WMN: t3_1vg6qn_t1_ces7xdz

[TITLE]

CMV increase employment by prohibiting non-paid work

[krausyaoj]

In the past there was no paid work as each family was a subsistence farming family. Then paid work was created by specialization. With increased automation there is worry that there will be high unemployment. To increase employment many tasks that are are non-paid could be prohibited for a variety of health and safety reasons. Some examples include: Require parents that teach at home to have a teachers license which improves education and increase jobs at schools Prohibit washing your car at home to reduce [water pollution](http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/news/nation/2008-09-28-car-wash_N.htm) and increase jobs at car washes Allow sale of auto parts and oil to only licensed mechanics for car safety and increased jobs for mechanics Prohibit sale of paint except to licensed painters which reduces grafitti and increases jobs for [licensed painters]( http://www.michigan.gov/statelicensesearch/0,4671,7-180-24786_24822-81388--,00.html) My view would be changed if this would lower total GDP.

[Iwilllive]

It doesn't really "create" jobs or GDP. What you're doing is forcing people to spend capital on something, but that means they won't be able to spend it on something else. Something that could likely be more beneficial for the overall economy, like investing or starting a company. I'd actually argue that a bunch of regulations and licenses would decrease GDP because you have to spend a lot of money on the paper-shuffling side of things that does little to nothing to help the economy and take more money away from meaningful economic activities.

[krausyaoj]

This proposal distributes jobs to those who need them. With high unemployment people who work multiple jobs or work without pay are greedy and selfish and deprive others of needed income. They are just as self-centered as the rich who push for tax breaks.

[Iwilllive]

Yeah... it doesn't work that way. Just imagine the people are paying themselves to do the job they are doing themselves "without pay". If that person is poor then paying for someone else to wash their car probably doesn't make any sense when they don't have enough money for food or healthcare. Moving money around doesn't always make more money and if you force people to move it around in inefficient ways, you end up making the market inefficient and decrease jobs and GDP.

[krausyaoj]

This would imply that taxing the rich to provide welfare to the poor is also inefficient and decreases jobs and GDP. I can agree with this view, but paying more people seems more efficient than welfare since you are paying people for productive work.

[Iwilllive]

You said you would change your view if it decreased GDP, so I made that point. If you want to pay people to do more things you should do more investments and increase jobs in things like infrastructure that will benefit everyone greatly. Eliminating "Free work", which I don't really know if you've defined that well. Will NOT increase employment overall because if I have to pay someone to wash my car then I can't use that same money to pay someone else for any other product or service. So any gains in employment are a wash. Overall this plan would create a huge amount of open jobs doing menial, unskilled jobs without room for promotion like doing laundry, and vacuuming the floor, while making it impossible for those people taking those jobs to be able to afford to pay someone else to do all of those tasks. You literally couldn't even breastfeed your own child because that would be considered "free work".

[krausyaoj]

You have not made a specific point that increasing regulations to protect the environment and health/safety to promote job creation will decrease GDP. You did make a vague claim that reguations and licensing harm the economy which is not true, http://www.epi.org/publication/the_economic_-_and_other_-_benefits_of_regulations/

[projhex]

What is work? You say washing your car and fixing your car or painting are work. /r/autodetailing for all of us car detailing enthusiasts /r/cartalk for those of us interested in the workings of cars /r/painting for those who like to paint. You want to turn everyones hobbies into a job? What are your hobbies? Would you be satisfied if it were *illegal* to do them, and in turn you actually had to pay someone for these services? Sorry, can't wash my own dishes, gotta have a maid. Sorry, can't cook dinner, gotta have a chef?

[krausyaoj]

∆ the line between hobbies and work is not clear. If a particular service is prohibited there may be a process for a hobbiest exemption. Work or hobbies that could damage the environment would still need licensing and insurance to minimize this damage.

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[flee2k]

First, you have essentially just set up a system creating several mini-monopolies because you have raised the barriers to entry. The possibility for widespread corruption in obtaining these licenses you would require to enter these mini-monopolies (or duopolies or whatever-polies) would be limitless. Next, with all these "polies" collusion would become rampant. Basically, the car wash people could all charge whatever they wanted for a car wash and I would have no alternative but to pay that price (or not wash my car). But with food I don't have the option. If I couldn't grill my own hamburger, McDonalds could charge me $50 for one and I would have to pay or starve. Because every restaurant knows this, they would all have a tacit agreement to charge exorbitant prices to maximize profits and would have no incentive to compete with one another. GDP may go up, but the standard of living would go down. Looking at innovation, look at how the oil companies work in America. There was no innovation (other than how to better drill for oil) for 50 years. Then "green" technologies started gaining traction and gas prices were perceived as too high and all of a sudden they magically discovered how to extract shale oil and started up entire divisions to research renewable technology. Without competition, or at least the threat of competition by new actors/products entering the market, this doesn't happen. TL;DR Higher barriers to entry --[STA-CITE]> less competition --> collusion --> less innovation --> less GDP in the long run (or conversely higher GDP but with a lower standard of living) [END-CITE]

[krausyaoj]

Prohibiting self car washes would not lead to a monopoly as there would still be multiple competitors just as in other markets with no do it yourself competition such as cell phones.

