State of the parties as 2015 General Election looms.

[Beef Oven!]

I think you need to define 'earn'.

Earn is to do with one's earnings in this context - profits , fees, salaries, wages and other non-financial benefits in kind that are given for work, service, services and enterprise. Off the top of my head.

[Beef Oven!]

Are worth and social values emotional and vague? I can't think of anything more important.

They are emotional and vague in the sense that people can have different views of worth and social value according to how they feel about the world. Socialists have very different views of worth and social value to free-market entrepreneurial capitalists. Supply and demand is purely objective.

Important is quite vague, as a concept.

[Flosshilde]

Scots, particuarly Aberdonians,

Aberdonians are called mean by other Scots.

[Beef Oven!]

Pay isn't set by supply and demand at all. Some people like to get together to defend their wealth and pretend that somehow they are "worth it".

Exactly. It's a pretence to take a moral view. They are not 'worth' anything, they just get paid because of supply and demand.

[MrGongGong]

Exactly. It's a pretence to take a moral view. They are not 'worth' anything, they just get paid because of supply and demand.

But it's not 'supply and demand' at all. There are thousands of people who could do the tasks that people earn stupid money for in the city.
How many people can play like Evan Parker ? Huge demand, low supply, he must be worth millions.

[ahinton]

You want earnings to be decided differently from S&D? Tell us a bit more how that would work.

I didn't say that, as you know; I merely presented to you a potential caveat that might work for you and, if it doesn't or is not relevant to you, you need not consider it so it is of no consequence.

[ahinton]

... because somewhere it has been decided that they shouldn't "earn" enough, and therefore that (if IDS gets his way) it should be made difficult for them to have more than two children. I don't see why you're clinging onto this idea of earned versus unearned income. (In any case, the majority of IDS's wealth seems to derive from after-dinner speaking and from his wife's rich daddy. In what way is that "earned"?)
Class warfare is very contemporary indeed, I'm sorry to have to say.

Ain't it just!

IDS's income from after-dinner speaking is at least some kind of stab at earning money from working, whereas what he derives from "his wife's rich daddy" clearly isn't.

[amateur51]

Ain't it just!

IDS's income from after-dinner speaking is at least some kind of stab at earning money from working, whereas what he derives from "his wife's rich daddy" clearly isn't.

Exactly, ahinton!

[ahinton]

Earnings are decided in the labour market, not mysteriously as you would have it.

To a point, that's true, but that doesn't mean to say that it works effectively, does it?! The "labour market" is as corrupt as any other, so what do or could you expect other than than inequality, injustice and the rest? What some people don't seem to want to recognise is that the every man/woman for him/herself scenario is a rampant in the public sector as it is in the private (and, given that government rund the public sector, can you wonder at it?!) - in other words, it invades and infects that entire labour market. There are some of a certain persuasion who might argue that this is exactly what it should do.

After dinner speaking? Supply and demand!

Free indigestion with every - er - ...

[ahinton]

I don't think there is anything wrong with it at all, because it's not a moral question. Pay is set by demand and supply, not some other emotional, vague, relative notion like, perhaps, worth or social value.

Consider for one moment, if you will, the pay of the CEO of the Financial Conduct Authority which has recently been brought to book (insofar as that unaccountable and immune outfit ever can be) for "closed-book" failures on a fairly grand scale; he and his henchcolleagues have agreed to forego their annual bonuses as a direct consequence of this and, since there is a cap of 25% of annual salary on annual bonuses there and the senior officals there would otherwise have taken the full amount of that, this means, for the CEO, that he has foregone £125K. Can you tell me what particular "supply and demand" arguments justify that CEO's £460K p.a. salary? and, before you answer, let's not forget that his outfit is not a government department but a private company limited by guarantee.

[ahinton]

Earn is to do with one's earnings in this context - profits , fees, salaries, wages and other non-financial benefits in kind that are given for work, service, services and enterprise. Off the top of my head.

In every case? May I respectfully ask you to examine carefully the top of your head which appears to lead you to believe that this applies universally (and see especially my remarks above on the boss of FCA)?

[Beef Oven!]

Ain't it just!

IDS's income from after-dinner speaking is at least some kind of stab at earning money from working, whereas what he derives from "his wife's rich daddy" clearly isn't.

His wife's rich daddy can do whatever he wants with his money - politics of envy as usual.

[Beef Oven!]

In every case? May I respectfully ask you to examine carefully the top of your head which appears to lead you to believe that this applies universally (and see especially my remarks above on the boss of FCA)?

I said in this context -pay attention.

[MrGongGong]

His wife's rich daddy can do whatever he wants with his money - politics of envy as usual.

Envy, my arse

[Beef Oven!]

Envy, my arse

No thank you.