• UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    2 days ago

    Are you complaining about the efficient supply chains and low cost-per-unit of production?

    Or are you complaining about the high degree of profit-taking and the denial of public benefits to the working class?

    • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
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      1 day ago

      Efficiency and low-cost comes with baggage too, so I guess both in a way. Efficiency and low cost good, but what is required to achieve those often sucks

      The second thing is undeniably bad

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        1 day ago

        Efficiency and low-cost comes with baggage too

        Automation under capitalism: Tons of unemployment and poverty while a few insiders get lots of treats

        Automation under socialism: Shorter work weeks, more vacation, and the standard of living for everyone goes up

        • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
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          1 day ago

          Did the shorter work weeks and more vacation after automation materialize in socialist states?

              • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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                24 hours ago

                https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eight-hour_day_movement

                The eight-hour day movement (also known as the 40-hour week movement or the short-time movement) was a social movement to regulate the length of a working day, preventing excesses and abuses of working time.

                Just for starters.

                The modern concept of “Retirement” is also tied to socialist policy and politics. One of the first major reforms states implement after a socialist election or Marxist revolution is the implementation of retirement age. And those countries with the strongest socialist histories tend to have the lowest retirement ages and most generous pensions. Fully socialist states like Vietnam and China and South Africa have retirement in the 55-62 range. More socialist-leaning European/East Asian states like France, Denmark, Korea, and Japan have a retirement age in the 63-67 range. And fully captured capitalist systems like Uganda or Bangladesh or the undocumented worker pools of the Americas have no retirement for private workers whatsoever, working people to death.

                • Kusimulkku@lemm.ee
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                  20 hours ago

                  That movement is not at all specific to socialist states. If you read a bit further it even says how it originated in industrial revolution Britain and happened all over the world.

                  I’m not asking about socialist or social democratic or labour movement policies in capitalist countries, I’m asking about automation shortening the work day in socialist countries

                  • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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                    20 hours ago

                    If you read a bit further it even says how it originated in industrial revolution Britain and happened all over the world.

                    Industrial Britian had an enormous activist labor movement. A slew of left wing thinkers and agitators emerged from the British academic scene, including Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Ghandi.

                    I’m not asking about socialist or social democratic or labour movement policies in capitalist countries

                    How are you defining “Capitalist Country” if you ignore all the socialist policies a country has implemented?

                    Hell, how do you define Socialist Country, if you exclude every one that’s undergone Capitalist accumulation?

                    8-hour work week is a socialist policy, espoused by socialist parties and implemented in governments with socialist majorities. Same with pensions and other public retirement funds.

                    The more socialists you have setting policy, the shorter your work week and the earlier your retirement.