Harlem, Let's Go back to Production

Harlem, wouldn't it be nice to have production, productive jobs again? Jobs are divided into two main categories, productive and overhead, based upon the nature of the work done. To help illustrate the difference, imagine a small company with one shop. The company has a factory which manufactures, say, small electric motors.

The workers on the factory floor, who make and assemble the motors, are classified as productive, because they transform various components into a finished product, in a way that increases the value of those components. This increase in value is measured in physical-economic terms, based upon the increased benefit to the economy of the output—an electric motor—over the benefit of the various inputs-the wiring, the housing, etc. The finished motor is more valuable than the parts, and wealth has been created.

The company also has an office staff, the buyers who purchase the inputs, the salesman who sell the finished product, the bookkeepers who handle the payroll, the managers who run the operation, and such. These people perform necessary functions, but those functions are essentially overhead, representing costs which must be covered by the productive sector of the company. But under globalization we just play money games at our jobs and then buy things made by slave labor. That is coming to an end with the popping of the financial bubble, in New York City, Harlem and the Bronx as well.