Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not if that country also legislates heavy penalties for companies that produce their goods in countries with worse labor laws.
Almost like we needed some international worker's organization to put pressure on all relevant countries at the same time...
The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
121–130 of 268 posts
Re: The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
#122Australia also has a 60 year productivity low and a government that is boosting taxes on capital gains on shares/business to basically a worldwide high. So take our experiments with a grain of salt!
What's your point about increased capital gains? Taxing income based on ownership should be higher than income via actual labor. It's insane that's not the case in most places.
Re: The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
#123Earlier quoted context omitted.
Tax changes that have been overdue for twenty-odd years to address house prices and attempt to level the playing field between labour and capital. Pity they didn't also change the gas tax.
The tax is already bad here, even without it. I paid $89,000 taxes just for the last financial year because stock gains are added up on top of the income and my partner doesn’t work and there’s no family support allowance here. I can apply Australian citizenship next year but I will leave ASAP after becoming a citizen for Singapore, Dubai or Hong Kong where the tax is < 20%
To pay $89,000 in taxes you'd have to be earning in the range of $350k. Do you think you're hard done by? I'd be rather annoyed if you were eligible for family support allowance in that earning range? (partially because I'd be missing out on a decent chunk of government support myself)
What am I missing about your situation that makes it remotely sympathetic?
Re: The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
#124Speaking as an American, I don’t give a shit if it increases productivity or not. Productivity has gone up exponentially with technological advancement since the advent of the 5 day work week. We, as a species, should be minimizing work to 3 or 4 days a week with equal overall pay. Corporations should be fined heavily for contacting an employee after working hours. On call should require corporations to pay hefty ove…
Do workers really care about productivity? As long as I get paid that's what matters.
Re: The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
#125Speaking as an American, I don’t give a shit if it increases productivity or not. Productivity has gone up exponentially with technological advancement since the advent of the 5 day work week. We, as a species, should be minimizing work to 3 or 4 days a week with equal overall pay. Corporations should be fined heavily for contacting an employee after working hours. On call should require corporations to pay hefty ove…
Lot of shoulds, oughts, etc. How about this: do whatever you want. Nothing is stopping you from setting up a 3 day workweek co-op. More power to any group that wants to. There are a number out there already. But it's worth considering why it hasn't totally taken over "naturally".
Re: The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
#126Speaking as an American, I don’t give a shit if it increases productivity or not. Productivity has gone up exponentially with technological advancement since the advent of the 5 day work week. We, as a species, should be minimizing work to 3 or 4 days a week with equal overall pay. Corporations should be fined heavily for contacting an employee after working hours. On call should require corporations to pay hefty ove…
Speaking as an Australian, our productivity has been lagging[1] compared to the US, largely due to the availability of cheap labour (attributed by economists to foreign students)[2]. I heard one economist on the ABC give the example of carwashes[2]. From the 1990s to the early 2000s, car washes in Australia were largely automated and hand-wash car washes were relatively uncommon. However, the abundance of cheap labou…
I wonder how it truly factors into productivity, though. How is productivity measured, and does that measurement capture what is true?
You mention automated car washes as a baseline. I never used those in the past because I figured they’d be rubbish or would scratch the car or whatever. So I’d occasionally wash the car myself, and that’s it. Now that we have manual car washes available, I use them from time to time. They clearly (I assert) do a better job than anything automated. And they do it inside and out.
So I find the comparison interesting, but in need of elaboration.
Re: The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
#127Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is absurdly ahistorical. Corporations take as much as they can. If there were no law limiting work to 40 hours / week, they would demand far more - as they had before massive workers' protests forced the current limits.
All the more reason people would prefer to work for a co-op, no? I really don't know why there aren't more co-ops, and am inferring they just don't work all that well. But if there are any regulations or something preventing them from succeeding, I'd love to know about it. Also, I guess it's worth noting I've been "exempt" all my life (not subject to 40 hours a week), so that particular labor win I guess didn't reall…
Re: The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
#128Earlier quoted context omitted.
I wonder what would happen to costs if we had a 90%+ tax rate on the ultra wealthy... maybe if all these record profits were instead funneled back into society everyone would be better off AND prices would drop... a system like this would be good for society it seems... we should come up with a good name for that system, tho...
I think its pretty naive to thing that it'd work this way. It's really bad idea. If someone has company that debuts on stock market, and stock price increases let's say 100x times, who is he funneling the funds from? I'd say it's not funneling but creation of wealth, economy is not zero-sum game.
Re: The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
#129Earlier quoted context omitted.
Speaking as an Australian, our productivity has been lagging[1] compared to the US, largely due to the availability of cheap labour (attributed by economists to foreign students)[2]. I heard one economist on the ABC give the example of carwashes[2]. From the 1990s to the early 2000s, car washes in Australia were largely automated and hand-wash car washes were relatively uncommon. However, the abundance of cheap labou…
The car wash example is interesting, as something I’ve seen and experienced but never thought about in that way. I wonder how it truly factors into productivity, though. How is productivity measured, and does that measurement capture what is true? You mention automated car washes as a baseline. I never used those in the past because I figured they’d be rubbish or would scratch the car or whatever. So I’d occasionally…
Re: The four-day workweek in Australia: insights from early adopters of 100:80:100
#130Earlier quoted context omitted.
The tax is already bad here, even without it. I paid $89,000 taxes just for the last financial year because stock gains are added up on top of the income and my partner doesn’t work and there’s no family support allowance here. I can apply Australian citizenship next year but I will leave ASAP after becoming a citizen for Singapore, Dubai or Hong Kong where the tax is < 20%
Why are you not leaving right now?