Slavery's Legacy & the Human Cost of Efficiency
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- Опубліковано 24 гру 2024
- Trevon Logan, a professor of economics at @theohiostateuniversity, critically examines the notion of efficiency in the context of slavery, highlighting the human cost and inefficiency of forced labor in the Antebellum South. He argues that traditional economic models fail to account for the true human cost of slavery, focusing solely on output and profit while ignoring the lives and agency of the enslaved. Logan emphasizes the need to reevaluate historical narratives to fully understand the dehumanizing effects of slavery and its enduring impact on racial inequality today.
Watch the first part of this interview: • Measuring the Danger o...
Learn more about his work at economics.osu....
7:42 This insight in particular is potentially worth a further look at in a broader context. How often do people hear 'I'd quit that job if I could go without my medication for a month', 'I can't afford the time off to take care of my parents', 'if I don't take this unscheduled shift switch then I'm not a "team player" and won't get hours next week'.
This is an interesting and necessary discussion. I agree that there is a dimension beyond the traditional understanding of the cost of production that plays a role in the issue of slavery. Traditional economic models indeed fail to capture the dehumanizing aspect of slavery, and a reevaluation of the narrative is needed in this regard. However, I’m not sure wage labor can simply be considered the opposite binary of chattel slavery on the basis of free will. I disagree with this. Yes, you go home after work, but that doesn’t necessarily equate to autonomy, especially in the current context of capitalism. In fact, the same dehumanizing argument (class-based rather than, or often in addition to, race-based dehumanization) can be applied to wage labor. I would argue that the same cost-efficiency argument presented by Prof. Logan applies here. The term "wage slavery" was an integral part of labor movement struggles in the 19th century United States, only falling out of use toward the end of that century for reasons other than a lack of conviction in the truth of the statement.
From Aristotle, through Cicero, to Wilhelm von Humboldt and the Diggers in England, the critique of wage labor as an unacceptable form of slavery-viewed by many as just as dehumanizing and psychologically degrading as chattel slavery-has been a recurring theme in the debate over wages as a form of retributive justice. It’s true that some defenders of slavery in the Southern U.S. supported this argument, but two wrongs don’t make a right. In the United States, figures such as Thomas Paine, the Lowell mill girls in their labor protests, and even Frederick Douglass-who initially opposed this “amalgamation”-eventually acknowledged that "the slavery of wages must go down with the other." This doesn’t even touch on the work of Marx and other anarcho-syndicalist authors who advanced similar arguments. The principle that you cannot commodify human creativity without essentially destroying it-and, by extension, any potential efficiency gains-applies to both chattel and wage slavery.
Now, I am not familiar with Prof. Logan’s work, and he may have addressed these points already, but I would argue that the comparison between chattel slavery and wage slavery is essentially a false dichotomy. The same argument for degradation, control, and dehumanization applies to both. To be clear, this does not diminish the uniquely repugnant nature of racism-based chattel slavery; it’s about addressing the broader question of loss of efficiency. I believe Prof. Logan’s argument is compelling and worthy of attention, but I think similar reasoning could be applied to issues such as the productivity puzzle in today’s industrialized Western world.
Great insights! Forced labour and slave trade is not a thing of the past. It is still ongoing in various forms around the world e.g. Africa, Middle East, Asia, Latin America, etc.
Sustainable labour economics
I expect a discussion of the entire history of slavery, not only a small section of it. Except we rarely hear about the fact that slavery used to be legal in countries like Saudi Arabia until 60 years ago.
That would be interesting, but also a little beyond the scope of a short and focused interview! Of course Professor Logan's specific findings can be extrapolated beyond what is discussed here, and this certainly wont be the first or the last we produce on the subject.
Keep believing in your own little bubble, "they" want to victimise whites and this new woke agenda is eradicating and fabricating History!" come out of the cave my friend.
A d we rarely hear that the richest families throughout Uk Europe and America including the British royals benefited and profited from slavery and majority of the population in these countries supported it. Now the western countries pretend as if slavery is something they never supported or aware of and some outside forces forced them to accept it is laughable. Can be compared with the extermination of indigenous peoples in us and Australia,something to sweep under the carpet
The transatlantic slave trade is certainly not a “small section” of the history of slavery.
@roc7880 your pathological, perverse, disingenuous and fake concern trolling for the economics of the global history of slavery in this 13 minute video should fool no one.
Shame on you and shame on @new EconomicTimes UA-cam account userfor not calling it out in their response.
Leave past slavery alone and lets move on
As always said by the enslaver class...humans aren't wired like that...as if Europeans "just get over the past"...the civil rights act in America is only 20 yrs younger than the Holocaust...do you tell Jews "just get over the holocaust"?...why is Scotland trying to secede from UK?...why is Catalonia trying to secede from Spain?...Venice from Italy?..Ukraine into 3 countries?... Yugoslavia into 6 countries?...who in the world has been successful at completely getting over the past injustices and riffs?...Europeans while only being 8 % of the world, subjugated by force over 80% of it...the global white zeitgeist is disingenuous in talking about western hemisphere slavery, colonialism, and accountability...comments like yours on every medium always make this abundantly clear
Why? This is a meaningful part of our history and something we should all be aware of and contemplate.
Yes, let's move on, but in what direction? Towards neoliberalism, back to the future?😂
It is important to reconcile with the past to move on a-hole. You probably sitting (with your fat bottom) on a lot of wealth from slavery or genocide of indigenous people
Slavery is current, wdym? It is legal to enslave the incarcerated to this day.