May 11, 2021 ☼ economy ☼ stocks ☼ labor
Source: NPR - Link
Sure, the economist says, he has a retirement account with stocks, and he personally benefits from the ongoing bonanza on stock exchanges. But the rocket ride of the stock market is powered by the exploding profits of increasingly powerful corporations. Their increasingly ridiculous profits, he says, are eating the income of the vast bulk of workers and hurting the overall economy. That notion is the central thesis of his forthcoming book, The Profit Paradox: How Thriving Firms Threaten the Future of Work.
This reflects something I’ve been saying for a while. Productivity, automation, and reorganization has been sped up by the pandemic. Large businesses are figuring out how to do more with less labor. This makes them more profitable, but it weakens the labor market and puts more folks on assistance. Something has got to give if the trend continues.