Replace shareholder-value capitalism with stakeholder capitalism
August 18, 2018 5:38 PM Subscribe
Elizabeth Warren has a plan to save capitalism - "She's unveiling a bill to make corporate governance great again." (via)
Elizabeth Warren unveils bold new plan to reshape American capitalism - "Accountable Capitalism Act would bring about 'fundamental change', redistribute wealth and give more power to workers."
The Shareholder Revolution Devours Its Children - "The economy has been rigged to channel wealth to a tiny elite."
Public Benefit, Incorporated - "Three simple changes to corporate law could radically remake our economy."
The Finance 202: Elizabeth Warren takes on corporate giants as she lays 2020 marker - "Her economic vision is emerging."
Kevin Williamson's unhinged attack on Elizabeth Warren's corporate accountability bill, explained - "I'm not sure he actually read it."
Scary. Deeply, Truly Scary - "Corporations would be run overwhelmingly for the benefit of existing workers. Pay would outstrip worker productivity – which itself would fall. Payrolls would bloat. Efficiency-enhancing innovation would disappear. And economic competition would become anemic as companies are run less and less to produce goods and services that appeal to consumers and more and more to produce security and sinecures that appeal to workers."
Elizabeth Warren Plans To Destroy Capitalism By Pretending To 'Save' It - Warren's plan would overrule corporate leaders' control over their own businesses. This is also known as 'socialism.'"
John Mackey and Conscious Capitalism Have Won the Battle of Ideas With Everyone but Libertarians - "Why can't free marketers celebrate entrepreneurs and titans of industry who change our world unless they admit they're in it only for the money?"
Trump and Warren agree: Corporations are holding back the economy - "Trump supports a minor tweak, while Warren would redirect corporations to serve the public as well as shareholders."
Capitalism Without Capital - "Not enough people are paying attention to this economic trend." (via)
"Over the last year, corporate profits have soared while average wages for Americans haven't budged. It's been the same sad story for decades. Today I'm introducing a new bill to help return to the time when American companies & workers did well together."How to Cure Corporate America's Selfishness - "Senator Elizabeth Warren has a simple idea for keeping big business accountable to the American public, not just shareholders."
"This is really interesting, as managerialist corporatism has always represented a middle ground between socialism and shareholder capitalism. This proposal would make us more like Japan."
Elizabeth Warren unveils bold new plan to reshape American capitalism - "Accountable Capitalism Act would bring about 'fundamental change', redistribute wealth and give more power to workers."
The Shareholder Revolution Devours Its Children - "The economy has been rigged to channel wealth to a tiny elite."
Public Benefit, Incorporated - "Three simple changes to corporate law could radically remake our economy."
The Finance 202: Elizabeth Warren takes on corporate giants as she lays 2020 marker - "Her economic vision is emerging."
Kevin Williamson's unhinged attack on Elizabeth Warren's corporate accountability bill, explained - "I'm not sure he actually read it."
Scary. Deeply, Truly Scary - "Corporations would be run overwhelmingly for the benefit of existing workers. Pay would outstrip worker productivity – which itself would fall. Payrolls would bloat. Efficiency-enhancing innovation would disappear. And economic competition would become anemic as companies are run less and less to produce goods and services that appeal to consumers and more and more to produce security and sinecures that appeal to workers."
Elizabeth Warren Plans To Destroy Capitalism By Pretending To 'Save' It - Warren's plan would overrule corporate leaders' control over their own businesses. This is also known as 'socialism.'"
John Mackey and Conscious Capitalism Have Won the Battle of Ideas With Everyone but Libertarians - "Why can't free marketers celebrate entrepreneurs and titans of industry who change our world unless they admit they're in it only for the money?"
Trump and Warren agree: Corporations are holding back the economy - "Trump supports a minor tweak, while Warren would redirect corporations to serve the public as well as shareholders."
"I've been doing some historical research into why so many Americans now say they support socialism. It really is important to realize that Republicans have systematically identified the social safety net with socialism."also btw...
Capitalism Without Capital - "Not enough people are paying attention to this economic trend." (via)
Co-determination is such an interesting corporate governance model; I’d love to see it gain some traction.
posted by Paragon at 5:59 PM on August 18, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by Paragon at 5:59 PM on August 18, 2018 [4 favorites]
But the rollout of her bill suggests that as she weighs whether to get into the presidential race, she’ll focus on how to prioritize workers in the American economic system while leaving businesses as the primary driver of it.
That's the real point of this bill, obviously. I love Warren, mind you—I think she's that rare politician who was genuinely called to office out of a desire to do good, rather than a desire for power. I'm proud that she's my senator, and I'd be happy to vote her into as high an office as she wants to go. I think she's probably the best person in Washington right now.
But her creating this bill isn't about changing policy, though I do believe that she thinks capitalism should be reformed and made more accountable to the populace. It's about signaling what her platform will be if she runs for president.
I hope she does run for president.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:20 PM on August 18, 2018 [8 favorites]
That's the real point of this bill, obviously. I love Warren, mind you—I think she's that rare politician who was genuinely called to office out of a desire to do good, rather than a desire for power. I'm proud that she's my senator, and I'd be happy to vote her into as high an office as she wants to go. I think she's probably the best person in Washington right now.
But her creating this bill isn't about changing policy, though I do believe that she thinks capitalism should be reformed and made more accountable to the populace. It's about signaling what her platform will be if she runs for president.
I hope she does run for president.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:20 PM on August 18, 2018 [8 favorites]
Signalling like this, regarding the eventual primary race, inspires me but also frustrates me because it just throws into stark contrast how centre-right and corporatist the party's senior leadership is.
posted by trackofalljades at 6:27 PM on August 18, 2018 [18 favorites]
posted by trackofalljades at 6:27 PM on August 18, 2018 [18 favorites]
Nobody is going to run on a platform of abolishing capitalism because that would be suicidal. Running on a platform of reforming capitalism and forcing it to work for the benefit of society is probably as radical as one can possibly get and still be a viable candidate. Possibly it is even too radical and wonkish for the general election, let alone as a set of implementable policy goals (a president is not a dictator after all, no matter how much our current one wishes it were so), but I think that in the primaries it just might work.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:39 PM on August 18, 2018 [28 favorites]
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:39 PM on August 18, 2018 [28 favorites]
This bill will go nowhere - at least right now. It’s about giving a shove to the Overton window as far as I’m concerned and that’s a good thing.
posted by azpenguin at 6:45 PM on August 18, 2018 [30 favorites]
posted by azpenguin at 6:45 PM on August 18, 2018 [30 favorites]
Great post, thanks!
posted by lilies.lilies at 7:01 PM on August 18, 2018
posted by lilies.lilies at 7:01 PM on August 18, 2018
Sorry socialists, the jig is up, Newt Gingrich has found Jacobin and he knows what we're up to with this incrementalism stuff and he's doesn't approve. (via @lukewsavage)
posted by Space Coyote at 7:07 PM on August 18, 2018 [5 favorites]
posted by Space Coyote at 7:07 PM on August 18, 2018 [5 favorites]
If a place called "Café Hayek" hates it, then let's do it.
I can only imagine the public fits the right will throw about this. But it's basically a return to the system we used to have, from Roosevelt to Reagan, the one that made every class better off rather than just the 10%.
(Though, 40% worker representation? Is that supposed to reassure the bad guys? 'Cos it won't. Might as well at least make it 50%, as in Germany.)
posted by zompist at 7:47 PM on August 18, 2018 [8 favorites]
I can only imagine the public fits the right will throw about this. But it's basically a return to the system we used to have, from Roosevelt to Reagan, the one that made every class better off rather than just the 10%.
