Downton Abbey: Interesting take on what rich people are supposed to do

I have been wondering what all the fuss was about, so my wife and I have started watching Downton Abbey on NETFLIX.

A young lawyer has just found out that he is to inherit Downton Abbey, but he is a middle-class fellow and sees no point in having a valet help him get dressed. He asks Earl Grantham if he may fire the valet.

To which, Earl Grantham responds:

This solves the mystery of why the Earl employs such a large army of servants. He believes it is his duty, as a nobleman, to employ as many poor people as possible, even if their jobs are useless.

And my impression of Great Britain is that the entire country is infected with this notion, that useless jobs should be preserved.

For example, I have heard that at the BBC, radio plays do not use pre-recorded sound effects as is done in the United States. Instead, a person must be employed to make all sound effects live.

And I think many liberals have the same idea.

But the reality is the job of a business is to not to employ people, the job of a business is to make a profit for its shareholders.

Discuss.

 

Um, I would think the reason why some wealthy employ servants is actually a matter of opportunity costs.

If a person values their time and effort highly enough, then it's effectively cheaper to get a servant to do things than to do it yourself.

For example, if you're a person who makes several million a year, you probably aren't going to do your own car maintenance unless you actually enjoy doing it. Instead, you're going to go to a dealership or an auto shop you trust.

If you're fabulously wealthy and own a fleet of exotic cars (like Jay Leno), then you might even hire your own mechanic.

So, the character on that show might view it as a nobility thing, but in reality, there's more of an economic component.

 

Let's just assume for the purpose of this thread that the character is telling the truth, and he is employing more servants that he really needs to out of a sense of largesse to those less fortunate.

And this is born out by the opening scenes, which literally show four or five servants in every single room getting ready for a typical day.

Even allowing for the fact that modern appliances hadn't been invented, there is no way a household of five could possibly need so many servants.

And in a way, these jobs are a kind of "welfare" because they are economically unnecessary.

 

Sure, and if it's voluntary welfare, I don't see a problem with it.

People take issue with mandatory welfare for understandable reasons, although a certain amount of it is basically inevitable.

 

What I'm taking issue with is the attitude that the rich owe the poor a living, even when the services of the poor aren't really worth anything.

To pay a man to pick out your clothes and dress you, when you can do that for yourself, is an example of what I'm talking about.

This is the mindset that slips into socialism, wherein the poor feel entitled to a monthly check for doing nothing at all.

 

I don't see it as any worse than the other extreme.

Truth be told, I'd rather live in the UK than a lot of the developing world that has little to no social safety net, even if I was really wealthy.

I think a lot of countries have found a happy medium with this balance. Canada seems to have a pretty functional welfare system. They still have room for improvement like anyone else, but there seems to be somewhat of a sense of duty among both rich and working class there.

The rich feel a duty to give back to society, while the working class feels a duty to be productive.

 

And yet, British and Canadians are coming to America for opportunities far more than the other way around.

The price of socialism is killing off dreams.

 

Um.... British, maybe. Canadians?... that's news to me.

Canada has a higher immigration rate than America. It also rates consistently higher than America on the HDI.

I'm not saying it's perfect, but it seems to be in a better long term position than us for a variety of reasons.

EDIT: Ok, I just checked the HDI. They're below us on the regular HDI but above us on the inequality-adjusted one.

Maybe Australia would be a better example.

Again, some of this is just because they have fewer challenges than us.

 

Americans are not going over to Canada in great numbers. Their immigration is from other countries.

 

At least you got it right that Socialism is a fraud created by Heirheads. But so is Capitalism. So, as usual, those who fall for the choices the ruling class tell us we must make can't see that all the allowed choices put us in the same subservient posture. It doesn't matter if you lick their Left Boot or their Right Boot, you still will never stand up like a man.

 

Canadians aren't coming here in great numbers either.

The vast majority of immigration into the West is from outside of the West.

Granted, in America's case, a large portion is specifically from Mexico, which is part of the West, but definitely on the poorer end of it.

 

I'm totally hooked. Effing soap opera, and they got me. Ahhhhhhhh!!!

Not content with one soap opera addiction, now Selfridge's, too.

 

I think it would depend on the industry, sure sounds are easy enough, and no one can tell the difference between a recorded noise and a live one (except for laughing) -- but other things that are higher skill type fields. Sure you could get a meal made by a machine, but for something like that, it would be more a part of the experience -- having a server bring you your food instead of going to a vending machine, or handmade clothes or toys being more of a luxury item than one made in a factory. So I guess in the case of Downton, it might very well be that the experience of being treated by a human and having food cooked and served by people, or whatever. So it depends on the business, it's not always the cheapest is best, it not always good to lay people off -- it's not always true that getting rid of a job means more cash. If you can make the experience more pleasing, that's something people want as well. Or should we lay off everyone in call centers and replace them with automated answering services everyone hates?

The other thing is that Earls are not running a business so much as a household, which makes a lot of what happens there personal taste. So perhaps this particular family likes to have human nurses and cooks and so on?

 

I never used to like stuff about British country manors and people hunting foxes and all that, but now that I'm older and can understand how nasty British people can be and still remain polite, it's interesting.

I mean, in America, these people would be slapping each other and pulling each other's hair, but in a British show a raised eyebrow or a polite cough is sufficient to get the point across.

 

In 1939, Germans and Russians came to Poland in great numbers too. And Quisling in Norway supported the "Yes We Can" policy chanted by Germans who wanted to stay there. Those two countries must have had a lot to offer back then.

 

Sounds to me like you have watched one episode and now you know everything about England.

 

Um... ok... How does this relate to this discussion?

 

Socialism, Marxism and "the Liberal party" are all given time in the second season. In the third season the purpose of Downtown is also addressed. The OP has clearly not paid attention to the show or is seeing his own biases.

 

It's a soap opera, it's not real. Things are said for dramatic effect. I think even Americans are aware of "Noblesse Oblige" (that's not an English term)

 

TV is not real life, stupid.

 

The USSR didn't succeed in abolishing the bureaucracy, but it still had more of them in jail. There's more than one kind of socialism; Lenin was more tolerant of cooperatives.