I’ve definitely shared this concept or observation or whatever you want to call it before, but recent events have made me think of it again. I should clarify first that what I base this train of thought on isn’t entirely something that clicks for me, something I might not get into expressing, but it definitely makes you or at least me wonder why the implications in the train of thought aren’t considered, at least outside my occupation (since I’m in an occupation designed to work around the otherwise neglect of the concept), and I thought of running this by.
Back in the old days, it was common for business people to pay their workers more honestly, as in based on what they thought the worker seemed to deserve. Often the workers would seem underwhelmed. Organized criminals would then step in and say “you’ll get more out of us” and so that part of society grew. For some reason, the first thing within the mind of the people in charge, trying to assess everything, was “let’s invent this thing, we might call it the minimum wage”. Alrighty. So this side thinking, what do we think of it? Something happened, right?
So here is where the train of thought works into the picture. Matters of monetization are just one arena up the sleeve of bad actors. A lot of people feel abruptly socially isolated. When this happens, instinct is often to seek out companions. Social life might be dead or people might be avoidant. Someone I know is in such a situation. Along comes what might be called a bad actor. To them, they might see a potential extension of themselves with freedom of minimal effort. And voila, someone new joins the “bad crowd” or “dysfunctional crowd”.
Watching this unfold myself, I think to myself. Places have a “minimum reference point” for the topic of exchange/payment/whatever the word is, so then what does the non-thinking come from to apply this thought to the whole isolation thing mentioned? Anyone here have people they know who were absorbed into a bad part of society when everything seemed dead and thought “well, it’s not like anyone else was going to give them what they need”?
Person is also provided for their social needs, parallel to the monetary needs.
Person works the job
Person goes home not feeling they need to hang out with that bad influence a few houses down because they wouldn’t need to under these circumstance
Crime lowers itself because criminals hired to look for the isolated can’t find any low hanging fruit
I don’t understand, do you want social services to be handled by private business instead of the government?
Social services as in what I’m talking about (asking because I never specifically mentioned that)? Nevertheless, anything that works out works, I’m not partial when it comes to that.
Okay let’s game a scenario, I own a mobile coffee cart. I need somebody to push the card around and sell coffee to people. I find somebody to push the card around and sell coffee. And I pay them x per day.
How do I also provide for their social needs? As a coffee cart service, I can’t provide a break room, the employees are out on their own beats. What would this social structure look like?
Well… the social problem described does/would remain. The execution of the response though is another story. It should be noted the IRS (or whatever the equivalent is in other places) oversees a lot of that business stuff, and that level of things often overlooks matters of wage on a small scale, which here might include the coffee stall thing. So it wouldn’t be alien to chalk up the oversight you bring up to the business type, even if it’s not something anyone looks forward to.
My occupation is very conceptual in its nature, it’s inspired by and one might say connected to a company in Israel called Personal Heroes, which people might know by their explanation of themselves of being to charity what criminal records are to crime. Before I moved to where I am now, they, in a possible effort to maybe make the world a better place, attempted to brainstorm a construct that would act as a makeshift answer to everything I mentioned, along with the already-existent aspects of itself which were inspired by Personal Heroes. It’s the kind of thing you might see on Shark Tank or Dragon’s Den, even though they were never consulted, and such things often go through several drafts/revisions/restructures. The current way it works for us in this part of the occupation is that deals are made which create incentive which is then channeled into a call to combat the bad influences I mentioned by removing their low hanging fruit, which involves competition. In a way, it could be compared to a hookup service if it was with a business model. It works though in a rather rickety way.
Here’s the problem in your thoughts: “social needs” are undefined, and they’re different for everyone. Money is a common denominator, a universal tool for meeting material needs pretty much regardless of what they are. You need food? No need to grow it, spend money. You need a pet? No need to go out and domesticate an animal; spend money. You need a house? No need to build it, spend money.
So what you need to do is come up with a common denominator the bridges the gaps between people’s differing social needs, otherwise you can’t systemise meeting those needs and thus can’t build any social/government infrastructure to do so. You need friends? No need to go out and make them, do _____ instead. Need intimacy? No need to primp or preen, do _____ instead.
And then, how do you stop this “social administration” (for lack of a better name) from being corrupted and turned against the populace?
It doesn’t necessitate an agency if that’s what you’re wondering. It would be more something that can be defined as akin to a norm with systemic aspects in how functionality is ensured but with the gaps filled culturally.
But
Which means it should be a government thing, which means it needs a system, which means it needs an agency. Define the social needs you’re talking about meeting first or this whole post and every response is nothing more than masturbatory nonsense.
Edit: and actually, now I want a proposal for what this system looks like. “People have problems and those should be addressed” is insubstantial to the point of being infuriating.
Not everything that’s a law is an agency. I don’t have expertise in the jargon of law, but it would be defined as whatever amount of unfulfillment is sufficient for bad actors to take advantage of, as demonstrated by their practice of doing so. So maybe not “solid” but, like with other things, can be assessed/tweaked. I remember watching an interview with Leah Remini who said something along the lines of “cults” not growing out of what she refers to as stable societal environments. Relativistically, people can have at least a rough idea on what may qualify, even if not clear cut.
Systemic approaches requires you define it in a way that can be systematized
A foundational criteria for what qualifies as a need can be defined. We know this by virtue of the fact it can be talked about on a “psychological” level. It’s the subjective gaps one might argue cannot be treated uniformly. That’s where the system, which is there mainly to provide a starting point, may leave it up to culture. Which one might compare to wages. It’s a starting point.
I’m still totally lost. I’m running my coffee cart business… Besides paying my people I have no idea what else I’m supposed to be doing.
I need concrete, affirmative, bullet points steps of what exact physical action needs to be taken.
Why does it have to be exact, as opposed to there being a flexible range which can be ruled upon based on situational discretion?
Because you want to make a law that the small business owner needs to follow and lets assume that business person doesn’t have a lot of free time or a degree in philosophy.
Give me a flexible range that has to be followed, and the ‘minimum’ of that range is the requirement, because that just makes business sense. Can you define the minimum edge of the range here?
If its vague, or up for interpretation, then you will be unhappy with the results.
So back to the concrete example, coffee cart business owner, WHAT DO I NEED TO DO FOR THIS LAW?
Well yeah, that’s what I meant. The minimum would be the “psychology”-used standard, and admittedly this is best measured by trained people, but it would consist of measuring one’s social intake and outtake over time and making a ratio based on what is needed and something good enough to not be outdone, which itself can be called the starting point but becomes flexible in the details. This often comes to mind when I’m watching medical dramas and they have office party episodes. As for the last part, once the coffee shop becomes organizational enough (and mainly then), it would just need