(Though, 40% worker representation? Is that supposed to reassure the bad guys? 'Cos it won't. Might as well at least make it 50%, as in Germany.)
posted by zompist at 7:47 PM on August 18, 2018 [8 favorites]
If you want to bring anything that looks like socialism to the election trail, don't forget the attempts that have come before.
Eugene Debs may have been a while ago, but those campaigns are still informative as to how you can run an electoral campaign for socialism which might have a chance.
From a 1911 speech
"Voting for socialism is not socialism any more than a menu is a meal. Socialism must be organized drilled, equipped and the place to begin is in the industries where the workers are employed...Without such economic organization and the economic power with which it is clothed, and without the industrial co-operative training, discipline and efficiency which are its corollaries, the fruit of any political victories the workers may achieve will turn to ashes on their lips."
posted by AnhydrousLove at 8:01 PM on August 18, 2018 [6 favorites]
Eugene Debs may have been a while ago, but those campaigns are still informative as to how you can run an electoral campaign for socialism which might have a chance.
From a 1911 speech
"Voting for socialism is not socialism any more than a menu is a meal. Socialism must be organized drilled, equipped and the place to begin is in the industries where the workers are employed...Without such economic organization and the economic power with which it is clothed, and without the industrial co-operative training, discipline and efficiency which are its corollaries, the fruit of any political victories the workers may achieve will turn to ashes on their lips."
posted by AnhydrousLove at 8:01 PM on August 18, 2018 [6 favorites]
Beat me to my own post.
The Need For Workplace Democracy and Co-Determination is Obvious
It’s socialism! It’s the death of the economy! It’s… a plan to give employees a few seats on corporate boards.
Data For Debunking, Elizabeth Warren is not Stalin.
Whenever I think about stuff I think I think about the Youngstown case where a factory was to be closed and workers sued, arguing that they had land use rights to it since they worked there and improved the land and without the factory the entire town would die so it should be given to them to as they see fit if the company wasn’t using it anymore.
The decision was, of course, to destroy the factory.
Capitalism is a great creator eh?
posted by The Whelk at 8:54 PM on August 18, 2018 [32 favorites]
The Need For Workplace Democracy and Co-Determination is Obvious
It’s socialism! It’s the death of the economy! It’s… a plan to give employees a few seats on corporate boards.
Data For Debunking, Elizabeth Warren is not Stalin.
Whenever I think about stuff I think I think about the Youngstown case where a factory was to be closed and workers sued, arguing that they had land use rights to it since they worked there and improved the land and without the factory the entire town would die so it should be given to them to as they see fit if the company wasn’t using it anymore.
The decision was, of course, to destroy the factory.
Capitalism is a great creator eh?
posted by The Whelk at 8:54 PM on August 18, 2018 [32 favorites]
Just as an aside, I’ve noticed that Warren has replaced Pelosi as an evil liberal bugaboo in the conservative campaign ads airing in my neck of the woods. She must be doing something right.
posted by Thorzdad at 8:58 PM on August 18, 2018 [18 favorites]
posted by Thorzdad at 8:58 PM on August 18, 2018 [18 favorites]
50%, as in Germany.
55% and we can talk.
posted by The Whelk at 9:02 PM on August 18, 2018 [10 favorites]
55% and we can talk.
posted by The Whelk at 9:02 PM on August 18, 2018 [10 favorites]
Well if by trying to "save capitalism" we slowly place more power and resources from the top into more and more hands and hold more and more things to broad democratic processes who continue the process of redistribution of authority and decision making until the very idea of capitalism is eroded to a faceless statue nub then I'd say it was pretty well and good saved.
posted by The Whelk at 9:15 PM on August 18, 2018 [22 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 9:15 PM on August 18, 2018 [22 favorites]
"Corporations would be run overwhelmingly for the benefit of existing workers."
Sign me up! Except you are gonna have to concince me a lot harder that that is the actual intent and effect of the bill. Because what I want is an economy that is run overwhelmingly for the benefit of workers. Well, and outgroups that are underemployed or unable to work, like the elderly, or disabled veterans, or just the disabled. And children. Also students, did I mention students?
In sum, not scary, barely a gesture toward the kind of scary I want.
posted by mwhybark at 9:39 PM on August 18, 2018 [9 favorites]
Sign me up! Except you are gonna have to concince me a lot harder that that is the actual intent and effect of the bill. Because what I want is an economy that is run overwhelmingly for the benefit of workers. Well, and outgroups that are underemployed or unable to work, like the elderly, or disabled veterans, or just the disabled. And children. Also students, did I mention students?
In sum, not scary, barely a gesture toward the kind of scary I want.
posted by mwhybark at 9:39 PM on August 18, 2018 [9 favorites]
So in other words, take the way business, labor and government coexisted in the three post-war decades and codify that behavior into law? But with all the (supposed) civil rights that many minorities have come to enjoy since then. Sure, sign me up.
posted by morspin at 10:18 PM on August 18, 2018 [6 favorites]
posted by morspin at 10:18 PM on August 18, 2018 [6 favorites]
Sorry socialists, the jig is up, Newt Gingrich has found Jacobin
Great! can he explain the articles to me? the headlines are often interesting, but when I start to get into the meat I get so completely lost ...
posted by jb at 11:42 PM on August 18, 2018 [5 favorites]
Great! can he explain the articles to me? the headlines are often interesting, but when I start to get into the meat I get so completely lost ...
posted by jb at 11:42 PM on August 18, 2018 [5 favorites]
The framing is terrible but the bill is good. Being explicitly anti-capitalist in your messaging is how you get people excited and lots of free media attention. Look at Bernie and AOC. Besides, when you talk about "saving capitalism" the obvious rejoinder is "from what?" There needs to be a worker movement strong enough to scare the powerful before they concede you a place at the table.
posted by bookman117 at 1:39 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by bookman117 at 1:39 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
when you talk about "saving capitalism" the obvious rejoinder is "from what?"
I've seen several reports on this proposal whose headlines specify "from itself."
posted by Kirth Gerson at 2:32 AM on August 19, 2018 [11 favorites]
I've seen several reports on this proposal whose headlines specify "from itself."
posted by Kirth Gerson at 2:32 AM on August 19, 2018 [11 favorites]
Yeah, but what is it doing to itself? It's enriching the owners while shitting on everyone else.
posted by bookman117 at 2:42 AM on August 19, 2018
posted by bookman117 at 2:42 AM on August 19, 2018
Tacking onto my previous comment, it's not just senior Democratic leadership who are pro-capitalism. The vast majority of Americans are pro-capitalism, even if they don't think of themselves that way. Capitalism is the air we breathe, it's our national religion. It's so all-pervading that most of us, most of the time, don't even notice it. Proposing to abolish capitalism might as well be proposing to abolish America, in terms of how it would play as a campaign strategy.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 3:21 AM on August 19, 2018 [8 favorites]
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 3:21 AM on August 19, 2018 [8 favorites]
Here's the thing about Corporations. They don't exist until the Secretary of State says they do, usually in response to a filing petitioning The State for it.
Theoretically, UNLESS there's a benefit to The People, there's no reason for them to allow them to exist.
There's no real way of expressing this without calling back to slavery, because Corporations ARE inferior to The People. I don't mean this offensively, but Corporations have forgotten their place, and it's past time to remind them.
posted by mikelieman at 4:23 AM on August 19, 2018 [10 favorites]
Theoretically, UNLESS there's a benefit to The People, there's no reason for them to allow them to exist.
