UKC

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4TmliW_F2Kw&feature=youtube_gdata_playe...

In reply to Choss: go and claim some more benefits, paid for by the rich.

In reply to Oliiver:

Paid for by the rich? Not likely.

In reply to Oliiver:

I suspect Choss pays a lot more tax and gets less from the state than you do, I certainly do! But don't worry I don't begrudge you education and health care, although I do wish you would pay attention a bit more in class.

In reply to Oliiver: One of the interesting things about supporters of capitalism, Oli, is that they very rarely have anything even approaching a vague working understanding of what capitalism is and how it functions. You are no exception. Mind you, you're a bay, really, and you've yet to go out and earn a wage. (That's assuming that you're who you claim to be. I have my doubts about, but it doesn't matter. It's ideas I'm interested in, not personalities.)

Now, what you need to understand before you express opinions like this one is just who produces wealth under capitalism. I'll help you out here. It isn't the rich. It's certainly true to say that the rich - generally - get rich through hard work. But it isn't their hard work that makes them rich. It's the hard work of other people whom they exploit.

You see, labour-power, which is the commodity that working people sell to employers is a commodity like any other for the most part, but it has a special quality. Applied to raw materials it can produce a value greater than its own value. Employers cream off this surplus value as profit without the need to lift a finger.

So all wealth is created by human labour. Which means that the workers produce all the wealth. Your beloved rich people are the parasites. Fortunately, capitalism is only a stage in the development of human society, and the socialist revolution that's coming is going to sweep away all this nonsense, being, as it is, the advent of the liberation of all humanity from really stupid, irrational shit.

In reply to Choss:

Didn't you know that the rich are an oppressed minority?

Want proof? Boris said so!

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/boris-johnson-says-superrich-...

In reply to davidbeynon:

Thats like something out of the onion.

Boris is a total bell end.

In reply to Choss:

Rubbish.

Boris is nowhere near that useful.

In reply to Choss:

I think we've got a pretty high threshold for the current privilege system- Sadly I think we've got a way to go before it bursts yet.

In reply to Choss: chords I think you're just innately jealous of the rich. Most people are wealthy because they work bloody hard. If you don't like being a peasant, go and change that and become rich. Only you can do it.

In reply to Oliiver:
Popshoooottttt!

In reply to Skol: uhm, grow up and go and get a grip

In reply to Choss: I'd say majority of people more well off than others have at some point worked very hard.

I'm currently at that stage, regularly working 20 hour days 7 days a week.

But I'm hoping in the next year or two this will cool off, and I'll be able to sit back and just take the profit from my company. It was bloody hard to raise my capital, followed by working as an employee would (to avoid paying on), working as a contracts manager (to avoid paying one) and doing my accounting, applying to all the construction and demolition schemes etc.

In reply to Oliiver:

Oliver, this attitude is really depressing.

There are lots of different kinds of people in our society and they start off in different places and end up in different places. As you say, many people who are wealthy do work bloody hard. But many are also born into positions which offer them opportunities to work bloody hard that not everyone gets.

Many people don't want to work just for money, they have other aspirations like doing meaningful work with its own intrinsic value. Some people want to contribute to society and sacrifice making a lot of money for that reason, similarly for those whose drive is to be creative in the arts where it's very unlikely that you'll get rich. So some people work very hard but make very little money. Other people do just have an easy life and get rich off the back of opportunities they were born into - and everything in between.

You imply that rich people work hard and are rewarded, whereas poor people are lazy and suffer the consequences. This is so simplistic and offensive that it's insulting to expect people to read that kind of tripe. Please, just don't bother posting this kind of worthless crap in future, it's boring to read and I end up wasting my time responding (a strange compulsion, I admit).

In reply to Jon Stewart: Jon, most rich people did well at school, and not all of them were educated at private school. If you complain about being poor, why don't you do something about it? It's called self help. Get done qualifications and demand a higher wage. The state shouldn't have to hold your hand past the age of 18, unless you're disabled.

In reply to Jon Stewart:

Well put.

