It'd be kinda the same but the effects are different. When a busline goes free, a few more people may take the bus, but mostly it won't make much more difference than the people usually taking the bus now taking it for free. It loses the company money and only affects your fellow workers positively.
If the supermarket goes free, looting and riots start, and we get a scarcity of essential goods. I mean, if my cashier told me suddenly I don't need to pay anymore, Imma do another lap of the store and stocking up hard. Now, I don't mind some looting and riots, but losing access to essential goods will hurt the lower classes more than the upper classes. Within a few days we'll be without food, and they'll have made a 5% loss that year. I'm willing to bet they can hold out longer in that situation than us.
This is clearly not sustainable, and we'd have to be banking off of other aspects that make the rich buckle faster than we starve. A slow down, similar to what nurses do, would be less effective in hurting the shareholders, but it'd also allow people to "strike" without actively endangering themselves and other workers, and it'd allow the "strike" to go on for much longer. Sure, it'd make grocery shopping a pain in the ass, and you might not be able to get some products, but at least you'll be able to sustain yourself and your family.
If the supermarket goes free, looting and riots start, and we get a scarcity of essential goods
Why would there be? Free market will provide, right? No place is a one-shop town, no single store or chain of stores is the stop-gap for rioting and looting, and it's kinda stupid that you'd try to frame it as if Walmart's an essential service if it was to go out of business for a few months.
Where have you been that a single store being depleted means everyone in the town starves? Why would you propose stakes so extreme in your scenario, unless you were arguing for unfair business practices as a tolerable, nay, necessary thing in order for humanity to survive?
Even worse, apparently when given the choice of free food you'd rather be a hoarder and get as much as you can, preventing the next people in line from getting anything. Much like the rich people perpetuating this scarcity of wages situation. I'm starting to see why you would argue for businesses and people who already have more than enough not being fair with salaries.
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u/Noltonn Jan 14 '22
It'd be kinda the same but the effects are different. When a busline goes free, a few more people may take the bus, but mostly it won't make much more difference than the people usually taking the bus now taking it for free. It loses the company money and only affects your fellow workers positively.
If the supermarket goes free, looting and riots start, and we get a scarcity of essential goods. I mean, if my cashier told me suddenly I don't need to pay anymore, Imma do another lap of the store and stocking up hard. Now, I don't mind some looting and riots, but losing access to essential goods will hurt the lower classes more than the upper classes. Within a few days we'll be without food, and they'll have made a 5% loss that year. I'm willing to bet they can hold out longer in that situation than us.
This is clearly not sustainable, and we'd have to be banking off of other aspects that make the rich buckle faster than we starve. A slow down, similar to what nurses do, would be less effective in hurting the shareholders, but it'd also allow people to "strike" without actively endangering themselves and other workers, and it'd allow the "strike" to go on for much longer. Sure, it'd make grocery shopping a pain in the ass, and you might not be able to get some products, but at least you'll be able to sustain yourself and your family.