the labor market is a market, and as such regulated by the rule of Supply and demand. That implies: if the supply is increased, then the price is decreased. If the supply is decreased, then the price is increased.
In the context of the labor market, that means:
If there’s fewer workers in the country (which comes naturally with a smaller population), then the price for labor (a.k.a. wages) goes higher. That increases the Quality Of Life for the people, and is therefore a socially good thing.
That’s interesting but I think you’re making a couple of crucial mistakes.
First as others mentioned, production and consumption are obviously intrinsically linked. A bigger country doesn’t automatically mean bigger quality of life despite having more workers, Switzerland is not richer because it’s smaller when it’s got roughly the same population as the poorest country on earth.
But if talking proportionally, more workers per capita means more production per capita, which means more consumption per capita.
Second, to kinda go in your direction and in part because of the contractual nature of employment, the market pressure on workers wages is not a product of the number of workers, but the number of available workers. For working (not unemployed) people, the quality of life does increase as that number gets lower, but this means less unemployment, not less workers. This fact is the reason why unemployment is not a side-effect of capitalism (or the lazy nature of people or whatever else), but a necessary feature of capitalism, since capital relies on this perpetual supply drive (buyers market) for profit.
You’re assuming everybody has the same buying power. That is in reality not the case. If you remove 20% of the people, buying power only goes down by something like 2%. Therefore your point seems disputed?
No I’m not, I’m just not assuming immigrants have 0 buying power, which your post implicitly was. Yes supply increases but demand also increases. Beyond that you get into the realms of having to do empirical research as to which is more (which is difficult).
it’s not that difficult, it’s quite obvious that immigrants and poor people have less buying power and therefore create less demand, while probably working harder than any billionaires and therefore create more supply.
i’d also argue that is straightforward to see. i don’t see your misunderstanding?
counterpoint:
the labor market is a market, and as such regulated by the rule of Supply and demand. That implies: if the supply is increased, then the price is decreased. If the supply is decreased, then the price is increased.
In the context of the labor market, that means: If there’s fewer workers in the country (which comes naturally with a smaller population), then the price for labor (a.k.a. wages) goes higher. That increases the Quality Of Life for the people, and is therefore a socially good thing.
That’s interesting but I think you’re making a couple of crucial mistakes.
First as others mentioned, production and consumption are obviously intrinsically linked. A bigger country doesn’t automatically mean bigger quality of life despite having more workers, Switzerland is not richer because it’s smaller when it’s got roughly the same population as the poorest country on earth. But if talking proportionally, more workers per capita means more production per capita, which means more consumption per capita.
Second, to kinda go in your direction and in part because of the contractual nature of employment, the market pressure on workers wages is not a product of the number of workers, but the number of available workers. For working (not unemployed) people, the quality of life does increase as that number gets lower, but this means less unemployment, not less workers. This fact is the reason why unemployment is not a side-effect of capitalism (or the lazy nature of people or whatever else), but a necessary feature of capitalism, since capital relies on this perpetual supply drive (buyers market) for profit.
More people also means more demand for things that require labour to create however. Your position is referred to as the lump of labour fallacy
You’re assuming everybody has the same buying power. That is in reality not the case. If you remove 20% of the people, buying power only goes down by something like 2%. Therefore your point seems disputed?
No I’m not, I’m just not assuming immigrants have 0 buying power, which your post implicitly was. Yes supply increases but demand also increases. Beyond that you get into the realms of having to do empirical research as to which is more (which is difficult).
it’s not that difficult, it’s quite obvious that immigrants and poor people have less buying power and therefore create less demand, while probably working harder than any billionaires and therefore create more supply.
i’d also argue that is straightforward to see. i don’t see your misunderstanding?