based on often dubious suggestions that they would add something to NZ.

Sure, we profited too before we worked for KFC, but in all honest made more in the years I was there working with KFC than before. Now I can't say exactly where the extra money came from precisely, however as the overall work load increases our prices tended to rise as did our margins. They aren't the be all to end all, however they sure did us no harm.

How also does it differ say from purchasing a motorcycle, which presumably is acceptable as you would appear to have a few.
A motorcycle is made from materials sourced from overseas, assembled with foregin labour, in plants constructed in another land. We collect little tax from the whole procees (ignoring GST as this is also charged on Macs).

That’s a fair question. Sadly though, we don’t make bikes in NZ (That fact alone makes this line quite irrelevant.), but if we did, I’d likely be standing in line.

Would you still purchase the NZ motorbike if your perception of the NZ assembled product was inferior or if it was demonstrably inferior?
I also must disagree with writing the argument off as "quite irrelevant" to me your writing it off is actually quite convenient as it means you don't have to rationalize your hypocracy. Despite what many on here would say, a motorcycle is not an essential part of life. It is a lifestyle choice, the same as McD is a lifestyle choice. You have elected to purchase imported goods with many if not all the flaws you stand against. Either our money going to overseas companies is bad or it isn't. What is it?


Burgers are a different proposition: we had an existing industry largely run by Mom and Dad small businesses that just couldn’t compete with a megacorp prepared to offer a sub standard product ((yes, my opinion)) based on convincing kids to pester their parents, a dubious ‘convenience’ and their knowledge that they could drive down wages to compete easily with owner operators.
I’d rather pay more and get a decent burger any day (and frequently do)

Way I see it is if Macs is bad, motorcycle is WAY bad.
Where have I got my wires crossed please?

I think the above addresses that question.

My question is this: what nett benefit to NZ did the introduction of McD’s have? Net benefit not individual benefit. As per the above argument, I suggest the nett benefit has been a negative one.


This really is an unanswerable question. Things that I may see as a net benefit you may not. Some view progress as a good thing, some view it as a bad thing. I view jobs for students as a positive, it would appear you have a problem with this. You would therefore need to define for me please the word "benefit" in this context. However, in my view, yes there is a gain, as I set out in my initial post.

[Hitcher]

This Naomi Klein anti-"corporatist" propaganda is nauseatingly irritating.

McDonald's Corporation set itself up in New Zealand almost 30 years ago. In that time it has sourced almost all of its ingredients, premises and fit-out from local suppliers, provided employment for thousands of people, paid taxes and offered choices to fast-food consumers that didn't exist before. It has also contributed to significant growth in New Zealand's fast food industry, paving the way for other franchised operators, most of whom are turning a dollar as well.

To blame McDonald's for New Zealand's current fascination with processed fast foods is facile and misleading. There are other more significant drivers of this trend, like diminishing household incomes (in real dollar terms), largely due to left-wing idealists who want us to be all equally poor, backward and oppressed.

What is the crime in economic growth? What is wrong with success? Surely a desirable objective must be to produce a bigger economic "cake" for all New Zealanders, rather than obsessing about "fairly" allocating a cake that gets smaller every year?

Hankering for the good old days when you had to wait half an hour for some greasy spoon proprietor to engineer a Hawaiian burger or heavily club a lump of shark into submission is taking an overly rose-tinted view of those times.

All things in moderation. And let whoever wants to move into New Zealand and ply their trade or craft do so. I hope they're successful in contributing choices profitably and sustainably.