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It’s encouraging that initiatives like this seem to be popping up more often - co-operatives of workers looking to cut out corporate middlemen. It will be an up

It’s encouraging that initiatives like this seem to be popping up more often - co-operatives of workers looking to cut out corporate middlemen. It will be an uphill climb, but I hope this is the future. The technical moats of a lot of recently minted tech companies don’t seem to be so great that they can’t be overcome with time and open source work. The inertia and efficiency that comes with scale will be harder to compete with.

CameronNemo 6y ago
Is Uber still operating at a loss? Hard to compete with that, even accounting for the 20% tax.
- mannerheim 6y ago
  Uber invested a lot of money into self-driving cars. Presumably a coop isn't spending money on automating away their workers.
  - discodave 6y ago
    They spent a lot of money subsidizing rides. It would be nice if they were making losses to plough money into R&D, but that is/was not the case.
  - CameronNemo 6y ago
    That is actually an interesting point. Why would I, as a driver, fund research and development aimed at making my skills worthless?
    - hobofan 6y ago
      Because you own part of the co-op, and it's value would go up if that research succeeds? I think co-ops can actually be a good way of handling technology replacing manual labor. The profits made from the technological advancements can be put in a dedicated trust of the co-op that is focused on retraining the workers for new positions. With that you could handle inevitable technological progress.
      - yellowapple 6y ago
        > Because you own part of the co-op, and it's value would go up if that research succeeds? That ownership is contingent on you working for the co-op, which doesn't seem very likely if a robot took your job. That said, there are a couple ways to work around this: 1. Flip the ownership model to a customer cooperative (or a customer/worker hybrid cooperative), thus moving the decisionmaking - and the incentives as a result - from workers to customers (which can and often do overlap). Customer cooperatives are a proven model here in the US (credit unions are probably the most widely known example). 2. Use automation to multiply labor rather than replace it. Replacing a drivers with cars at a 1:1 ratio obviously doesn't leave much room for drivers, but replacing them at a 1:10 ratio (or somesuch) can mean converting drivers into owner-operators of "squads" of cars. This depends on there being enough of a customer base to warrant this multiplication; for this to work, it's best paired with a massive expansion of that customer base (adding a bunch more cities, for example, or extending service areas, or slashing fares).
    - oh_sigh 6y ago
      Skills is a stretch. Having a driver's license in the US is a pretty low bar for entry for being a rideshare driver.
    - Barrin92 6y ago
      competition and because if you own a share of a future technology you're still standing to gain financially. It's not like tech companies not routinely also innovate away their own tech. Software developers also work on tools that make software development easier.
    - hkt 6y ago
      Drivers don't have an incentive, but car manufacturers do. The dream for Uber was a robofleet of driverless cars, which can still happen; it'll be General Motors getting into the taxi trade if such a thing ever became feasible.
    - throwinreturn 6y ago
      That would probably be competition. A monopolist corporation has no incentive to improve its capital if it gets its profit anyway (c.f. the dismal state of DSL and cable). But if it's not a monopolist, it might be forced to anyway. It's the same thing at a worker cooperative, or for that matter at a heavily unionized workplace: the workers have no incentive to automate themselves out of a job, but may collectively understand that if they don't, the business will go under and they'll all be left without jobs.
- dbuder 6y ago
  Only from spending big on marketing and lobbying.
fossuser 6y ago
Do others have better experiences with co-ops than I do? I know people love REI, but whenever I go in there to buy anything that requires someone (ski boots, skis, work on skis) - it sucks. There's never anyone available, it often takes up to an hour or more to get helped or waiting in line. Sometimes I have to leave and come back later. Last time I gave up and ordered everything online. It's not like it's crazy packed in there either, it's pretty empty - there's just nobody working there. Co-ops are supposed to be better about aligning incentives, but at least for me I've often had worse experiences as a customer. Uber and Lyft work pretty well (for the most part, except for when drivers cancel on you) - I'd be surprised if a co-op could pull off a similarly good experience for riders.
- TaylorAlexander 6y ago
  I've not had any trouble finding help at REI, but it sounds like perhaps you go more often than I do. The point of the co-op is that it is much better for the worker. There's no inherent reason why a co-op would need to have any different level of customer service than a corporation. My personal worst customer service experience is at Home Depot for example. I had to wait 45 minutes to get a 4 foot length of hose cut, something that would have been under 5 minutes at my local hardware store (and so I go to the local shop now). Ideally many stores would be co-ops and they could compete on price, quality, customer service etc like any other business. Perhaps you're satisfied with the customer experience at Uber, but the situation for drivers seems pretty exploitative. If I can get similar service and the workers get a fair deal, I'd be much happier choosing that.
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
- afarrell 6y ago
  Was that true pre-pandemic?
- vore 6y ago
  REI is a consumers' cooperative, not a workers' cooperative. The people who work at REI don't own the business, and they would basically have the same role in any other company (which is one of the criticisms of why they're not actually good for labor). In fact, in a consumers' cooperative would probably be better in this case since you would have more direct control over the business than with a regular corporation.
nickik 6y ago
> It’s encouraging that initiatives like this seem to be popping up more often Any evidence for that? Seems to me this has been 'pet idea' of the labor movement for 200+ years. Maybe that are more that are visible to the avg person because of the web and social media, but if there are actually more seems highly questionable.

