In Margin Call, a film about the 2008 economic meltdown, an investment banker watches as all of the firm’s financial products become worthless. When his boss attempts to console him, noting that he could have been “digging ditches all these years,” the banker responds, “That’s right. And if I had, there’d be some holes in the ground to show for it.”

This is a common refrain in analysis of the financial crisis: Instead of swapping derivatives on Wall Street, we should be building things.

It’s true that Wall Street is a parasite, producing nothing of value while siphoning off money from the rest of us. The vast majority of transactions exchange existing stocks that don’t even provide additional capital to businesses. Wall Street’s real function is not to fund risky new ventures but to concentrate wealth in the hands of the one percent.

However, bourgeois liberals and right-wing populists who long for a return to good, solid, virtuous industrial capital are living in fantasyland.

Let’s take Apple, a company recently praised by President Barack Obama. Unlike collateralized debt instruments, the commodities that Apple makes have a genuine use value for consumers.

Yet these sleek machines conceal the labor required to manufacture them. According to a recent report by The New York Times, Chinese workers are often made to work over 60 hours per week in dangerous conditions to produce iPads in Apple supplier Foxconn’s factories.

Foxconn, driven by Apple’s relentless demand for products on a slimmer profit margin, drives workers to exhaustion while skimping on ventilation and safety equipment. Last May this led to an explosion which killed four and injured 18.

Meanwhile, Apple inspectors seem to pass over their supplier’s abuses. As one Apple executive said: “You can either manufacture in comfortable, worker-friendly factories, or you can reinvent the product every year, and make it better and faster and cheaper, which requires factories that seem harsh by American standards. And right now, customers care more about a new iPhone than working conditions in China.”

So, while it is true that banks and investors produce nothing of worth, we should also remember that real-world commodities like the latest iPod emerge from the factory stained with blood.

Some might argue that the abuses seen at Foxconn are the result of China’s more authoritarian form of capitalism. Employees are better protected here in the U.S., we’re told.

Of course, no capitalist enterprise would choose to pay an American a living wage when they could just as easily pay someone else a starvation wage.

Indeed, capitalists and their flunkies are overjoyed at the increase in profits made possible by the cheap labor provided by China and the third world. Global capital’s faithful apologist, Thomas Friedman, lavishes praise on one of Apple’s Chinese plants, which woke its workers in the middle of the night for an extra 12-hour shift when an emergency order of iPhone screens came in. “Average is over,” as Friedman puts it.

But even if we somehow repatriated those factories, there’s no reason to believe it would somehow transform them into workers’ utopias.

From the Upper Big Branch Mine disaster to the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire, American companies have a long history of preventable deaths. Capitalists will always undermine or ignore safety and labor regulations in their pursuit of ever-expanding profits. It’s just business sense: dangerous, low-paid work is cheaper.

These arguments about a golden era of manufacturing in America represent the latest in an age-old reactionary tradition which blames a single scapegoat for the ills of the entire capitalist system. Automobile tycoon Henry Ford railed against banks, claiming they were an international conspiracy, while police gunned down unemployed protesters in Detroit.

Now, libertarians like Ron Paul attack the bank bailouts but call for a repeal of minimum wage laws and the Occupational Health and Safety Act.

My point is that we shouldn’t ignore the grotesque wealth grabs of the banks. (Even as they help wreck the economy, a Goldman Sachs employee was overheard boasting that “My garbage disposal eats better than 98% of the world.”)  At the same time, we also cannot overlook the exploitation of industrial works.

As long as we remain within capitalism, workers in the real economy will be sacrificed to make more profits.

JORDAN S. CARROLL is a PhD student in English who can be reached at jscarroll@ucdavis.edu.

In the Jan. 31 editorial “Not in our interest,” the authors make a case against the appropriation of campus resources in order to allow a bank to occupy space in the Memorial Union. However, they attempt to conceal weak arguments behind lofty rhetoric intended to shamelessly romanticize the college campus as an enlightened utopia thriving on the raw power of pristine, distilled human ingenuity. Though they are right to seek to define a campus’ meaning, they fall victim to a pervasive “campus-as-church” fallacy, a hyper-educationalism more akin to a grandfather’s nostalgia about his days at Yale than to the present reality of student life.