In reply to Chambers:


You could argue that all the wealth is created by human labour yes. But works do not produce all the wealth.

Workers alone produce nothing they are just people, they may have skills and poetical to create wealth but left to their own devices normally produce almost noting.

The ones who create the wealth are the ones who create the the companies and the organisations. They come up with an idea, something to make, something to sell, something to offer and they construct a framework in order for that idea to be realised. They harness the potential of the workers, they organise them into a single working machine, putting together all the different skills required to make, sell and distribute whatever produce they have come up with.

In a manufacturing sense you could say they are the only real craftsmen because no one employee can make the finished item. Where as the owner of the company has a tool box that can create the end product. They use a tool box of people and skill sets each one serving a role on the production line to produce and then sell something no one worker could have ever made alone.

In reply to Oliiver:

I'm not complaining about being poor. I'm not poor. I have good qualifications and lots of opportunities, and a good well-paid career both behind me and ahead of me.

I'm complaining about the nonsense that you post.

Your comment about the state holding people's hands is unspecific and meaningless. Are you saying there should be no schools and hospitals as well as no benefits system at all. What you have posted is just a load of rubbish. It doesn't mean anything, all it does is display a lack of understanding about the systems in place in our society. I hope you put more thought into your schoolwork than the absolute garbage you post on here.

In reply to Choss: uhm, I said after 18. Welfare state needs shrinking it's not healthy

In reply to Oliiver:

How about the 'rich' pay a fair wage wage to the 'poor'. You know, a living wage rather than minimum wage, and stop the state from subsidising their profits. Inheritance Tax Exemption, or welfare for the landed, needs abolishing, that's unhealthy to society.

In reply to Oliiver:

No they didn't:
Roman Abramovich
Bill Gates
Richard Branson
Coco Chanel
Simon Cowell
Walt Disney
Steve Jobs
Mark Zuckerberg
Duncan Bannantyne

Thats just the big names. But if you go on the forbes rich list, average net worth of non-graduates is 6.6% higher than graduates.

In reply to Chambers:

I was with you until your last sentence. Don't you know that really stupid, irrational shit (as you say) is part and parcel of humanity. You can't prevent people from being stupid

In reply to Chambers:



Are you saying that people like Rab Carrington who spent years building up the company Rab, in taking on more employees and making decisions on the future of the business, from product development to people managing, while going to bed with the knowledge that people's mortgages and families relied upon Rab being a continuing success (which relied upon him making the right decisions), didn't work hard or lift a finger towards the company generating a profit?

When ever I took my jacket round the to the Sheffield Factory, he always seemed to be running up and down the stairs, and he delt with me in person while I explained how I'd damaged my jacket or what needed fixing. He looked pretty tired still when I saw him bouldering at The Edge few months after selling Rab, almost like he was still recovering.

Politely, I think you viewpoint might be a little bit skewed. I've known of a few people who've worked very hard to build up their companies, which is why I've an insight into the pressure they can be under psychologically.

Obviously, there 'are' employers who exploiter their workers, but there are employers who don't, too. To say otherwise just isn't true.

In reply to dutybooty: That's not entirely correct that list. Bill gates, dropped his degree to pursue his endeavour. I'm on about education up until 18.

In reply to Oliiver:

Talking of education. Are you at Private school, or Leeching off us?

If its private school, your daddy is wasting his money.

If its state, stop bitching.

In reply to Oliiver:



Sounds like something straight out of the tabloids. This is either a total wind up or you're just hopelessly naive. I suspect I'm being naive to even respond.

1. Social mobility: most people remain in or close to the class they're born into. If you're born poor you're likely to remain that way and same for rich. There are occasional exceptions. Some people get lucky and some have really bad luck but these are exceptions not the norm. This has nothing to do with intelligence. It's privilege as the title of the thread makes clear.

2. Wealth begets wealth: The system is designed around keeping the rich rich and the poor poor. This is not a conspiracy but is just derives from the fact that the rich are the class that have by far the most power and its entirely natural for them to make the rules in their own interest to the detriment of everyone else.