[NateDawg007]

The central problem with this approach is that it overvalues paid work above unpaid work. It is a central problem with measuring GDP. I work at a job that I care about (education) that doesn't pay very well. For that reason, I do a lot of the maintenance of my own car. I cook my own meals and clean my own house. I grow a lot of my own food in my garden. I hunt for a large amount of my own meat. I am also considering raising my own chickens. This is a lot of work that I do that is valuable to me, but is not measured. My life is better now than it would be under your scheme.

[krausyaoj]

You sound greedy in that you don't want to share your wealth. What do you think of companies that outsource jobs to low wage countries? Your car maintenance risks other people you share the road with and deprives mechanics of income. Cooking and cleaning does not affect anyone else's safety.

[ulyssessword]

The easiest way to get 100% employment would be to ban tractors on farms, as that would force millions of extra people to work to get the same result. Employment is not a good end goal to have, instead you should look at how much useful work is being done. When people do work/hobbies on their own, there are (almost) all of the same benefits of a professional doing it, but without the costs of calling them up, having them drive out, manning an office to manage customers, advertising, or anything else that does not directly add value to the country.

[krausyaoj]

Banning farm tractors would lower GDP. My goal was to increase employment without decreasing GDP and improving the environment and health/safety standards.

[ghotier]

What you are suggesting is akin to the Broken Window Fallacy, which I would encourage you to google. In this case, the idea is to cause damage that only a professional could fix, because that spurs economic activity. However, that economic activity does not have a positive impact. Your proposal assumes that the broken window fallacy is not a fallacy.

[krausyaoj]

This is not [parable of the broken window](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window) because no increase in damage is proposed. This is simply an expansion of minimum wage to all work. If you oppose this proposal then you should also oppose minimum wage.

[ghotier]

No, I shouldn't. This proposal prevents me from washing my own clothes and making my own food. It creates work by forcing people to pay others to work for them. It is not just an extension of the minimum wage,

[krausyaoj]

My proposal was not to prohibit all self work but those that have environmental and health/safety impacts. Washing your clothes has no safety impacts. Making your own food affects only your health. But making food for others would require that you have a food preparation license.

[ghotier]

What's the safety impact of me painting my own ceiling, exactly?

[krausyaoj]

My proposal was to prohibit the sale of paint used for graffiti so would not apply to ceiling paint. Why do you want to paint yourself and not create jobs?

[ghotier]

Because it is cheaper for me to paint my ceiling myself. It's not an economic good to create jobs that aren't necessary. And, aside from the fact that any paint could be used for graffiti, spray paint isn't designed for graffiti. It's designed for a consumer use that any consumer can do. Professional painters don't use spray paint. There's no economic good that comes from preventing a consumer from using a consumer product.

[krausyaoj]

Painting yourself to simply save money sound selfish. Other people need jobs which you are denying them. I don't see any need for consumers to purchase spray paint and believe its sale should be banned to consumers. What possible use do non-professionals have for spray paint? https://www.paint.org/find-your-issue/spray-paint--graffiti-control.html http://www.chicagonow.com/dennis-byrnes-barbershop/2011/11/just-having-a-can-of-insoluble-spray-paint-in-chicago-will-be-illegal/

[notian]

What is the benefit of increased "busy-work" employment (as opposed to something like a [Negative income tax](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Negative_income_tax))?

[krausyaoj]

This is not "busy-work" but real work done without pay by the rich that could be used to employ and provide income to the poor. If you own a car or home you are rich and you should share your income and create jobs.

[CNoitez]

So from what I can gather from your OP, the only reason you actually think this is a good idea is because it will increase the total GDP. There's a big problem with this though, ignoring "muh freedoms" which is a fairly obvious argument: You can't assume that every business will actually benefit from this, because you are not properly comparing profits in the current system vs. profits under your new one. For instance, suppose we set up the no-painting rule to prohibit do-it-yourself people from painting their own property - how do you know they're all going to hire painters instead? What if they just decide not to have the thing painted at all? You seemed to assume the demand here was inelastic, meaning that people basically HAVE to have it regardless of an increase in cost - this might be true for certain goods, but not many services. And most of the services we actually *need* already require contacting trained professionals, so there wouldn't be much difference there. For the rest, I don't see people opting to pay extra/go out of the way to get these services done. In fact, it's more likely that painters would just get worked harder instead of more people becoming licensed painters. Because of the vast amount of services that would be non-essential and probably just avoided in the event "do-it-yourself" becomes illegal, I think the belief that this policy will increase the GDP is totally unfounded and based on only a superficial understanding of economics.

