The problem is that workers of all stripes are shut out of decisions and in fact have zero input whatsoever on how the profits which they helped generate are divided up. — Mikie
There's a similar list for the United States. Right? Genocide and chattel slavery aren't ancient history, either. — Moliere
Well then that's to do, not with the distribution, but the power of the participants to freely negotiate. — Isaac
I'm arguing that there is no 'right' way to distribute the profits of a co-operative enterprise, but there is a right amount of freedom to negotiate. — Isaac
Your target is off. It's not the outcome that's at fault, it's the conditions of coercion which lead to such outcomes. — Isaac
There's no profit distribution that's automatically right or wrong, it's about the degree of coercion, the power imbalance in those negotiations. If we removed that, a 90% split to investors could still be right, if that's what everyone freely agreed. — Isaac
But this simply isn’t true. I may have failed to emphasize this, but while this transfer of profits to shareholders — which has increased these last 40 years — hasn’t been good for workers, it hasn’t been good for businesses either. — Mikie
Sure. But a particular kind of capitalism— one that is currently choosing to distribute 90% of profits to shareholders. This is the background on which people in states and, more relevant to this thread, corporations operate. It’s a system of beliefs and values.
Shareholder primacy theory is a major justification for these actions in my view.
I share your thought about capitalism, but I don’t think it’s sufficient to answer the OP questions. — Mikie
The problem is that workers of all stripes are shut out of decisions and in fact have zero input whatsoever on how the profits which they helped generate are divided up.
— Mikie
The amount the workers are paid is no more determined by fairness than is the amount the owners are paid nor is a fairness standard used to determine the cost of the good or service. — Hanover
It's all supply and demand. — Hanover
This is to say it's not a decision making process that relies upon fairness that determines the price of goods, the price workers will make, and the profits the owners will take, but it's a business decision that will determine the viability of the business and whether it will be able to survive based upon the way all earnings are distributed. — Hanover
We had an industrial revolution based on partnerships. — Benkei
It is based on partnerships because most of the states, thus "public administrations" are not effective enough or they hold so much debts that it is impossible to maintain an order in the markets. The state's presence is not necessary for everything. Despite the fact our governments can approve laws to intervene them, the results didn't end up well, for example: Venezuela with a high rate of inflation and zero control in currencies or Argentina, 96 % of inflation and a structure where middle class doesn't even exists. — javi2541997
why did you ignore my third question? — Mikie
Question 1 and 2 are ambiguous and rhetorical. — Mikie
Key to a more charitable consideration of Simons is to keep his overriding concern in mind: that an inconvertible fiat money system and the corporate form of the private business organization are inconsistent with classical liberal or libertarian premises. According to Simons, it is the combination of these two institutions which is mainly responsible for some of the more significant negative side effects of modern capitalist practice, like undue cyclical instability and excessive inequality of income and wealth.
While management is the agent for shareholders in the sense of being ultimately appointed by and accountable to them, it is also the agent for the corporation itself.
After all, in order to manage the corporation’s assets, management must legally represent the corporation as the titleholder to these assets. And because the corporation is an impersonal legal entity, agency for the corporation lends a significant degree of autonomy to the position of management, which is precisely why it has proved so difficult to make shareholder control over management more effective, despite the many legislative measures aimed at enhancing management accountability to shareholders.
Workers are not currently free to negotiate equally which is what leads to such clearly unfair distribution arrangements and the situation is clearly getting worse. — Isaac
So, out of the solutions available, which do you favour? Minimum wage (effectively a legal lower threshold on the distribution arrangement), or Universal Basic Income (removes much of the coercion so that each party is more equal). Or do you have a third option you prefer? — Isaac
I’m in favor of those.
I think there co-op model is a good one. I also like the idea of requiring workers on the board of directors. I think Germany has something to this effect.
Then there’s the obvious case of stronger labor unions. Repealing stock buybacks and increasing corporate taxes are also low hanging fruit. — Mikie
Fidgetting with knobs and switches isn't going to change what is a structural problem. They're dealing with symptoms and if that's the best on offer then workers will continue to get shafted. — Benkei
Most interesting. — Ms. Marple
So now the more interesting question of what you think is in the way of getting (or, in some cases, keeping) all that? — Isaac
Absolutely. But...and you can see where I'm going with this... None of those ideas we new. Some have been around since I was a young man, others since the 60s. Some since the 1860s. — Isaac
They haven't worked. Either they haven't taken hold, or their opposition has been stronger, or they've just not proven popular. — Isaac
But not enough people want to join unions — Isaac
We could take collective action, but that requires people to collect with, and there aren't enough. — Isaac
The breakdown of these figures exposes how on a global basis, extreme wealth is accumulated not by innovating or increasing production, but by taking advantage of rising prices and exploiting labour. In this effort, wealthy people are enabled by lack of regulation and taxation. The result is a bonanza of plunder with no sheriff in town.
This has been happening for a while, but the pandemic accelerated the trend. Rich people benefited from everything – every positive intervention from the state and negative impact of the crisis somehow still ended up increasing their wealth. They benefited from rising costs by using them as an alibi to charge higher-than-inflation prices, then distributing the rewards as dividends instead of higher wages. Food and energy corporations made a killing, making $306bn in windfall profits in 2022, then distributing 84% to shareholders.
the pandemic accelerated the trend. Rich people benefited from everything – every positive intervention from the state and negative impact of the crisis somehow still ended up increasing their wealth.
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