4 ms·

Throwing people out on the street is tough, but at least we destroy people's livelihoods ~progressively~. All CEOs are bastards.

pc86 4y ago
> Throwing people out on the street is tough, but at least we destroy people's livelihoods ~progressively~. > All CEOs are bastards. Imagine turning a perfectly valid criticism into some weird anti-capitalist thing?
- weakfish 4y ago
  It’s true though
  - pc86 4y ago
    It's just so weird, though. If you honestly have that opinion, that means one of two things is true. 1. We shouldn't have CEOs, in which case most businesses today wouldn't exist. Using Apple as an example, it never would have released the products it did - not to say Steve or Tim are soldering iPhone components, that's clearly not what I mean. But you can't honestly believe that Jobs didn't play some role in directing Apple early on and instilling a certain culture (for better or worse). Maybe you think that employee-owned co-ops would produce things of higher value for lower cost, but that hasn't really been the cast so far in human history. Employee-owned companies exist and none of them are producing world-class products, and most of them still have CEOs. 2. You think we should have CEOs, maybe because they're a necessary evil or something, but you still want to bitch about it online, in which case ... :shrug:? What's the third option?
    - mod 4y ago
      > 1. We shouldn't have CEOs, in which case most businesses today wouldn't exist. There's over 30 million businesses in the US [0], and 200,000 CEOs. Is it really impossible to imagine another structure that doesn't involve a CEO or chief? I don't personally think it'll change anything (nor do I have any hatred for CEOs), we'll just hate whoever made the decision. It's just easier when it's one human-with-out-of-fashion-attributes who makes a lot of money. [0] https://www.bizjournals.com/albany/news/2019/04/11/number-of-businesses-in-the-united-states.html https://www.bizjournals.com/albany/news/2019/04/11/number-of... [1] https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes111011.htm https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes111011.htm
      - pc86 4y ago
        So of the 29,800,000 other businesses "without a CEO," how many of them still have one person making the majority of the decisions? I'd venture to say 80-90% of them. And how many of the largest, most economically successful companies have no CEO? Zero.
        mod 4y ago
        > 1. We shouldn't have CEOs, in which case most businesses today wouldn't exist. I was just responding to this. Sounds like you agree we'd have "most" of the 30M businesses left.
        xeromal 4y ago
        They're saying that even though small business owners may not technically be CEO, they are the business owner which is just another title for CEO. lol. You're being too technical. Their point is sound.
      - solveit 4y ago
        > Is it really impossible to imagine another structure that doesn't involve a CEO or chief? It's quite difficult to imagine one that works for most large companies, at the very least. Name a couple if it's so easy.
        mod 4y ago
        I think it's the best strategy, but it's not hard to imagine another one. If CEOs were outlawed tomorrow, we would still have large companies. They would adapt with a new structure.
    - _wolfie_ 4y ago
      I think not having so wide gap in salary between employees and C-level people would be a good start. I'm not saying people higher on the ladder should not be getting more money (I'm still undecided on what my opinion on this as general rule is), but the wage gap between C-level and regular employees is... unhealthy. And it's growing.
- UtopiaPunk 4y ago
  I'm an anti-capitalist, so that's just how it goes :) I believe democracy is a pretty good way of doing things. It's a pretty mainstream boring opinion to think democracy is good. I just want to see democracy applied to workplace. To be clear, I'm not saying we should just copy what we do in civil governments over to corporations. The United States' government at all levels is pretty anemic in being democratic, imo, and not a model to be envied. But there are other models for groups of people to collectively work together where they share decision making power and share in the fruits of their labor. There's stuff like worker-owner cooperatives, sociocracy, and open source software, for example. These different models for building things exist despite being within a capitalist society. I believe that under a different economic model, or even just powerful policy changes, people could be empowered in other ways to work together to create things for society. And looking at your other post, it's true, I don't think Apple could exist as it does today in any society besides a capitalist society. That's not so bad, though, is it?
nonethewiser 4y ago

pc86 4y ago

> Throwing people out on the street is tough, but at least we destroy people's livelihoods ~progressively~. > All CEOs are bastards. Imagine turning a perfectly valid criticism into some weird anti-capitalist thing?