There's no real way of expressing this without calling back to slavery, because Corporations ARE inferior to The People. I don't mean this offensively, but Corporations have forgotten their place, and it's past time to remind them.
posted by mikelieman at 4:23 AM on August 19, 2018 [10 favorites]
I think we ought to do something like... embrace the statements of early-to-mid 20th century conservatives and re-define socialism to include our current system, with all the things like anti-trust law and Medicare which were supposedly going to lead to a totalitarian socialist or communist dystopia and very clearly did not.
Obviously, the present situation would only count as a very crappy form of socialism. But not only would there be a rhetorical advantage to being able to say, “See—even Ronald Reagan said that what we have now in the U.S. is socialism! We're just going along with what Reagan said!”, I think a major stumbling block on all fronts is that the right's propaganda has convinced everyone that “capitalism” refers to something like an economist's perfect theoretical model of frictionless perfectly spherical corporations interacting via utter rationality, when the reality is and has always been ridiculously laughably divergent from that. This conceptual proxy for capitalism is able to slip right past the bullshit detectors of a common sense person where any accurate appraisal of the country would set off so many alarms it would trigger quarantine protocols for containing xenomorphs.
I feel like every time someone on Fox News stridently says "Capitalism!" or implies their passionate groveling reverence for it, the audience's conceptions of the U.S. are snapped back to a version of that theoretical “free market” model only deviating from its perfection because of the corrupting influence of teh libruls. But with a looser conception of “socialism” for common parlance (which I realize doesn't fit its academic or historical definition) I think you can make a good argument that on the contrary, the U.S. is and always has been socialist: from colonial-era public education in some places to a constitutionally-established post office to early congressional land grants for universities to the Erie Canal (which Teddy Roosevelt of all people identified as socialist in a positive way) and great public works of the twentieth century, relatively heavy state involvement in the economy for the benefit of We The People is just a basic part of America.
Dithering about one flavor of capitalism versus another is playing the propaganda game on their turf but we need a way to bring it home. The tools for doing so are readily at hand:
TL;DR We need to get the popular conception of history seeing the way that socialism and its antecedents are fundamentally intrisic to the American endeavor, by stripping away the accreted bullshit and by drawing lines through all of the factors down the centuries bending toward a civic culture, civilization, and economy dedicated to benefitting We The People.
posted by XMLicious at 4:52 AM on August 19, 2018 [12 favorites]
Obviously, the present situation would only count as a very crappy form of socialism. But not only would there be a rhetorical advantage to being able to say, “See—even Ronald Reagan said that what we have now in the U.S. is socialism! We're just going along with what Reagan said!”, I think a major stumbling block on all fronts is that the right's propaganda has convinced everyone that “capitalism” refers to something like an economist's perfect theoretical model of frictionless perfectly spherical corporations interacting via utter rationality, when the reality is and has always been ridiculously laughably divergent from that. This conceptual proxy for capitalism is able to slip right past the bullshit detectors of a common sense person where any accurate appraisal of the country would set off so many alarms it would trigger quarantine protocols for containing xenomorphs.
I feel like every time someone on Fox News stridently says "Capitalism!" or implies their passionate groveling reverence for it, the audience's conceptions of the U.S. are snapped back to a version of that theoretical “free market” model only deviating from its perfection because of the corrupting influence of teh libruls. But with a looser conception of “socialism” for common parlance (which I realize doesn't fit its academic or historical definition) I think you can make a good argument that on the contrary, the U.S. is and always has been socialist: from colonial-era public education in some places to a constitutionally-established post office to early congressional land grants for universities to the Erie Canal (which Teddy Roosevelt of all people identified as socialist in a positive way) and great public works of the twentieth century, relatively heavy state involvement in the economy for the benefit of We The People is just a basic part of America.
Dithering about one flavor of capitalism versus another is playing the propaganda game on their turf but we need a way to bring it home. The tools for doing so are readily at hand:
We need our own idealistic history of American to counter their saccarine rewritten-but-not-true-in-the-first-place-anyway nationalist pablum that has the Founding Fathers as prophetic demigods who sought to craft the foundations of the perfect free market via their every deed and action, and also did you know they were all home-schoolers? (For anyone aspiring(←megathread link) to be the Mouth of Sauron: in the Black Speech of Mordor “home-schoolers” describes rich Southern plantation owners and bankers and lawyers who could afford tutors for their own children.)Labor is prior to and independent of capital. Capital is only the fruit of labor, and could never have existed if labor had not first existed. Labor is the superior of capital, and deserves much the higher consideration.—Abraham Lincoln, First Annual Message, December 3, 1861
TL;DR We need to get the popular conception of history seeing the way that socialism and its antecedents are fundamentally intrisic to the American endeavor, by stripping away the accreted bullshit and by drawing lines through all of the factors down the centuries bending toward a civic culture, civilization, and economy dedicated to benefitting We The People.
posted by XMLicious at 4:52 AM on August 19, 2018 [12 favorites]
I like capitalism, but I hate corporatism, and corporate feudalism even more. I want to live in capitalist society where individual initiative and entrepreneurship are rewarded, not in some robber baron's market fiefdom. That is from what capitalism needs saving.
Socialism is just another way of consolidating power so it can be easily captured by a dictator, but capitalism done right looks a lot like communism.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 6:06 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
Socialism is just another way of consolidating power so it can be easily captured by a dictator, but capitalism done right looks a lot like communism.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 6:06 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
"Corporations would be run overwhelmingly for the benefit of existing workers. Pay would outstrip worker productivity – which itself would fall. Payrolls would bloat. Efficiency-enhancing innovation would disappear.”
First, it’s reeeeeaaaaalllyyy hard for me to see how “corporations exist to benefit workers” is bad, especially compared to “corporations exist to further enrich already wealthy shareholders, most of whom provide no labor.” But the bigger issue is what a fucked up view of humanity this represents. “If you give workers a voice, they’ll stop working! Efficiency will fall! They’ll raid the coffers to give money to themselves!” Okay, maybe so, if the baseline is unlivable wages, inadequate benefits, and zero job security. But people take pride in what they do. They look out for organizations that look out for them. They’re naturally competitive. If workers elect 40% of the board of XYZ Widget Company, they’ll choose people who will help XYZ Widgets be the best damn widgets possible. They just won’t impoverish their employees to do it.
And I’d bet a lot of money that productivity will go up. You’re going to have a hard time convincing me that fairly compensated workers with a voice in what happens are going to work less than minimum wage peons.
Crap like this is basically all rooted in the lie that “Labor is labor because they are too dumb and lazy to be owners. We owners are smart and rich.” In reality, luck and opportunity has more to do with where you wind up than merit does.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 6:09 AM on August 19, 2018 [31 favorites]
First, it’s reeeeeaaaaalllyyy hard for me to see how “corporations exist to benefit workers” is bad, especially compared to “corporations exist to further enrich already wealthy shareholders, most of whom provide no labor.” But the bigger issue is what a fucked up view of humanity this represents. “If you give workers a voice, they’ll stop working! Efficiency will fall! They’ll raid the coffers to give money to themselves!” Okay, maybe so, if the baseline is unlivable wages, inadequate benefits, and zero job security. But people take pride in what they do. They look out for organizations that look out for them. They’re naturally competitive. If workers elect 40% of the board of XYZ Widget Company, they’ll choose people who will help XYZ Widgets be the best damn widgets possible. They just won’t impoverish their employees to do it.
And I’d bet a lot of money that productivity will go up. You’re going to have a hard time convincing me that fairly compensated workers with a voice in what happens are going to work less than minimum wage peons.
