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Creating a company requires capital. Freelancing does too, without necessarily offering more control. Smaller companies can easily be more dictatorial than big

by 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
  > 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. This alone isn't enough to argue that it's not immoral because the company is their private property. What if Amazon bought up all the farmable land in the country/world and started charging prices that were unaffordable to 90% of people and causing starvation. This is comparable to what's happening, but instead of one company it's multiple companies and instead of food price it's employee conditions edit: to be clear, I know my point isn't enough to prove it IS immoral either, just that the private property point isn't enough to prove that it isn't. I don't think I'm capable of arguing this argument all the way through, But my opinion probably falls closer to Marx than most people. The only thing I do know for sure is that what we have now isn't working, and if capitalists don't want socialism/communism to take over they better fix things soon.
  - asteroidbelt 5y ago
    > What if Amazon bought up all the farmable land in the country/world and started charging prices that were unaffordable to 90% of people and causing starvation. That would cause anti-monopoly intervention by the government. > This is comparable to what's happening, but instead of one company it's multiple companies and instead of food price it's employee conditions What employee condition? Facebook employees who leak these emails are quite rich, perhaps top 1% in the US let alone in the world. Their are unhappy because they want more than money, they also want to "do greater good" as they erroneously view it. > The only thing I do know for sure is that what we have now isn't working It does not work perfectly, but it works relatively well. The US is one of the richest countries in the world. Poorest 10-percentile US citizen is way more rich than average person living in a third-world country. > if capitalists don't want socialism/communism to take over they better fix things soon I think capitalism is doing fine. The largest problem in the US (I'm not in the US) is partly corrupt election system. E. g. representatives being too dependent on the party because of certain restrictions like limits of how much money a candidate can raise for a campaign. Or lack of ranked choice voting.
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.

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
> 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. This alone isn't enough to argue that it's not immoral because the company is their private property. What if Amazon bought up all the farmable land in the country/world and started charging prices that were unaffordable to 90% of people and causing starvation. This is comparable to what's happening, but instead of one company it's multiple companies and instead of food price it's employee conditions edit: to be clear, I know my point isn't enough to prove it IS immoral either, just that the private property point isn't enough to prove that it isn't. I don't think I'm capable of arguing this argument all the way through, But my opinion probably falls closer to Marx than most people. The only thing I do know for sure is that what we have now isn't working, and if capitalists don't want socialism/communism to take over they better fix things soon.
- asteroidbelt 5y ago
  > What if Amazon bought up all the farmable land in the country/world and started charging prices that were unaffordable to 90% of people and causing starvation. That would cause anti-monopoly intervention by the government. > This is comparable to what's happening, but instead of one company it's multiple companies and instead of food price it's employee conditions What employee condition? Facebook employees who leak these emails are quite rich, perhaps top 1% in the US let alone in the world. Their are unhappy because they want more than money, they also want to "do greater good" as they erroneously view it. > The only thing I do know for sure is that what we have now isn't working It does not work perfectly, but it works relatively well. The US is one of the richest countries in the world. Poorest 10-percentile US citizen is way more rich than average person living in a third-world country. > if capitalists don't want socialism/communism to take over they better fix things soon I think capitalism is doing fine. The largest problem in the US (I'm not in the US) is partly corrupt election system. E. g. representatives being too dependent on the party because of certain restrictions like limits of how much money a candidate can raise for a campaign. Or lack of ranked choice voting.

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.