• @dystop@lemmy.world
    link
    fedilink
    45
    edit-2
    10 months ago

    Amen.

    You can’t keep slaves anymore, but you can own a company and pay your workers an amount that makes it hard for them to pay for basic necessities so they don’t have time for leisure, or organising unions, or finding other jobs. The workers are free to go, of course, but then they’ll fall into financial ruin and not have healthcare.

    • Maeve
      link
      fedilink
      2010 months ago

      Frighteningly few have health care with full employment, sometimes it’s not offered, when it is, it’s still not budgetable.

    • Solivine
      link
      fedilink
      1410 months ago

      That’s exactly what it is, then I’ve had people laugh at me when I compare it to slavery.

      • Maeve
        link
        fedilink
        2110 months ago

        It’s called wage slavery and you can use that information to educate, if any will listen.

        • Solivine
          link
          fedilink
          1310 months ago

          Nah, most will just say get a better job, you’re not working hard enough etc. Lots of people I speak to tend to frame it as a worker problem rather than a problem with the system. It’s also why lots of people seem to be anti strikes…

          • Maeve
            link
            fedilink
            1010 months ago

            Well I did use a qualifier. I know. I was in McDonald’s one day getting a soda and they took forever. A young woman was griping that “it’s those kids! No one wants to work anymore!” I told her for those wages and what was expected, i don’t blame them. I got an angry glare.

            • @Malfeasant@lemm.ee
              link
              fedilink
              610 months ago

              “but they’re paying $15 an hour, isn’t that what you people* wanted?”

              Uh, it was, but that was 10 years ago…

              *not the racist “you people”, just the run of the mill ignorant one.

        • @RegularGoose@sh.itjust.works
          link
          fedilink
          6
          edit-2
          10 months ago

          Too many people seem to think that chattel slavery is the only thing that counts as slavery, and that even that doesn’t count if a slaver is less horrible to their slaves than other slavers are.