Okay... so I became very angry while going through this unit as it brought up many feelings that I thought I had dealt with hence my procrastination in posting it and I tried to make it as objective as possible but could not...

I was in a mindset of lack until I exposed myself to the international teaching job scene made possible by the availability of the internet when I turned 28. My perception of my lack of relevant qualifications against competitors of other countries as well as locally continually permeated my thoughts. I would never apply to certain schools in SA due to my race and was scared to apply locally as well as internationally due to social brainwashing that “you from your demographic could never compete” so “Stay in your lane” would be the negative self talk at times. Through the years my inferiority complex amoungst the races due to apartheid psychologically affected my self-worth…I could not afford university and there were no bursaries available except for certain races and subjects. My parents put me through college after completeing highschool and then after 8 years I put myself through university by working 3 jobs to attain a PGCE in education. When I started teaching I was judged by my own race for not sounding or being “coloured” enough. I share this not to gain sympathy or pats on the back but to look at my own value of wage through the years from earning R 7.50 per hour to now earning over R 2500 per hour in the last 20 years having moved from the arts industry to the education industry. The current minimum wage in SA is R 27,58 and specifically for teaching it is R129 per hour. I look back at the social and political state and can see the impact that it has had on my own employment rate. I can say that being unemployed for more than 2 years in the prime of your working life is not ideal and it became harder with each month to gain gainful employment. I took so many below minimum wage jobs just to be employed to get my CV loaded with life experience while my family put food on the table. Not many may have that opportunity today. My story is not unique and through it one can see the factors that contribute to how as a worker I valued my wage and unemployment status. I worked hard and made very difficult decisions over the years to overcome the obstacles to earning more than minimum wage and still continue to work through the psychological effects that linger despite the ceilings that I have broken through.

• Nina Wakefield

@Nina Wakefield,
Thanks Nina for sharing the very human experience of the intersection of social stratification, discriminatory policies and the workings of the market system - what you share is very poignant and something we all need to hear, because often we are shielded from such harsh realities. Often in teaching my students in Economic development, they often equate improving economic data with better living standards for all, and that is just not true, it is overly simplistic. In the same way, while we enjoy stable jobs and high wages (relative to most of the world), it is also easy for us to assume that all is well, or in Andreotti's words - a socially sanctioned ignorance.

This morning one of my students commented when discussing the difference between Equality and Equity (fairness of opportunities), he pointed out that often it is so easy to question Inequality because that is what is most evident, but not to question the issues of inequity which often causes the inequality in the first place. I felt so proud of him for being able to see and articulate that so clearly!

In the same way, your experience speaks of both the inequality and inequity - I hope as more people learn to question rather than be banked and acquiesce that their lot is inevitable; and when people of privilege (like us and our students) leverage our privilege for greater good, we will begin to see positive changes taking place.

And in this way, there is more freedom experienced, no matter skin color or geographic location.

• Cat Ho

@Cat Ho Thank you Cat for continuously attention about the returning Chinese in her response to Tammy’s comment. Yes, after years of development, especially for the people who living in big cities in China, more and more family sending their children to abroad to study. However, due to the large number of people and the policies of many countries to protect their labor markets, some highly educated Chinese believe that returning to the country may provide better job opportunities for them. As part of the important reasons to maintain the profit, the employer are much more willing to hire these employees with cross-cultural understanding.

• Lu Chen

@Lu Chen, I have also read some articles where they claimed that some companies prefer to hire local graduates from local universities due to their extensive networking advantage so perhaps it depends on the companies''needs and culture.

• Tammy Cheng

In Economics there is an interesting diagram showing how people behave with the wage increase. It is called the backward-bending supply of labour curve. In short, it shows that the productivity (number of hours worked) increases until the wages rise to a high enough point to allow people to work less and enjoy more leisure hours. After the session I have come to the conclusion and the wage is an important ( and probably the most effective) factor influencing the demand and supply for labour, but nowdays it is important to consider other non-quantitative factors sometimes such as well-being or work-life balance. I think this way Gen Z in China is an interesting phenomenon to explore. They created new patterns of behaviour, such as 'quiet quitting' or even 'lie flat'. I think with high social pressure and a big inequality gap such examples is a good reminder to the society about human needs of the employees going above just the minimum wage. There is a good article on bbc about this: https://www.bbc.com/news/business-60353916

