It doesn't matter what I nor anyone thinks, what matters is the reality that we are "employed" that is to say indentured servants to our bodies and biological needs. Food, water, shelter, entertainment, interaction even. There are more people then resources. You either beat each other to death or work together and treat others as equals to address these needs. There are no other options, aside from enslaving others. How is this a socially acceptable debate?

How is this a socially acceptable debate? — Outlander

Interesting question!

There are more people then resources. You either beat each other to death or work together and treat others as equals to address these needs. — Outlander

I was focusing more on businesses and how they relate to 'people'. But your raise an interesting point about our biological needs and resources. We do have limited resources, and dividing it 'fairly' among people is neither feasible nor desirable.

I was focusing more on businesses and how they relate to 'people'. — Wheatley

Well unless we're referring to some science fiction artificial intelligence.. business by definition is an endeavor by people. So how does it not relate to people becomes the question. Free market. If you're not relevant, you don't bring in new customers. It's pretty simple really.

You either beat each other to death or work together and treat others as equals to address these needs. There are no other options, aside from enslaving others. — Outlander

I think the point of the OP is that our current society despite libertarian appearances entails more of the latter than the former. The argument for capitalism is that everyone has the possibility to "make it"- but in many cases the hierarchies of economics are so far apart from bottom to top that the bottom will feel like slaves to this system. There are people that lack some of the most basic needs in life while others have abundance to sustain thousand of lifes all for themselves.

Neoclassical economists (mainstream) use the profit motive as an axiom to build economic models. Making money is seen as the single purpose for all business. — Wheatley

Money has completely distorted the value of things. As I grew up, I found it stranger and stranger that people are spending all their life chasing money instead of trying to use money to not need money anymore. Work is necessary, but strictly speaking I merely need food, water and shelter - once I have the basics down, I can basically do what I want.
But instead of relying on nature directly (for instance, by tending to a garden and growing our own food), most of us take a detour through the medium of money.


I don't think the system is right. It made sense to some degree. A currency that represents the value of goods makes perfect sense. But in our day and age, the currency IS the value. This is backwards.

On the note of resources and such: While population is growing, production needs to grow as well. In this regard, the growth of businesses and companies is perfectly sensible as well. However, again the issue is that the representation (money) has become detached from the thing itself. Hence businesses aim to maximize profit rather than their use for society.

:up:

Do businesses care that some employees hate their job? Perhaps. Perhaps not because caring about your workers may cut into their profits, a big no-no. Society has allowed a bunch of systems to exist, called "businesses", who may not even care about the employees they hire. Many workers are treated like dirt. It all seems so cruel and unfair.

What do you think? — Wheatley

I think businesses are always looking to maximise profit and cut costs and will ususally do whatever the legal system, the government and conditions allow them to get away with. Happiness of staff only starts to matter when you go further up the hierarchy.

Happiness of staff only starts to matter when you go further up the hierarchy. — Tom Storm

Exactly! You end up with tons of miserable people at entry level jobs.

There are people that lack some of the most basic needs in life while others have abundance to sustain thousand of lifes all for themselves. — Hermeticus

Can't take it with you. Lost are those who call circumstance reality. Contrary to popular belief, you actually can make a horse drink. Though it usually drowns.

business by definition is an endeavor by people. — Outlander

But they are not people.

Can't take it with you. Lost are those who call circumstance reality. Contrary to popular belief, you actually can make a horse drink. Though it usually drowns. — Outlander

Not sure what you're trying to express or what the point of the horse anecdote is.

Something that I think is becoming more and more of a concern for the future is automation.

'Work' was always about humans. The first 'computer' was a job role for a human. Economics being essentially about resources and distribution shows up something interesting in regards to work and production. A work horse needs to be tended to as does a human. Petrol doesn't and nor does a machine. This leads to the ethical problem of there being no ethical problem.

Fuel will not go on strike or die of exhaustion. The fewer humans required for a workplace means that there is certainly more room for a 'profit only' concern - not that I think this is the be all and end all of all business ventures!

Human wants and needs drives the economy more than businesses. I am not denying there is a feedback though. If the concern is there is too much concern with profit then I believe we need to look towards forces that can change cultural habits in regards to consumerism and/or changing how humans live their lives in general.

