What is Anarcho-socialism?

[Harry Bosch]

They have some good points, but also severe limitations. I started a company years ago that could be considered a company without a boss. There were three of us. We all had equal power. Equal say. We agreed to do 1/3 of the work. We decided everything democratically. Over time, we would delegate certain functions to each member. As we grew, we couldn't find people willing to invest and work the long hours and forgo their pay. We had to hire workers because they wanted the immediate paychecks. We offered some in the beginning ownership positions, but they would have to forgo paychecks. They weren't willing. In the long run, they would have made far more if they could have been owners. But that was their choice.

Worker owned companies are starting all the time.

A major grocery chain in Florida, Publix, is worker owned.

It isn't worker run, but that is just one step further.

Anecdotal failures exist in any system. They demonstrate nothing.

So you consider someone who doesn't want to be an owner a failure?

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The Spanish Anarchists had a motto, "No bosses".

That is Anarchism.

When one understands the difference between a boss and a leader one begins to understand Anarchism.

The main difference is how obvious their contribution is.

You see the guy who joins in and gets his hands dirty as good, the guy who stands back and guides as bad. The former is only viable in a small group, in a large group it's actually a sign of incompetence if it's done much.

The best boss I've ever had appeared to do almost nothing. Only a few of us who worked closely with him saw what he actually did. When he was forced out (office politics) things seemed to go on working like they had been but without his hand on the tiller things started running rougher and rougher. Innovation also stopped, no appreciable improvement was made in the three years after he was gone.

- - - Updated - - -

John Rawls had a good take on this issue. There needs to be democratic participation or too many issues get sacrificed for profit of a few dictatorial fellows. That applies to economics.

On a small scale, fine. As the scale gets bigger this requires too much investment in learning to make reasonable democratic decisions. On a large enough scale it becomes impossible because there's simply too much to learn. The task must be divided up to be accomplished at all.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

They have some good points, but also severe limitations. I started a company years ago that could be considered a company without a boss. There were three of us. We all had equal power. Equal say. We agreed to do 1/3 of the work. We decided everything democratically. Over time, we would delegate certain functions to each member. As we grew, we couldn't find people willing to invest and work the long hours and forgo their pay. We had to hire workers because they wanted the immediate paychecks. We offered some in the beginning ownership positions, but they would have to forgo paychecks. They weren't willing. In the long run, they would have made far more if they could have been owners. But that was their choice.

Worker owned companies are starting all the time.

A major grocery chain in Florida, Publix, is worker owned.

It isn't worker run, but that is just one step further.

Anecdotal failures exist in any system. They demonstrate nothing.

He's showing that most people prefer the certainty of a paycheck now to the possibility of much more down the road.

Both my wife and I are self-employed at this point. That means no sick time, vacation time, no unemployment coverage, no purchasing department to provide our tools. At least we collect most of what we make promptly, although in the past there have been accounts receivable for her that went years before being collected.

 

[untermensche]

Worker owned companies are starting all the time.

A major grocery chain in Florida, Publix, is worker owned.

It isn't worker run, but that is just one step further.

Anecdotal failures exist in any system. They demonstrate nothing.

So you consider someone who doesn't want to be an owner a failure?

I consider somebody who actually wants to be a tool of another as a damaged individual. Damaged by the system they were born in.

 

[untermensche]

Worker owned companies are starting all the time.

A major grocery chain in Florida, Publix, is worker owned.

It isn't worker run, but that is just one step further.

Anecdotal failures exist in any system. They demonstrate nothing.

He's showing that most people prefer the certainty of a paycheck now to the possibility of much more down the road.

Both my wife and I are self-employed at this point. That means no sick time, vacation time, no unemployment coverage, no purchasing department to provide our tools. At least we collect most of what we make promptly, although in the past there have been accounts receivable for her that went years before being collected.

There is nothing inherent to worker ownership and control that makes a paycheck less secure.

It is the exact same thing we have now except some deadwood is eliminated and workers get a larger share as a result.

 

[Jayjay]

My gut feeling is that anarcho-socialists vs. anarcho-capitalists are just two different opinions as to the outcome of anarchism. The former think that it'll lead to some sort of partipatory, socialist volunteer sharing society. The latter think it'll be some sort of libertarianism.

In other words, wishful thinking.

Who said anything about volunteering?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchism#cite_note-1

ANARCHISM, a social philosophy that rejects authoritarian government and maintains that voluntary institutions are best suited to express man's natural social tendencies." George Woodcock. "Anarchism" at The Encyclopedia of Philosophy

 

[AthenaAwakened]

Who said anything about volunteering?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anarchism#cite_note-1

ANARCHISM, a social philosophy that rejects authoritarian government and maintains that voluntary institutions are best suited to express man's natural social tendencies." George Woodcock. "Anarchism" at The Encyclopedia of Philosophy

So Wikipedia said it.

