Originally Posted by
PoliTalker
How does wealth extraction work to create extreme wealth inequality?
Well, capitalism always looks for ways to make more profits, increase profits. Small capitalism is more directly connected to people. Big capitalism is not, and that produces the extreme wealth inequality.
If a company is begun by a highly motivated capitalist who builds it from scratch and eventually gets wildly profitable, then he gets rich. And when he wants to retire and enjoy his wealth, he sells out.
When he began that company he had a few workers. He was personally acquainted with each of them. He hired them, he promoted them or fired them. He gave raises to the good ones and hired more to build the company. He knew every worker personally. He could relate to what happens to them as a result of his decisions. He felt a responsibility to be good to them because they are the most important part of the company.
If the company got big, an HR department took over the hiring and firing. The leaders and decision-makers of the company no longer even know the people who work for them. That's important. Oh, the owner knows the higher level workers and the long-timers, but all those new people never even met him. And the decision-makers are making decisions for the company without even connecting to what those decisions mean to the workers. Leadership is disassociated from the rank and file. Leadership in this position is able to make tougher decisions which have devastating effects to the workers. And it doesn't bother them as much because they don't even know the people who suffer the fate of those decisions.
What if, instead of this trajectory, there was a different path?
What if big companies were required to have representatives of labor on their boards? Somebody to 'bring it home.' Somebody to champion the worker's rights?
What if, when the owner was ready to sell out, that board was shifted to be entirely representative of the workers? What if workers could vote and fire a leader who did not live up to this responsibility? That would have a much better outcome for workers and communities where the company resides.
Well?
Where would the money come from to pay off the original owner when he sells out?
How about the profits the company is earning? What if THAT money was used to pay the owner for selling the company?
And what if the new owners of the company are actually hired by the workers so that they work for the workers?
This sounds a whole lot better for society than a company focused on one thing: more profits for the owners.
PoliTalker anti-troll thread thief disclaimer: If this thread is stolen, plagiarized, will the thief have the nerve to use the entire OP, word for word? Including this disclaimer? If you want my take on it, you'll have to post to this original PoliTalker thread. I refuse to be an enabler for online bullies, so I won't post to a stolen thread. I won't even read it. If you don't see me, PoliTalker, posting in this thread check the author. This might be a hijacked thread, not the original.
A healthy sustainable business model would not only generate profits for the owners and workers but would also have a responsibility to the workers and the communities they reside in.
Then you would never see your Detroits and your Flint Michigans, your devastated communities that capitalism left behind.
And if companies could not be bought and sold like products, then there would be no giant multi-national conglomerates that are so powerful they tell nations what to do.
Why would we want capitalism telling us what to do?
We should be the ones who control capitalism, not the other way around.
Jefferson would have agreed as would Adam Smith.
Last edited by Old Trapper; 01-30-2019 at 11:54 PM.
"2Timothy 3 "But know this, that in the last days perilous times will come: For men will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boasters, proud, blasphemers, disobedient to parents, unthankful, unholy, unloving, unforgiving, slanderers, without self-control, brutal, despisers of good, traitors, headstrong, haughty, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God, having a form of godliness but denying its power. And from such people turn away"
Bookmarks