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This. Companies will always min/max a system so they retain as much money as possible for as few hands as they can manage, always funneled upwards to executives

This. Companies will always min/max a system so they retain as much money as possible for as few hands as they can manage, always funneled upwards to executives and shareholders. Rather than trying to “negotiate” with these entities, regulations should be wielded to stop min-maxing beyond a certain point or in bad faith, and firing people while turning a profit is 100% bad faith that should be regulated or barred.

martin-t 1y ago
Behavior is shaped by incentives. Countries used to be overwhelmingly autocratic - often ruled by hereditary dictators called kings. People realized unchecked power will always lead to abuse and overthrew them. Companies are overwhelmingly autocratic (cooperatives being exceedingly rare to the point most people don't know about their existence) - often rules by hereditary dictators called owners. But you can't legally overthrow them[0]. If only we had a system of rules we could vote on which would make this arrangement forbidden... --- [0]: You can't legally overthrow a government either but if you do it successfully anyway, then you are the government and you decide what is legal. Ironically, no democratic countries I know of have clauses in their ruleset ("laws") which declare that people are allowed to overthrow the government if it's no longer democratic, even if those democratic governments were created by overthrowing a previous dictatorship.
- ericmay 1y ago
  The US kind of does in that at least in spirit if the government violates the constitution we have this 2nd Amendment and plenty of moral precedent from the founders. It’s in the Declaration of Independence too which, in my view, is just the first page of the Constitution. The 0th Amendment if you will. Related to your second point about autocracy - I mean the good thing is you can, today, go start a company with the exact governance structure you propose and go compete in the market.
  - Hikikomori 1y ago
    Won't work if the government is willing to use the army against you, like the current one.
    - ericmay 1y ago
      Nope, see various rebellions throughout history plus insurgencies and such. It won’t work not because it wouldn’t work - you’re also assuming 100% military compliance and, as a veteran who served in active duty I can tell you not everyone agrees or disagrees with the current administration and people really do care about the Constitution, but it wouldn’t work because when you sit down and really think about it, the status quo for 90% of people is pretty good and they’re not going to take up arms over the vast majority of things a government does.
  - humanrebar 1y ago
    Also the U.S. Constitution allows for a full rewrite by a constitutional convention process. This hasn't been attempted, of course.
    - ericmay 1y ago
      Yea good point. I always forget about that.
  - danaris 1y ago
    > if the government violates the constitution we have this 2nd Amendment and plenty of moral precedent from the founders. Yeah? How's that working out right now, when the government is unquestionably violating the Constitution left and right?
    - ericmay 1y ago
      Well you still need the people to actually believe the Constitution is being violated or that it’s not something that can be corrected.
  - raw_anon_1111 1y ago
    I always find this so funny. “Citizens have guns so they can overthrow a government that has tanks, helicopters, nuclear weapons, bunker busting bombs, etc”
    - ericmay 1y ago