Thank you.

 

[Harry Bosch]

He's showing that most people prefer the certainty of a paycheck now to the possibility of much more down the road.

Both my wife and I are self-employed at this point. That means no sick time, vacation time, no unemployment coverage, no purchasing department to provide our tools. At least we collect most of what we make promptly, although in the past there have been accounts receivable for her that went years before being collected.

There is nothing inherent to worker ownership and control that makes a paycheck less secure.

It is the exact same thing we have now except some deadwood is eliminated and workers get a larger share as a result.

Wages are paid as an operating expense. They are sometimes paid out of equity. Owners are generally paid from profits. Most companies do not generate a profit. Or the profit is intermittent. (It's my hope that if I repeat the same post to you over and over is that at some point: it will stick!!)

 

[untermensche]

There is nothing inherent to worker ownership and control that makes a paycheck less secure.

It is the exact same thing we have now except some deadwood is eliminated and workers get a larger share as a result.

Wages are paid as an operating expense. They are sometimes paid out of equity. Owners are generally paid from profits. Most companies do not generate a profit. Or the profit is intermittent. (It's my hope that if I repeat the same post to you over and over is that at some point: it will stick!!)

None of this addresses my point.

Unless you are talking about magic money.

Because money is money and when a lot of deadwood, like so-called upper management is eliminated, along with a lot of middle management that is redundant, there is more for most.

Capitalists structures must ensure that money flows to the top. They waste a lot of energy and employ a lot of people to see that it does.

Basically all a capitalist business is is a scheme to take the fruits of labor and transfer them to ownership. The rest is immaterial.

 

[Harry Bosch]

Wages are paid as an operating expense. They are sometimes paid out of equity. Owners are generally paid from profits. Most companies do not generate a profit. Or the profit is intermittent. (It's my hope that if I repeat the same post to you over and over is that at some point: it will stick!!)

None of this addresses my point.

Unless you are talking about magic money.

Because money is money and when a lot of deadwood, like so-called upper management is eliminated, along with a lot of middle management that is redundant, there is more for most.

Capitalists structures must ensure that money flows to the top. They waste a lot of energy and employ a lot of people to see that it does.

Basically all a capitalist business is is a scheme to take the fruits of labor and transfer them to ownership. The rest is immaterial.

You always claim that owners are blood thirsty greedy Hooligians. If so, why do they spend so much money on expensive upper management if they are "deadwood"?

 

[untermensche]

None of this addresses my point.

Unless you are talking about magic money.

Because money is money and when a lot of deadwood, like so-called upper management is eliminated, along with a lot of middle management that is redundant, there is more for most.

Capitalists structures must ensure that money flows to the top. They waste a lot of energy and employ a lot of people to see that it does.

Basically all a capitalist business is is a scheme to take the fruits of labor and transfer them to ownership. The rest is immaterial.

You always claim that owners are blood thirsty greedy Hooligians. If so, why do they spend so much money on expensive upper management if they are "deadwood"?

They create an artificial class structure within the organization.

Something humans have been doing a long time.

These people are no more greedy than the princes and dukes and lords of old.

 

[Harry Bosch]

You always claim that owners are blood thirsty greedy Hooligians. If so, why do they spend so much money on expensive upper management if they are "deadwood"?

They create an artificial class structure within the organization.

Something humans have been doing a long time.

These people are no more greedy than the princes and dukes and lords of old.

Do you have any evidence that supports your assumption that corporations pay for unneeded upper managers?

 

[untermensche]

They create an artificial class structure within the organization.

Something humans have been doing a long time.

These people are no more greedy than the princes and dukes and lords of old.

Do you have any evidence that supports your assumption that corporations pay for unneeded upper managers?

They have to since the biggest part of a corporation are the structures to transfer the wealth created by workers upward. That is really their only reason for being.

Somebody has to manage this.

 

[Harry Bosch]

Do you have any evidence that supports your assumption that corporations pay for unneeded upper managers?

They have to since the biggest part of a corporation are the structures to transfer the wealth created by workers upward. That is really their only reason for being.

Somebody has to manage this.

Again, do you have evidence for you conspiracy? I've owned two companies, been a worker, mid-level manager, and high-level manager. I know many many managers. I have an MBA. I read a different business book every week. And I have never heard of the conspiracy that you describe. Please help me see the truth! I need evidence....

