The boss needs you, you don't need him!
Labor is entitled to all it creates
this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2023
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Well the risk is shared among all members, as well as the rewards. As a founding member, you have more risk at the start, but that risk scales down as the operation scales up.
You're more likely to have worker's cooperatives that fulfill actual needs, either in local society or the participants' lives, than capitalist firms. Less damage.
This is partly due to how there's little incentive for aggressive profit extraction since the workers, who control the coop, often live nearby. Would you actively choose to make things worse for yourself and your neighbours, to get some more money in your pocket?
Far from all activity in the world needs a person who wants to get rich, spearheading them.
We have organizations in civil society too, don't we?
I don't understand your answer.
For simplicity let's say I found a brand new co-op that sells ice cream. I use my personal money to buy an ice cream van, do all the legal paperwork to form the company, buy all of the initial product that I'm going to sell. The first week goes well and the business looks promising, but I need some help so I hire someone. Let's say after 3 weeks we pay off all my initial investment, the van, the other start up costs. Now we're purely in profit mode - do we split the profit half and half? If so, I have made a terrible decision to start a business. I placed myself at financial risk for future profits while my employee took no risk and gained the same exact reward.
On the other hand, if we split the profits unequally in any way, how would that be different from the status quo? As soon as a company can choose unequal splitting of profits wouldn't self interest dictate the founder take the largest percentage as possible so long as it doesn't lose employees? If they can find employees willing to take 0% profit for a steady wage we are back where we started.
There can be an internal capital account that keeps track of what the founder invested to buy all the initial product and ice cream van. This account would give the founder a recoupable claim on that value they invest.
The founder can charge new workers a membership fee.
There is nothing wrong with unequally dividing the profits, but that has to be a democratically accountable decision.
The moral difference in favor of the worker coop is that it is democratic
Understood. Thank you for clarifying.