Work Reform

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A place to discuss positive changes that can make work more equitable, and to vent about current practices. We are NOT against work; we just want the fruits of our labor to be recognized better.

Our Philosophies:

All workers must be paid a living wage for their labor.
Income inequality is the main cause of lower living standards.
Workers must join together and fight back for what is rightfully theirs.
We must not be divided and conquered. Workers gain the most when they focus on unifying issues.

Our Goals

Higher wages for underpaid workers.
Better worker representation, including but not limited to unions.
Better and fewer working hours.
Stimulating a massive wave of worker organizing in the United States and beyond.
Organizing and supporting political causes and campaigns that put workers first.

founded 3 years ago

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kat_angstrom@lemmy.world

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Being poor is expensive (discuss.online)

submitted 5 days ago by VetOfTheSeas@discuss.online to c/workreform@lemmy.world

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[–] ytg@sopuli.xyz 27 points 5 days ago (2 children)

Not exactly the tweet, but dropping this again here because of the title.

The reason that the rich were so rich, Vimes reasoned, was because they managed to spend less money. Take boots, for example. ... A really good pair of leather boots cost fifty dollars. But an affordable pair of boots, which were sort of OK for a season or two and then leaked like hell when the cardboard gave out, cost about ten dollars. ... But the thing was that good boots lasted for years and years. A man who could afford fifty dollars had a pair of boots that'd still be keeping his feet dry in ten years' time, while a poor man who could only afford cheap boots would have spent a hundred dollars on boots in the same time and would still have wet feet.

This was the Captain Samuel Vimes 'Boots' theory of socio-economic unfairness.

[–] EncryptKeeper@lemmy.world 5 points 3 days ago

This might not apply anymore though since it seems capitalism found out about it and companies realized they could make the $50 boots as trash as the $10 boots and the rich wouldn’t think twice about throwing them out at the same rate so the two options now are spending $10 a year or $50 a year on boots

[–] A_Random_Idiot@lemmy.world 1 points 3 days ago* (last edited 3 days ago)

Its ultimately the lack of economic flexibility.

When us poors run into trouble, we have to deal with it immediately, without a chance to plan for it or save up for it or make other arrangements, so we have to buy the cheap boots, because we don't have the financial buffer to absorb the impact of the 50 dollar boots on our budgets, even knowing it will save us money in the long run, because we're living so threadbare that money is stretched to the limit.