"Nobody wants to work anymore."

[Jericho Z. Barrons]

Not sure where you get only one side gets to profit, or benefit. The employer has the space, the materials, the equipment all which costs money. This is a high risk high return relationship.

The employee idealistically has the skills to use said machine to make a product to which for their efforts get paid. (No risk, Low pay)

The employer then has to sell said good, to see any profit at all.

Amazon has no Monopoly on supply chains, browns, UPS, fed ex all deliver right now independent of Amazon. Sometimes delivering Amazon as well as a few smaller companies in my area. I am sure the UK is the same.

While I suppose you could work a job just cause it needs to get done which sounds good on paper, but there would be a lot of jobs left undone cause no one would do them just because it should be done.

If an employee is not getting paid enough, then only one side is benefiting from the arrangement. It's bullshit that this can only work with a lopsided arrangement. A lot of companies now are exploring profit sharing options, where employees get benefits and bonuses based on a quarterly profit made by the company. There are many options than simply "shut up and just do it if you want to eat."

Have you looked into it at all? Have you looked into it recently? Small businesses are having trouble getting stock and product in their stores. Yet they can order the products from Amazon. Look it up. Small businesses are dying because of these bigger corporations having better connections and more mass and money.

So we appeal to the baser nature of humans, that we just can't achieve more and shouldn't try. It's just a "I got mine, so, fuck everyone else" mindset? Fine. Then I deserve more money to take abuse from corporations and customers who don't value me being there. Fuck everyone else. It can go down the drain until I hear a better offer. Because getting mine is most important.

One thing we also haven't talked about is Covid. A lot of these businesses don't give a shit about Covid and will do the bare minimum or don't offer from home options. Do you remember what it was like before Covid? How even if you had a cold, you'd still come into work and just trudge through your shift because you can't afford to call off(whether it is loss of those hours or hours in general because your boss sees you as unreliable when you call off) or you're urged not to because your supervisor says you're not "sick enough". And then you end up passing the cold out to all your coworkers and customers? Remember that? Yeah, you can't do that with Covid. People will literally die. Yet these companies don't take into account the greater risk employees are taking on in order to be on site in a work environment.

 

[Jericho Z. Barrons]

ALSO - the employer is entitled to make a profit: it's the reward for putting up the capital and risk when starting a business. If a small business goes broke, who has the most to lose? Hint: it won't be the worker.

^^^This. Right here. That's siding with the business owner, valuing their place in the arrangement more than the worker. Because guess what? The business doesn't exist without the worker. So, I call bullshit on entitlement of the employer and risk. And if the business goes broke, the worker loses a job just the same as the employer does. How do you figure it is any different for one and not the other?

 

[Sync]

^^^This. Right here. That's siding with the business owner, valuing their place in the arrangement more than the worker. Because guess what? The business doesn't exist without the worker. So, I call bullshit on entitlement of the employer and risk. And if the business goes broke, the worker loses a job just the same as the employer does. How do you figure it is any different for one and not the other?

And there you are again, demonstrating that you've never owned a business to know what the business owner goes through.

If you watched the clip I linked, Dinesh D'Souza clearly outlines some circumstances that make wages different between employees and owners in a small business. (NOTE: again - small business.)

"The business doesn't exist without the worker." you said. Well, yes. It does need workers to run it. A business will have the workers who agree to the conditions of employment offered. If you don't like those conditions, then you are free to not take the offer. If the next person does like the conditions offered, then they'll take the job you turned down. That's doesn't make the person who took the job offer wrong, though; they chose to enter into the agreement with the owner. And here's a tip for you: the business doesn't exist without the owner who put up the idea for the business, and who took the risk of acquiring the capital for the business; employees can't work for a business that doesn't exist.

The employee's wages are guaranteed - the owner cannot withhold or refuse to pay wages to staff (if they do, they'll soon have the government breathing down their neck).

If the business makes a loss, the employees gets paid, the owner does not. Tell me how the owner benefits here?

If the business goes broke, both the owner and the employees are out of their jobs, yes - but the employees still get what's owed to them, where the owner gets nothing, and might have to lose personal property/finances to make up what is owed. The ex-employees can find another job; the ex-owner gets screwed after filing for bankruptcy. The workers lose; the owner loses more. Tell me how the owner benefits here?

Take the blinkers off for a moment and consider the other side of the equation.

 

[Nihilistic_Impact]

Sync links to a video of a felon who was convicted on the easiest crime to get away with, illegal campaign contribution. He's also an idiot that links to pretend the parties are the exact same as they were at their inceptions so the republicans could not be racists, they're the party of Lincoln.

But then I expect nothing of quality from an individual who slinks back into a thread they said they were leaving because of bad faith arguments and lack of civility to do the very same thing they accuse others of. Reactionary rhetoric is very often projection and Sync proves this time and time again.

