5 ms·

That's the thing. You're not a capitalist, the owners are. They have the capital and set the working conditions for you, the worker. What makes that entire s

by wffurr 8y ago

That's the thing. You're not a capitalist, the owners are. They have the capital and set the working conditions for you, the worker. What makes that entire setup capitalist is that it's privately funded and owned, as opposed to being subject to democratic control.

philipov 8y ago
The difference between Corporate Socialism and Democratic Socialism is the flavor of koolaid being served at the propaganda canteen. (hint: large concentrated power centers don't remain democratically controlled)
- lisper 8y ago
  There is one other important difference: in democratic socialism, your vote is inalienable. In Corporate socialism votes are quite literally bought and sold as part of the standard operating procedure.
  - philipov 8y ago
    That only matters if voting actually functions as the root cause of election victory, but in practice it is merely an illusion of choice. Party leaders and influencers control the election field, ensuring they get to choose a controlling share of legislature membership. Voting may be a proximal cause of election victory, but it is the ability to choose most of the people who get to even run that actually matters. In a two-party system, there are two flavors of propaganda and people can choose which political machine they want picking the candidates. In a one-party system like we've seen with the great Socialist states of the 20th century or with American party primaries, leadership control over elections is even more blatant. In the American system, for example, the existence of third party or non-Machine candidates acts as a pressure valve that ensures no real change can happen, since the major parties can divvy up the successful rhetoric and defuse it with their own loyal candidates, while anyone else who gets elected will be in too small a number to form an effective legislative caucus. The result of individual elections isn't important. What matters is how the system functions in aggregate.
    - lisper 8y ago
      No. The course of history changed radically as the result of the last presidential election in the U.S., and it will change radically again depending on the outcome of the midterms. Things are very different now than they would have been if Hillary Clinton had won, and if the Democrats take the House, things will go very differently than if they fail to do so.
      - philipov 8y ago
        Yes, things will be very different. We get to choose between corporate feudalism and outright fascism. Great choices we have there. One is obviously worse than the other, but neither are for the benefit of the American people. The polarizing antagonism between our political parties is a symbiotic relationship that keeps either one from having to own the consequences as both continue to feed off their common host. The party that gets elected determines which group of ultra-rich interests gets preferential treatment in looting the economy.
        lisper 8y ago
        That's because the advocates of corporate feudalism and fascism are out there working to promote their agendas, while the advocates of alternatives are wasting time whining on HN about the poor menu of choices instead of getting out there to fight for better choices. Good choices do not get handed to you on a silver platter any more than anything else in life. That doesn't change the fact that in a democracy, if enough people get together and FUCKING VOTE instead of sitting at home gazing at their navels and feeling sorry for themselves, they can change the world. BTW, love him or hate him, Donald Trump is the poster child for democracy in action. He did not get to be president because some shadowy Powers That Be decided to make him president. He got to be president because he convinced tens of millions of people to FUCKING VOTE for him.
        philipov 8y ago
