Subject: Why are we so afraid of unemployment? by Juchang He E-mail: chang at public.shenzhen.cngb.com
Why are we so afraid of unemployment? It is because people are afraid of poverty. Unemployment will bring people poverty. If there weren't poverty, people wouldn't be afraid of unemployment. Therefore, if we can solve the problem of poverty, people won't be afraid of unemployment.
(People's living standard can be divided into four grades. The first grade is necessary consumption of education, clothing, food, housing and transportation. The second grade is ordinary consumption, which means buying some more clothes and purchasing TV sets and washers, etc. The third grade is extravagant consumption, which means going to hotels, restaurants and dancing-halls and taking cars, etc. The fourth grade is over-extravagant consumption.)
How can the problem of poverty be solved? When there appears inadequate production of consumer goods of the first and second grades, the government should instruct people to produce consumer goods of the first and second grades. In this way, unemployment will be decreased and poverty will be eliminated.
Are people who have jobs protected from poverty? Of course not. People with low wages have to face poverty as well. In this case, the government should stipulate a level of the lowest wages in the form of law, and all the wages shouldn't be lower than this level. In this way, the problem of poverty will be solved.
Is finding a job the only way to eliminate poverty? Of course not. If there is overproduction of consumer goods of the first and second grades, the government should provide the unemployed with relief funds instead of finding jobs for them, because, at that time, social wealth is adequate, even more than needed. So the unemployed will never live in poverty.
Economists simply tell people how to eliminate unemployment, rather than tell people how to eliminate poverty. I think this is unscientific. Their current strategy will conceal the economic condition of a country, so as to make social poverty remain the same year after year in the world. Economists should be aware that poverty is far more harmful than unemployment. It is because people are afraid of poverty that they are afraid of unemployment. Therefore, economists should tell people how to eliminate poverty rather than unemployment. If economists fail to tell people how to eliminate poverty, they shouldn't call themselves economists.
Sincerely, Juchang He SHENZHEN, P.R. CHINA E-mail: chang at public.shenzhen.cngb.com Welcome to My Homepage <http://sites.netscape.net/juchang/homepage.html>