Crap like this is basically all rooted in the lie that “Labor is labor because they are too dumb and lazy to be owners. We owners are smart and rich.” In reality, luck and opportunity has more to do with where you wind up than merit does.
posted by Pater Aletheias at 6:09 AM on August 19, 2018 [31 favorites]
Needs a new catch phrase like "A chicken in every pot". But replace chicken with wall sized TV, and pot with well "pot"
posted by sammyo at 6:49 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by sammyo at 6:49 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
I forsee many shell companies whose annual revenue is magically just under a billion. The powers would rather pay for financial shenanigans than let the workers have a seat at the table.
posted by kokaku at 6:52 AM on August 19, 2018 [9 favorites]
posted by kokaku at 6:52 AM on August 19, 2018 [9 favorites]
"capitalism done right looks a lot like communism"
Has humanity done this before? China seems to be adopting the worst parts of capitalism and putting them together with the worst parts of communism.
posted by Selena777 at 7:23 AM on August 19, 2018 [3 favorites]
Has humanity done this before? China seems to be adopting the worst parts of capitalism and putting them together with the worst parts of communism.
posted by Selena777 at 7:23 AM on August 19, 2018 [3 favorites]
Unless we eliminate the market mentality and capital hoarding we’re just arguing about what song the band plays as the ship sinks. Ignoring the extensional crisis to the species of climate change, basically no one under 40 has savings or wealth to speak of. I don’t know how that doesn’t translate into a massive overhaul of the entire way of doing things in the near future.
Social democracy without social control of the production and decision making is a cease fire with the alien entities called Corporations.
I’m pretty sure people would be down for some kind of system where if you have to pay an unexpected 400$ it doesn’t completely ruin your life.
posted by The Whelk at 7:41 AM on August 19, 2018 [9 favorites]
Social democracy without social control of the production and decision making is a cease fire with the alien entities called Corporations.
I’m pretty sure people would be down for some kind of system where if you have to pay an unexpected 400$ it doesn’t completely ruin your life.
posted by The Whelk at 7:41 AM on August 19, 2018 [9 favorites]
China is state capitalist.
"society where individual initiative and entrepreneurship are rewarded"
This would be good, but not if the reward is economic control over the lives of others.
I will note that in Germany, co-determination is backed up by organised labour to a much greater extent than it would be in the US, as I understand things.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 7:56 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
"society where individual initiative and entrepreneurship are rewarded"
This would be good, but not if the reward is economic control over the lives of others.
I will note that in Germany, co-determination is backed up by organised labour to a much greater extent than it would be in the US, as I understand things.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 7:56 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
I‘m afraid the whole plan, although certainly well-intentioned, just doesn‘t sound very sexy. What‘s the slogan to rally behind? (Surely not ‚Save Capitalism!‘?)
posted by The Toad at 7:57 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by The Toad at 7:57 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
I don’t know maybe something about workers all over coming together cause they have very little to loose.
posted by The Whelk at 7:59 AM on August 19, 2018 [8 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 7:59 AM on August 19, 2018 [8 favorites]
Workers / United / Will Never Be Defeated
We know what you're all about / Cuts / Job Losses / Money for the bosses
Tell me what democracy looks like / this is what democracy looks like
When working folks are under attack / What do we do? / STAND UP, FIGHT BACK!
or variations thereof are all classics. The issue is not a lack of chants.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 8:23 AM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]
We know what you're all about / Cuts / Job Losses / Money for the bosses
Tell me what democracy looks like / this is what democracy looks like
When working folks are under attack / What do we do? / STAND UP, FIGHT BACK!
or variations thereof are all classics. The issue is not a lack of chants.
posted by AnhydrousLove at 8:23 AM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]
Black & White Unite & Fight
posted by The Whelk at 8:33 AM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 8:33 AM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
Because what I want is an economy that is run overwhelmingly for the benefit of workers.
I get what you are saying but I think its useful to be more precise.
What you want is an economy that is run for the welfare of the public. Not everyone is a worker. And not every worker is doing or making things good for the public.
But having workers on the board of directors is a good start in steering companies in the right direction.
posted by JackFlash at 8:54 AM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
I get what you are saying but I think its useful to be more precise.
What you want is an economy that is run for the welfare of the public. Not everyone is a worker. And not every worker is doing or making things good for the public.
But having workers on the board of directors is a good start in steering companies in the right direction.
posted by JackFlash at 8:54 AM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
China isn't communist: they're what late-stage socialism looks like. They're as good an example of how ideology is nothing but an excuse for the ruling class to maintain and consolidate power as is the US.
posted by I-Write-Essays at 8:57 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by I-Write-Essays at 8:57 AM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
Yeah we often use worker as a stand-in for the public but it's important to remember not everyone can or even should work.
No wealth but commonwealth, no governance but by the consent if the governed
posted by The Whelk at 9:08 AM on August 19, 2018 [12 favorites]
No wealth but commonwealth, no governance but by the consent if the governed
posted by The Whelk at 9:08 AM on August 19, 2018 [12 favorites]
"Corporations would be run overwhelmingly for the benefit of existing workers. Pay would outstrip worker productivity – which itself would fall. Payrolls would bloat. Efficiency-enhancing innovation would disappear.”
I always wonder why people think things like this when exactly the opposite happened in Germany. German unions, employers, and politicians have conspired over the last two decades to deliberately supress wage growth in Germany as productivity went up in order to increase overall employment.
Many Germany industrial workers expect to be with the same employer for decades, they expect their unions to represent their interests and that includes protecting the competitive position of their employers.
Of course if you expect to only work for a company for a few years and have no protection against arbitrary dismissal (the way American workers do) then you're not going to run the company with the same amount of care.
posted by atrazine at 10:46 AM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
I always wonder why people think things like this when exactly the opposite happened in Germany. German unions, employers, and politicians have conspired over the last two decades to deliberately supress wage growth in Germany as productivity went up in order to increase overall employment.
Many Germany industrial workers expect to be with the same employer for decades, they expect their unions to represent their interests and that includes protecting the competitive position of their employers.
Of course if you expect to only work for a company for a few years and have no protection against arbitrary dismissal (the way American workers do) then you're not going to run the company with the same amount of care.
posted by atrazine at 10:46 AM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
And even that's a utopian pie-in-the-sky scenario compared to American capitalism, where employers and politicians have conspired to deliberately suppress wage growth as productivity went up in order to increase overall yacht sales.
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 11:21 AM on August 19, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by Holy Zarquon's Singing Fish at 11:21 AM on August 19, 2018 [4 favorites]
I'm grateful to Senator Warren for trying but her own party isn't going to pass this bill. It was President Clinton who convinced the Democrats to abandon the interests of the working class in favor of corporations. President Obama didn't really change that. One of his first acts in office was to bail out the banks. There was never any chance of him questioning the corporatist agenda both parties share. The Democrats controlled Congress at the time; it was the Dems who used taxpayer money to pay the very Wall Street speculators who caused the crisis. For that same price they could have resolved the crisis by paying off the mortgages of every homeowner in America. Obama could have had the Justice Department investigate and indict everyone who helped bring the crisis about. Instead they were rewarded. By the Democrats.
Mostly those same Democrats are in Congress and running the party. So don't hold your breath.
posted by eustacescrubb at 11:45 AM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
Mostly those same Democrats are in Congress and running the party. So don't hold your breath.
posted by eustacescrubb at 11:45 AM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
Trump Tax Cut Pays Dividends For the G.O.P. - "Republicans may be struggling to sell their $1.5 trillion tax cut to voters, but the law has helped unleash tens of millions from donors who benefited handsomely from it."
posted by kliuless at 11:54 AM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by kliuless at 11:54 AM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]
As someone who worked for a public benefit corporation and saw the positive effect being explicit about goals other than shareholder profit maximization this can have, I’m excited.
