Worker owned business on the rise...

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See this article in the Guardian:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... NETTXT3487


Is this the Third Way?

ruveyn

A lot of people claim that co-ops are inefficient. Maybe they are less efficient in the sense that democratic governments are less efficient than more centrally controlled autocratic states. There definitely is room for change though. In Germany there are a lot of large companies where employees get 50% equally-distributed voting power regarding the election of board members. The remaining 50% is based on share holdings. This turns out to be better check on executive power than relying on traditional union negotiations. The problem with traditional unions is they are not truly democratic as they have their own hierarchies that favor one group of workers over another or put an unfair emphasis on seniority.

looks interesting, but will it catch on

Maybe it will. Maybe it won't. But at least it is an idea that is actually being practiced in the real world. When two points of view collide and deadlock, a third way is a handy thing to have.

ruveyn

Employee ownership sounds great to me.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

Worker owned concerns are disadvantaged by the fact that Capitalism's domination means the Capitalists get the government to set the rules to benefit themselves and not the worker owned concerns. They do not like the competition.

Hail to the Cronies.

ruveyn

It is time we started creating our own work.
It would be interesting to see what we can create without interference from the neurotypicals

This is good news. I've been saying I'd like to see more of this for some time. Hope it catches on.

One reason for the number growing higher could be a large reduction in state and local government jobs after a government downturn as a share of total workers. This is still a good thing if they have not lost as many jobs. Also corporate America I think might be using more capital intensive methods.

The number is...to be honest...garbage. It's either too high or too low, depending on what standard you use for "employee owned businesses". Looking at the Fortune 500, you'd be hard pressed to find 10 percent that have a measurable amount of employee ownership represented at the board level.

Now, I'd love to see Aspie-owned businesses, but that's discussed in a couple of other threads.

That's why promoting worker owned business needs to be official public policy. It's the only way to offset capitalist malfeasance.

Capitalist malfeasance put your computer in front of your face and provided ALL the components of the international computer network you are using.

ruveyn

I thought that was capitalist innovation that made use of PC's common in everyone's households. I think what GoonSquad is getting at is how capitalists have often screwed over the working man and woman.

-Bill, otherwise known as Kraichgauer

That is true. But whatever private businessmen have to to us, the Government has done ten times worse, trumped the private folks in Spades. The main source of evil in the 20 th century was government. It will probably be the same in the 21 st century.

ruveyn

Worker owned business is communism.