3 ms·

Because employees voluntarily agreed to these conditions when they signed the contract.

by asteroidbelt 5y ago

lucian1900 5y ago
Was it voluntary? If all workplaces offer the same terms, what choice does someone without capital have?
- asteroidbelt 5y ago
  There's an option to create own company. There's an option to work as freelancer. Intermediate option is to work in a smaller company where the distance between the entry level employee and the CEO is much smaller, so the changes of being heard are much higher. There is an option to work in non-commercial organization, which does not have a goal to make profits, so there are more reasons to listen to the employees. But you can't have your cake and eat it. I. e. pick a company which pays the best because it works efficiently and uses the employees to their best abilities and at the same time works inefficiently because it listens to incompetent employees.
  - lucian1900 5y ago
    Creating a company requires capital. Freelancing does too, without necessarily offering more control. Smaller companies can easily be more dictatorial than big ones, small business tyrants are common. Non-commercial organisations aren’t necessarily any better. They also often don’t pay enough for survival. I’m asking something fairly simple: why is it moral that the people that do all the work have no control over their working lives?
    - asteroidbelt 5y ago
      > why is it moral that the people that do all the work have no control over their working lives? Basic principles of civilized society like respect of private property (which is the company which is owned by shareholders) and respect of contracts, and these principles are more important than employee wishes to play CEO. > Creating a company requires capital. So this is the problem. Some people worked hard to obtain that capital. They studied hard, got top notch education, deprived themselves of private life, had very high risk of failure (majority of entrepreneurs fail). And their work resulted in them being shareholders and top management. While others were smoking marijuana, downshifting, working 9-5 at best, taking long vacations. And the second ones demand the same rights to control the company. I don't see how that is fair. It is having a cake and eating. And I have another answer to that. Want to make decisions in the company? Then get hired as CEO. They don't want to hire you as CEO? Then perhaps you are not qualified to do company-wide decision. And if you are not qualified to do company-wide decisions, then probably you should not make these decisions working entry-level jobs.
      - lucian1900 5y ago
        Most capital is inherited. No amount of hard work will make up for that. The very notion of private property exists to maintain that inherited capital, with state violence. Is that moral? Why?
        asteroidbelt 5y ago
        > Most capital is inherited. This is a common myth. (I should say, marxist myth.) > Of those folks, 67.7% were self-made, while 23.7% had a combination of inherited and self-created wealth. Only 8.5% of global high-net-worth individuals were categorized as having completely inherited their wealth. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/26/majority-of-the-worlds-richest-people-are-self-made-says-new-report.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/26/majority-of-the-worlds-riche...
        lucian1900 5y ago
        If you ignore the fact that only those whose families are at least comfortable financially can afford to take the risk necessary to get into a position where they can begin exploiting other workers. Globally, the vast majority of capital is owned by people who grew up rich.
        asteroidbelt 5y ago
        > If you ignore the fact that only those whose families are at least comfortable financially can afford to take the risk necessary to get into a position where they can begin exploiting other workers. There's some inertia, of course, it's easier for children for reach people to become successful, but even poor people can become rich, and become often. A lot of rich people in the US are children of immigrants which didn't have safety net. This guy for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamath_Palihapitiya https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamath_Palihapitiya but many many more. > Globally, the vast majority of capital is owned by people who grew up rich. So we are no longer talking about free market economy?
      - mnowicki 5y ago
    - datavirtue 5y ago
      "why is it moral that the people that do all the work have no control over their working lives?" This is substantive reason for unions. Though people keep harping about a few dollars wages and health care. Companies love when the union debate is kept to wages and benefits. Employees run the company and should control it.
      - lucian1900 5y ago
        Exactly. Democratic control over the workplace would make lots of things possible, including lowering profits to increase wages far more than any union dues would cost.
        asteroidbelt 5y ago
        > Democratic control over the workplace would make lots of things possible, including lowering profits Yes. > increase wages No.
      - asteroidbelt 5y ago
        > This is substantive reason for unions. Union exists to improve working conditions. I never heard of unions protecting working disagreeing with top management policy making, that would be silly. > Employees run the company No they don't. They do what they are hired to do. They do not steer it. > and should control it. They can just create another company and control it just fine. But then guess what? They will sell their shares on the first opportunity. Because workers don't really need that.
    - blooalien 5y ago
      > "Freelancing does too, without necessarily offering more control." Sometimes the only "capital" freelancing requires is your knowledge and expertise/wisdom in a particular skillset. I'll agree with "without necessarily" offering more control, but at least in my own personal experiences with freelancing (in IT/computer related work), it offered me a great deal of control, in that if I didn't feel like taking a contract, I simply didn't. It wasn't as if I didn't have other contracts available to fill that void. :)
      - lucian1900 5y ago
        Most people don’t have highly sought after expertise and gaining it requires capital. Freelancing also requires savings to deal with the potential for contracts to fall through. You and I can freelance if we choose to. We could only choose to become petty bourgeois because we’re already part of the labour aristocracy, though.

