3 ms·

Honestly. Some people are just impossible to please short of every company becoming a completely worker owned cooperative.

wpietri 5y ago
Sounds good to me. I've seen so much dysfunction generated by distorting companies to please executives and investors. I'd love to see what different approaches produce. I'd hope it would be better, but at least we could get some variety in pathology, and society wouldn't just take this generation's dominant paradigm as perfect and eternal. For those interested in the topic, I recommend reading "A Lapsed Anarchist's Approach to Building a Great Business". [1] Years ago a grad student went to the University of Michigan to study their large collection of anarchist literature. As a sideline, he started the now-legendary Zingerman's Deli. Over the years, it spun off a large collection of associated businesses, each run by some of the workers. Lots of interesting ideas, ones backed by real-world success. '1] https://www.zingermans.com/Product/zingermans-guide-to-good-leading-part-1-a-lapsed-anarchists-approach-to-buildi/P-ARI-12 https://www.zingermans.com/Product/zingermans-guide-to-good-...
- JumpCrisscross 5y ago
  > I'd love to see what different approaches produce Worker-owned companies exist: they're called partnerships. Just add a line requiring all employees be shareholders so the partners can't hire staff. Lots of construction companies are organized like this. (Wholly employee-owned firms were more popular before WWII [1].) I don't see any evidence that they pursued profits less furiously than investor-owned competitors. ESOPs have been more successful [2]. Outside the domain of highly-skilled artisans, it turns out most employees--like most shareholders--don't want to do the work of being an investor. That results in the sort of clubbiness that will be familiar to anyone who has been involved in small-town politics. [1] https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/month101&div=100&id=&page= https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/... [2] https://hbr.org/1987/09/how-well-is-employee-ownership-working https://hbr.org/1987/09/how-well-is-employee-ownership-worki...

wpietri 5y ago

Sounds good to me. I've seen so much dysfunction generated by distorting companies to please executives and investors. I'd love to see what different approaches produce. I'd hope it would be better, but at least we could get some variety in pathology, and society wouldn't just take this generation's dominant paradigm as perfect and eternal. For those interested in the topic, I recommend reading "A Lapsed Anarchist's Approach to Building a Great Business". [1] Years ago a grad student went to the University of Michigan to study their large collection of anarchist literature. As a sideline, he started the now-legendary Zingerman's Deli. Over the years, it spun off a large collection of associated businesses, each run by some of the workers. Lots of interesting ideas, ones backed by real-world success. '1] https://www.zingermans.com/Product/zingermans-guide-to-good-leading-part-1-a-lapsed-anarchists-approach-to-buildi/P-ARI-12 https://www.zingermans.com/Product/zingermans-guide-to-good-...

JumpCrisscross 5y ago
> I'd love to see what different approaches produce Worker-owned companies exist: they're called partnerships. Just add a line requiring all employees be shareholders so the partners can't hire staff. Lots of construction companies are organized like this. (Wholly employee-owned firms were more popular before WWII [1].) I don't see any evidence that they pursued profits less furiously than investor-owned competitors. ESOPs have been more successful [2]. Outside the domain of highly-skilled artisans, it turns out most employees--like most shareholders--don't want to do the work of being an investor. That results in the sort of clubbiness that will be familiar to anyone who has been involved in small-town politics. [1] https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/month101&div=100&id=&page= https://heinonline.org/HOL/LandingPage?handle=hein.journals/... [2] https://hbr.org/1987/09/how-well-is-employee-ownership-working https://hbr.org/1987/09/how-well-is-employee-ownership-worki...