The authors contend that the bank consumes “prime campus space that is meant to be a central location for student activity and resources.”  What, then, becomes a permissible student resource for the MU? Perhaps the dining services and coffee shop that dominate half of the main level are acceptable simply because the authors make use of them, whereas the bank is a nuisance because it does not serve their needs.

Whatever their criteria, by the authors’ broad standards and elitist educational puritanism no moneymaking enterprise can dare lay a claim to students’ funds on a college campus. STA Travel — also located in the MU — is a privately run travel agency that charges fees for its services, but no one is calling for its expulsion from campus. Starbucks has locations at the ARC and the Silo, but its overpriced coffee and for-profit mission has not incurred such indignation.

If I can grab a latte after class at Starbucks, what of the students who genuinely desire to use the services of U.S. Bank? The authors paint the bank as some tyrannical vacuum of hard-earned cash. Yet the institution retains its station at the MU precisely because of, not in spite of, the students who use and benefit from its services. These services include investment opportunities from humble savings accounts to more advanced financial products which earn money for clients. The disruptive nature of the student demonstrations at the bank may be directed at bank personnel, but they also have consequences for our fellow students whose right to participate in these services is violated.

Nobody is obliged to do business at U.S. Bank. If a group feels dissatisfied with its presence, the most effective response is a coordinated non-participation in its services. Those students who require financial assistance are not duped into believing that this bank is their only option. They have myriad campus resources to find alternatives.   Yet for those who do choose U.S. Bank as their source of funding, I believe they would see the institution not as a stumbling block to the principles of education, but as the gateway to a more prosperous future thanks to the education they can now afford.

To put it bluntly, Occupy UC Davis has alienated the student population. The movement received an outpouring of support following the pepper spray incident, but whatever goodwill that existed on Nov. 18 is now nowhere to be found. Students, faculty and staff have been exhausted by the movement’s nonstop actions to disrupt campus business. We have to keep in mind that the great majority of us are here to receive an education.

We all have our academic and personal commitments. Being a student here is hectic enough. What we don’t need is the extra inconvenience of not being able to pay our rent and bills just because a group of the same 14 students sit outside U.S. Bank every single day. Fine, there is another U.S. Bank branch in downtown that people can go to. But what makes the Occupiers so special that they can obstruct others’ rights to access a campus resource? One should ask the question: Would it be alright if Occupiers sat down in front of the CoHo, shutting it down day after day so hungry students couldn’t eat lunch?

Of course, I understand the concerns of the Occupy movement and most students appreciate some of their actions that have raised awareness. At some point, though, enough is enough. We cannot “indefinitely” have an occupation everywhere on campus. They don’t understand the disruption and harm they are causing to our campus community. They want free tuition, yet the Occupiers are causing the university to spend money that would have gone toward student programs and academics, but instead is being spent to clean up beer bottles and marijuana in Dutton Hall and the CCC.

The question we should also ask is: Why is the university not enforcing any rules and laws? The answer: Well, the university is afraid, especially after the pepper spray incident. However, that does not mean Occupiers are justified in taking advantage of the situation and disrupting the campus and thus the students they claim to be representing. The Occupy UC Davis movement has taken a very radical turn — it is now run by anarchists who somehow believe the occupation of the Cross Cultural Center and U.S. Bank will lead to free college tuition for all California residents.

Students, the other 99 percent who are either indifferent or against what Occupy is doing to our campus: You need to rise up and let your voices be heard to the administration. Have no fear about speaking up. Remember, this is your campus. We are all paying tuition here. Send in your e-mails, call up the chancellor. We need your help to get the message across to the administration: Do something. Enough is enough. We are fed up with the spineless indifference of the administration, and we need a return to peace on this campus. Chancellor Katehi, do something!

Super Bowl XLVI. Patriots vs. Giants. The Golden Boy vs. Peyton’s Little Brother. Beer. Wings. Chips. Six-, nay, seven-layer dip. Commercials.

