The Minimum Wage Law and Commodification

From: EV
Sent:
To: Walter Block
Subject: RE: wine

“Change wine into people.” Oops, I fudged, but still for a purpose. “Change wine into workers.” But this gets at the very issue. Wine is a commodity for sale. People are not. That’s the basic difference between our respective views. Thank you for confirming me once again. Your missives keep reassuring me. So I take a bottle of wine that I don’t like — I pour it down the drain. Take a bottle of wine that I drink some from, but then have no use for – I pour it down the drain. So I don’t like a worker, I pour him down into the gutter. The difference, to be sure, is that when talk about minimum wage, we are not talking about this or that employer. I am talking about a society, a state, a nation, items that, I think, you don’t think exists. A society can pour wine in the drain, but not its people or, even, any people. Put another way, but an old statement from me, you and your kin are quite willing to commodify people. I am not. But, once again, I am an ethicist. You are an economist, so no wonder. And both of us are not on either of those turfs, but on another turf where we debate, namely, politics. So thanks for confirmation. Now, as a side note, I confess that is what Catholics claim to do. In fact, they even claim to change wine into blood and, more accurately, to change wine into God. But, so to speak, that is talking about religious metaphysics. EV

From: Walter Block [mailto:[email protected]]
Sent:
To: EV
Subject: wine

Dear EV:

I’m firm, you’re stubborn, he’s a pig headed fool. Emotively, these are very different. Substantively, not at all.
I’m abstracting from irrelevancies, you’re a commodifier. Again, emotively, these are very different. Substantively, not at all. In using the wine (saying that the higher the price of wine, the less of it will be purchased), I’m abstracting from irrelevancies. I’m saying, the higher the price of ANYTHING, wine, shoes, labor, violins, beer, other things equal, the less of it will be bought. If it makes you happy to call this “commodification,” please feel free to do so. However, realize, that heart surgeons “commodify” their patients. They, too, abstracting from irrelevancies. During surgery, hopefully, they are not thinking of their patient as a father, a teacher, a brother, a husband. They are only focusing on his heart problem. For them, if it was a cow’s heart, or a computer heart, it would be the same thing. They block out everything else from their mind, so that they can do a good job on the person’s heart. That’s what good economists also do. We block out irrelevancies. We abstract from them. Ok, ok, we “commodify.” But, we do so in order to achieve clarity. EV, your very soul is in question. When you get to the Pearly Gates, St. Peter is going to ask you about your views on a minimum wage law which viciously undermines the employment prospects for the “least, last and lost amongst us.” Right now, I’m sorry to say, you’re not getting into heaven, because you are supporting evil.

Maybe some of these will convince you:

Murphy, Robert P. 2014. “Economists debate the minimum wage.” February 3;
http://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2014/Murphyminimumwage.html

Murphy, Robert P. 2015A. “The Minimum Wage ‘Experiments.’” June 16; https://mises.ca/posts/blog/the-minimum-wage-experiments/

Murphy, Robert P. 2015A. “Robert Reich Shills for $15 Minimum Wage.” June 22;
https://mises.ca/posts/blog/robert-reich-shills-for-15-minimum-wage/

North, Gary. 2014. “How Minimum Wage Laws Promote Racial Discrimination.” July 19; https://www.lewrockwell.com/2014/07/gary-north/want-young-black-males-to-get-jobs/

North, Gary. 2016. “Labor Unions and the Minimum Wage: ‘We Got Ours — Screw You.’” May 2; https://www.lewrockwell.com/2016/05/gary-north/got-screw/

Rothbard, Murray N. 1988. “Outlawing Jobs: The Minimum Wage, Once More.” The Free Market. Auburn, AL: The Ludwig von Mises Institute, December, 1, 7-8; http://archive.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard315.html; https://www.lewrockwell.com/rothbard/rothbard124.html

Rothbard, Murray N. 2015A. “On the minimum wage.”July 29;
http://www.economicpolicyjournal.com/2015/07/murray-rothbard-on-minimum-wage.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+economicpolicyjournal%2FKpwH+%28EconomicPolicyJournal.com%29

Rothbard, Murray N. 2015B. “The Crippling Nature of Minimum-Wage Laws.” November 6;
https://mises.ca/posts/articles/the-crippling-nature-of-minimum-wage-laws/

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3:35 pm on August 14, 2016