The Pitchforks are Coming

The views of American Billionaire Nick Hanauer.

http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2014/06/the-pitchforks-are-coming-for-us-plutocrats-108014.html#.U61F6bGFB-M

Does this have any relevance to the UK or are we all content to run around sticking pitchforks in each other's backsides ?

That's a really interesting piece. The idea that paying a decent wage/salary (above even the living wage, let alone the minimum wage) actually stimulates demand because your workers can now afford your and other companies' products/services, thus generating economic growth, creating jobs, reducing the need for state handouts, while at the same time increasing the tax take by the Treasury is not new. As Hanauer says, Henry Ford had precisely this idea in the 30's.

It's broadly a philosophy I buy and put into practice in my businesses. Even the shareholders don't lose out - the extra demand for their companies' products/services creates extra profits.

Interesting. Mike Ashley would be in severe danger. Treat people better, more fairly, and the world becomes a better place - that's not where we're currently headed...

I like his style. He's right. There are no examples of societies,where the vast majority are non stakeholders,that survive long term.

The USA is a good example of a society that has reached the pinnacle of its power over a very short period of time and has funded too much growth with debt. The people who hold all of the money at the top are causing a lot if misery at the bottom and that will cause a societal breakdown sooner rather than later.

UK is a peculiar case though. We have the same unbalanced society where a very small elite run everything but, in many ways, our welfare state acts as a brake on social friction. We have access to decent healthcare and education in a way totally unthinkable in the US and our institutions have been built over a thousand years so are better able to sense public attitudes and avoid the worst calamities.

I don't think the UK is immune from social upheaval. Clearly it's not. But I think inequality in America is far far starker. I spent a few years working with VA hospitals in the states and you would not believe the difference in standards between so called "public" and "private" facilities. Truly shocking.

Also welfare in America is truly disgraceful. The gap between have and have not over there is chasmic.