Campus, the Super Bowl is nearly upon us. In three short days, an estimated 100 million viewers across the nation will gather ‘round the biggest, highest-resolution TV they can find to watch America’s most dominant forces battle for the affection of their fans. Each squad has been preparing all year for the big show, working hard to ensure that their game day strategy will help them achieve their ultimate goal. Critics, injuries and other setbacks along the way — none of them matter now. It all comes down to one game on the world’s biggest stage.

During breaks in the action, there will be some football.

Ever since the NFL championship became a major televised event in 1958, professional football’s title game has steadily gained steam as one of the largest annual media events in the world. Every year, advertisers big and small sprint toward the network hosting the big game in hopes of securing at least one 30-second spot to showcase themselves and their products in an innovative way.

This year, the Super Bowl will air on NBC. As has been the case every year, the cost of a commercial has increased since the previous year, with a 30-second spot selling for $3.5 million on average. I’d love to drop three and a half mil myself on a personal ad, but like other advertisers who didn’t make the cut, I’m either:

1. Too controversial
2. Too unstable
3. Too poor
4. All of the above

Self-esteem aside, though, these are the hard facts. When you have an estimated viewership of 100 MILLION, little guys are going to get pushed aside by the juggernauts for airtime to literally show us the goods. As usual, big names from all major industries will be putting forth their best efforts this year to capture consumers’ hearts/laughs/wallets, like Coca-Cola, Pepsi, Volkswagen and Anheuser-Busch.

What makes advertising so effective on this day of all days, however, is not only the sheer number of people watching. According to a recent study by Starcom MediaVest Group, 76 percent of Super Bowl viewers say they like the fact that the ads are created specifically for the game. Also, 62 percent say they pay more attention to these ads than usual.

It’s an accepted fact in the sports world that the best performances happen on the biggest stages, and in advertising, this idea is no different. Potential for exposure of this magnitude brings out the best in the creative minds of advertisers, and no plausibly effective avenue is left unused.

This year, for example, many companies plan to promote their Super Bowl ads through Twitter and other social media sites. Targeting younger, more internet-savvy demographics such as us college kids, these businesses hope to keep the conversation going during the game, even after their commercial has aired.

Skeptical about how much activity Coke’s #GameDayPolarBears (yes, the unreasonably dexterous, soda-loving CGI beasts will be back) hashtag will realistically get? Consider this: After Tim “God’s-second-son” Tebow (it’s okay for me to make this joke because I’m a Broncos fan and actually root for the guy) threw a game-winning overtime touchdown against the Pittsburgh Steelers a few weeks ago, there were an alleged 9,000 tweets per second about the play.

Advertisers want in on that kind of babble because, if they can generate a high level of conversation about their ad, they’re far more likely to earn a big payday for themselves in products sold immediately after the Super Bowl. College kids tweeting=money.

Although many people dislike the hype produced by the Super Bowl and the media frenzy that follows it, I believe it’s something to embrace. What’s important to remember, especially for us as the vibrant youth, is that the Super Bowl as a complete package is everything we could ever want in a day: relaxation, food and entertainment.

Probably the only thing to worry about now is a serious lack of opportunities to take a piss.

VICTOR BEIGELMAN is picking Patriots over Giants, Coke over Pepsi, and Bud Light over Miller Light. Send him your picks at vbeigelman@ucdavis.edu.

I am appalled at the comic from Jan. 31 and honestly surprised to see such a comic in The Aggie. I did not expect to see a comic full of misogyny. After the recent hate event at the WRRC I felt I needed to let you know that publishing this type of material is inappropriate.

Slut shaming is one the oldest methods of oppressing and controlling women. Women are told that expression of their sexuality is wrong, sinful and damaging to their character. So women go through life denying their sexual urges and often being undereducated about sexual health. A woman has every right to express and explore her sexuality as she pleases in a responsible manner. A woman’s sexuality is a personal decision and society should respect that.

I say this to those who work at The Aggie and all those reading this letter: It’s time to decide whether you are going to support misogyny or work to create a world where women are treated as equals in society. And guys, if you find yourself relating to Tuesday’s comic, your search for a girlfriend won’t be ending anytime soon.

Amanda Dunham