tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5071936218849577375.post3374589534625749326..comments2024-03-19T23:20:47.782-07:00Comments on Unintentional Irony: DetcordJames Killushttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08265296146264452333noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5071936218849577375.post-79251847243959653532007-12-02T21:41:00.000-08:002007-12-02T21:41:00.000-08:00Ah, I also forgot empty suits. That would make a g...Ah, I also forgot empty suits. That would make a good title, "Toothy Sharks and Empty Suits."James Killushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08265296146264452333noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5071936218849577375.post-73355238926504625432007-12-02T16:06:00.000-08:002007-12-02T16:06:00.000-08:00Desktop computers did promise to automate much of ...Desktop computers did promise to automate much of the "paper pushing" that passed for middle management in the 80s. White collar productivity improved but nothing like what was envisioned/promised. One fundamental reason was the fact that getting useful work out of a circuit, even an extremely fast circuit, was much easier to imagine than to actually do.<BR/><BR/>Plus, even though the hierarchy clearly identified decision-makers and pissants, in reality many of the paper pushers and most assuredly the secretaries were the day-to-day operational brains of those organizations. Cutting the fat turned into cutting the brain. Lucky they were dinosaur-like in size and brain-dependency.<BR/><BR/>And yes, we did select for sharks. Toothy sharks.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5071936218849577375.post-4706040078628541812007-12-02T12:14:00.000-08:002007-12-02T12:14:00.000-08:00Brad Delong has observed that corporations were no...Brad Delong has observed that corporations were not big winners in this matter, either. With high marginal tax rates, pay tends not to cluster so much at the top, resulting in better pay for those even just slightly down the managerial hierarchy, the middle managers and such, whose diligence is necessary for the day-to-day operation of a company.<BR/><BR/>In a previous version of this theory, I thought that the computer revolution of the 1980s allowed, for the first time, corporate downsizing at the middle and lower management levels, all the way to executive assistants, typists, etc. It's easier for someone to lay off some nameless factory worker; much harder when it's a well-respected secretary or two out of eight managers who report directly to the big boss.<BR/><BR/>The result was that the system selected for guys who had no problem doing that sort of thing, the sharks and cobras, aka borderline sociopaths.<BR/><BR/>And, of course, ideologies that emphasized sociopathic behavior came to fore.James Killushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08265296146264452333noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5071936218849577375.post-661924901904951682007-12-02T11:00:00.000-08:002007-12-02T11:00:00.000-08:00Go back to when Superman and John L Lewis were pla...Go back to when Superman and John L Lewis were players in the nation's interests and imagination and you'll see the social institutions of today's America in recognizable form. Church, politics, teevee, movies, baseball, college & pro football, family, automobiles, work, education: all changed, but mostly cosmetic change. And yet my children's future looks much different than mine because, as you say, we've broken the pact.<BR/><BR/>The when, where, and who of this breach of trust isn't clear to me either but one of the hows, a detcord touching off massive economic and social change came when we forgot the rationale for progressive income tax. The owners of the Daily Planet and Peabody Coal had a harsh disincentive to extract exhorbitant income from their companies. A top rate of 90% in 1960 was no barrier to national prosperity, maybe because today's executive compensation was then better spent on independent newsrooms and mine safety; reinvested. This graph <A HREF="http://www.heritage.org/research/features/BudgetChartBook/charts_T/t1.cfm" REL="nofollow">of top tax rates</A> could also be a graph of social optimism since 1960.<BR/><BR/>We did ourselves no favor when we freed top corporate management from the discipline of diminishing personal returns.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.com