The Cause of and Purpose for the Coffins

I think the idea of “traditionalism” as brought up by Weber in chapter two is most interesting. This concept of working only so much as to be able to live in the ways that they are accustomed starts to enter into an anthropologic realm of study. Weber brings up the point that “people do not wish ‘by nature’ to earn more and more money.” This being true means that the concept of acquiring more and more wealth is just a construction of culture. When a capitalist society must rely on laborers from a precapitalist economy it must take into account the economic traditionalism that the workers are comfortable with. This reading really points out how easy it is for capitalists to find and exploit cheap labor in non-capitalist economies. Countries with expanding populations, the cost of labor is low, especially in tasks that require no trained skill. The century old concept of when “lower wages were believed to enhance worker productivity” perfectly exemplifies this willingness of capitalists to gain wealth not only out of their commodities but also out of their laborers, as a commodity. So depending on the economy established in a region, how exactly can the most productive wage of labor be established? 

I think too, the article “The employees shut inside coffins” by Stephen Evans shows an example of the long-term effects of this capitalist manipulation. The dog-eat-dog mentality of fighting for survival arises out of societies where one worker is easily replaced by the next, where each employer is only worth the amount of capital that can bring to the company, sometimes, or usually meaning working longer hours, harder, for equal pay.  The president of the coffin simulation company, Park Chun-Woong, told the BBC reporter “he wants to strengthen the sense of corporate togetherness.” The question becomes if the idea for this ritual was established out of an effort to better the lives of the tirelessly over worked, or simply to reduce the rate of suicide so as to not have to replace so many workers annually. Are these programs such as the simulated death rituals, the forced laughter, the stretching, that have been so said enforced “from cradle to grave” devised to decrease the competition and distress of the at risk population, or as a simulator for better more dedicated workers?