• Kristina Pilgueva

The lie flat behavior is also interesting to me as I saw it by accident on Youtube a while ago. I remember thinking about China being such a power house and thinking that the amount of people doing this surely hurts the economy and may exacerbate serious financial and social crisis but it also brings serious attention to the concerns of over working and over achieving within the prospects of said economy. The youth have the opportunity to reflect on past practices and hopefully can use this time to find some ways to alleviate unemployment, improve working conditions all the while trying to save the environment. Whew ... we really have created a legacy that seems incapable of being conquered... how did we end up in this mess... how can we help change and use these attitudes to better the future.

• Nina Wakefield

I think we always have the question What is really considered as enough, Need vs Desire.....etc
so if the developed/rich countries(are they the same @Cat Ho,?) always provide enough minimum wage/living wage to ensure livelihood, is it possible that this mechanism is not helpful in pushing the civilization to explore their economic potential?@Kristina Pilgueva,

• Tammy Cheng

Joanne Anderson
I took for granted that the minimum wage protected low- skilled workers from being exploited. I thought it benefitted and protected workers and improved their quality of life. I only saw it through my lense, where I applied the mimimum wage to the workers I employed in a job market that isn't fully regulated. For example my cleaner was Zimbabwean and could've been working illegally in South Africa but she ensured me she was working legally and so I worked through one of our departments in SA to ensure I was paying her to standard and helped her do that with her next employer. I didn't fully understand the implications for business owners in terms of productivity and overheads and the impact this has on the labour market as a whole. I certainly hadn't considered that implementing a minimum wage might cause unemployment. I currenlty pay an Ayi her going rate and I haven't checked what the minimum wage is here or whether there are agencies I should be working through. I will be sure to do this in my next country to adhere to labour market practices and regulations.

• Joanne Anderson

I appreciate the comments made above. I think we all do tend to see through the lens of our personal experiences and it is a natural habit but it is good that we have these experiences to see different perspectives. Particularly when we can draw on each other for individual international experiences from where we come from. I do not employ someone to do these activities such as cleaning partly for the reasons concerning their wage and all the legalities it entails. I prefer not get involved and to do the work myself.

• Nina Wakefield

I wonder the minimum wage you paid your cleaner was it ultimately higher or lower the 'unofficial' market price? And when you went through all the bureaucratic loopholes, did you also pay the income tax for the worker? how did it affect the minimum wage?

• Kristina Pilgueva

@Jo
Indeed, there are many things we take for granted and do not question - including the idea that minimum wages are a good thing to help protect workers from exploitation, and yet as we discussed, this can now become the basis for employers to not ask a more important question - what is a living wage that my workers need to ensure their productivity and also their well-being.

I think the ayi issue is so relevant for us all - again, how we often think we are the victim, and fail to see we also hold power to impact others? Currently I pay my ayi about 60 kuai an hour, i know this is probably quite a bit higher than the market rate; i also decided i will pay her even through the summer and holidays. It does cost me a little more but when I see how much I value the hours she frees me or not do chores I dislike, such as ironing, I do think this is a very good arrangement.

• Cat Ho

China is known as the world's factory, and the result of raising workers' wages is that more and more international companies are shifting their factories to Southeast Asian countries with relatively lower wages. This has led to the closure of some factories in China and the unemployment. But perhaps the government hopes to raise wages and increase pressure on employers, thereby allowing China's economy to transform and develop more independent industries? Just as the idea raised in the video, “economists and politicians will likely be arguing about the impact for years to come.”

• Lu Chen

@Lu Chen,
Lu Chen, what a great point, and again points to the complexity of these global issues - that often 1 solution is not adequate but a comprehensive/composite approach is what is needed. There is also a really interesting phenomenon that has begun when the trade war started a few years back, and that is Made by China in America. Here is a short video of this situation -

https://wetheeconomy.com/films/made-by-china-in-america/

In short, globalization does mean work and production are radically altered and peoples' jobs and lives are being impacted in ways that are quite out of their control. This also increases the level of stress and lack of well-being people feel today.