[krausyaoj]

∆ prohibiting do it yourself may not increase GDP depending on elasticity of demand for the service. For each service this would need to be tested before deciding on prohibiting do it yourself. Determining a net cost/benefit analysis would be difficult and involve calculating externalities such as pollution and health/safety effects.

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[mrsschiller]

There's an awful lot of things we could do if we were willing to sacrifice freedom and subsequently quality of life in the name of raising GDP. GDP is a useful economic indicator but it is no substitute for quality of life. If we were to allow our basic activities so be so severely limited in the name of chasing a particular higher number, would money still be a tool to improve our lives and society or would it rather become an oppressive force that was negatively affecting what really matters - human development and life satisfaction? Edit: Also, sure, you may have more people employed, but does that really help when Joe Blow who works at McD's can't even wash his own car but has to pay someone else to do it? Won't this whole host of new expenses that working people traditionally avoided by doing the work themselves be a huge strain on lower-income workers, potentially moving a lot of them who are just now scraping by into a position of poverty? Even if the services were very cheap, that means this class of people would be pulling in even less cash to begin with.

[hyperbolical]

You want to legally prevent people from washing their own cars? Can they still wipe their own asses, or will we be creating jobs to do that too? I'm not joking by the way. If your sole goal is increasing employment, wouldn't you make ass-wiper jobs?

[krausyaoj]

Yes, I do want to prevent people from washing their own cars because of water pollution, http://www.sustainablesanmateo.org/smc_soln/use-your-local-car-washnot-your-driveway/ It is already prohibited in Germany and proposed for the UK, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/motoring/news/9550745/Plea-to-ban-motorists-washing-their-cars-in-the-street.html

[down42roads]

Your proposal would place an undue financial burden upon people, particularly low income people. Now, EVERYTHING will have labor costs involved. A car wash would now cost $20 at a business instead of $2 at your home. Here's some more examples you failed to mention: Prohibit home-cooked meals, only licensed professional chefs. Prohibit cleaning your own home, only licensed professional maids. Prohibit privately owned vehicles, only licensed professional drivers. Prohibit doing your own laundry, only licensed professional launderers. Prohibit making your own travel plans, only licensed professional travel agents. This approach to the problem would cause financial damages to individuals and families, and create a bureaucratic nightmare. On top of the agencies required to give and maintain the licenses, you would need an enforcement infrastructure.

[krausyaoj]

Poverty is the same excuse that businesses use regarding minimum wage. If you can afford a car then you are rich and can afford to pay for car washes to avoid water pollution. Home cooking, cleaning and driving don't have significant environmental effects that differ between do it yourself and paid work. I do think that homeowners should have to pay for yard work like those who live in apartments. You would pay a monthly fee to a neighborhood association and they would perform all yard work. If you can afford a single family home, then you can pay to have your yard work done and create jobs and not be greedy and do the work yourself.

[down42roads]

[STA-CITE]>If you can afford a car then you are rich and can afford to pay for car washes to avoid water pollution. [END-CITE]Not necessarily. If you are paycheck-to-paycheck, driving a '88 POS back and forth hoping it doesn't crap out halfway to work, every dollar helps. [STA-CITE]>Home cooking, cleaning and driving don't have significant environmental effects that differ between do it yourself and paid work. [END-CITE]Driving, specifically, is wrong. [Minimizing cars on the road](http://www.pacommutes.com/public-transit/eco-impact/) can make a huge impact on the environment. Mass production of food can consume considerably less energy than individual preparation. An oven cooking 4 pizzas is a more efficient use than an oven cooking 1, right? Basically, you can have a car and/or a home, and still be either in poverty or close enough that you can't afford to subsidize unnecessary jobs. That really is what you question comes down to, right? Why do things for yourself when you can subsidize a job for someone else?

[krausyaoj]

For me, the ideal world would have people living in cities, taking mass transit to work and eating at restaurants. There would be very few single family homes or cars. The only people that need to live in single family homes are farmers and others who work in rural areas. Performing non-paid work for yourself deprives others of jobs in the same manner as working two jobs. You should work only one job and let someone else have that other job. But people who work multiple jobs are greedy and care more about their own standard of living and don't want to share the wealth.

[down42roads]

So when one job can't feed my kids and I work a second, I'm just being a selfish ass?

[krausyaoj]

That depends on the hours worked and when you had the kids. If you are working 40 hours a week and get a second job to support the kids then you are a selfish ass. Don't have kids if one full time job is not enough to support them. This is similar to having a full time job and taking a second job because you want to purchase extra luxuries. Let someone else have that job who needs the money for basic necessities.