Do businesses care that some employees hate their job? Perhaps. Perhaps not because caring about your workers may cut into their profits, a big no-no. Society has allowed a bunch of systems to exist, called "businesses", who may not even care about the employees they hire. Many workers are treated like dirt. It all seems so cruel and unfair. — Wheatley

I think there is a combination of things in at work in here. Some are willfully blind to their workers (and/or so disconnected from them). Others care about how productive they are and so wish to have happy workers that do better work BUT this is only a serious factor for rare/skilled labour. If there are only a handful of people able to do X or Y then they will be treated better or move to another business or set up their own.

For non-skilled labour there is a problem. With an almost endless supply of people to fill positions z and x there value of their labour is decreased and so concerns for the workers welfare will not really impact profits at all - in fact it will likely increase them if businesses act together to decrease wages. Or act in opposition to each other by undercutting labour costs to increase profits by way of cheap production. This double-edged sword is certainly an issue that governing bodies have a headache with not being able to find a constant balanced between these two problems.

But they are not people. — Wheatley

Neither are these sentences, yet we know they're personal. Created by and for persons. Your point (what I assume to be at least) is not lost on me, I understand the "less than personal" environment that successful businesses tend to operate from (simply because the next guy who maybe spends a little less time being all buddy buddy with every single person who steps foot in the door and more time selling product and maximizing efficiency may make it in the black while the other guy remains in the red) the fact remains unless you're selling a product or service to a robot and/or employing them, it is in fact all about the people at the end of the day. Whether or not you "dehumanize" them as some would say to a paper sheet of demographics and numbers or not.

Many economic theories are based on the assumption that businesses exist to maximize profits. Neoclassical economists (mainstream) use the profit motive as an axiom to build economic models. Making money is seen as the single purpose for all business. — Wheatley

Free market capitalism works. Other systems, e.g. government controls, don't seem to. What do I mean when I say "capitalism works?" It creates a market that gets resources to the places they're needed in a more or less efficient manner. When I fly over New York City and northern New Jersey, I get a visceral feel for the vastly complicated network of pushes and pulls that create the civilization I'm flying over, for better or worse. Problem - often, usually? capitalism does what it does with no regard to it's employees, the surrounding communities, or the world at large. The involvement of large corporations can make things much worse. Solution - 1) govern regulation 2) labor unions and 3)...? I don't think the revolution of the proletariat, if it were possible, would be a very good candidate.

Created by and for persons. — Outlander

Democratic governments are created by and for the people. Yet we still talk about how the government (as an entity) treats its people. Business are like governments because they both act like an entity with goals different than individual people. Of course people contribute to these systems, but to call these entities "people" is a bit of a stretch.

don't think the revolution of the proletariat, if it were possible, would be a very good candidate. — T Clark

I don't think so either. Sorry, Marx.

I'd like to offer two points.

First, it's true that the profit motive is a very basic aspect of capitalism. But making a profit, and markets generally, have been around for a long time.

What's different about capitalism is the relationship between employer and employee. That's the dynamic that separates capitalism from feudalism, slavery, and economic/political systems. This is a point the economist Richard Wolff makes repeatedly, and which I'm echoing here. I think it make sense.

Second, you're quite right about the assumption that businesses (especially corporations) exist to make a profit. But this idea, surprisingly, is relatively new. It can be partly traced back to a famous 1970 article by Milton Friedman, titled A Friedman doctrine‐- The Social Responsibility Of Business Is to Increase Its Profits.

This idea spread throughout the universities and business schools. Around the same time, you had the mobilization of the business community, partly in reaction to the 1960s movements and the writings of Ralph Nader. They felt under threat. The call to arms is the now-famous Powell Memorandum, written to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which outlines a number of actions that should be taken by businesses.

Currently, there is a big shift away from the Friedman Doctrine (also called "shareholder primacy") and towards "Stakeholder Capitalism," as stated in the Chamber of Commerce and Business Roundtable mission statements. You hear guys like Larry Fink of BlackRock and Mark Benioff of Salesforce talking this up a lot now.

So some of the ideology is beginning to shift. On the left, there's been a greater push towards New Deal-era policies, including the "regimented capitalism" which was predominant in the 50s and 60s. A large chunk of the Democratic establishment are still neoliberal. The right, however, are becoming even more corporatist and authoritarian -- what's often called more "libertarian." This is embodied in Mitch McConnell.

So no, it's not a fair system. But if we recognize what's going on, we can change it for the better. I think stronger unions is a fine start, but also voting for more progressive candidates like Bernie Sanders and AOC is helpful as well. The government should be working to regulate these industries, workers should be given the option to run the factories themselves, there should be workers on the board of directors, there should be a strong safety net put in place given that we're the wealthiest country on earth, taxes should be changed, etc.