CameronNemo 6y ago

Is Uber still operating at a loss? Hard to compete with that, even accounting for the 20% tax.

mannerheim 6y ago
Uber invested a lot of money into self-driving cars. Presumably a coop isn't spending money on automating away their workers.
- discodave 6y ago
  They spent a lot of money subsidizing rides. It would be nice if they were making losses to plough money into R&D, but that is/was not the case.
- CameronNemo 6y ago
  That is actually an interesting point. Why would I, as a driver, fund research and development aimed at making my skills worthless?
  - hobofan 6y ago
    Because you own part of the co-op, and it's value would go up if that research succeeds? I think co-ops can actually be a good way of handling technology replacing manual labor. The profits made from the technological advancements can be put in a dedicated trust of the co-op that is focused on retraining the workers for new positions. With that you could handle inevitable technological progress.
    - yellowapple 6y ago
      > Because you own part of the co-op, and it's value would go up if that research succeeds? That ownership is contingent on you working for the co-op, which doesn't seem very likely if a robot took your job. That said, there are a couple ways to work around this: 1. Flip the ownership model to a customer cooperative (or a customer/worker hybrid cooperative), thus moving the decisionmaking - and the incentives as a result - from workers to customers (which can and often do overlap). Customer cooperatives are a proven model here in the US (credit unions are probably the most widely known example). 2. Use automation to multiply labor rather than replace it. Replacing a drivers with cars at a 1:1 ratio obviously doesn't leave much room for drivers, but replacing them at a 1:10 ratio (or somesuch) can mean converting drivers into owner-operators of "squads" of cars. This depends on there being enough of a customer base to warrant this multiplication; for this to work, it's best paired with a massive expansion of that customer base (adding a bunch more cities, for example, or extending service areas, or slashing fares).
  - oh_sigh 6y ago
    Skills is a stretch. Having a driver's license in the US is a pretty low bar for entry for being a rideshare driver.
  - Barrin92 6y ago
    competition and because if you own a share of a future technology you're still standing to gain financially. It's not like tech companies not routinely also innovate away their own tech. Software developers also work on tools that make software development easier.
  - hkt 6y ago
    Drivers don't have an incentive, but car manufacturers do. The dream for Uber was a robofleet of driverless cars, which can still happen; it'll be General Motors getting into the taxi trade if such a thing ever became feasible.
  - throwinreturn 6y ago
    That would probably be competition. A monopolist corporation has no incentive to improve its capital if it gets its profit anyway (c.f. the dismal state of DSL and cable). But if it's not a monopolist, it might be forced to anyway. It's the same thing at a worker cooperative, or for that matter at a heavily unionized workplace: the workers have no incentive to automate themselves out of a job, but may collectively understand that if they don't, the business will go under and they'll all be left without jobs.
dbuder 6y ago
Only from spending big on marketing and lobbying.

fossuser 6y ago

Do others have better experiences with co-ops than I do? I know people love REI, but whenever I go in there to buy anything that requires someone (ski boots, skis, work on skis) - it sucks. There's never anyone available, it often takes up to an hour or more to get helped or waiting in line. Sometimes I have to leave and come back later. Last time I gave up and ordered everything online. It's not like it's crazy packed in there either, it's pretty empty - there's just nobody working there. Co-ops are supposed to be better about aligning incentives, but at least for me I've often had worse experiences as a customer. Uber and Lyft work pretty well (for the most part, except for when drivers cancel on you) - I'd be surprised if a co-op could pull off a similarly good experience for riders.

TaylorAlexander 6y ago
I've not had any trouble finding help at REI, but it sounds like perhaps you go more often than I do. The point of the co-op is that it is much better for the worker. There's no inherent reason why a co-op would need to have any different level of customer service than a corporation. My personal worst customer service experience is at Home Depot for example. I had to wait 45 minutes to get a 4 foot length of hose cut, something that would have been under 5 minutes at my local hardware store (and so I go to the local shop now). Ideally many stores would be co-ops and they could compete on price, quality, customer service etc like any other business. Perhaps you're satisfied with the customer experience at Uber, but the situation for drivers seems pretty exploitative. If I can get similar service and the workers get a fair deal, I'd be much happier choosing that.
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
afarrell 6y ago
Was that true pre-pandemic?
vore 6y ago
REI is a consumers' cooperative, not a workers' cooperative. The people who work at REI don't own the business, and they would basically have the same role in any other company (which is one of the criticisms of why they're not actually good for labor). In fact, in a consumers' cooperative would probably be better in this case since you would have more direct control over the business than with a regular corporation.

nickik 6y ago

> It’s encouraging that initiatives like this seem to be popping up more often Any evidence for that? Seems to me this has been 'pet idea' of the labor movement for 200+ years. Maybe that are more that are visible to the avg person because of the web and social media, but if there are actually more seems highly questionable.