PeachParts Mercedes-Benz Forum - Another Ruby Ridge/Waco event brewing

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Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry (Post 3323010)

Why slavery disappeared is a bit of a puzzle to me. I've heard the argument that industrialization made it unnecessary. But that argument by itself I don't find convincing. What's cheaper about having free workers in a factory as compared to slaves? The best argument I can imagine is that factories are associated with cities and housing slaves in cities is expensive compared to housing slaves on a large farm. But that argument isn't completely convincing either since workers still have to pay for housing in cities.
On a macro scale, I can see where allowing free class movement from the lower classes to the upper classes is preferable since it allows smart people, who would otherwise be slaves, to move beyond the level of simple manual labor and contribute to the economy in more complex ways. So if the slave class gets educated, the economy might find a new Einstein or a new Bill Gates. But the micro process of that transition from chattel slavery to wage slavery eludes me. Do people know of specific examples where a slave owner switched from being a chattel slave owner to being a wage slave owner? I don't know of any.

Irish were used to build drainage canals in New Orleans rather than slaves. Slaves were expensive to buy and maintain. Irish were cheaper to import, had no owners, were responsible for themselves and the city was not responsible for them except for wages.

Many, many Irish died.

Slaves are very expensive compared to say, a tractor.

Both have an initial purchase price but only one reproduces, requires constant daily maintenance, and must be maintained beyond its useful life.

One cottonpicker (machine) costs a lot to buy and they are expensive to maintain. But you can pick many acres in a day.

It takes whole small armies of the cotton picking people to pick the same area in the same time. And the people require food and shelter and maintenance year-round and servicing well beyond their useful life.

I can see where tractors would replace slaves. But tractors would also replace wage slaves for the same reason.
The fact that slaves reproduce though, makes them better than tractors. Tractors don't self-reproduce.

Is the higher initial investment cost the main reason why factory owners preferred wage slaves to chattel slaves? Wouldn't the same thing apply to plantation owners in the south? Wouldn't wage slaves have been cheaper? If so, why did they hang on to chattel slaves when wage slaves already showed their utility in other places? Just because they had already spent their initial investment costs?

Who employed the Irish to dig canals in NO? The city? I can see where a city would prefer wage slaves to chattel slaves. But couldn't slave owners have rented their slaves to the city to do the work? Were the Irish cheaper than hiring black slaves?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Idle (Post 3322912)

Please read up on 'The Whiskey Rebellion' to see how the Founding Fathers dealt with a similar situation.

If you wish to take up arms against the US you no longer have any rights as you are in open rebellion. So now it comes down to who has the most staying power.

I'm betting on the US even if Conservatives are not.

Don't have any idea what you're responding to in my post. Please re-read my post. You totally missed the points of it.

Quote:

Originally Posted by aklim (Post 3322959)

Feeling guilty over something someone else did is even more dumb than the religious people who wear punishment devices and flog themselves. At least they are repenting their own sins. I'm sure I had an ancestor that did bad things to someone. Sorry, not biting. Your so and so can take it up with my so and so. I'm not paying for my father's debt nor do I expect him to pay for mine. I pay my bills and he can pay his.

I don't see it as an issue of feeling guilty but as one of justice. Affirmative action shouldn't go on forever and coming to some accurate idea of how long such programs ideally should be in place would be impossible. Of course some feel they shouldn't be used at all.

My feeling is that no one is served by having a sort of permanent underclass. Problems of crime and spreading slums likely result from that. When I see video of whites abusing blacks during sit-ins in the early days of the civil rights movement and look at the pictures of smiling whites present at some public hanging/burning of a black I see pea-brained fools, unaware of how undignified and ridiculous they look, well, not just look but are.

Would you rather live in a community where black people provide skilled services and purchase the services you provide or would you prefer a community where blacks are on the periphery, cowering in fear and/or plotting to steal something and get some sort of revenge?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Idle (Post 3322913)

Read up on the Afrikaners history during World War 2. Smuts wanted to side with the Nazi's since they were such fine people who shared Smuts world view. This did not take place since the RSA was a Commonwealth Country and the King put his foot down by telling Smuts if they wished to join with the Nazi's they could and after the war was over Smuts could be hung with the rest of them.

I have no idea where you got that from but it is simply not correct. There were plenty of Afrikaners who sympathized with the Nazi's but Smuts' was not one of them. He was a friend and colleague of Churchill from WWI and was made a Field Marshall in the British Army during WWII.

- Peter.

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry (Post 3323023)

You and I disagree on the concept of 'wage slave' so that's where discussion stops.

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry (Post 3323025)

Slave owners didn't want to risk their expensive property at the compensation rate offered so they refused to rent them out. It was cheaper for the city to contract Irish labor.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Botnst (Post 3323144)

Slave owners didn't want to risk their expensive property at the compensation rate offered so they refused to rent them out. It was cheaper for the city to contract Irish labor.

That's interesting. Wage slaves sell for less than chattel slaves. Maybe it was a matter of cutting out the middle man (the slave owner).

Quote:

Originally Posted by Botnst (Post 3323142)

You and I disagree on the concept of 'wage slave' so that's where discussion stops.

Ostrich move?

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry (Post 3323159)

Ostrich move?

That's a cheap shot, Kerry.

I dispute it because it abuses the term, "slave".

It's old ground we've covered before Kerry, do you really want to revisit it again?

Quote:

Originally Posted by kerry (Post 3323157)

That's interesting. Wage slaves sell for less than chattel slaves. Maybe it was a matter of cutting out the middle man (the slave owner).

It's pretty simple.

The Irish were free people and could choose that line of work, stay in Ireland, or go somewhere else. They freely accepted the wages and the risk.

The slaveowners did not believe the risk to their slaves was worth the profit of their labor.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Botnst (Post 3323168)

The Irish were free people and could choose that line of work, stay in Ireland, or go somewhere else. .

When were the canals dug? I doubt the Irish considered themselves free people at the time.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Botnst (Post 3323167)

That's a cheap shot, Kerry.

I dispute it because it abuses the term, "slave".

It's old ground we've covered before Kerry, do you really want to revisit it again?

Sure we have. But the fact that I think the term accurately describes the conditions of labor under capitalism and you don't is a reason not to discuss the issue??

By accepting your term in discussion I give it legitimacy. I won't do it.