The Guns & Worker party

[panamaican]

If the premise of what you're saying is correct then what you are arguing is that there is no way to simultaneously strengthen the ability and opportunities for the aspiring entrepreneur(the little guy) while simultaneously supporting/strengthening the worker(also the little guy). If that is true then...wtf? Then our only option is to resign ourselves to permanent worker status, working for an ever increasing monopoly of corporations, and just to try and leverage the most we can out of it(even tho they control our politicians anyway). Or I suppose we eventually use the government to take control of certain corporations and sectors of the economy to balance things out?

I guess if those are the only other two options I would rather take my chance strengthening both and then letting the free market close the gap rather than succumb to an ever increasing corporate dominated economy and world.

I am saying that the entrepreneur needs to hire staff and anything that you do to strengthen the hand of the worker must also weaken the hand of the person doing the hiring because they are in opposition to each other.

People talk about corporations as if they just spring into existence as large regional/national entities and aren't the end result of little guys getting bigger. And where do you draw the artificial line that you're going to stop helping the little entrepreneur?

 

[SBJJ]

I'll never understand how someone can claim to be pro worker yet pro open borders.

Throw in Automation and u have a recipe for disaster when both the illegals and poor/working class are all jobless. It's going to be glorious!

 

[skaleton]

I am saying that the entrepreneur needs to hire staff and anything that you do to strengthen the hand of the worker must also weaken the hand of the person doing the hiring because they are in opposition to each other.

People talk about corporations as if they just spring into existence as large regional/national entities and aren't the end result of little guys getting bigger. And where do you draw the artificial line that you're going to stop helping the little entrepreneur?

Where you draw the line can be debated, but absolutely you draw the line. Where is the line in the tax legislation between corporation and small businesses? Seems like a good place to start. You can provide workers protections while simultaneously boosting small businesses. Maybe you don’t expand some of the worker protections to small businesses. Details can always be ironed out but we need to have an overall goal promoting small business and workers. Corporations and all the jobs they bring also steal from the jobs that independent owners could be providing.

 

[Quequeg]

I'll never understand how someone can claim to be pro worker yet pro open borders.

Throw in Automation and u have a recipe for disaster when both the illegals and poor/working class are all jobless. It's going to be glorious!

Nobody is for open borders except for hard core libertarians and chamber of commerce.

 

[panamaican]

Where you draw the line can be debated, but absolutely you draw the line. Where is the line in the tax legislation between corporation and small businesses? Seems like a good place to start. You can provide workers protections while simultaneously boosting small businesses. Maybe you don’t expand some of the worker protections to small businesses. Details can always be ironed out but we need to have an overall goal promoting small business and workers. Corporations and all the jobs they bring also steal from the jobs that independent owners could be providing.

And this is why I disagreed. You say "draw a line" but you don't come close to actually addressing what that looks like. Very few people do. Very few people even take the time to determine what they think is a small business. Here, in the U.S. you can have millions in revenue and still be a "small business". You can employ dozens of people and be a small business.

We would cut those employees in multi-million dollar businesses out from the protections that other workers get? The waiter at a local restaurant needs fewer protections than a worker at a chain restaurant? The details are the reason you can't strengthen both at the same time. You can strengthen one and you do it until the leverage is balanced and then you step away.

 

[SBJJ]

Nobody is for open borders except for hard core libertarians and chamber of commerce.

So a wall is needed

 

[Quequeg]

So a wall is needed

Nope, better enforcement yes.

 

[snakedafunky]

I'll never understand how someone can claim to be pro worker yet pro open borders.

Throw in Automation and u have a recipe for disaster when both the illegals and poor/working class are all jobless. It's going to be glorious!

I think that depends a bit on the qualification level of your native workers.
Not legit open borders. But if you take the example of Germany. Before the open borders with eastern Europe Germany had un unemployment of around 11% in 2004.
Now that is down to 3.5% and 1 million open positions many of them for qualified workers but in general, workers are needed in all sector.
That is of course not all because of the open boarders to the east. But the available cheap labor has helped the German economy a lot.
Which has also helped qualified workers. Which are most workers in Germany.

Not saying open borders are good. But a regulated influx of cheap unqualified labor doesn't have to be a bad thing if you have a robust and qualified workforce.
Same with automation. At the moment automation is creating more jobs than it destroys many of the created ones are good paying jobs.

 

[skaleton]

And this is why I disagreed. You say "draw a line" but you don't come close to actually addressing what that looks like. Very few people do. Very few people even take the time to determine what they think is a small business. Here, in the U.S. you can have millions in revenue and still be a "small business". You can employ dozens of people and be a small business.

We would cut those employees in multi-million dollar businesses out from the protections that other workers get? The waiter at a local restaurant needs fewer protections than a worker at a chain restaurant? The details are the reason you can't strengthen both at the same time. You can strengthen one and you do it until the leverage is balanced and then you step away.