      Ok so the US military is going to drop a nuclear weapon on Dallas or Buffalo to stop insurgents? Why even bother writing something like that when you know it’s stupid? Obviously governments have superior firepower and can and have quashed rebellions. But rebellions have been successful as well. Taking away arms from the people makes rebellion in the case of tyranny that much harder. I don’t think it’s unfair to question whether such rights are worthwhile or not, but I do think it’s unfair to suggest that since the government has helicopters you can’t have a rebellion. They sure didn’t need any tanks or helicopters when the MAGA goons tried to hang Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi.
      - martin-t 1y ago
        Not to mention the army is composed of people who, despite systematic indoctrination, can decide to switch sides. However, this is a huge danger of ML ("AI"). It allows individuals to concentrate power. All real-world power comes from violence. Sufficiently advanced ML models allow individuals to profile subordinates and remove them before they rebel and (partially now but increasingly in the future) to control swarms of drones and robots.
        ericmay 1y ago
        Really good call out on the AI/ML. Now that is dangerous. Also, as an army veteran who served on active duty including a tour in Iraq (not direct combat role, thankfully) I can tell you that in my experience you're spot on - the systematic indoctrination isn't to a political party but it's to the military and to defending the country and the Constitution. That's up to interpretation. The military has never been faced with resolving a constitutional crises so we really don't know how things would play out - but not every soldier is a rabid Trump supporter or something. Far from it. Very far from it.
- com2kid 1y ago
  > Companies are overwhelmingly autocratic (cooperatives being exceedingly rare to the point most people don't know about their existence) - often rules by hereditary dictators called owners. But you can't legally overthrow them[0]. Nearly every publicly trade company has a very well defined method by which executives can be replaced. Companies are a dictatorship appointed by an oligarchy that is appointed by the democratic votes of shareholders.
joshuacc 1y ago
“firing people while turning a profit is 100% bad faith that should be regulated or barred.” That’s far too broad a claim. Just because you’re turning a profit doesn’t mean you should be locked into keeping all of your employees. Some are likely to be underperformers who don’t bring sufficient ROI compared to other investments/hires you could make.
- UncleMeat 1y ago
  My experience with these sorts of layoffs is that they are not tightly bound to performance. If you have underperformers you can fire them the ordinary way.
  - Covenant0028 1y ago
    Exactly. How is it that an org suddenly discovered thousands of employees are under performers? And how is it that the number of under performers coincides with the number McKinsey and Co (or similar company) said it would be?
    - gruez 1y ago
      >Exactly. How is it that an org suddenly discovered thousands of employees are under performers? The more correct statement is they suddenly cared about under performers. It's not any different than say, you noticing your grocery bills going up and as a result you cancel all the subscriptions you don't need. It's not like all those SaaS services' value propositions suddenly plummeted because the price of eggs went up, but now you suddenly have an eye for cutting costs.
  - stego-tech 1y ago
    Literally this. Corporations are good at making up plausible excuses, but anyone who takes more than two seconds to evaluate their claims beyond face value will find they’re almost always complete bullshit. Underperformers should be rotated out long before a mass layoff occurs. If your company isn’t axing them until a mass layoff, they’re doing bad business.
  - 1y ago