As someone who also saw the same company give up its B-Corp certification in response to investor pressure, I think we will only ever realize those benefits when they are applied to all corporations. I hope that happens before either the pitchforks or depression.
posted by Cogito at 12:10 PM on August 19, 2018 [8 favorites]
As someone who also saw the same company give up its B-Corp certification in response to investor pressure, I think we will only ever realize those benefits when they are applied to all corporations. I hope that happens before either the pitchforks or depression.
posted by Cogito at 12:10 PM on August 19, 2018 [8 favorites]
The Democrats controlled Congress at the time; it was the Dems who used taxpayer money to pay the very Wall Street speculators who caused the crisis. For that same price they could have resolved the crisis by paying off the mortgages of every homeowner in America.
TARP was used to buy $426 billion worth of bank equity shares and toxic assets. These were eventually sold for $442 billion, for a net gain of $15 billion to the Treasury. Why not buy delinquent mortgages directly? First, because it wouldn't have solved the immediate problem, which was illiquidity in the banking sector. As bad as the recession was, it could have been a lot worse if major banks had been allowed to implode like Lehman brothers. Second, it would have cost more. At the time of the housing crisis, total mortgage debt in the country was close to $9 trillion dollars. The rate of delinquency started off around 3% in 2008 and eventually rose to 11% at its peak, so the cost of paying off those mortgages (just the delinquent ones) would have topped $1 trillion. Housing prices have still not returned to pre-recession levels a decade later, so it's unlikely the Treasury would have been able to recover most of that money, much less make a profit. Finally, paying off mortgages would still have amounted to a bailout of the financial sector (albeit a slower, less efficient bailout), since investors and speculators were ultimately the ones holding the mortgage-backed securities. The families who had their delinquent mortgages paid off would certainly have been happy with this system, but keep in mind that the bulk of delinquent mortgages were held by middle- and high-income families.
posted by dephlogisticated at 3:16 PM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
TARP was used to buy $426 billion worth of bank equity shares and toxic assets. These were eventually sold for $442 billion, for a net gain of $15 billion to the Treasury. Why not buy delinquent mortgages directly? First, because it wouldn't have solved the immediate problem, which was illiquidity in the banking sector. As bad as the recession was, it could have been a lot worse if major banks had been allowed to implode like Lehman brothers. Second, it would have cost more. At the time of the housing crisis, total mortgage debt in the country was close to $9 trillion dollars. The rate of delinquency started off around 3% in 2008 and eventually rose to 11% at its peak, so the cost of paying off those mortgages (just the delinquent ones) would have topped $1 trillion. Housing prices have still not returned to pre-recession levels a decade later, so it's unlikely the Treasury would have been able to recover most of that money, much less make a profit. Finally, paying off mortgages would still have amounted to a bailout of the financial sector (albeit a slower, less efficient bailout), since investors and speculators were ultimately the ones holding the mortgage-backed securities. The families who had their delinquent mortgages paid off would certainly have been happy with this system, but keep in mind that the bulk of delinquent mortgages were held by middle- and high-income families.
posted by dephlogisticated at 3:16 PM on August 19, 2018 [5 favorites]
capitalism done right looks a lot like communism
See, this is exactly what I was talking about above. There has been an immense amount of propaganda at every level to make your thoughts turn to an imaginary perfect “capitalism done right” when the subject of capitalism-absent-socialism comes up, a frictionless fluid market where no one can achieve enough leverage to take advantage exploitatively because of the magic invisible hand. It has never ever existed anywhere and never will.
No one will ever get past the Dictatorship of the Capitalists in the form of the “robber baron's market fiefdom” nor will anyone ever get past the Dictatorship of the Proletariat through fealty and submission to their respective ideological systems. Fairy tales about those things materializing one beautiful day are intended to get you to do nothing about endemic economic exploitation.
If you can suggest with a straight face that China reached some sort of teleological “late stage socialism” in the course of the whole whopping 43 years between the conclusion of the Communist Revolution there and Deng Xiaoping's “to get rich is glorious” 1992 Southern Tour I think it simply shows the power of the propaganda at both ends of the spectrum. Both markets and common ownership of things at a societal level—held in trust for the public—are essential tools for putting in place a healthy and adaptive res publica and economy, but avarice is incapable of the societal transformation these mythologies attribute to it.
posted by XMLicious at 3:36 PM on August 19, 2018 [9 favorites]
paying off mortgages would still have amounted to a bailout of the financial sector (albeit a slower, less efficient bailout), since investors and speculators were ultimately the ones holding the mortgage-backed securities. The families who had their delinquent mortgages paid off would certainly have been happy with this system, but keep in mind that the bulk of delinquent mortgages were held by middle- and high-income families.
So instead if helping out people with mortgages, regardless of class, we sent the money right back to the people who caused the problem and did nothing for the people who were sold the mortgages in bad faith in the first place, because it wasn't "efficient."
And you're right, by the time all was said and done, TARP didn't pay out as much as was originally estimated ($700 billion - much closer to the $1 trillion), but at the same time the government is the guarantor on over $7 trillion in debt meaning that yes, while the Treasury made a "profit" of a few billion, it now technically is on the hook for all the debt should the banks fail again. And there's no reason to think they won't - there have been numerous cases of TARP fraud, little to no consequences for banks not using the bailout money as expected, and corporate officers leaving companies with giant golden parachutes. That's all aided the overall project of shifting wealth toward the 1%. Meanwhile the economy has supposedly "recovered" but wages have fallen.
posted by eustacescrubb at 4:00 PM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]
So instead if helping out people with mortgages, regardless of class, we sent the money right back to the people who caused the problem and did nothing for the people who were sold the mortgages in bad faith in the first place, because it wasn't "efficient."
And you're right, by the time all was said and done, TARP didn't pay out as much as was originally estimated ($700 billion - much closer to the $1 trillion), but at the same time the government is the guarantor on over $7 trillion in debt meaning that yes, while the Treasury made a "profit" of a few billion, it now technically is on the hook for all the debt should the banks fail again. And there's no reason to think they won't - there have been numerous cases of TARP fraud, little to no consequences for banks not using the bailout money as expected, and corporate officers leaving companies with giant golden parachutes. That's all aided the overall project of shifting wealth toward the 1%. Meanwhile the economy has supposedly "recovered" but wages have fallen.
posted by eustacescrubb at 4:00 PM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]
Also, the 2007/08 crisis was only possible because President Clinton oversaw the repeal of the teeth of the Glass-Stegal Act which had made illegal the very practices that led to the crisis. So my main point - that the Democrats are not likely to support Sen. Warren's bill because they don't differ from the Republicans in this regard - stands, whether you're optimistic about that $7 trillion or not.
posted by eustacescrubb at 4:18 PM on August 19, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by eustacescrubb at 4:18 PM on August 19, 2018 [4 favorites]
paying off mortgages would still have amounted to a bailout of the financial sector (albeit a slower, less efficient bailout), since investors and speculators were ultimately the ones holding the mortgage-backed securities.
There are certainly other more fair scenarios than the one you painted. For example, one that was proposed by many economists at the time was Right to Rent. Instead of foreclosing on homeowners, the mortgage would be converted into a right to rent the home they lived in for 5 to 10 years at prevailing market rates.
