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It’s like making use of slaves
Very often our cheap goods are produced because of low wages. It’s like making use of slaves— slave labor may be cheaper and thus slave-produced goods would be cheap, but this is unjust. The purpose of an economy is to allow everyone, producer and consumer (and most of us are both), to live in a decent and reasonable manner.
As to the question of mass production, the cost of some things might rise, but so would the quality. Many of the products of mass production are shoddy and need to be replaced frequently. The products of a distributist society would tend to be better and last much longer, because they are more carefully made and because they are produced with a real care about product quality, not just about how much the producer can sell and how much money he can make.
–Thomas Storck answering a question about Distributism. Read the entire post here.
Painting by RLM STUDIOS
There was a time inAmerica when materials goods were made to last a long time. Slowly the concept of planned obsolescence crept in. Advertising and marketing took greater prominence in business plans. Soon, quality in goods lessen while brand reputation remained high.Take the American automobile industry... by the 1970's U.S. cars were made cheaply from inferior materials. They rarely lasted more than 100,000 miles. Japan capitalized on the inferiority of GM, Ford and Chrysler products by offering inexpensive but better made cars.
As far as slave labor is concerned...
The capitalist system is based on the price of product minus expenses. Profit. Usually raw materials are rigid costs. But labor costs are flexible. Business owners must keep labor costs down to maximize profits and remain competitive. By diluting the power of organized labor during the Reagan years, corporate management was able to reduce wages with little resistance.
Slowly the middle-class began to lose economic prosperity in order to compete with the emerging countries of China, India, Malaysia and Mexico.
In these countries worker are treated harshly for little pay.
What Americans don't understand and politicians won't acknowledge, our lifestyle is unsustainable. The American worker wages will continue to drop while workers in other countries will rise... slightly.
Eventually it will even out and all, except the elite managers, will be "slaves". This is the new world order that President Bush talked about.
Educational and informative comment Richard, thanks a lot! You should definitely check out the rest of the article where I pulled the quote from. Distributism mad Ridiculously Simply. The thing I like most about the philosophy is that its primary focus is the well being and the common good of all, not making profits and producing useless crap that nobody needs. Check it out! http://www.jesusradicals.com/on-distributism-part-1-distributism-made-ridiculously-simple/