 

[Jericho Z. Barrons]

Sync links to a video of a felon who was convicted on the easiest crime to get away with, illegal campaign contribution. He's also an idiot that links to pretend the parties are the exact same as they were at their inceptions so the republicans could not be racists, they're the party of Lincoln.

But then I expect nothing of quality from an individual who slinks back into a thread they said they were leaving because of bad faith arguments and lack of civility to do the very same thing they accuse others of. Reactionary rhetoric is very often projection and Sync proves this time and time again.

Yeah, I'm not watching a D'Souza video where he tries to inform me of the values in capitalism. I've seen enough of his arguments be torn apart to know that it would be heavily slanted and uninformed.

There are ways to make the system better and the bottom line comes down to a narrative where workers are being told to get back to work getting paid the same they were getting paid before, which we discovered wasn't enough, now, adding on the risks of working through a pandemic. Because businesses might fail if we don't. But apparently, since I've never owned a business, I can't reasonably form an opinion on how to balance the needs of employers and workers, so, what do I know?

 

[Nihilistic_Impact]

You know what would solve this issue of employees not understanding the risks of owning an operating a business? Democracy in the workplace. Give everyone in the company a stake by giving them some degree of say in the course of operations. Sure, this is a very slim run down of what I'm saying and I don't have the means to articulate all the particularities and limitations that would be needed; but I believe it would give better outcomes for the worker and their community.

But I could direct anyone interested to materials that could explain better than me.

 

[Arclight1988]

Yeah, you guys both just have to be right here, tried in good faith. Yet, it is clear no matter the argument you have made up your mind. Not even giving a counter point just saying what is current is wrong which to me is a dangerous mindset. Like if the government takes over and imposes true dictatorial governship stripping all your rights you will be foolishly sitting their at least it's not a capitalist society.

Yet I have good news! Put your ideas where your mouth is! Open a small business, and put your ideas into practice! I am sure everything we said is a lie, and glorious socialism will pave the way to a new way.

Good luck getting any fellow 'employees' to pay for broken equipment, or accept not being paid because the company is not turning a profit as these have crippled countless businesses who have tried this model, and lawsuits, and greed burn everything to the ground. Yet I am sure it is best described as it was not well implemented.

 

[Jericho Z. Barrons]

You're the one who isn't speaking in good faith, Arc. First of all, I have said multiple times that the system can be made to work better. Unions to protect workers rights can help businesses and employee relations. Profit sharing which I have mentioned multiple times which allows workers to feel committed and a part of the company they work for. I haven't simply jumped to socialism as a complete solution even though I am open to socialism being tried. So, it's really unfair for what I've or Nihil has said here to be a blind condemnation of capitalism simply because it's capitalism when several solutions that would work within capitalism have been offered.

Second, of course starting a business in a capitalist system and expecting it to work on socialism isn't going to work. No duh. The rules of the system are already stacked a certain way, so, the whole system would have to be altered if we wanted a socialist business model to work and thrive. I shouldn't have to start a business for my needs to be considered valid and that's the point I was trying to make. The fact that my offered solutions aren't even being considered simply because "I just don't understand how business is run" is the definition of bad faith, so...

 

[Nihilistic_Impact]

Yes, good faith to prescribe a scenario to my ideology as though I would approve of it instead of being horrified by it. I am against autocratic rule full stop and a firm believer in rights, and probably a greater number of rights than you. So take that bullshit and fuck off with it.

You do know that what I'm proposing does exist in the world? There's a pretty big example over in Spain called the Mondragon Corporation. And it's kind of hard to put my money where my mouth is when I don't have the money that would be necessary to start a business, the success rate of small businesses is abysmal as well with, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics half of them fail within five years and twenty percent in the first year.

Also, it wouldn't be socialism since it's still working under a capitalist system.

You need better arguments, like you said you're not against regulations; but you never say what you're for. You never disputed our points about how capitalism is is based upon infinite growth or it's tendency to concentrate power. You only said that's not actually capitalism without putting forth any evidence as to why.

Even I critiqued a form of socialism that consolidated power into the hands of a few, even you agreed with me that we need to disperse power; but when democracy was brought up you trotted out the tyranny of the mob as though that's an actual argument and not just some talking point sound drop. There is no deeper interrogation of what the reverse is, how do we protect rights, how do we define those rights.

Arclight, you're more articulate than Sync in constructing your arguments, you're politer about it all; but you also fail to present information and counterfactuals. Instead relying upon talking points with no follow up. This conversation is at an end; but it's because you have failed. You may feel safe in your ideology, just as I do mine, and that's alright. I don't expect to win the day, or even tomorrow; but the future is a bright land of possibilities which will see humanity living with compassion for one another and free of want.