This would keep families in their homes and their children in their schools and provide stability and security for millions of families that in the actual scenario were kicked out and onto the street. It would have helped stabilize the housing market by eliminating the glut of foreclosed homes and stabilized neighborhoods from the blight of abandoned and run down homes.
Because the housing bubble had increased house prices so much above equivalent rentals, in most cases the monthly payments for renters would decrease by 30% or more. Bondholders would have taken a haircut in the short term, but the illiquidity death spiral would have been stopped as uncertainty about the number of foreclosures was eliminated.
As far as the big banks go, they should have been handled the same way as Obama handled General Motors. Management was fired and replaced, equity holders were wiped out and bondholders were given a haircut.
Instead, in what was perhaps the most egregious and damning part of the bank bailout, as tens of millions were thrown out of work and lost their homes, politicians declared that salary contracts were sacred and billions in bonuses must be paid to the very bank executives responsible for the financial crisis.
And in a further failure, Obama and Eric Holder protected the wrongdoers from prosecution, saying it was "difficult." However, in the previous much smaller savings and loan crisis of the 1980s, there were over 30,000 criminal referrals, and over 1000 individuals in cases deemed major went to jail. The justice department had a better than 90% conviction rate for cases they took to trial. Obama and Holder jailed not a single major banker. They didn't even try.
posted by JackFlash at 5:58 PM on August 19, 2018 [12 favorites]
There are certainly other more fair scenarios than the one you painted. For example, one that was proposed by many economists at the time was Right to Rent. Instead of foreclosing on homeowners, the mortgage would be converted into a right to rent the home they lived in for 5 to 10 years at prevailing market rates.
This would keep families in their homes and their children in their schools and provide stability and security for millions of families that in the actual scenario were kicked out and onto the street. It would have helped stabilize the housing market by eliminating the glut of foreclosed homes and stabilized neighborhoods from the blight of abandoned and run down homes.
Because the housing bubble had increased house prices so much above equivalent rentals, in most cases the monthly payments for renters would decrease by 30% or more. Bondholders would have taken a haircut in the short term, but the illiquidity death spiral would have been stopped as uncertainty about the number of foreclosures was eliminated.
As far as the big banks go, they should have been handled the same way as Obama handled General Motors. Management was fired and replaced, equity holders were wiped out and bondholders were given a haircut.
Instead, in what was perhaps the most egregious and damning part of the bank bailout, as tens of millions were thrown out of work and lost their homes, politicians declared that salary contracts were sacred and billions in bonuses must be paid to the very bank executives responsible for the financial crisis.
And in a further failure, Obama and Eric Holder protected the wrongdoers from prosecution, saying it was "difficult." However, in the previous much smaller savings and loan crisis of the 1980s, there were over 30,000 criminal referrals, and over 1000 individuals in cases deemed major went to jail. The justice department had a better than 90% conviction rate for cases they took to trial. Obama and Holder jailed not a single major banker. They didn't even try.
posted by JackFlash at 5:58 PM on August 19, 2018 [12 favorites]
So my main point - that the Democrats are not likely to support Sen. Warren's bill because they don't differ from the Republicans in this regard - standsAre we certain that there’s no chance that the party position has shifted in the last twenty years? An entire generation realizing that they got a worse deal than their parents has and will have no significant effect?
posted by adamsc at 5:59 PM on August 19, 2018 [2 favorites]
It's only been 10 years since TARP. And a majority of the Democrats in Congress were in Congress then. Nothing about Secretary Clinton's campaign suggested she was going to abandon the party's corporatist allegiance. So, sure, the party could have changed, but I'm not seeing any reason to assume it has.
posted by eustacescrubb at 6:21 PM on August 19, 2018 [3 favorites]
posted by eustacescrubb at 6:21 PM on August 19, 2018 [3 favorites]
Pater Aletheias: But people take pride in what they do. They look out for organizations that look out for them. They’re naturally competitive. If workers elect 40% of the board of XYZ Widget Company, they’ll choose people who will help XYZ Widgets be the best damn widgets possible. They just won’t impoverish their employees to do it.
Right on the money as usual, Pater Aletheias. I recently started working for an employee-owned company. Rank-and-file employees don't get to elect board members at my company, but we do own stock in it—the workers and the shareholders are one and the same. We have an incentive to help the company do well, and because of the way ESOPs are structured (you don't get a payout until you leave the company) we have an incentive to help it do well in the long term rather than the short. So we're not making strategic decisions, but there are some parallels with the way corporations would work under Warren's system.
The difference between this company and literally every other one I've ever worked for is stark. Even though most employees are unlikely to benefit from increasing the company's value for decades at least, and even though we have no direct say in strategic decisionmaking, the attitude that people have here is just amazing. When people have spare time, they go help other workers instead of slacking. When they see something that's not right or could be better, they speak up. When they have an issue with the way management is doing something, they say so. People sit around at lunch brainstorming how to do a job better the next time around. And people take real lunch breaks, work compressed work weeks if they want to, get access to the company's financials, sit on steering committees… there's what I would call a feeling if civic pride, that we're all part of the same big project and that we should all do our parts. It's the kind of thing that most corporations only pretend to have, but it's real here. It shows in the quality of work, and it shows in people's work ethic. People feel well treated, and they respond with loyalty and hard work. I've never seen anything like it.
To put some hard numbers to it though, here's an excerpt from a Forbes piece from 2016:
A study by EY found that S ESOPs returned 11.5% average annual growth from 2002 to 2012 compared to a growth rate of just 7.1% for the top publicly traded companies. Of course, when an ESOP company grows its value, that means the employees who own the company see their shares in the ESOP grow – which means they have more money saved for their retirement.
Employee-owned companies grow on average 62% faster than traditional ones. That's a pretty huge difference. Give workers a share of the fruits of their labor, and they'll deliver.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 7:07 PM on August 19, 2018 [14 favorites]
Right on the money as usual, Pater Aletheias. I recently started working for an employee-owned company. Rank-and-file employees don't get to elect board members at my company, but we do own stock in it—the workers and the shareholders are one and the same. We have an incentive to help the company do well, and because of the way ESOPs are structured (you don't get a payout until you leave the company) we have an incentive to help it do well in the long term rather than the short. So we're not making strategic decisions, but there are some parallels with the way corporations would work under Warren's system.
The difference between this company and literally every other one I've ever worked for is stark. Even though most employees are unlikely to benefit from increasing the company's value for decades at least, and even though we have no direct say in strategic decisionmaking, the attitude that people have here is just amazing. When people have spare time, they go help other workers instead of slacking. When they see something that's not right or could be better, they speak up. When they have an issue with the way management is doing something, they say so. People sit around at lunch brainstorming how to do a job better the next time around. And people take real lunch breaks, work compressed work weeks if they want to, get access to the company's financials, sit on steering committees… there's what I would call a feeling if civic pride, that we're all part of the same big project and that we should all do our parts. It's the kind of thing that most corporations only pretend to have, but it's real here. It shows in the quality of work, and it shows in people's work ethic. People feel well treated, and they respond with loyalty and hard work. I've never seen anything like it.
To put some hard numbers to it though, here's an excerpt from a Forbes piece from 2016:
A study by EY found that S ESOPs returned 11.5% average annual growth from 2002 to 2012 compared to a growth rate of just 7.1% for the top publicly traded companies. Of course, when an ESOP company grows its value, that means the employees who own the company see their shares in the ESOP grow – which means they have more money saved for their retirement.
