There has been a great deal of good and serious discussion in the blogsphere of wage cuts, particularly minimum wage cuts as a cure for recession. A lot from Krugman and Tyler Cowan some from Wonks Anonymous and others but Rajiv Sethi gets it about right. There is nothing like a good serious discussion of economic theory and labor markets.

And the following blog post will be nothing like a good serious discussion of labor markets and economic theory.

You see Wonks Anonymous has a brilliant idea for Professor Cowan and others. If, as is obvious from simplistic economic theory, cutting money wages will increase employment, wouldn't working for free increase employment even more? We don't want people to work for free every hour of every day. We should just pick a day, one day of every week, when we donate our labor to the poor suffering, over taxed and over regulated entrepreneurs.

What we need is a new, Capitalist Subbotnik. Under Communism workers were forced to work for free for the evil state. Under Capitalism - a fundamentally different economic system based on liberty rather than force - we will step forward of our own accord to revive the economy with unpaid labor.

We could start in the public sector where workers in many states are already being forced to take extra days off to balance the budget. They could just go in to work on those days and maintain public services at no additional expense to the taxpayer. Think of the potential savings if public workers started to work for free on Saturday. Why even California might be able to support new, supply side tax cuts that would jump start our economy.

All that we need to do to bring the magic of free labor to the private sector is to change those pesky wage and hours laws. Wonks Anonymous sees a bright future where workers act to save their jobs by voluntarily working Saturdays. Who needs a weekend anyhow?

This will, without question raise the income of business owners and they will be able to cut prices, which we all know is the solution to all of our problems. Of course the market works in mysterious ways and demand might not quickly pick up in response to price cuts. In the short run more free labor might result in lay offs.

Not to worry, workers who lose their jobs can always find internships or go into to business for themselves in the recycling industry.