 

[Arclight1988]

Yet where do you get the capital to start a business? Where does all the items needed to run, as well as the connections to start begin? Great you use the excuse the guy sync cited went to jail so that somehow completely invalidates his point great

Most 'employers' go the first several years not making any money just trying to pay back loans, scraping by as well as saving up getting to know people. Then you expect someone fresh off the street to benefit from all that work with no risk, and say that's fair. Well what's your alternative? Do the items magically appear, and people start working?

You keep making the argument pay more, or give more benefits are you willing to conceed if a business goes under those workers get zero income for their work. The boss just shrugs, and says get out I have folded can't afford to run?

In socialism you have to get the majority to agree your business is a need, and a benefit to all, and one of the greatest flaws is new technology, and new innovation because it's like trying to get a house of eight kids to decide which room the new game system goes in. It's complete madness, and even in the best face ends in grid locks where people try to decide how to distribute base things like food.

For Nihilistic Impact, that's the same Argument Destiny used against Wolf in the debate you said he got beaten so badly in. Yet, in a capitalist society you can do mostly what you want by gaining the currency of the time using it to both start, and continue financing the things you want for a more comfortable life.

Granted regulations are needed for environmental protections, and human rights as there are people who could care less what happens to the lives of people who used to get mangled by machines trying to keep them running. Yet we need laws to tell some people not to do vile things, or murder people. So good luck finding a system those things do not happen.

 

[Sync]

You're the one who isn't speaking in good faith, Arc. First of all, I have said multiple times that the system can be made to work better. Unions to protect workers rights can help businesses and employee relations. Profit sharing which I have mentioned multiple times which allows workers to feel committed and a part of the company they work for. I haven't simply jumped to socialism as a complete solution even though I am open to socialism being tried. So, it's really unfair for what I've or Nihil has said here to be a blind condemnation of capitalism simply because it's capitalism when several solutions that would work within capitalism have been offered.

Second, of course starting a business in a capitalist system and expecting it to work on socialism isn't going to work. No duh. The rules of the system are already stacked a certain way, so, the whole system would have to be altered if we wanted a socialist business model to work and thrive. I shouldn't have to start a business for my needs to be considered valid and that's the point I was trying to make. The fact that my offered solutions aren't even being considered simply because "I just don't understand how business is run" is the definition of bad faith, so...

Yes, Unions can help to protect workers. Unfortunately, when unions get too demanding, business fold. Look at Car Manufacturing here in Australia. Australia used to make vehicles here until the mid-2010s. One of the nails in the coffins was the unions: they kept demanding more and more from the car companies - General Motors, Ford, Toyota are three examples - and eventually the manufacturing arm withdrew from the country. Unions were not the only factor in this event to be sure, but the unions were unwilling to compromise on pay and conditions to allow the workers to remain employed. Is it better to have reduced pay and still have a job? You tell me.

Profit Sharing: you keep talking in terms of large, established businesses, and keep ignoring what I'm offering. The local plumber you call to fix a broken pipe for your shower is an example of capitalism at work, yet you ignore him because he doesn't fit into your mindset. The plumber who was working for a larger business then decides to go out on his own - he resigns from his comfortable job in a large company, uses his savings to get himself started, needs more money to get his own business up and running so gets a large loan from the bank and has to put his house up as collateral to make it work, gets a bit more business and hire someone else to work with him, has to pay the second guy's wages even if he doesn't get a large amount of business/income one month and risks leaving himself short which then puts his house on the line... You keep ignoring the millions of businesses like this plumber. You're too focussed on the large corporations like Amazon and Apple and Microsoft and can't (or won't) see the everyday small businesses all around you.

^^^This. Right here. That's siding with the business owner, valuing their place in the arrangement more than the worker. Because guess what? The business doesn't exist without the worker. So, I call bullshit on entitlement of the employer and risk. And if the business goes broke, the worker loses a job just the same as the employer does. How do you figure it is any different for one and not the other?

One thing I neglected to add here is: the business owner is entitled to make a profit, but that doesn't mean they're always going to get it. And if the business fails to make a profit, it's the owner who wears the loss.

Yeah, I'm not watching a D'Souza video where he tries to inform me of the values in capitalism. I've seen enough of his arguments be torn apart to know that it would be heavily slanted and uninformed.

There are ways to make the system better and the bottom line comes down to a narrative where workers are being told to get back to work getting paid the same they were getting paid before, which we discovered wasn't enough, now, adding on the risks of working through a pandemic. Because businesses might fail if we don't. But apparently, since I've never owned a business, I can't reasonably form an opinion on how to balance the needs of employers and workers, so, what do I know?