Because employees voluntarily agreed to these conditions when they signed the contract.

lucian1900 5y ago

Was it voluntary? If all workplaces offer the same terms, what choice does someone without capital have?

asteroidbelt 5y ago
There's an option to create own company. There's an option to work as freelancer. Intermediate option is to work in a smaller company where the distance between the entry level employee and the CEO is much smaller, so the changes of being heard are much higher. There is an option to work in non-commercial organization, which does not have a goal to make profits, so there are more reasons to listen to the employees. But you can't have your cake and eat it. I. e. pick a company which pays the best because it works efficiently and uses the employees to their best abilities and at the same time works inefficiently because it listens to incompetent employees.
- lucian1900 5y ago
  Creating a company requires capital. Freelancing does too, without necessarily offering more control. Smaller companies can easily be more dictatorial than big ones, small business tyrants are common. Non-commercial organisations aren’t necessarily any better. They also often don’t pay enough for survival. I’m asking something fairly simple: why is it moral that the people that do all the work have no control over their working lives?
  - asteroidbelt 5y ago
    > why is it moral that the people that do all the work have no control over their working lives? Basic principles of civilized society like respect of private property (which is the company which is owned by shareholders) and respect of contracts, and these principles are more important than employee wishes to play CEO. > Creating a company requires capital. So this is the problem. Some people worked hard to obtain that capital. They studied hard, got top notch education, deprived themselves of private life, had very high risk of failure (majority of entrepreneurs fail). And their work resulted in them being shareholders and top management. While others were smoking marijuana, downshifting, working 9-5 at best, taking long vacations. And the second ones demand the same rights to control the company. I don't see how that is fair. It is having a cake and eating. And I have another answer to that. Want to make decisions in the company? Then get hired as CEO. They don't want to hire you as CEO? Then perhaps you are not qualified to do company-wide decision. And if you are not qualified to do company-wide decisions, then probably you should not make these decisions working entry-level jobs.
    - lucian1900 5y ago
      Most capital is inherited. No amount of hard work will make up for that. The very notion of private property exists to maintain that inherited capital, with state violence. Is that moral? Why?
      - asteroidbelt 5y ago
        > Most capital is inherited. This is a common myth. (I should say, marxist myth.) > Of those folks, 67.7% were self-made, while 23.7% had a combination of inherited and self-created wealth. Only 8.5% of global high-net-worth individuals were categorized as having completely inherited their wealth. https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/26/majority-of-the-worlds-richest-people-are-self-made-says-new-report.html https://www.cnbc.com/2019/09/26/majority-of-the-worlds-riche...
        lucian1900 5y ago
        If you ignore the fact that only those whose families are at least comfortable financially can afford to take the risk necessary to get into a position where they can begin exploiting other workers. Globally, the vast majority of capital is owned by people who grew up rich.
        asteroidbelt 5y ago
        > If you ignore the fact that only those whose families are at least comfortable financially can afford to take the risk necessary to get into a position where they can begin exploiting other workers. There's some inertia, of course, it's easier for children for reach people to become successful, but even poor people can become rich, and become often. A lot of rich people in the US are children of immigrants which didn't have safety net. This guy for example: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamath_Palihapitiya https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chamath_Palihapitiya but many many more. > Globally, the vast majority of capital is owned by people who grew up rich. So we are no longer talking about free market economy?
    - mnowicki 5y ago
  - datavirtue 5y ago
    "why is it moral that the people that do all the work have no control over their working lives?" This is substantive reason for unions. Though people keep harping about a few dollars wages and health care. Companies love when the union debate is kept to wages and benefits. Employees run the company and should control it.
    - lucian1900 5y ago
      Exactly. Democratic control over the workplace would make lots of things possible, including lowering profits to increase wages far more than any union dues would cost.
      - asteroidbelt 5y ago
        > Democratic control over the workplace would make lots of things possible, including lowering profits Yes. > increase wages No.
    - asteroidbelt 5y ago
      > This is substantive reason for unions. Union exists to improve working conditions. I never heard of unions protecting working disagreeing with top management policy making, that would be silly. > Employees run the company No they don't. They do what they are hired to do. They do not steer it. > and should control it. They can just create another company and control it just fine. But then guess what? They will sell their shares on the first opportunity. Because workers don't really need that.
  - blooalien 5y ago
    > "Freelancing does too, without necessarily offering more control." Sometimes the only "capital" freelancing requires is your knowledge and expertise/wisdom in a particular skillset. I'll agree with "without necessarily" offering more control, but at least in my own personal experiences with freelancing (in IT/computer related work), it offered me a great deal of control, in that if I didn't feel like taking a contract, I simply didn't. It wasn't as if I didn't have other contracts available to fill that void. :)
    - lucian1900 5y ago
      Most people don’t have highly sought after expertise and gaining it requires capital. Freelancing also requires savings to deal with the potential for contracts to fall through. You and I can freelance if we choose to. We could only choose to become petty bourgeois because we’re already part of the labour aristocracy, though.