martin-t 1y ago

Behavior is shaped by incentives. Countries used to be overwhelmingly autocratic - often ruled by hereditary dictators called kings. People realized unchecked power will always lead to abuse and overthrew them. Companies are overwhelmingly autocratic (cooperatives being exceedingly rare to the point most people don't know about their existence) - often rules by hereditary dictators called owners. But you can't legally overthrow them[0]. If only we had a system of rules we could vote on which would make this arrangement forbidden... --- [0]: You can't legally overthrow a government either but if you do it successfully anyway, then you are the government and you decide what is legal. Ironically, no democratic countries I know of have clauses in their ruleset ("laws") which declare that people are allowed to overthrow the government if it's no longer democratic, even if those democratic governments were created by overthrowing a previous dictatorship.

ericmay 1y ago
The US kind of does in that at least in spirit if the government violates the constitution we have this 2nd Amendment and plenty of moral precedent from the founders. It’s in the Declaration of Independence too which, in my view, is just the first page of the Constitution. The 0th Amendment if you will. Related to your second point about autocracy - I mean the good thing is you can, today, go start a company with the exact governance structure you propose and go compete in the market.
- Hikikomori 1y ago
  Won't work if the government is willing to use the army against you, like the current one.
  - ericmay 1y ago
    Nope, see various rebellions throughout history plus insurgencies and such. It won’t work not because it wouldn’t work - you’re also assuming 100% military compliance and, as a veteran who served in active duty I can tell you not everyone agrees or disagrees with the current administration and people really do care about the Constitution, but it wouldn’t work because when you sit down and really think about it, the status quo for 90% of people is pretty good and they’re not going to take up arms over the vast majority of things a government does.
- humanrebar 1y ago
  Also the U.S. Constitution allows for a full rewrite by a constitutional convention process. This hasn't been attempted, of course.
  - ericmay 1y ago
    Yea good point. I always forget about that.
- danaris 1y ago
  > if the government violates the constitution we have this 2nd Amendment and plenty of moral precedent from the founders. Yeah? How's that working out right now, when the government is unquestionably violating the Constitution left and right?
  - ericmay 1y ago
    Well you still need the people to actually believe the Constitution is being violated or that it’s not something that can be corrected.
- raw_anon_1111 1y ago
  I always find this so funny. “Citizens have guns so they can overthrow a government that has tanks, helicopters, nuclear weapons, bunker busting bombs, etc”
  - ericmay 1y ago
    Ok so the US military is going to drop a nuclear weapon on Dallas or Buffalo to stop insurgents? Why even bother writing something like that when you know it’s stupid? Obviously governments have superior firepower and can and have quashed rebellions. But rebellions have been successful as well. Taking away arms from the people makes rebellion in the case of tyranny that much harder. I don’t think it’s unfair to question whether such rights are worthwhile or not, but I do think it’s unfair to suggest that since the government has helicopters you can’t have a rebellion. They sure didn’t need any tanks or helicopters when the MAGA goons tried to hang Mike Pence and Nancy Pelosi.
    - martin-t 1y ago
      Not to mention the army is composed of people who, despite systematic indoctrination, can decide to switch sides. However, this is a huge danger of ML ("AI"). It allows individuals to concentrate power. All real-world power comes from violence. Sufficiently advanced ML models allow individuals to profile subordinates and remove them before they rebel and (partially now but increasingly in the future) to control swarms of drones and robots.
      - ericmay 1y ago
        Really good call out on the AI/ML. Now that is dangerous. Also, as an army veteran who served on active duty including a tour in Iraq (not direct combat role, thankfully) I can tell you that in my experience you're spot on - the systematic indoctrination isn't to a political party but it's to the military and to defending the country and the Constitution. That's up to interpretation. The military has never been faced with resolving a constitutional crises so we really don't know how things would play out - but not every soldier is a rabid Trump supporter or something. Far from it. Very far from it.
com2kid 1y ago
> Companies are overwhelmingly autocratic (cooperatives being exceedingly rare to the point most people don't know about their existence) - often rules by hereditary dictators called owners. But you can't legally overthrow them[0]. Nearly every publicly trade company has a very well defined method by which executives can be replaced. Companies are a dictatorship appointed by an oligarchy that is appointed by the democratic votes of shareholders.

joshuacc 1y ago

“firing people while turning a profit is 100% bad faith that should be regulated or barred.” That’s far too broad a claim. Just because you’re turning a profit doesn’t mean you should be locked into keeping all of your employees. Some are likely to be underperformers who don’t bring sufficient ROI compared to other investments/hires you could make.

UncleMeat 1y ago
My experience with these sorts of layoffs is that they are not tightly bound to performance. If you have underperformers you can fire them the ordinary way.
- Covenant0028 1y ago
  Exactly. How is it that an org suddenly discovered thousands of employees are under performers? And how is it that the number of under performers coincides with the number McKinsey and Co (or similar company) said it would be?
  - gruez 1y ago
    >Exactly. How is it that an org suddenly discovered thousands of employees are under performers? The more correct statement is they suddenly cared about under performers. It's not any different than say, you noticing your grocery bills going up and as a result you cancel all the subscriptions you don't need. It's not like all those SaaS services' value propositions suddenly plummeted because the price of eggs went up, but now you suddenly have an eye for cutting costs.
- stego-tech 1y ago
  Literally this. Corporations are good at making up plausible excuses, but anyone who takes more than two seconds to evaluate their claims beyond face value will find they’re almost always complete bullshit. Underperformers should be rotated out long before a mass layoff occurs. If your company isn’t axing them until a mass layoff, they’re doing bad business.
- 1y ago