I do think there are new opportunities though...but the framing of labour and the labour market needs to be re-imagined. Are people for the economy, or should the economy be about people and their well-being?

• Cat Ho

Growing up, I remember hearing and learning about the costly consequences of systematic deregulation in the UK and the US. Boogiemen personas like Margaret Thatcher and Ronald Reagan were introduced to me as the root of the common worker's despair. Regions in the North of the UK that saw proud mining communities decimated, the same could be said in what is now the Rust Belt in the USA.

One of the common assumption I had made from the process of deregulation is that the labour force had seen a wedge being created within itself and that workers who had previously benefitted from bargaining power, through unions, were being picked off one by one. Thus I would say that I grew up already doubting the economic assumption that there was a relatively balanced bargaining power between workers and employers.

After this third session, I would like to reframe my understanding to a less confrontational view, rather I would like to reframe it as how can employers and employees meet in finding a compromise that would allow for living wages for workers and more sustainable growth and productivity for employers.

• Robin Ford Coron

You pretty much sum up what I hope to achieve from joining this course. My goal at the end of this project is to learn and understand more about Economics from all of you, if not just Cat, and the see what are the mutual grounds we can come to at individual, society, national and international levels.

• Tammy Cheng

@Robin Ford Coron,
I really appreciate your desire to be less confrontational and to consider if some different approach can exist in terms of the relationship between labour and employers. I think that is a great place to start - what if profit is not the only bottomline and companies are also valued based on other metrics (that is not just a form of greenwashing). I know there are some companies who have become co-operatives, do you think that's a way forward when workers are part owners of the business too?

• Cat Ho

One way I would like to re-frame my understanding about labor is to consider the potential benefits of immigration on the economy. While my assumption focused on the potential negative effects of immigration, Card's research highlights that immigrants can also contribute positively to the economy by filling labor shortages, starting businesses, and increasing consumer demand. By re-framing my understanding to consider the broader impacts of immigration, I can develop a more nuanced view of its effects on the labor market. But I would like to know what can we do about the brain drain and capital shortage of developing/native countries if highly skilled immigrants are only willing to work in countries which is willing to pay more, if not the rich countries?

• Tammy Cheng

Thank you for raising this question. I think it is a serious point government needs to think about - how to retain the qualified workers within the country. Sometimes countries have very unpopular measures, like SriLanka. The citizens say they need to freeze a big amount of money in their local bank account if they want their kid to go to study abroad - about 30-50K $, otherwise they will not be able to leave the country. Also Chinese government has recently launched a program encouraging highly-qualified citizens working abroad ( usually in scientific field) to return to China by giving them positions and income levels surpassing what they get in the Western country. Seems the combination of the regulations and wage is still the most effective mechanism to control the migration.

• Kristina Pilgueva

@Tammy Cheng,
Tammy, such great questions! Very important point of discussion is the seemingly reverse subsidy that developing countries are giving to developed countries when they tend to lose their brightest and best workers through immigration.

I think this points to the need for equity to be on a global scale - that economies and countries everywhere should have some level of flourishing so that no matter where, people have a choice to live and work in their countries of origin. Although almost all of us have not done that, apart from Lu Chen!

Of course, there are also situations when this is seen to be reversed - in the early 2000's, very few Chinese students studying overseas was planning to come back to live and work in China, but things changed as the Chinese economy strengthened. Things might have changed again now.

What are some possible ways to ensure a more equitable outcome for developing countries in this issue? I sometimes wonder if doing away of national boundaries be helpful since so much of conflict and angst spring from this socially constructed conception. What if we have Planetary Citizenship and no matter what country you come from, it does not matter as we are all working towards the same outcome - the viability of our planet and the flourishing of all. I know this is very Utopian and definitely has its dystopian side,

• Cat Ho

Victoria is a region in Australia. They promoted skilled and sponsored immigration visas during and after covid to attract talent and fill roles to keep the economy running. Invitations have been going out at an unprecedented rate for the last few years. Now that they have reached their quotas, they have closed the application processes and visas will not be available until the need arises. This, in my mind, is an example of a healthy, regulated labour market that protects its citizens from the availability of cheaper labour and ensures that industries don't fall flat due to a limited supply of skilled labour.

• Joanne Anderson