Employee-owned companies grow on average 62% faster than traditional ones. That's a pretty huge difference. Give workers a share of the fruits of their labor, and they'll deliver.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 7:07 PM on August 19, 2018 [14 favorites]
Cogito: As someone who worked for a public benefit corporation and saw the positive effect being explicit about goals other than shareholder profit maximization this can have, I’m excited.
As someone who also saw the same company give up its B-Corp certification in response to investor pressure, I think we will only ever realize those benefits when they are applied to all corporations.
My company is actually a B-corp as well as an ESOP. It's an employee-owned benefit corporation. It's a really good model and I'm proud to be a part of it.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 7:21 PM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]
As someone who also saw the same company give up its B-Corp certification in response to investor pressure, I think we will only ever realize those benefits when they are applied to all corporations.
My company is actually a B-corp as well as an ESOP. It's an employee-owned benefit corporation. It's a really good model and I'm proud to be a part of it.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 7:21 PM on August 19, 2018 [1 favorite]
As ongoing Democratic Party problems, I often said the lack of deep backbench was an asset - the general trend is everyone is either 27 or 67 and the younger cohorts don’t like corporations at all.
posted by The Whelk at 7:32 PM on August 19, 2018 [4 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 7:32 PM on August 19, 2018 [4 favorites]
The issue is not a lack of chants.
WHAT DO WE WANT / GRADUAL CHANGE / WHEN DO WE WANT IT / IN DUE COURSE
posted by flabdablet at 10:28 PM on August 19, 2018 [7 favorites]
WHAT DO WE WANT / GRADUAL CHANGE / WHEN DO WE WANT IT / IN DUE COURSE
posted by flabdablet at 10:28 PM on August 19, 2018 [7 favorites]
But the bigger issue is what a fucked up view of humanity this represents. “If you give workers a voice, they’ll stop working! Efficiency will fall! They’ll raid the coffers to give money to themselves!” Okay, maybe so, if the baseline is unlivable wages, inadequate benefits, and zero job security. But people take pride in what they do. They look out for organizations that look out for them.Yeah, this is classic "Theory X" thinking, where management thought the worst of workers and felt the only way to motivate this "unreliable and irresponsible lot" was through control, coercion and threats of punishment. Which didn't work so well for people who had most of their lower-order needs met. So Theory Y largely took over; treat people as though they were capable of and willing to self-direct; that they would exercise self-control if they were committed to the objectives; that you get better workers when you address their higher-order needs like self-actualization. Other, even more humanistic theories, came and the arc of change was generally towards treating workers as much more willing to contribute if given latitude and respect. Things like Job Enlargement, Participative Management and Decentralization came when companies moved away from Theory X.
McGregor came up with those theories in 1960, and it looks like they want a rollback to 1959. Are we really going back to management views from before I was born?
posted by Hardcore Poser at 7:18 AM on August 20, 2018 [2 favorites]
capitalism doesn't need saving; we need to be saved from capitalism.
posted by entropicamericana at 8:12 AM on August 20, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by entropicamericana at 8:12 AM on August 20, 2018 [2 favorites]
How does a government generate funds to pay for social programs without it?
posted by Selena777 at 8:22 AM on August 20, 2018
posted by Selena777 at 8:22 AM on August 20, 2018
Yeah, this is classic "Theory X" thinking, where management thought the worst of workers and felt the only way to motivate this "unreliable and irresponsible lot" was through control, coercion and threats of punishment.
And oddly enough, CEOs, management and whomever require bonuses, stock options, and other "positive" incentives to make sure they work adequately hard for the interests of the company. The carrot for me and the stick for thee.
posted by Rumple at 8:49 AM on August 20, 2018 [3 favorites]
And oddly enough, CEOs, management and whomever require bonuses, stock options, and other "positive" incentives to make sure they work adequately hard for the interests of the company. The carrot for me and the stick for thee.
posted by Rumple at 8:49 AM on August 20, 2018 [3 favorites]
And we know when dealing with humans, the carrot always outperforms the stick.
Management thinking themselves separate from workers is a classic divide and conquer move from the people up top.
posted by The Whelk at 9:13 AM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
Management thinking themselves separate from workers is a classic divide and conquer move from the people up top.
posted by The Whelk at 9:13 AM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
I'm grateful to Senator Warren for trying but her own party isn't going to pass this bill.
Dems don't have the Senate so nothing's getting passed no matter what. This is an Overton move, meant to introduce a new mode of business into the public consciousness. I consider myself pretty woke on inequality, its causes & solutions but I had never heard of co-determination as a practical system currently in use with a substantial record to point to.
posted by scalefree at 10:01 AM on August 20, 2018
Dems don't have the Senate so nothing's getting passed no matter what. This is an Overton move, meant to introduce a new mode of business into the public consciousness. I consider myself pretty woke on inequality, its causes & solutions but I had never heard of co-determination as a practical system currently in use with a substantial record to point to.
posted by scalefree at 10:01 AM on August 20, 2018
Also, proposing these things when not in power shows us, the voters, that there’s a plan for when you do get into power. It shows a little skin in the game.
posted by The Whelk at 10:25 AM on August 20, 2018 [5 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 10:25 AM on August 20, 2018 [5 favorites]
I love the idea and long for the fantasy world in which is could even jokingly start to be implemented.
posted by GoblinHoney at 2:41 PM on August 20, 2018
posted by GoblinHoney at 2:41 PM on August 20, 2018
The idea of codetermination seems to have some similar foundations to conscious capitalism, which I've been reading about lately. I'm curious to hear more if anyone has experience with how they compare and contrast.
posted by Cogito at 3:40 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by Cogito at 3:40 PM on August 20, 2018 [1 favorite]
How does a government generate funds to pay for social programs without it?
fwiw :P
"The second time around, National Review bothered to find a codetermination critic who knows something about the subject."
also btw...
"There was no skills gap, nor an innovation shortage, nor an explosion of stay-at-home dads. There was a collapse in aggregate demand that was left to rot, while a lot of people who should have known better made things worse."
"These slides from Harvard's Peter Hall on contemporary populism are excellent."
posted by kliuless at 9:02 PM on August 20, 2018
fwiw :P
"The second time around, National Review bothered to find a codetermination critic who knows something about the subject."
also btw...
"There was no skills gap, nor an innovation shortage, nor an explosion of stay-at-home dads. There was a collapse in aggregate demand that was left to rot, while a lot of people who should have known better made things worse."
"These slides from Harvard's Peter Hall on contemporary populism are excellent."
posted by kliuless at 9:02 PM on August 20, 2018
Is it socialism or liberal reform? Sometimes it can be both. Kinda.
posted by The Whelk at 9:27 AM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
posted by The Whelk at 9:27 AM on August 21, 2018 [2 favorites]
"Socialism" vs. "capitalism" is a false dichotomy - "We need go-go capitalism to afford a generous welfare state, and people won't support go-go capitalism without a safety net."
also btw...
Question for the Universe: "I dimly remember some time ago thinking that Peter F. Drucker sought the reconciliation between the advantages of capitalism—bold entrepreneurship and growth—and socialism—redistribution, common concern, and all pulling in the same direction—in the figure of the manager, whose social role was precisely to arrange things so that society could be an 'association, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all'. But now I cannot find it. Did I just dream that I had written this down someplace?"
Tony Judt (2009): What Is Living and What Is Dead in Social Democracy?
posted by kliuless at 2:36 AM on August 22, 2018
also btw...
Question for the Universe: "I dimly remember some time ago thinking that Peter F. Drucker sought the reconciliation between the advantages of capitalism—bold entrepreneurship and growth—and socialism—redistribution, common concern, and all pulling in the same direction—in the figure of the manager, whose social role was precisely to arrange things so that society could be an 'association, in which the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all'. But now I cannot find it. Did I just dream that I had written this down someplace?"