Not watching someone speak "because I don't like him"...? There's that closed mindset again. You say you're open-minded, but then hear a name and switch off.

So how would you make capitalism "better"? Bearing in mind that:
a) first you'd have to get everyone to agree on what "better" is. "Better" for you is not necessarily "better" (and could make things "worse") for the person standing in front of you in the queue at Starbucks.
b) corruption & greed are human things, and are not endemic to any particular system. Leaders in socialist societies have become billionaires just as have leaders in capitalist societies...which should be putting the socialist leaders under a much larger microscope, given that the general idea of socialism is to share wealth, right...?
c) governments screw things up. Always. If you want something to work, you keep governments out of it. Governments only add layers of bureaucracy and Red Tape and inefficiency. You only have to look at the Renewables Technologies businesses to see that in action: they get government handouts to develop something, but because they're always getting paid (government grants) they've got no real incentive to actually improve. Take away the government props and see how they stand up.

 

[Arclight1988]

.
b) corruption & greed are human things, and are not endemic to any particular system. Leaders in socialist societies have become billionaires just as have leaders in capitalist societies...which should be putting the socialist leaders under a much larger microscope, given that the general idea of socialism is to share wealth, right...?
c) governments screw things up. Always. If you want something to work, you keep governments out of it. Governments only add layers of bureaucracy and Red Tape and inefficiency. You only have to look at the Renewables Technologies businesses to see that in action: they get government handouts to develop something, but because they're always getting paid (government grants) they've got no real incentive to actually improve. Take away the government props and see how they stand up.

You know Sync while you and I would agree on prolly more I do think it's bad faith to frame those end to arguments in a way for two simple reasons.

Trying to say one side should be more heavily scrutinized is the same as being dismissive of the idea as a whole which many would find unfair despite the olive branch of saying they both have greed and corruption. Every idea should be weighed, and measured if you dismiss a part just because they are hypocritical most things will fail.

Same thing goes with government screw ups, they write tax laws that allow people to hide money, and not pay taxes they should then cry tax rates are too high. Why does everyone in the house, and senate make 175,000 a year and even if they were not when they went In leave millionaires. Attacking in industry with many technological boundaries, and cost boundaries and saying they are not improving just because government spend money keeping them up is well unfair. How do socialist leaders always have more than their people in lifestyle better food, betting items, better living space money itself has little use to those in a socialist nation, but whoever deals with other nations needs the capital to buy comfort, and living items when the country can not produce enough food as in Venezuela not squandered by the higher class to defend themselves from the people.

 

[Sync]

You know Sync while you and I would agree on prolly more I do think it's bad faith to frame those end to arguments in a way for two simple reasons.

Oh, I know the current systems are flawed, I'm under no illusion about this. I'm also quite aware that the alternative systems are equally, if not more, flawed.

The current popular argument is, very broadly, "capitalism equals greed". Now while this may be true in some instances, it is not in the vast majority of cases - and that's simply because when the populists look at capitalism, they only look at the large end of the scale, and not the everyday part of the scale that's all around them. So the flaw there is in the narrow view the populists have to begin with...and then they say (equally broadly) "socialism is fairer". So...if socialism is fairer, how do so many socialist states through out history and up with the leadership in riches and the population in squalor? That, too, needs to be closely examined, and the lazy defence of "yes, it's be tried before, but it's never been done right" needs to be discarded quickly so we can begin to investigate practical ways it might be considered.

But others here have said they can make the current systems better...so let's hear their suggestions.

 

[Arclight1988]

.

But others here have said they can make the current systems better...so let's hear their suggestions.

I want to do a thread running through the positives, and negatives of capitalism, and socialism in a perfect world without corruption, and bad practices by companies to better compare when I get my thoughts together. Though when the argument of it has not been done right, I love pointing technically Capitalism has not been tried out for the same reasons given for socialism.

Though many capitalists do for some reason get a superiority complex against socialist, and you get issues like the debate Nihilistic Impact used where one side feels like they prepared to debate a toddler when a professor is on, and in many ways looks the fool for it.

Recently I have heard the US talking about splitting, and if we do it by state, and how each state wants to be run I am all for it. Some will be capitstic, some socialistic, some libertarian, some right wing, and then left wing. We will have to have a common good, and some deals about resources, but in the end I think people should be able to choose how we are governed or eventually riots, civil disrest, and eventually actual revolution which often causes more trouble than it fixes.

 

[Jericho Z. Barrons]

I don't have all the answers. I made this thread asking for solutions and wanting to talk about the problems. I know that what we're currently doing isn't working and the dominant narrative about the labor shortage is dehumanizing and doesn't solve anything.

I've found the discussion back and forth to be informative up to this point. So, I look forward to anyone else having ideas and wanting to talk about the problems workers are facing realistically.