weakfish 4y ago
It’s true though
- pc86 4y ago
  It's just so weird, though. If you honestly have that opinion, that means one of two things is true. 1. We shouldn't have CEOs, in which case most businesses today wouldn't exist. Using Apple as an example, it never would have released the products it did - not to say Steve or Tim are soldering iPhone components, that's clearly not what I mean. But you can't honestly believe that Jobs didn't play some role in directing Apple early on and instilling a certain culture (for better or worse). Maybe you think that employee-owned co-ops would produce things of higher value for lower cost, but that hasn't really been the cast so far in human history. Employee-owned companies exist and none of them are producing world-class products, and most of them still have CEOs. 2. You think we should have CEOs, maybe because they're a necessary evil or something, but you still want to bitch about it online, in which case ... :shrug:? What's the third option?
  - mod 4y ago
    > 1. We shouldn't have CEOs, in which case most businesses today wouldn't exist. There's over 30 million businesses in the US [0], and 200,000 CEOs. Is it really impossible to imagine another structure that doesn't involve a CEO or chief? I don't personally think it'll change anything (nor do I have any hatred for CEOs), we'll just hate whoever made the decision. It's just easier when it's one human-with-out-of-fashion-attributes who makes a lot of money. [0] https://www.bizjournals.com/albany/news/2019/04/11/number-of-businesses-in-the-united-states.html https://www.bizjournals.com/albany/news/2019/04/11/number-of... [1] https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes111011.htm https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes111011.htm
    - pc86 4y ago
      So of the 29,800,000 other businesses "without a CEO," how many of them still have one person making the majority of the decisions? I'd venture to say 80-90% of them. And how many of the largest, most economically successful companies have no CEO? Zero.
      - mod 4y ago
        > 1. We shouldn't have CEOs, in which case most businesses today wouldn't exist. I was just responding to this. Sounds like you agree we'd have "most" of the 30M businesses left.
        xeromal 4y ago
        They're saying that even though small business owners may not technically be CEO, they are the business owner which is just another title for CEO. lol. You're being too technical. Their point is sound.
    - solveit 4y ago
      > Is it really impossible to imagine another structure that doesn't involve a CEO or chief? It's quite difficult to imagine one that works for most large companies, at the very least. Name a couple if it's so easy.
      - mod 4y ago
        I think it's the best strategy, but it's not hard to imagine another one. If CEOs were outlawed tomorrow, we would still have large companies. They would adapt with a new structure.
  - _wolfie_ 4y ago
    I think not having so wide gap in salary between employees and C-level people would be a good start. I'm not saying people higher on the ladder should not be getting more money (I'm still undecided on what my opinion on this as general rule is), but the wage gap between C-level and regular employees is... unhealthy. And it's growing.
UtopiaPunk 4y ago
I'm an anti-capitalist, so that's just how it goes :) I believe democracy is a pretty good way of doing things. It's a pretty mainstream boring opinion to think democracy is good. I just want to see democracy applied to workplace. To be clear, I'm not saying we should just copy what we do in civil governments over to corporations. The United States' government at all levels is pretty anemic in being democratic, imo, and not a model to be envied. But there are other models for groups of people to collectively work together where they share decision making power and share in the fruits of their labor. There's stuff like worker-owner cooperatives, sociocracy, and open source software, for example. These different models for building things exist despite being within a capitalist society. I believe that under a different economic model, or even just powerful policy changes, people could be empowered in other ways to work together to create things for society. And looking at your other post, it's true, I don't think Apple could exist as it does today in any society besides a capitalist society. That's not so bad, though, is it?

nonethewiser 4y ago