jlou

joined 2 years ago
[–] jlou@mastodon.social 3 points 8 months ago

I have never found a meme that suitably emphasizes the responsibility aspect. Responsibility plays an essential role in the underlying argument due to the peculiarity that responsibility can't be transferred from person to person even with consent. You find memes about workers deserving the entire value of their labor, but none that emphasize responsibility and workers' property rights to the literal produced outputs and liabilities for the used-up inputs rather than just their value

@solarpunk

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 7 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (3 children)

The entire video isn't required to understand the argument. The first 15 minutes are sufficient

This argument probably can be explained in a 4 panel comic.

Probably, something like:
1 side: an employer and employee cooperating to commit a crime, which results in both being held responsible
Other side: an employer and employee cooperating to produce a widget resulting in the employer solely appropriating 100% of the property rights to the widget and liabilities for used-up inputs

@solarpunk

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 3 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

A variant of this should replace non-profit tax exemptions and all campaign finance rules.

The way to prevent bribing is secret and anonymous contributions. You could, for example, imagine including these contributions to your favorite media and FOSS organizations as part of your ballot.

This could be implemented by a federation of worker coops to fund local public goods that all the member coops benefit from with the matching pool coming from membership fees and Harberger leases

@socialism

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 41 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

Any company that receives government subsidies or is bailed out because it's too big too fail or whatever the reason should be mandated to become a worker coop

@politics

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 9 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The founders can hold more or all non-voting preferred stock in the worker coop to represent their larger stake and investment. They can also use a separate corporation, which only the founders own, with no employees to hold their capital and then lease it the worker coop

@politics

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 4 points 9 months ago* (last edited 9 months ago)

It would definitely be easier in an economy where this was the only way of doing things.

I am not a lawyer.

Based on the underlying economic theory and ethical arguments for worker coops/employee-owned companies, what you could do in such a situation is make a separate legal entity for the worker coop, and then lease the assets of the current legal entity to the worker coop. You and your partner maintain exclusive ownership of the original legal entity

@politics

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 0 points 9 months ago (1 children)

The statement being false implies that it is true, which is why this statement is contradictory if there are any omniscient beings

@atheistmemes

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 1 points 9 months ago

Today's legal systems mandate that legal responsibility be non-transferable for crimes. The economic democracy position argues that legal responsibility should be generally non-transferable matching general non-transferability of de facto responsibility due to the principle of justice that legal and de facto responsibility should match. Not all mandates are authoritarian (e.g. a mandate that one must respect others' personal property). Employment violates workers' property rights

@canada

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 0 points 9 months ago (2 children)

Political democracy also mandates legal non-transferability for voting rights. Would you allow people to sell or transfer their voting rights?

People prefer democratic firms: https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/american-political-science-review/article/what-do-americans-want-from-private-government-experimental-evidence-demonstrates-that-americans-want-workplace-democracy/D9C1DBB6F95D9EEA35A34ABF016511F4

A mandate doesn't restrict any non-institutionally-described action as labor is de facto non-transferable. It only prevents fraudulently treating de facto responsible persons as legal non-responsible things.

Are we free when we can sell our freedom or when we can't even if we want to?

@canada

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 0 points 9 months ago (4 children)

The idea is to mandate worker coop structure on all firms.

It's not that telling. Without a worker coop mandate, there are collective action problems and market failures. It's harder for all the workers to cooperate to form a worker coop than an employer to hire up all the workers.

No society has a full worker coop mandate because the modern arguments for it were published in the 90s. Some countries do mandate some worker board representation and codetermination though
@canada

[–] jlou@mastodon.social 12 points 9 months ago

Or we could abolish the employer-employee contract and mandate that all firms be worker coops, so that no one could appropriate the positive and negative fruits of other people's labor

@news

 

We Don't Agree on Capitalism: Demarcating the Red and Black

https://wedontagree.net/we-dont-agree-on-capitalism-(essay)

@libertyhub

 

The case for employee-owned companies

https://www.pbs.org/newshour/economy/column-the-case-for-employee-owned-companies

In the sidebar, it asks for recommendations such as reading lists. I propose that David Ellerman's work be included in the reading list. He makes a unique argument in favor of workplace democracy

@progressivepolitics

6
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by jlou@mastodon.social to c/humanities@beehaw.org
 

Does classical liberalism imply democracy?

https://www.ellerman.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Reprint-EGP-Classical-Liberalism-Democracy.pdf

"There is a fault line running through classical liberalism as to whether or not democratic self-governance is a necessary part of a liberal social order. The democratic and non-democratic strains of classical liberalism are both present today particularly in the United States. Many contemporary libertarians ... represent the non-democratic strain in their promotion of non-democratic sovereign city-states."

@humanities

 

The Telekommunist Manifesto

https://www.networkcultures.org/_uploads/%233notebook_telekommunist.pdf

"Proposing ‘venture communism’ ... for workers’ self-organization, Kleiner spins Marx and Engels’ ... Manifesto ... into the age of the internet. ... [V]enture communism allocates capital that is ... needed to accomplish what capitalism cannot: the ongoing proliferation of free culture and free networks.

In developing [this] concept ..., Kleiner provides a critique of copyright."

@leftism

 

"Inalienable Rights: Part I The Basic Argument." How the capitalist employer-employee relationship violates fundamental rights

https://www.ellerman.org/inalienable-rights-part-i-the-basic-argument/

Solarpunk should emphasize democracy in the workplace and not take something like the employer-employee contract as part of the furniture of the universe

@solarpunk

 

"Economic Democracy: arguments from the US" for workers' self-management and against the employer-employee contract

Economic democracy is a philosophy that shows that all workers have an inalienable right to workplace democracy/workers' self-management/worker coops. The employer-employee contract violates that right even if employment is fully voluntary. An inalienable right is a right that can't be given up or transferred even with consent

https://youtu.be/E8mq9va5_ZE?t=566

@leftism

 

Capitalist Markets Aren’t “Free.” They’re Planned for Profit.

Neoliberalism was never about shrinking the state to unfetter markets and enhance human freedom. In her new book, Vulture Capitalism, Grace Blakeley argues that neoliberalism has always sought to wield state power to maximize profits for the rich.

https://jacobin.com/2024/03/neoliberalism-markets-planning-vulture-capitalism/

@solarpunk

 

Collective Action Problems are Not a Capitalist Plot: On the Non-Triviality of Going from Individual to Collective Rationality

https://wedontagree.net/collective-action-problems-are-not-a-capitalist-plot

@socialism

 

Property in land - What are your thoughts on Georgist libertarianism?

The basic idea behind Georgism is that land and natural resources are not the fruits of anyone’s labor, so no one has a natural right to it. Georgism proposes based on this that collective ownership arrangements be applied to such resources. Geolibertarianism supports full private property rights in the products of labor.

https://youtu.be/smi/_iIoKybg

What are your thoughts on this approach to natural resources?

@libertarian

 

Take it from a former banker: the budget is for ordinary people. The mega-rich look on and laugh - Gary Stevenson

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2024/mar/05/banker-budget-mega-rich-traders-jeremy-hunt

@politics

 

The case for liberal anti-capitalism in the 21st century

https://aeon.co/essays/the-case-for-liberal-socialism-in-the-21st-century

The most powerful critiques of capitalism are actually liberal critiques in that they appeal to the liberal principles that defenders of capitalism invoke, but show that capitalism does not in fact satisfy them even in the ideal case.

@general

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