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Fordlandia

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Re: Fordlandia

#31

Post by verylittlemeat »

nimbius wrote: post #20

Ah the paragon of american assembly line manufacturing, Henry Ford. As a millennial its taken me a while to get the real dirt on the guy, as in america highschools extol only his virtue. Did you know Ford had his own secret police after he doubled the salary of his workforce? To qualify for his doubled salary, the worker had to be thrifty and continent. He had to keep his home neat and his children healthy, and, if h…

Captains of industry who liked to play simcity in real life were not unusual for the time. One of the worst strikes in American history started over "company town" issues.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pullman_Strike

This is really the ongoing story of organized labor vs their corporate overlords. If you want to see real interviews and video from what living in company town with secret police is like check out the documentary Harlan County, USA.

Re: Fordlandia

#32

Post by eecc »

shard972 wrote: post #30
nimbius wrote: post #20

Ah the paragon of american assembly line manufacturing, Henry Ford. As a millennial its taken me a while to get the real dirt on the guy, as in america highschools extol only his virtue. Did you know Ford had his own secret police after he doubled the salary of his workforce? To qualify for his doubled salary, the worker had to be thrifty and continent. He had to keep his home neat and his children healthy, and, if h…

How much of those policies Ford was implienting can be attributed to the culture of the time? I understand in today's culture such a pushing of family values is pretty much illegal but i wonder how many other companies at the time had similar kinds of policies.

Adriano Olivetti, although much later in time didn’t hoist his demands on the workforce. He did lay out a huge amount of benefits that nobody in it’s right mind would complain about though... yet most of this drive died with him, as the rest of the Italian industrials preferred confrontation and stashing of their material proceedings abroad in Switzerland... perhaps it had something to do with the witchunt against anything remotely Socialist

Re: Fordlandia

#33

Post by sbr464 »

RickJWag wrote: post #17

At the time, I'm sure Ford's ideas were considered very progressive and a gift to the indigenous people. Today, he's the target of a critical article like this one. (There's more criticism of Winston Churchill on HN today, too.) My theory is that the world has become so prosperous (at least parts of it) that people have no idea what's good and what's not any more.

Progressive is one way to put it. That and gift are not my words of choice.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_International_Jew

The International Jew: The World's Foremost Problem

Re: Fordlandia

#34

Post by hueving »

madez wrote: post #8

> biopiracy What a load of. The privatization and capitalization of literally everything is crazy. I despise companies like Nestlé for trying to capitalize common goods like drinking water. This obsession on the one-dimensional metric of money makes the rich richer, and the poor poorer.

There is a legitimate argument behind treating water as a market good like anything else. There is an incredible amount of waste due to water rights in California (e.g. Almond growing during droughts) because water isn't sold in an auction.

We obviously need some token amount guaranteed for drinking water. But the rest used for industrial and farming purposes should be auctioned by the government.

Re: Fordlandia

#35

Post by TomMarius »

verylittlemeat wrote: post #31
nimbius wrote: post #20

Ah the paragon of american assembly line manufacturing, Henry Ford. As a millennial its taken me a while to get the real dirt on the guy, as in america highschools extol only his virtue. Did you know Ford had his own secret police after he doubled the salary of his workforce? To qualify for his doubled salary, the worker had to be thrifty and continent. He had to keep his home neat and his children healthy, and, if h…

Captains of industry who liked to play simcity in real life were not unusual for the time. One of the worst strikes in American history started over "company town" issues. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pullman_Strike This is really the ongoing story of organized labor vs their corporate overlords. If you want to see real interviews and video from what living in company town with secret police is like check out the do…

Yes. Czech entrepreneur Tomáš Baťa (there is pretty good chance you're wearing shoes with his name right now) founded a whole city (not a town, a pretty big city for its time).

Re: Fordlandia

#36

Post by madez »

hueving wrote: post #34
madez wrote: post #8

> biopiracy What a load of. The privatization and capitalization of literally everything is crazy. I despise companies like Nestlé for trying to capitalize common goods like drinking water. This obsession on the one-dimensional metric of money makes the rich richer, and the poor poorer.

There is a legitimate argument behind treating water as a market good like anything else. There is an incredible amount of waste due to water rights in California (e.g. Almond growing during droughts) because water isn't sold in an auction. We obviously need some token amount guaranteed for drinking water. But the rest used for industrial and farming purposes should be auctioned by the government.

I see the problems you describe, but if you sell the rights in auctions you once again boil it down to the one-dimensional metric of money. I think not just how much one is willing to pay, but also what it'll be used for, is relevant.

Re: Fordlandia

#37

Post by kjs3 »

shard972 wrote: post #30
nimbius wrote: post #20

Ah the paragon of american assembly line manufacturing, Henry Ford. As a millennial its taken me a while to get the real dirt on the guy, as in america highschools extol only his virtue. Did you know Ford had his own secret police after he doubled the salary of his workforce? To qualify for his doubled salary, the worker had to be thrifty and continent. He had to keep his home neat and his children healthy, and, if h…

How much of those policies Ford was implienting can be attributed to the culture of the time? I understand in today's culture such a pushing of family values is pretty much illegal but i wonder how many other companies at the time had similar kinds of policies.

Probably a lot. He was a virulent racist and anti-semite as well. So he's got that going for him.
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