so what ultimately determines wages is productivity
unfortunately, the data has shown that this is not true anymore, and hasn't been for more than 4 decades.
i agree that government and bureaucracy is in a large part obstructing some of the natural restructuring that would otherwise occur in the free market in today's stratified society. however, it is obvious that a paradigm shift occurred around 1970 when productivity, employment rates, and wages decoupled. i don't think it is a coincidence that this lines up with a shift towards automative replacement of many jobs, in both unskilled and skilled labor.
There's another explanation. "On 15 August 1971, the United States unilaterally terminated convertibility of the US$ to gold."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bretton_Woods_systemcan you demonstrate how the Bretton Woods System would have the aforementioned effect on productivity and wages?
cum hoc ergo propter hoc is a logical fallacy.
"this coupled with the severe contraction of the economy in 2008 and the jobless recovery since has produced and maintained feedback loops manifesting themselves as rapid stratification in both income and wealth distribution in the US and the world: wage suppression, natural monopolization and other effects of economies of scale, globalization of economies corresponding to globalization of inequality, and large profits for the business and financial elite corresponding to large negative externalities for everyone else. each of these items could be expanded into an entire thesis, but i won't go into more detail. the point is that each of these things are independent feedback loops that support and accelerate wealth inequality."
There is no such thing as "natural monopolization". Governments create monopolies. The free market resists them as mass resists acceleration. The only business model that can't be copied is government-mandated exclusivity. Bitcoin is probably the best example of free market dominance and even it faces hundreds of competitors eating into it's market share.
there is very much so such a thing as a
natural monopoly and if you disagree you are at odds with basic economics. you also conveniently forgot to address every other item on that list. there is no "free market" ideal, there is only the apparatus that exists, and the present apparatus rewards huge negative externalities and is perpetuating and accelerating wealth inequality, both things which render it unsustainable in the long term. high rates of unemployment coupled with wage suppression creates poverty traps worse than the welfare state. we're not talking about "Capitalism" or "The Free Market", we're talking about global capitalism as it exists today, and the global market. the ills are most certainly
not the sole fault of governments, and scapegoating them in this way is a dangerous misdirection away from the real issues endemic in the apparatus that are contributing to the suffering of millions...
in other words, i don't care about your lofty Randian free market ideals. while capitalism may be "the best solution we can aspire to", and that would be hard to disagree with, it is also clear that our present form of global capitalism is suffering from a huge amount of inefficiencies, many of which cannot be attributed to meddling governments. how can we reconcile these two things? i have no clue, but we've first got to get our heads out of our asses and stop worshipping the sacred cow long enough to think critically about why the apparatus is failing at efficiently distributing resources.
--arepo