        Who says I'm not fighting for better choices? Voting just doesn't happen to be very effective at doing that if you don't first make sure there are good candidates to vote for. Telling people to just vote is as good as believing in the power of markets to solve all ills; neither are a magic bullet. Getting people to understand that problem is part of the fight. If you would like to support a good candidate, you should consider donating to Ross Barkan for NY State Senate: http://rossbarkan.com/ http://rossbarkan.com/
- wffurr 8y ago
  One party states (and to a lesser extend the American party primaries) are not terribly democratic. Diffuse power spread amongst many small power centers resists central control.
  - philipov 8y ago
    If the primaries aren't democratic, even a democratic choice between two undemocraticly-nominated candidates does not lead to democratic outcomes. We need to destroy the political machines that are running our elections.
pythonistic 8y ago
We're trying to change the dynamic in my employer. There is still company-wide centralized planning, and our parent company still sets overall goals and expectations for profitability, but we're something of an experiment in self-organization where individual departments and teams have responsibility for setting and spending budget, setting policy, and selecting the work that needs to be done. It's as democratic as we can get without an employee board or becoming a Mondragon. New and innovative initiatives are more often started from the mid- to low-levels of the company (three or four new lines of business have been started this way), and for the past year or so those initiatives are encouraged to become startups. The baby businesses are essentially put in an incubator where they have an initial budget and cash provided by the company but are encouraged to be individually profitable, report on their finances, are given coaching and regular meetings with startup business advisors, etc. And if they provide services back to the company, they're supposed to bill teams for those services. (The company still provides salary and benefits to the employees who start businesses within the company; there's some accounting magic to adjust which department budget actually pays for these.) Examples of internal businesses started include: * delivery of cafe drinks and food (with a delivery charge paid for by the receiving employee) * conference room ownership and maintenance: these can now be permanently rented by teams, and the business that "owns" them is responsible for decorating, cleaning, providing technology services, etc. * balloons, party supplies, swag, and desk toys, purchased either by the employee or their team And businesses started with a focus outside the company include: * providing detailed retail sales and product category data to suppliers and manufacturers * tools to identify and encourage employee networks (who knows who, what skills does each employee have, who may provide an introduction to another employee) * tools for polling and identifying employee sentiment * self-organization consulting, training, mentoring, and software * company tours (at $10 per visitor)
- wffurr 8y ago
  That sounds pretty great, but without the employee board or co-operative ownership it all operates at the whim of the paternalistic owners / managers.
erikb 8y ago
A) There is a lot of democratic control actually. More than employees execute I would say. In a 90k people organisation even the most powerful person has much less power than a majority of the other 89.999 people. The founders btw own less than 20%. Aaaand I also own shares. So I'm one of the guys who sets the policy for employees like me. I also go to the shareholder meeting which is held not far away from where I work. The most powerful owner is probably an investment bank. But they only care about the numbers. If "care package for employees of size $X" is spent on tennis courts or air conditioning in the office, or free ice cream after the canteen lunch, they simply don't care. So it's open for democratic processes to assign these budgets. B) Why is democracy a prerequisit for socialism?