Tony Judt (2009): What Is Living and What Is Dead in Social Democracy?
Americans would like things to be better. According to public opinion surveys in recent years, everyone would like their child to have improved life chances at birth. They would prefer it if their wife or daughter had the same odds of surviving maternity as women in other advanced countries. They would appreciate full medical coverage at lower cost, longer life expectancy, better public services, and less crime.John Steinbeck: America and Americans
When told that these things are available in Austria, Scandinavia, or the Netherlands, but that they come with higher taxes and an “interventionary” state, many of those same Americans respond: “But that is socialism! We do not want the state interfering in our affairs. And above all, we do not wish to pay more taxes.”
This curious cognitive dissonance is an old story. A century ago, the German sociologist Werner Sombart famously asked: Why is there no socialism in America? [...] Why is it that here in the United States we have such difficulty even imagining a different sort of society from the one whose dysfunctions and inequalities trouble us so? We appear to have lost the capacity to question the present, much less offer alternatives to it. Why is it so beyond us to conceive of a different set of arrangements to our common advantage?
Our shortcoming—forgive the academic jargon—is discursive. We simply do not know how to talk about these things. To understand why this should be the case, some history is in order: as Keynes once observed, “A study of the history of opinion is a necessary preliminary to the emancipation of the mind.” For the purposes of mental emancipation this evening, I propose that we take a minute to study the history of a prejudice: the universal contemporary resort to “economism,” the invocation of economics in all discussions of public affairs.
For the last thirty years, in much of the English-speaking world (though less so in continental Europe and elsewhere), when asking ourselves whether we support a proposal or initiative, we have not asked, is it good or bad? Instead we inquire: Is it efficient? Is it productive? Would it benefit gross domestic product? Will it contribute to growth? This propensity to avoid moral considerations, to restrict ourselves to issues of profit and loss—economic questions in the narrowest sense—is not an instinctive human condition. It is an acquired taste.
SURE I remember the Nineteen Thirties, the terrible, troubled, triumphant, surging Thirties. I can’t think of any decade in history when so much happened in so many directions. Violent changes took place. Our country was modeled, our lives remolded, our Government rebuilt, forced to functions, duties and responsibilities it never had before and can never relinquish. The most rabid, hysterical Roosevelt-hater would not dare to suggest removing the reforms, the safeguards and the new concept that the Government is responsible for all its citizens.A Radical Response
Martin Wolf is as grand and important as an economic journalist can ever become. A respected economist in his own right, Wolf has had top-level access to economic policy makers for decades now, seeing generations of finance ministers and central bank governors come and go. All of them care, deeply, about what he thinks and what he writes, and they tend to spend as much time as they can trying to persuade him of their point of view. The result is a classic virtuous cycle: He’s well informed because he’s extremely influential, and he’s influential because he’s extremely well informed.Heather Boushey and Greg Leiserson: Taxing for Equitable Growth - "The tax system should raise more revenues. The United States should be investing more, not less, in children, infrastructure, and public health... Reform should also be progressive, raising these additional revenues from relatively more fortunate... Reform should increase the role of corrective taxes... to discourage activities with harmful effects for which the public and private costs exceed the benefits... Reform should restructure how we tax investment income. The preferential rate for capital gains encourages wasteful tax planning... Policymakers should address this issue through one of... mark-to-market taxation of investment income, deferral charges imposed when assets are sold, or an annual wealth tax... They better align the measurement of investment income with the economic reality."
In the wake of the financial crisis, Wolf has become an even rarer beast: the highly influential radical. His is the loudest and foremost voice saying that the global policy response to the crisis was far too timid; that it all but ensures we will have an even worse crisis down the road; and that unless we start implementing extreme measures today, we will be running headlong into catastrophe.
For his change of stance alone, Wolf, the chief economics commentator for The Financial Times, deserves a great deal of credit. Public intellectuals too often feel their views need to remain consistent over time; Wolf is honest and brave enough to say that his pre-crisis views were wrong. Even though he wholeheartedly embraced the financial-liberalization policies of the Thatcher years, and subsequently wrote a book entitled “Why Globalization Works,” he now concludes that “the interaction between liberalization and globalization has destabilized the financial system.” The crisis, Wolf says, “was no ordinary economic event”: “To pretend that one can return to the intellectual and policy-making status quo ante is profoundly mistaken.”
posted by kliuless at 2:36 AM on August 22, 2018
oh and...
VW employees reject new currywurst ketchup: "nobody in the hundreds of tests, some in cafeterias, seemed to mind. Unfortunately, employees did. Criticism reportedly rained down on the corporate intranet as soon as the new sauce was introduced. The real culprit, Mr. Cordes suspects, was the way the company handled the rollout: 'If the label hadn't changed, probably no one would have noticed', he said, though he admits he can taste a difference: 'You feel it more on the tip of your tongue rather than in your throat, like before'. What now? 'We are going to evaluate it and make changes', he told the broadcaster." :P
codetermination!
posted by kliuless at 2:48 AM on August 22, 2018
VW employees reject new currywurst ketchup: "nobody in the hundreds of tests, some in cafeterias, seemed to mind. Unfortunately, employees did. Criticism reportedly rained down on the corporate intranet as soon as the new sauce was introduced. The real culprit, Mr. Cordes suspects, was the way the company handled the rollout: 'If the label hadn't changed, probably no one would have noticed', he said, though he admits he can taste a difference: 'You feel it more on the tip of your tongue rather than in your throat, like before'. What now? 'We are going to evaluate it and make changes', he told the broadcaster." :P
codetermination!
posted by kliuless at 2:48 AM on August 22, 2018
"The most rabid, hysterical Roosevelt-hater would not dare to suggest removing the reforms, the safeguards and the new concept that the Government is responsible for all its citizens."
Would that it were true.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 3:12 AM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Would that it were true.
posted by Kirth Gerson at 3:12 AM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Well, give them 40 years. Capital hoarders are great at waiting, which is why yu need to cut off thier source of power, every compromise with them ensured thier return in another generation or so.
posted by The Whelk at 7:47 AM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
posted by The Whelk at 7:47 AM on August 22, 2018 [1 favorite]
Imagine If Shareholders Didn't Come First - "Elizabeth Warren wants to make companies also consider workers, customers and local communities."
When independent directors are not so independent - "A director got to buy into Milwaukee Bucks owned by his company's PE backer Another director had houses on Hawaiian island owned by CEO Another director owned a plane w/ CEO All 3 companies referred to these board members as 'independent.'"
Elizabeth Warren vs. the Roberts Court - "The Massachusetts senator has a big plan to clean up Washington, but the Supreme Court has proven hostile to anti-corruption laws."
also btw...
-My Fall Industrial Organization reading list
-The Shrinking Universe of Public Firms: Facts, Causes, and Consequences
posted by kliuless at 4:26 AM on August 30, 2018
When independent directors are not so independent - "A director got to buy into Milwaukee Bucks owned by his company's PE backer Another director had houses on Hawaiian island owned by CEO Another director owned a plane w/ CEO All 3 companies referred to these board members as 'independent.'"
Elizabeth Warren vs. the Roberts Court - "The Massachusetts senator has a big plan to clean up Washington, but the Supreme Court has proven hostile to anti-corruption laws."
also btw...
-My Fall Industrial Organization reading list
-The Shrinking Universe of Public Firms: Facts, Causes, and Consequences
posted by kliuless at 4:26 AM on August 30, 2018
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