From being able to support a family with only the husband salary, to supporting it with two full time salaries, to barely supporting it even with two full time salaries, all the way back to child labor.
The transformation back into feudalism is nearly complete. Hope you're happy with the freedom to develop your slave career. Don't forget career is the most important part of your life, don't forget to pay your 50% taxes so that we can give them as social support to people who compete with you on pricing, as we artificially choke supply with regulations so that god forbid your work will lose its leverage over your life.
I think we're about 5 years away, maybe less, until company towns come back, as a "new and modern" solution to living costs crisis, you just have to sign a contract saying you will never leave the town unless you pay the debts to the company(and somehow your rent, groceries and medical bills are tiny bit more than what you are paid a month)
It's not a company town unless the company owns all the businesses and houses and pays you in company scrip. If you are going to call company planned residential projects for employee housing "company towns", then there are already company towns in Silicon Valley, but you'll have to excuse me for not feeling sorry for the workers.
Do you really think Elon Musk would be able to prevent himself from putting his face on the town currency? He may or may not care to name the store Elonmart.
Like spending $44 billion on a marginally profitable social media network, seemingly in a fit of pique at the SEC, and inserting a VIP modifier of 1000X into the algorithm so that his posts always pop to the top of everyone's feed because he was mad that the US President's tweet got more attention? Does that sound like the actions of a person with zero interest in wielding power over the residents of his new domain?
4 years ago, Google had proposed a massive housing development of their own, which some then compared to bringing back "company towns". My reaction was, we must be in a pretty crappy state where company towns are an improvement (over the current housing situation).
I already saw some documentary about gentrification. And how the restaurateur were building houses to house her workers. Charging pretty obscene rent and somehow telling nothing was wrong there... That isn't too far away from true exploitation.
In summer tourist areas, it's pretty common to bring in students from e.g. eastern Europe and (I think) often provide housing. But doesn't seem like a terrible deal for everyone involved. A lot of ski areas have dorms as well for seasonal workers.
Those are short term with a well defined end date and with clear upfront costs. Company towns were anything but, with workers frequently surprised with random charges at the end of the month just to make sure they don't accidentally make any money and pay off their debt to the company l.
They weren't all strictly the same though, there's some variations on the theme. One company in the past was in the business of buying fish from fishermen in small remote towns, transporting and selling it wholesale. They were also in the business of financing the boats for the fishermen. The terms of the loans were predatory and the company was a monopoly in the area, whatever money the fishermen made just went back to the company.
I was with you until the rant about taxes and regulations. I was under the impression that child labor laws are a form of regulation and that loosening these laws would be a form of deregulation.
The transformation back into feudalism is nearly complete.
Calling bad stuff "feudalism" is extremely tiresome as well as showing ignorance. It's unfortunate you have to muddy-up an otherwise OK rant/summary with this confused terminology.
Conventional agricultural labor on the land wasn't easy but it extraordinarily different from low-paid factor labor. This a return to Factory Capitalism Classic, which was a new system in most places starting in early 19th century. Peasant children might well have worked along side their parents in the fields at times and the work might have been back-breaking at times but the growing season then dictated everyone got substantial time off by virtue of there being nothing to do. Factories, mines and workshops were the first places that could impose relentless 18 hour days because they the organization, technologies and market to do that.
> Neo-feudalism or new feudalism is the contemporary rebirth of policies of governance, economy, and public life, reminiscent of those which were present in many feudal societies. Such aspects include, but are not limited to: Unequal rights and legal protections for common people and for nobility,[1] dominance of societies by small and powerful elite groups of society, and relations of lordship and serfdom between the elite and the people. Obviously, former are rich and the latter poor.
and it's an excellent and poignant term for the golden faucets wealthy vs two jobs hungry kids poor, backed by "prosperity gospel" and slave prison labor and disenfranchisement of felons and other human rights violations.
That the misuse of terminology has gotten large enough to have a wikipedia page doesn't mean it's not misuse. These policies are only "reminiscent" of feudalism in the minds of those who don't know the history of conventional capitalism.
..is rooted in feudalism isn't it... the mentality is similar, you nearly own people who can be grateful they are allowed to work for you, and you consider yourself more entitled than those.
the only däshift is from owning people born on your soil to nearly owning people who work for you.
and as they need these frickin "brains" for their work and that makes them crave "freedom" you have to give them as much freedom as needed --- and as little as it's sufficient --- so they move cash your way.
the term neo-feudalism is well understood and has a well defined meaning, as established by the mere existence of the Wikipedia article.
what we see is a concerted attempt of some golden faucets to push the world as feudal as can be. as little personal freedom, as much bubbling-up economy as possible.
it's a pushdiwn of social market economy via capitalism back to high tech neo feudalism.
I understand the point you're trying to make, but that was basically the mother working a full time job that now has to be off loaded and distributed to places like schools, child care facilities, etc.
Homemaker labor is still labor. Both parents working is different now in shape but not really that new.
The transformation back into feudalism is nearly complete. Hope you're happy with the freedom to develop your slave career. Don't forget career is the most important part of your life, don't forget to pay your 50% taxes so that we can give them as social support to people who compete with you on pricing, as we artificially choke supply with regulations so that god forbid your work will lose its leverage over your life.