by wffurr 8y ago

philipov 8y ago

The difference between Corporate Socialism and Democratic Socialism is the flavor of koolaid being served at the propaganda canteen. (hint: large concentrated power centers don't remain democratically controlled)

lisper 8y ago
There is one other important difference: in democratic socialism, your vote is inalienable. In Corporate socialism votes are quite literally bought and sold as part of the standard operating procedure.
- philipov 8y ago
  That only matters if voting actually functions as the root cause of election victory, but in practice it is merely an illusion of choice. Party leaders and influencers control the election field, ensuring they get to choose a controlling share of legislature membership. Voting may be a proximal cause of election victory, but it is the ability to choose most of the people who get to even run that actually matters. In a two-party system, there are two flavors of propaganda and people can choose which political machine they want picking the candidates. In a one-party system like we've seen with the great Socialist states of the 20th century or with American party primaries, leadership control over elections is even more blatant. In the American system, for example, the existence of third party or non-Machine candidates acts as a pressure valve that ensures no real change can happen, since the major parties can divvy up the successful rhetoric and defuse it with their own loyal candidates, while anyone else who gets elected will be in too small a number to form an effective legislative caucus. The result of individual elections isn't important. What matters is how the system functions in aggregate.
  - lisper 8y ago
    No. The course of history changed radically as the result of the last presidential election in the U.S., and it will change radically again depending on the outcome of the midterms. Things are very different now than they would have been if Hillary Clinton had won, and if the Democrats take the House, things will go very differently than if they fail to do so.
    - philipov 8y ago
      Yes, things will be very different. We get to choose between corporate feudalism and outright fascism. Great choices we have there. One is obviously worse than the other, but neither are for the benefit of the American people. The polarizing antagonism between our political parties is a symbiotic relationship that keeps either one from having to own the consequences as both continue to feed off their common host. The party that gets elected determines which group of ultra-rich interests gets preferential treatment in looting the economy.
      - lisper 8y ago
        That's because the advocates of corporate feudalism and fascism are out there working to promote their agendas, while the advocates of alternatives are wasting time whining on HN about the poor menu of choices instead of getting out there to fight for better choices. Good choices do not get handed to you on a silver platter any more than anything else in life. That doesn't change the fact that in a democracy, if enough people get together and FUCKING VOTE instead of sitting at home gazing at their navels and feeling sorry for themselves, they can change the world. BTW, love him or hate him, Donald Trump is the poster child for democracy in action. He did not get to be president because some shadowy Powers That Be decided to make him president. He got to be president because he convinced tens of millions of people to FUCKING VOTE for him.
        philipov 8y ago
        Who says I'm not fighting for better choices? Voting just doesn't happen to be very effective at doing that if you don't first make sure there are good candidates to vote for. Telling people to just vote is as good as believing in the power of markets to solve all ills; neither are a magic bullet. Getting people to understand that problem is part of the fight. If you would like to support a good candidate, you should consider donating to Ross Barkan for NY State Senate: http://rossbarkan.com/ http://rossbarkan.com/
wffurr 8y ago
One party states (and to a lesser extend the American party primaries) are not terribly democratic. Diffuse power spread amongst many small power centers resists central control.
- philipov 8y ago
  If the primaries aren't democratic, even a democratic choice between two undemocraticly-nominated candidates does not lead to democratic outcomes. We need to destroy the political machines that are running our elections.

pythonistic 8y ago

We're trying to change the dynamic in my employer. There is still company-wide centralized planning, and our parent company still sets overall goals and expectations for profitability, but we're something of an experiment in self-organization where individual departments and teams have responsibility for setting and spending budget, setting policy, and selecting the work that needs to be done. It's as democratic as we can get without an employee board or becoming a Mondragon. New and innovative initiatives are more often started from the mid- to low-levels of the company (three or four new lines of business have been started this way), and for the past year or so those initiatives are encouraged to become startups. The baby businesses are essentially put in an incubator where they have an initial budget and cash provided by the company but are encouraged to be individually profitable, report on their finances, are given coaching and regular meetings with startup business advisors, etc. And if they provide services back to the company, they're supposed to bill teams for those services. (The company still provides salary and benefits to the employees who start businesses within the company; there's some accounting magic to adjust which department budget actually pays for these.) Examples of internal businesses started include: * delivery of cafe drinks and food (with a delivery charge paid for by the receiving employee) * conference room ownership and maintenance: these can now be permanently rented by teams, and the business that "owns" them is responsible for decorating, cleaning, providing technology services, etc. * balloons, party supplies, swag, and desk toys, purchased either by the employee or their team And businesses started with a focus outside the company include: * providing detailed retail sales and product category data to suppliers and manufacturers * tools to identify and encourage employee networks (who knows who, what skills does each employee have, who may provide an introduction to another employee) * tools for polling and identifying employee sentiment * self-organization consulting, training, mentoring, and software * company tours (at $10 per visitor)

wffurr 8y ago
That sounds pretty great, but without the employee board or co-operative ownership it all operates at the whim of the paternalistic owners / managers.

erikb 8y ago

A) There is a lot of democratic control actually. More than employees execute I would say. In a 90k people organisation even the most powerful person has much less power than a majority of the other 89.999 people. The founders btw own less than 20%. Aaaand I also own shares. So I'm one of the guys who sets the policy for employees like me. I also go to the shareholder meeting which is held not far away from where I work. The most powerful owner is probably an investment bank. But they only care about the numbers. If "care package for employees of size $X" is spent on tennis courts or air conditioning in the office, or free ice cream after the canteen lunch, they simply don't care. So it's open for democratic processes to assign these budgets. B) Why is democracy a prerequisit for socialism?