The argument I always hear is the "risk" argument. It goes like, "Why should the workers get the profits when the company owner takes all the risk?" It's bullshit of course, because workers actually take more risk, arguably.
In 1999, I lost my job. Was I doing my job poorly? Not at all. I lost my job because the company's stock price dropped. This sort of thing happens all the time. If the owner doesn't make the profit they want, they will find a way to take it out of their employees.
(Stream of consciousness nonsense, read at your own risk)
As someone uneducated on theory, I do have some questions. As Amazon is the company listed in the article as an example, and the place at which I work, I’ll use it as the example as well.
It’s to my understanding that when Amazon was starting out, Jeff Bezos did in fact provide labor to produce value.
(Of course he had a tremendous head start coming out of a high position at a hedge fund company and with a investment of $250,000 to $300,000 dollars from his family, the former definitely being stolen funds under surplus value and the later likely including some but my research doesn’t go that far.)
If one works to provide value but eventually rises to a position where they no longer need to, does their return on time invested still count as stolen value?
Actually writing this out, I think I may be answering my own question. That the simple fact is the value he’s receiving now is not a retirement fund as saved from his value or reward for his work, but because he owns the company. So yes, it does fit within the surplus value theory even if he did work at Amazon previously.
But that does bring me to what I originally created the example to ask, how does retirement fit into this theory? Is it just expected that a person has to put aside money for when they cannot work? Should the company they work at have a program to set aside some of the produced value for them? Should the government collect some as taxes to dole out when they reach a certain age? Is there a way to ethically design a retirement system under capitalism?
Personally, my initial thoughts lean towards the government system, similar to the social security of the us (where I live) as a program that collects money from all working citizens to assist those who cannot or should not. But that does feel like it might conflict with the surplus value theory as it has been explained here.
Fantastic questions! I'll try to break them up one-by-one.
1. Though I believe we over exaggerate the story of "building up the company by one's self," it is true that many owners were at one point workers themselves. I talked about this in the post "Socialism & Small Businesses" (https://joewrote.substack.com/p/socialism-and-small-businesses). Whether talking about small businesses or Amazon, the guiding question should be "who is currently doing the work?" In 1994, that would have been Bezos, so he should have been rewarded. Nowadays, that is not the case, so workers should be rewarded.
2. As for retirement, I too am a fan of the Social Democracy style of retirement benefits. While it will always be possibly for worker cooperatives to offer their worker-owners strong pensions, as most workers change jobs multiple times in their life, it would be best to ensure guaranteed retirement plans on a societal level.
These are great questions, many of which will be covered in an upcoming post.
Aren't you missing the fact that owner Joe purchased the goods, tools, and the factory that enabled the workers to produce the shoes? Should he just do all that for free?
The argument I always hear is the "risk" argument. It goes like, "Why should the workers get the profits when the company owner takes all the risk?" It's bullshit of course, because workers actually take more risk, arguably.
In 1999, I lost my job. Was I doing my job poorly? Not at all. I lost my job because the company's stock price dropped. This sort of thing happens all the time. If the owner doesn't make the profit they want, they will find a way to take it out of their employees.
Exactly. Plus, the "risk" is losing capital, which usually comes from surplus value provided by other laborers.
(Stream of consciousness nonsense, read at your own risk)
As someone uneducated on theory, I do have some questions. As Amazon is the company listed in the article as an example, and the place at which I work, I’ll use it as the example as well.
It’s to my understanding that when Amazon was starting out, Jeff Bezos did in fact provide labor to produce value.
(Of course he had a tremendous head start coming out of a high position at a hedge fund company and with a investment of $250,000 to $300,000 dollars from his family, the former definitely being stolen funds under surplus value and the later likely including some but my research doesn’t go that far.)
If one works to provide value but eventually rises to a position where they no longer need to, does their return on time invested still count as stolen value?
Actually writing this out, I think I may be answering my own question. That the simple fact is the value he’s receiving now is not a retirement fund as saved from his value or reward for his work, but because he owns the company. So yes, it does fit within the surplus value theory even if he did work at Amazon previously.
But that does bring me to what I originally created the example to ask, how does retirement fit into this theory? Is it just expected that a person has to put aside money for when they cannot work? Should the company they work at have a program to set aside some of the produced value for them? Should the government collect some as taxes to dole out when they reach a certain age? Is there a way to ethically design a retirement system under capitalism?
Personally, my initial thoughts lean towards the government system, similar to the social security of the us (where I live) as a program that collects money from all working citizens to assist those who cannot or should not. But that does feel like it might conflict with the surplus value theory as it has been explained here.
Fantastic questions! I'll try to break them up one-by-one.
1. Though I believe we over exaggerate the story of "building up the company by one's self," it is true that many owners were at one point workers themselves. I talked about this in the post "Socialism & Small Businesses" (https://joewrote.substack.com/p/socialism-and-small-businesses). Whether talking about small businesses or Amazon, the guiding question should be "who is currently doing the work?" In 1994, that would have been Bezos, so he should have been rewarded. Nowadays, that is not the case, so workers should be rewarded.
2. As for retirement, I too am a fan of the Social Democracy style of retirement benefits. While it will always be possibly for worker cooperatives to offer their worker-owners strong pensions, as most workers change jobs multiple times in their life, it would be best to ensure guaranteed retirement plans on a societal level.
These are great questions, many of which will be covered in an upcoming post.
I enjoyed the metaphor here, nice work.
Thanks Jared!
Aren't you missing the fact that owner Joe purchased the goods, tools, and the factory that enabled the workers to produce the shoes? Should he just do all that for free?
Great question! This will be answered in tomorrow's post.