To actually draw that line would require putting time and thought in at a level most people don’t have. I would love to vote for a politician who has put that time in. I won’t make a decision about what a small business is because it would be my arbitrary opinion, I don’t hold the ruling consensus power. I’d be happy to cap it at 50 employees to start with. Not to say it wouldn’t become quickly obvious that that number is to high, or low. The real point is that continuing to empower monstrous corporations that take up huge percentages of the market place is only beneficial to a very few higher ups.

It’s not that one needs the protections and the other doesn’t. It’s that if “small” businesses are easier for people to start then you end up with many small businesses competing in the market and you naturally provide workers other options where they can look for jobs. That in itself provides some protections because if your job offers shit conditions another business can scoop up the better workers by providing better conditions, Or, if the initiative is there, workers can start their own business that can be competitive relatively quickly.

A business can retain workers if they are the only game in town. In a town with 30 competing businesses and the ability for startups to startup quickly, you retain workers through treating them right.

 

[panamaican]

To actually draw that line would require putting time and thought in at a level most people don’t have. I would love to vote for a politician who has put that time in. I won’t make a decision about what a small business is because it would be my arbitrary opinion, I don’t hold the ruling consensus power. I’d be happy to cap it at 50 employees to start with. Not to say it wouldn’t become quickly obvious that that number is to high, or low. The real point is that continuing to empower monstrous corporations that take up huge percentages of the market place is only beneficial to a very few higher ups.

It’s not that one needs the protections and the other doesn’t. It’s that if “small” businesses are easier for people to start then you end up with many small businesses competing in the market and you naturally provide workers other options where they can look for jobs. That in itself provides some protections because if your job offers shit conditions another business can scoop up the better workers by providing better conditions, Or, if the initiative is there, workers can start their own business that can be competitive relatively quickly.

A business can retain workers if they are the only game in town. In a town with 30 competing businesses and the ability for startups to startup quickly, you retain workers through treating them right.

That's not how capitalism works. Capitalism works to reduce 30 competing businesses down to a few major players who can command economies of scale to deliver better prices and products to their consumers and then lots of small businesses with minimal revenue and reach. That's the system.

Small businesses are as extremely easy to start. That hasn't changed. They're very hard to make profitable to the point where you need to hire someone.

If you want to strengthen sole proprietors or businesses with no employees, that's easy enough to do. And if you want to strengthen workers, that's also pretty easy. But what's not really feasible is to strengthen the position of companies with employees while also strengthening the position of the workers relative to the employers. Eventually, your start up is going to need to hire someone and staff costs are usually one of the biggest expenses out there.

If you blanket strengthen workers, you're going to harm small businesses that need to hire people. And if you exclude some workers from those protections that's not fair to them. Small businesses lack the money to provide the types of benefits that larger corporations provide so you'll have employees who don't have the benefits or the protections of their counterparts at big companies.

 

[skaleton]

That's not how capitalism works. Capitalism works to reduce 30 competing businesses down to a few major players who can command economies of scale to deliver better prices and products to their consumers and then lots of small businesses with minimal revenue and reach. That's the system.

Small businesses are as extremely easy to start. That hasn't changed. They're very hard to make profitable to the point where you need to hire someone.

If you want to strengthen sole proprietors or businesses with no employees, that's easy enough to do. And if you want to strengthen workers, that's also pretty easy. But what's not really feasible is to strengthen the position of companies with employees while also strengthening the position of the workers relative to the employers. Eventually, your start up is going to need to hire someone and staff costs are usually one of the biggest expenses out there.

If you blanket strengthen workers, you're going to harm small businesses that need to hire people. And if you exclude some workers from those protections that's not fair to them. Small businesses lack the money to provide the types of benefits that larger corporations provide so you'll have employees who don't have the benefits or the protections of their counterparts at big companies.

Our system is capitalist but with incentives for different sized groups. Just the fact that a corporation gains some of the benefits of being a legal person without all of the downsides is incentive. As an example, if you gave criminal penalties to the heads of Exxon during that oil spill in the gulf instead of punishing the corporation with fines you’d deincentivize people to allow their corporations to get larger than anything that they could personally manage.

The protections afforded to those that run massive companies that skirt laws, regulations etc are incentive to building these large scale companies that you are describing as “just how capitalism works”. That is how capitalism works with all of the protections that have been afforded through other laws we’ve passed. The laws lobbied for by big business allow big business to get away with all sorts of silliness. Part of what allows such large businesses to flourish with low risk is that they are not held to criminal liability much of the time. I don’t believe that the US as it is now is the epitome of capitalism, I think it is very strongly corporatist.

 

[panamaican]

Our system is capitalist but with incentives for different sized groups. Just the fact that a corporation gains some of the benefits of being a legal person without all of the downsides is incentive. As an example, if you gave criminal penalties to the heads of Exxon during that oil spill in the gulf instead of punishing the corporation with fines you’d deincentivize people to allow their corporations to get larger than anything that they could personally manage.

