Saturday, November 25, 2006

Economics Homework

My sister asked me to help her out with some of her economics homework.

The question she had to discuss went something like: "Karl Marx said that workers are exploited when they generate more wealth than they earn".

Nice.

My sister said that while she worked at Lush (they sell natural cosmetics) during the Summer she generated €100s a day more than she earned, that it was exploitation, that you had to be resigned to.

(I wish they taught kids about production functions in schools).

My answer was: exploitation is a moral issue, and therefore economics can't answer that question but can only explain how various circumstances arise.

On reflection, it is strange that economics and morality should be dichotomous, as economics is as /social/ science concerned with well being.

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