Systems are designed to maintain the status quo. People did demand higher wages but the rich change the rules to make it more difficult - eg. strike, laws, laws around protesting, unions etc In short anything that can make a difference they can legislate against. Simply put demands are met by violence (if you don't understand that then try to figure it out).


3. The media propagates the ideology of the rich because ... well its not run by the poor is it. The media is an extremely powerful form of thought control and we are literally brainwashed into a set of beliefs that support the status quo.

As an example when you hear the term 'the unemployed' what to you first think of? Poor people, shoddily dressed, queuing outside dole offices perhaps? Or very wealthy types, living it up, having lavish dinner parties on luxury yachts in places like Cannes? Both types exist but when we hear 'the unemployed' in the media we know exactly to whom they're referring, to the degree that we are barely even conscious of the second group. That's brainwashing.

4. .... I could go on but ultimately if you want to learn about the world we live in you will and if you don't you won't.

In reply to Timmd:

I'm not saying anything of the kind.There are two points here. First off, it's possible for people to become capitalists by working very hard. But such self-made success stories are vanishingly rare. Most rich people are born that way, and most of those that aren't have had some help.

Second point: It matters not a jot how hard the owner of a given company works. It doesn't change the way that capitalism functions, and it doesn't affect the fact that the source of profit is the unpaid labour of workers.

No doubt about the committment of people like this.

Nobody's disputing that.

All employers exploit their workers. Doesn't make them evil, doesn't make them necessarily greedy. That's just how capitalism functions.

In reply to Jimbo C:

Come on! We're collectively capable of some fantastic stuff!

In reply to Chambers:

Rab didn't pay his workers?

In reply to Choss:

A message to the UK government eh?????? Demanding better rights for the poor oppressed.

And the voice used??? An American one!!! Get back in your box!

In reply to Chambers:


Exploit how?

In reply to Timmd:

I do a job. I charge my clients £1000.

My materials and tippings costs and overhead for that day amount to £200.
I pay my employees £200.
£600 for me.

You lose a bit of money on other jobs where things don't go to plan in my industry but I aim to make 100% profit in a year. I could easily pay my employees a better wage and make 50% profit in a year. But I don't. Because then I wouldn't have 100% profit.

I see exactly how the people above can consider this exploitation.

In reply to Timmd:

It isn't just workers that are exploited. By paying artificially low salaries, some employers effectively outsource part of their employment costs to the government via the (bloated) benefits system. If employers payed enough (at the lower end of the scale) for people (sorry, "hard working families") to support their dependants, the benefit bill could come down.

In reply to dutybooty:

I lose that contract next year, have no work so my employees are sitting around, but I still pay them £200. Are they exploiting me?

The employees are not being exploited (assuming it's a fair wage), as they take barely any risk compared to the business owner.

As a consequence of this much reduced financial risk, they have a much reduced financial reward.

This is why the richest among us are not the brightest. They have the appetite for risk and took (and were in a position to be able to take, so privilege does come into it) opportunities.

In reply to Timmd:

Their wages represent a value that is less than the value of waht they produce.

In reply to BJP001:


Sub-contractors so the situation need not arise :P but in a way they do very well. Paid £100 per day for unskilled labour (qualifications are required but job specific and paid for by myself). They leave when they're done. Sometimes, when they arrive at 7am and leave at 09:30am I feel a little exploited.


This is how I have always viewed it. The stress in running a business is unreal! They leave here and don't need to think about it until tommorrow! Privilege does come into it but this doesn't exclude non-privileged people. I know many people born onto council estates, work hard, take on second jobs, get a mortgage on a house, start paying it off then sell everything up, start a company with the capital, sleep in a sleeping bag under their rented office desk whilst setting up.

But the appetite for risk in those people is huge!

In reply to stp: Everything you say is correct. On point 3 I'd add that in some cases the very lifestyles of the rich and famous are commodified and sold to poor people as something to aspire to. Now that is a pretty sick joke!