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This week’s Weekly discussion thread will be focused on Capitalism / Economic Systems. Here is the definition we will be using so everyone can use the same terminology. If your argument does not use that definition, we ask that you reframe so that it does so that everyone can work within the same framework.

Here are some questions that should help kickstart things:

  • Is capitalism effective? Is it good, or as evil as some Lemmy instances will have you believe?
  • Are there better alternatives, and why are they better?
  • How could we realistically move toward those alternatives?
  • Is there anything you do not understand or would like to discuss about Capitalism / Economic Systems?
  • @Gradually_AdjustingEnglish
    2•9 months ago

    I like to advocate for more employee owned companies. I think we should look into policies that offer incentives to companies that voluntarily do this. We should also be looking at penalising companies that fail to offer a thriving wage to every worker. You can use capital markets as part of an economic system, but you have to really deliberately blur the lines between the classes intrinsic to that system for it to work - and I think the question there is how long can you keep it, before the more powerful party decides to assert itself.

    • @[email protected]English
      1•9 months ago

      It would be interesting to cap how much of a company must be owned by employees and not investors, but I think it gets really complicated (is the CEO an employee, can they be the only one owning shares, what happens when people quit, how do employees sell shares if they can’t sell to more investors?)

      • Ace T'KenOPMEnglish
        2•9 months ago

        I am the C.E.O. of an I.T. firm I’ve created. The employees once they are here for a certain amount of time become shareholders and I am purposely the lowest-paid employee at my company. I do not take dividends.

        We also have a “No Outside Shareholders” policy, so if an employee shareholder ever left (not that any have in the 8 years we’ve been running as we treat our people like gold) the company maintains a reserve of money to purchase shares for their current value. Current value is arrived at by getting a quick valuation done.

      • @Gradually_AdjustingEnglish
        1•9 months ago

        Liquidity is overrated imo. Selling stuff for what people will pay is how things are supposed to work. Market making for liquiditys sake is a racket.

        There are already employee ownership models that exist and work, so no point in hashing that all out here. It’s a good way to put more power into worker’s hands without going into actual communism, which you can work towards alongside this type of policy if you like imo

      • @[email protected]English
        1•9 months ago

        Presumably:

        1. The CEO is an employee.
        2. The CEO can’t be the only one owning shares, as all employees must own at least a fraction of a share.
        3. When someone leaves their job, whether quitting or being fired, they must give up their shares.
        4. Employees don’t sell shares, as shares are not bought or sold under this regime.