The protections afforded to those that run massive companies that skirt laws, regulations etc are incentive to building these large scale companies that you are describing as “just how capitalism works”. That is how capitalism works with all of the protections that have been afforded through other laws we’ve passed. The laws lobbied for by big business allow big business to get away with all sorts of silliness. Part of what allows such large businesses to flourish with low risk is that they are not held to criminal liability much of the time. I don’t believe that the US as it is now is the epitome of capitalism, I think it is very strongly corporatist.

I'm talking about the protections to workers. If you strengthen something like maternity/paternity leave for workers, it hurts small businesses who can't afford to lose an employee for that long without replacing them. If you exclude small businesses then women who work for those smaller companies are worse off than women who work for big companies.

If you strengthen union protections, it's the same conversation except small businesses will have far less leverage against a large union. If you exclude them then you're opening up small business employees to abuses that the union guys are protected from.

You have to pick one, imo. And right now, we should pick workers because they're the ones who are losing.

 

[skaleton]

I'm talking about the protections to workers. If you strengthen something like maternity/paternity leave for workers, it hurts small businesses who can't afford to lose an employee for that long without replacing them. If you exclude small businesses then women who work for those smaller companies are worse off than women who work for big companies.

If you strengthen union protections, it's the same conversation except small businesses will have far less leverage against a large union. If you exclude them then you're opening up small business employees to abuses that the union guys are protected from.

You have to pick one, imo. And right now, we should pick workers because they're the ones who are losing.

Overall I agree with this post, the only thing I don’t see eye to eye with you on is that you have to pick one. I see the mass power of big businesses as the big enemy here. Protections to workers are one way to attack that problem, another way to attack it would be to provide power to small business. For that reason alone I’d like to allow smaller businesses leeway on some points that I think big business should be hammered over.

Some regulations that are great for keeping big business in check would absolutely be death sentences to small business, your maternity leave is a perfect example, I think a distinction has to be made in policy between the two types of entities. It’s sort of a case of my enemies enemy is not my friend but they are at least my enemies enemy.

Also, if it was up to me to lay down arbitrary small business lines I’d cap at 20 employees and push for some sort of profit sharing/worker ownership. My number of 50 earlier is because I believe to make headway, especially if your position can be seen as extreme, you have to be willing to meet in the middle. And what I’d like to see as a final vision is definitely not the norm in our US business landscape. I think long term the way to provide better worker protections is putting the workers in ownership positions and protecting startup companies with that as a vision is one of the ways that I see to allow that to be accomplished.

 

[Liquid Smoke]

Rather than being an exclusively pro "worker" party id rather it be a pro ownership and pro entrepreneurship party as well as pro worker. Some of us do not want to work for others but instead build our own businesses. I'd rather our political parties didn't pit one against the other.

Anyone with a job is a worker. Jeff Bezos is a worker, and a damn good one too.
Fuck you guys for saying he should pay more in taxes than he already does.

 

[SBJJ]

Nope, better enforcement yes.

So u are for an open border

 

[SBJJ]

I think that depends a bit on the qualification level of your native workers.
Not legit open borders. But if you take the example of Germany. Before the open borders with eastern Europe Germany had un unemployment of around 11% in 2004.
Now that is down to 3.5% and 1 million open positions many of them for qualified workers but in general, workers are needed in all sector.
That is of course not all because of the open boarders to the east. But the available cheap labor has helped the German economy a lot.
Which has also helped qualified workers. Which are most workers in Germany.

Not saying open borders are good. But a regulated influx of cheap unqualified labor doesn't have to be a bad thing if you have a robust and qualified workforce.
Same with automation. At the moment automation is creating more jobs than it destroys many of the created ones are good paying jobs.

Automation is in its infancy. Read up on what it will do to the future work force. It's beyond scary

 

[Kframe]

Damn near Democratic..

 

[Kframe]

You've got to stop the bothsideism, Viva.

While the NRA and GOP constantly scare monger about Dems "coming for our guns," this is a hollow threat used to score political points and sell more guns. Gun sales soared under Obama because he was going to "take our guns away"... except he didn't. He never tried.

The GOP on the other hand, actually DOES fuck over unions and stack the deck in favor of corporations instead of employees every single chance it gets.

Slight difference.

DNC talks all the time about want to come for the guns via legislation. SO the Reps have it right to inform their base about what their enemies want to do.

 

[luckyshot]

DNC talks all the time about want to come for the guns via legislation. SO the Reps have it right to inform their base about what their enemies want to do.

Please read the thread.

 

[Jkillah]

This is as childish and reactionary as saying that everything private businesses do exploits workers and the environment.

There is a place for both a public and a private sector. Each brings with it specific strengths and specific weaknesses. Tuning their proper interdependence is the key to advancing human civilization.

My statement is accurate. There is not a single government run agency in this country that both performs their service well and at a reasonable cost. Not one. Even if you want to argue that the government would perform a particular activity better than the private sector would, that does not mean the government does so satisfactorily and without extreme amounts of waste.

Name your top five government programs in terms of quality and lack of waste.