>a classist and strongly capitalist one dividing members of a company into owners and employees.
But you don't have to divide it as "owners" and "employees". The underlying category is the division between those who favor high-risk-uncertain-reward, and those who favor safety-and-salary. I'd argue the varied risk profile is rooted in the psychology of economic participants instead of being born of any classism. The employee that wants to be an owner can be an owner. The owner that wants to be an employee can be an employee.
>An alternative, more progressive position is that all workers should be entitled to some ownership of the fruits of their labour. That is to say, everyone involved in an enterprise, no matter how big or small, is entitled to receive ownership proportional to the impact of their contribution
These types of appeals always leave out the other major factor: owner's capital at risk. We want the workers to get benefits of ownership but never discuss how employees should also bear the same financial risks as the owners. It's an incomplete call to action. The founders/owners are the ones depleting their life savings and maxing out their credit cards to help fund their (sometimes crazy) business idea. If the business goes bust, is there any realistic discussion of employees giving back their salary to help pay off creditors? Of course not. (And rightfully so; the employees took a salary and don't want to deal with any of that -- that's the owner's problem!) The discussion only talks of employees benefiting from additional upside without taking on any additional downside.
If the business was inherited, I can be more aligned with employees sharing more upside. If Joe Dilettante owns business he got from dad, he could run it into the ground without competent employees keeping things profitable. However, since this is Hacker News and the "startup" crowd, we're usually talking about creating businesses from scratch.
> In this world view there is no division between owners and employees,
There already is no division. If an employee wants to be an owner, he can do so. For California, here are the forms:
Pointing out those forms is not a snark. I'm emphasizing that there is no "classism" preventing anyone who happens to be an employee now from becoming an owner tomorrow. Submit those forms, and go create wealth. Instead of asking for ownership percentage from other owners, you can simply get the State of California to grant you ownership of your own company. You give ownership to yourself. The avenues of ownership are already available to everyone.
Is this not in the spirit of the Hacker News demographic or am I reading things wrong?
But you don't have to divide it as "owners" and "employees". The underlying category is the division between those who favor high-risk-uncertain-reward, and those who favor safety-and-salary. I'd argue the varied risk profile is rooted in the psychology of economic participants instead of being born of any classism. The employee that wants to be an owner can be an owner. The owner that wants to be an employee can be an employee.
>An alternative, more progressive position is that all workers should be entitled to some ownership of the fruits of their labour. That is to say, everyone involved in an enterprise, no matter how big or small, is entitled to receive ownership proportional to the impact of their contribution
These types of appeals always leave out the other major factor: owner's capital at risk. We want the workers to get benefits of ownership but never discuss how employees should also bear the same financial risks as the owners. It's an incomplete call to action. The founders/owners are the ones depleting their life savings and maxing out their credit cards to help fund their (sometimes crazy) business idea. If the business goes bust, is there any realistic discussion of employees giving back their salary to help pay off creditors? Of course not. (And rightfully so; the employees took a salary and don't want to deal with any of that -- that's the owner's problem!) The discussion only talks of employees benefiting from additional upside without taking on any additional downside.
If the business was inherited, I can be more aligned with employees sharing more upside. If Joe Dilettante owns business he got from dad, he could run it into the ground without competent employees keeping things profitable. However, since this is Hacker News and the "startup" crowd, we're usually talking about creating businesses from scratch.
> In this world view there is no division between owners and employees,
There already is no division. If an employee wants to be an owner, he can do so. For California, here are the forms:
http://www.sos.ca.gov/business/be/forms.htm
Pointing out those forms is not a snark. I'm emphasizing that there is no "classism" preventing anyone who happens to be an employee now from becoming an owner tomorrow. Submit those forms, and go create wealth. Instead of asking for ownership percentage from other owners, you can simply get the State of California to grant you ownership of your own company. You give ownership to yourself. The avenues of ownership are already available to everyone.
Is this not in the spirit of the Hacker News demographic or am I reading things wrong?