Long version? Go Ahead!

The short article is just below this post.

Regional Minimum Wage is varying across Indonesia, the highest belong to Jakarta (Rp 2.200.000). Countries like UK and USA have this system as well, it’s only that theirs are far ahead us. Our income mean is about US$800 (I learned this in Middle School).

Anyway, the relation between human rights and wage is close. People need income to fulfill their basic needs. Example: we need money to buy our home, or at least rent an apartment. We also need money for food and clothing (neither are rented, imagine renting an underpants!), and for mental health as well (entertainment (setting your television to political-party-member-owned channel will do) and love…).

But think about this: the laborers are trapped in a vicious circle, I think.

Prove?

Watch this.

1.Laborers are short of money.

2.They push the government to raise the minimum wage.

3.They succeed.

4.More wage means more spending (at least in Indonesia).

5.More spending means more demand for certain needs.

6.More demand leads to higher price of commodities.

7.Laborers are short of money.

That, I took it from the previous post.

Before asking for their rights, they should have done this: saving money early, instead of spending more.

Here is Maslow’s hierarchy of needs:

According to @JetVeetlev, founder of Hitman System, a good wage can fulfill the second stage… when it’s managed well. I think saving money is one of the crucial managements. By saving money instead of spending it, your future will be more secure, more stable, and of course, free from fear that the physiological needs will become more expensive. Saving money is the key to national security.

A couple of days ago, I listened to a song by Enter Shikari: Gandhi mate, Gandhi. The intro says:

“Now, I don't know about you, but I don't think the primary purpose of your life, of my life and the entirety of the human race is just to blindly consume to support a failing economy and a faulty system. Forever and ever until we run out of every resource and have to resort to blowing each other up to ensure our own survival. I don't think we're supposed to sit by either while we continue to use a long outdated system that produces war, poverty, collusion, corruption, ruins our environment and threatens every aspect of our health and does nothing but divide and segregate us. I don't think how much military equipment we are selling to other countries, how many hydrocarbons we're burning, how much money is being printed and exchanged, is a good measure of how healthy our society is but I do think I can speak for everyone when I say, we're sick of this s**t.”

Yes, we do. But what kind of fault it is? A system is faulty when the people is faulty, and capitalism (I’m sure this is the “faulty system” they are talking about) is no exception. Now look at this. Capitalism is not faulty. But people who abuse it for their own good, they’re faulty. Selling product with advertisements, it’s not wrong. Using psychological tricks and making the consumers blindly consume things they don’t need, that’s wrong. Fulfill a demand, that’s not faulty. Creating a bogus demand, that’s faulty. The core of the tree is, there are a lot of people we don’t need that is abusing our rights. And who gets hit? Consumers… of which a lot of them are laborers.  Poor consumers-laborers.

The diagram above explains the flow of labor, money and goods/consumables. As you can see, consumers sell their labor (or their property) and gets paid, while producers sell consumables and get paid by money from laborers. This needs to be in perfect balance. Which is occasionally not, for example, fulfilled in the case of slavery, the one in that one kitchenware factory.

However, as you can see, the flow needs to be balanced. If the producers pay more for labor, it means either they have to work more, or buy more. This is nuts.

So, Enter Shikari got its point. But how do we face it?

Save money. Invest. That’s all we can do in this nuts system… But I’d rather be in capitalist system rather than socialist system. Imagine eating rationed food for the rest of your life.

Ilios Zoi

DMD 3.2

Lasalle College International Jakarta