Richest 2% hold half of world's assets

[pvn]

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Perhaps I'll put it this way. I'm sure most factory workers would like to own their own business, but when the choice is work in the factory and live, albeit meagerly, or try to start your own business and let your family starve, then that's no choice at all. The capitalist are, as the ACist like to say, holding a gun and saying: be exploited or starve.

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The capitalist is not responsible for the worker's need to produce in order to avoid starvation. He did not put the worker in that position. Do you see why this is important?

[pvn]

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How is it the person paying $100 is not getting robbed?

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They could be as well. See everyone is robbed under capitalism. If the person hiring the plumber values his service at $100, then he is not being robbed.

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OK.

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However, if he does not actually value the service at $100, he is robbed if he knew he could get the service at $50.

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If he didn't value the service at $100, why would he buy it?

If he knew he could get it for $50, why would he pay $100?

Do you believe that oil companies were engaging in "exploitative" price gouging earlier this year when gas was approaching $4/gallon?

[Poofler]

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I'm not saying their will be no supervisors or managers in worker controlled firms, just significantly less than in capitalistic firms; right now most managers and supervisors spend much of their time just trying to make sure other people will be productive i.e. "make sure people are working hard/don't slack off etc." and disciplining those who do not.

If the wokers were the business owners, this function of management/supervision is rendered obsolete, because they will produce just because they get more $ if they produce, and workers won't allow their neighbor to slack off (because that hurts their pocketbook) hence their will be less managers and supervisors.

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I would think those assumptions are most valid in situations where you are least likely to have supervisors. All else equal, the marginal utility of your effort drops the larger the firm. Compare a 5 person law firm to a 3,000 person manufacturer. In the former, that extra effort is well worth it, in the latter, working yourself into a sweat to screw in 5 more bolts per hour is probably not. Your neighbor is in the same situation.

[Money2Burn]

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In your system

[/ QUOTE ] It's not my system. If you read the whole post, I favor the capitalist system.

Their are many real world worker controlled/owned firms, and they have run into both the positives and negatives that I listed.

If you are interested in how they work, I suggest reading up on "Mondragon" and/or Science Applications International Corporation (SAIC)(you'll probably get something good on the net if you do a google search for Mondragon). For SAIC, http://www.saic.com/about/history.html.

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I had a feeling you would point that out. I realized what i sounded like after i posted, but didn't feel like changeing it. Thanks for the info though.

[ShakeZula06]

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What's stopping the boy from dealing directly with man and mowing his lawn for the full gallon of milk.

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Like I said,
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Let's say he was sitting in his basement smoking weed and I told him he could mow a lawn.


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Lack of knowledge about the opprotunity, which is no excuse for exploitation.

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Ah, I see, so now it's not convience, it's ignorance. And why is it considered exploitation rather then me getting a profit for doing the middleman work of finding a lawn for him to mow?
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If the boy sought you out to find him lawns, then it's a different beast.

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What if i'm seeking out people to mow lawns, and he obliged, same thing?
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BTW, i'm not a marxist. I don't believe in centrally planned society. I'm a minarchist.

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Are you just arguing to be devil's advocate then, because I've never heard of a minarchist that believes this, it seems mutually exclusive to me.

[Dan.]

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Are you just arguing to be devil's advocate then, because I've never heard of a minarchist that believes this, it seems mutually exclusive to me.

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Noam Chomsky?

Edit: I often wonder my own beliefs as well, as they occasionally seem contradictory when explained. But in my mind, there is no conflict. I think it boils down to this: I'm very libertarian regarding issues that effect only one person (drug use, abortion, etc), but economically we are all connected, so I have a stake in other's choices, which may adversely affect me. (But I don't want to hijack this any further, so I'll leave it there.)

[Propertarian]

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I would think those assumptions are most valid in situations where you are least likely to have supervisors. All else equal, the marginal utility of your effort drops the larger the firm. Compare a 5 person law firm to a 3,000 person manufacturer. In the former, that extra effort is well worth it, in the latter, working yourself into a sweat to screw in 5 more bolts per hour is probably not. Your neighbor is in the same situation.

[/ QUOTE ] While I'm willing to go along with the idea that this effect is stronger the smaller the company...

I think, based on your language, you are ignoring the importance of principled behavior has in this area. A worker in a worker owned firm is far more likely to not "shirk" and is far more likely to report co-workers who do "out of principle"; in one case, the person not working is costing a millionaire or a bunch of wealthy stockholders she doesn't know money, in the other, she is costing her coworkers and herself money.

[Money2Burn]

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If the wokers were the business owners, this function of management/supervision is rendered obsolete, because they will produce just because they get more $ if they produce, and workers won't allow their neighbor to slack off (because that hurts their pocketbook) hence their will be less managers and supervisors.

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QFT. Talk about the ultimate economic insentive. If the company fails to produce many, high quality products, the workers themselves suffer. So obviously they'll work to their fullest, while at the same time self-policing other workers.

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What happens when the market for your product slows down for a period of time and, reguardless of how high quality the products and how many and how cheaply you produce them the business still loses money and the employees with it? Do you think these people will want to keep busting their asses for a loss?

[Dan.]

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What happens when the market for your product slows down for a period of time and, reguardless of how high quality the products and how many and how cheaply you produce them the business still loses money and the employees with it? Do you think these people will want to keep busting their asses for a loss?

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Lol, yeah companies never suffer a loss under a free market. Assuming they aren't covering their average variable costs, they obviously stop producing. But if they are covering their average variable costs, they will be better off staying open and producing at a loss than shutting down. I don't need to hijack this into a microecon lesson, so PM me if you don't understand. (I'm being serious. If you're interested, money2burn)

[neverforgetlol]

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The capitalist are, as the ACist like to say, holding a gun and saying: be exploited or starve.

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Lol. There's no gun, real or figurative. Almost everyone must work in order to survive. Very, very few are in a position to never have to work a day in their lives. The capitalist offers the worker a deal: Take a smaller cut of the revenue up front, or risk your capital the way the entrepreneur is. Since the worker doesn't want to risk his capital, he takes the deal. No exploitation.

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The worker most likely does not have the capital to risk in the first place, so that's not a choice. it's a catch-22.