The workplace is about the power relationship between the boss and the worker. Bosses are willing to take the ostensibly less productive option (e.g. 5 instead of 4 day workweeks) to maintain a sense of precarity in their workers that is in the long run more beneficial to them by way of suppressing wages, dissuading job seeking, and making them less likely to stand up for themselves over their conditions.
Yep, the Reserve Army of Labor must be preserved, and time to allow Proletarians to accumulate on their own time and eventually compete must be stifled.
Have you read Marx? Capitalists serve Capital and its accumulation, not necessarily their own long-term interests. The draw and power of accumulation is so high that short term wins become necessary, which results in crisis.
The workplace is about the power relationship between the boss and the worker. Bosses are willing to take the ostensibly less productive option (e.g. 5 instead of 4 day workweeks) to maintain a sense of precarity in their workers that is in the long run more beneficial to them by way of suppressing wages, dissuading job seeking, and making them less likely to stand up for themselves over their conditions.
Yep, the Reserve Army of Labor must be preserved, and time to allow Proletarians to accumulate on their own time and eventually compete must be stifled.
It’s weird how they can take the long view on some things and yet they will happily run a company into the ground for a 1% higher quarterly return.
Have you read Marx? Capitalists serve Capital and its accumulation, not necessarily their own long-term interests. The draw and power of accumulation is so high that short term wins become necessary, which results in crisis.
No wonder they have such raging boners for forcing people back into offices.
tl;dr-- the cruelty is the point.