Democratic governments are created by and for the people. Yet we still talk about how the government (as an entity) treats its people. — Wheatley

Human nature cannot be escaped so easily, unfortunately, as your point reminds us of.

Business are like governments because they both act like an entity with goals different than individual people. — Wheatley

I think there's a Star Trek episode that covers this.. "the needs of the many" or some business like that.

to call these entities "people" is a bit of a stretch. — Wheatley

Again, unless it's an automated and unmonitored system, people are wholly involved in every benefit, gain, inconvenience, and grievance, though we'd like to think otherwise. We as frail beings subject to the whims of nature and biology have to invent a boogeyman of sorts, someone - anyone - who's not the man in the mirror. And that's why he'll never be caught.

Free market capitalism works. — T Clark

Point me to one country where they have free markets.

What do I mean when I say "capitalism works?" It creates a market that gets resources to the places they're needed in a more or less efficient manner. — T Clark

Capitalism does not create markets. You can have markets in any system. You had markets in ancient Greece, you have markets in communist China. China is also highly efficient at getting resources to places they're needed. Is that capitalism?

Problem - often, usually? capitalism does what it does with no regard to it's employees, the surrounding communities, or the world at large. The involvement of large corporations can make things much worse. Solution - 1) govern regulation 2) labor unions and 3)...? — T Clark

Returning to the policies of the 1950s and 60s would be a start -- much higher taxes on the wealthy, a much better regulated financial sector, and an ideology of corporate governance that prioritized employees, innovation, and infrastructure along with shareholder dividends (as opposed to the "shareholder primacy" doctrine of Milton Friedman). You look at where the profits started shifting during the 1980s: buybacks and dividends, shrinking all the other investments to employees and infrastructure, and leading to stagnant wages, destruction of unions, precarious jobs, less corporations overall and, ultimately, less growth.

Problem - often, usually? capitalism does what it does with no regard to it's employees, the surrounding communities, or the world at large. — T Clark

You're right that capitalism is very efficient at distribution. It creates demands where there were none, so it's growth oriented.

Apathy about communities and employees is made possible by private property, but that kind of disregard requires a large mobile work force that can be exploited. That's not always available, as we're now seeing in the US.

Apathy about communities and employees is made possible by private property, but that kind of disregard requires a large mobile work force that can be exploited. That's not always available, as we're now seeing in the US. — frank

I wonder how long the worker shortage will last. Probably not long enough to make a permanent difference. We need regulation and labor unions.

We need regulation and labor unions. — T Clark

Both have been pretty thoroughly ground into the dust. We need a system reset.

Both have been pretty thoroughly ground into the dust. We need a system reset. — frank

Seems like there is some enthusiasm for putting the squeeze on some corporations. Those are mainly tech companies, which probably aren't the main problem. Unions seem to be waking up a bit too. May be a flash in the pan. We'll see.

Seems like there is some enthusiasm for putting the squeeze on some corporations. — T Clark

They'll just exit the US like so many before them.

They'll just exit the US like so many before them. — frank

They have a lot of customers here and they need to be here to serve them. They won't be able to escape.

They have a lot of customers here and they need to be here to serve them. They won't be able to escape. — T Clark

Take a closer look at where your consumables were manufactured. I think you'll find that most of it wasn't here, except maybe some of the food you eat, which was produced by disenfranchised migrants who couldn't possibly unionize.

Remember, the US economy revolves around Wall St., not manufacturing. This is called Neoliberalism.

Take a closer look at where your consumables were manufactured. I think you'll find that most of it wasn't here — frank

I don't see how that contradicts my point.

the US economy revolves around Wall St., not manufacturing. — frank

Yes. It strikes me that making the financial industry the heart of the economy has been disastrous. It highlights how things are distorted when pure profit is the motive.

I don't see how that contradicts my point. — T Clark

Well, what did you mean by:

They have a lot of customers here and they need to be here to serve them. They won't be able to escape — T Clark

What companies are you talking about?

Well, what did you mean by:

They have a lot of customers here and they need to be here to serve them. They won't be able to escape
— T Clark — frank

You're talking about where the items being sold come from. I'm talking about where the customers are. Amazon can't get out of the reach of the US government as long as they're selling here. A lot of American companies get more trouble from the EU than they do here. Ditto with China.

You're talking about where the items being sold come from. I'm talking about where the customers are. Amazon can't get out of the reach of the US government as long as they're selling here. A lot of American companies get more trouble from the EU than they do here. Ditto with China. — T Clark

Oh, Amazon. Yes.