 

[arkirk]

They have to since the biggest part of a corporation are the structures to transfer the wealth created by workers upward. That is really their only reason for being.

Somebody has to manage this.

Again, do you have evidence for you conspiracy? I've owned two companies, been a worker, mid-level manager, and high-level manager. I know many many managers. I have an MBA. I read a different business book every week. And I have never heard of the conspiracy that you describe. Please help me see the truth! I need evidence....

If you believe in the conspiracy it does not seem so conspiratorial to you. When you go to the casino, you accept transfers of wealth that have no actual justification and no real exchange of value. It is an OPEN CONSPIRACY that society is taught to believe in...in fact there is a degree devoted to it....the MBA.

 

[coloradoatheist]

Again, do you have evidence for you conspiracy? I've owned two companies, been a worker, mid-level manager, and high-level manager. I know many many managers. I have an MBA. I read a different business book every week. And I have never heard of the conspiracy that you describe. Please help me see the truth! I need evidence....

If you believe in the conspiracy it does not seem so conspiratorial to you. When you go to the casino, you accept transfers of wealth that have no actual justification and no real exchange of value. It is an OPEN CONSPIRACY that society is taught to believe in...in fact there is a degree devoted to it....the MBA.

It's not a conspiracy, it's just the most efficient way to organize a group of a significant size.

 

[arkirk]

If you believe in the conspiracy it does not seem so conspiratorial to you. When you go to the casino, you accept transfers of wealth that have no actual justification and no real exchange of value. It is an OPEN CONSPIRACY that society is taught to believe in...in fact there is a degree devoted to it....the MBA.

It's not a conspiracy, it's just the most efficient way to organize a group of a significant size.

A number of years ago, I was the the Utilities Supervisor on a U.S.Marine Base. The base had a population of around 10,000. It had on base housing and a maintenance department to keep up the properties. I was there about two years when we received a new Facilities Maintenance Officer with a fresh new MBA. He ran around there and cut the civil service staff and started trying to buy piecemeal the same services in town for his facilities. Lucky for him he did not cut our department....water, sewage, and electrical distribution. He felt he had to decrease the personnel maintaining his equipment without regard for the fact that his expenses rose and the services provided by his patchwork contracts were inferior to those that had been in place when he arrived. MBAism is clearly a disease and based on the notion that brilliant graduates with these sacred certificates can work miracles by merely tampering with things that are not broken.

 

[coloradoatheist]

It's not a conspiracy, it's just the most efficient way to organize a group of a significant size.

A number of years ago, I was the the Utilities Supervisor on a U.S.Marine Base. The base had a population of around 10,000. It had on base housing and a maintenance department to keep up the properties. I was there about two years when we received a new Facilities Maintenance Officer with a fresh new MBA. He ran around there and cut the civil service staff and started trying to buy piecemeal the same services in town for his facilities. Lucky for him he did not cut our department....water, sewage, and electrical distribution. He felt he had to decrease the personnel maintaining his equipment without regard for the fact that his expenses rose and the services provided by his patchwork contracts were inferior to those that had been in place when he arrived. MBAism is clearly a disease and based on the notion that brilliant graduates with these sacred certificates can work miracles by merely tampering with things that are not broken.

I'll agree in part with you that sometimes trying to fix things that aren't broke is bad. At least you know who is accountable.

 

[Harry Bosch]

It's not a conspiracy, it's just the most efficient way to organize a group of a significant size.

A number of years ago, I was the the Utilities Supervisor on a U.S.Marine Base. The base had a population of around 10,000. It had on base housing and a maintenance department to keep up the properties. I was there about two years when we received a new Facilities Maintenance Officer with a fresh new MBA. He ran around there and cut the civil service staff and started trying to buy piecemeal the same services in town for his facilities. Lucky for him he did not cut our department....water, sewage, and electrical distribution. He felt he had to decrease the personnel maintaining his equipment without regard for the fact that his expenses rose and the services provided by his patchwork contracts were inferior to those that had been in place when he arrived. MBAism is clearly a disease and based on the notion that brilliant graduates with these sacred certificates can work miracles by merely tampering with things that are not broken.

The larger issue is that untermensche has no MBA, Bachelors, doesn't read businessmagazines, doesn't read business books, and has never started his own company. However, we are suppose to take his word because he has read a lot about the Spanish Civil war in 1920!

 

[Loren Pechtel]

So you consider someone who doesn't want to be an owner a failure?

I consider somebody who actually wants to be a tool of another as a damaged individual. Damaged by the system they were born in.

The problem is you want the benefits of ownership without the risks.