C445585@UMCVMB.BITNET (John M. Kelsey) (02/09/90)
Jimbo, Do you have any figures about worker-owned corporations, and their relative efficiency? I'd be interested in knowing. I've read about one particular paper mill / wood processing company that was worker-owned, and that wound up giving its employee-owners a considerably better return on the initial in- vestment they made to the company than they'd have gotten in a standard invest- ment account. --John Kelsey
JWS@BROWNVM.BITNET (02/11/90)
Check out the Weirton Steel Cooperative in Weirton, W.Va. Workers bought up this closed US Steel Corp. plant with loans and second mortgages on their own homes, cut their wages and worked extra hours. The sacrifices paid off. Weirton isn't the largest steel producer in the country, but it is prosperous and it offered these workers an alternative to unemployment. The workers make the day to day decisions about how the plant will run, what sort of product the market demands, how much profit should go back into the business, how much to pocket, etc. They perform all the labor, receive all the profit. Socialism doesn't work? It works in Weirton.
AJP93@CAMPUS.SWARTHMORE.EDU (02/13/90)
Mark, your definition of socialism is a bit narrow. Large numbers of socialists in the US actually disavow the notion of government ownership of industry; they talk of worker ownership of industry, which is quite different. We have seen what happens when the government claims to be the workers. Many of us see a socialism as exactly what the steelworkers did. --Andy Perrin
JWS@BROWNVM.BITNET (Joseph Sullivan) (02/13/90)
In reply to Mark's posting (2-12) disputing the 'socialism' of the Weirton Steel Co., it needs to be said that socialism is worker ownership and manage- ment of the means of production. State ownership is state ownership, period. I can't account for what passed for Socialism in Europe, but in the US, the Socialist Party consistently has advocated worker ownership, or, put another way, economic democracy. The view that "socialism means the state owns every- thing" is a continuing misconception. From its first Presidential campaign in 1900, the SP has, through Eugene Debs and later through Norman Thomas, worked strenously to make that fact known. The association of American Socialism (or 'democratic socialism' as you put it) with Stalin and the Soviet Union is just one of those misconceptions that won't go away no matter how many party platforms have been issued. Your view that Weirton sounds more like capitalism isn't actually far off base. "Making every worker a capitalist", in the sense that each worker receives the full of value of his/her labor, and not the full value of someone else's labor, is precisely what the Socialist Party has pursued all along. Receiving what YOU earn, and not what 400 factory workers have earned for you.
JWALES3@UA1VM.BITNET (Jimbo) (02/13/90)
On Sun, 11 Feb 90 08:45:13 EST <JWS@BROWNVM> said: > The workers make >the day to day decisions about how the plant will run,what sort of product the >market demands, how much profit should go back into the business, how much to >pocket, etc. They perform all the labor, receive all the profit. >Socialism doesn't work? It works in Weirton. Give me a break. What is your definition of socialism? I would imagine that there is nothing about 'to each according to his needs' in the way the workers are compensated! Geez. This is simply one of the many ways a corporation can be organized in a free market economy. Socialism is a political system, not a form of corporate organization. --Jimbo
JWS@BROWNVM.BITNET (Joseph Sullivan) (02/13/90)
Replying to Ralph Harris' posting regarding Weirton Steel: I think I've probably answered a lot of these questions in my last posting to Mark. I've read Von Mises and, once again, am more interested in American thinkers in this area, because they're the ones who have dealt with these problems as they occurred in America. European economists have a tendency toward abstractions and semantics that are irrelevant to steel workers, bus drivers and coal miners. As for the term 'syndicalism', I won't argue with you there, though it is, once again, a European term. The closest the US comes to syndicalism is the IWW. Big Bill Haywood, the IWW's leader, never used that term in his writing or speeches. He regarded himself as a Socialist. As to your questions regarding who will run the plant, what to do with new employees, etc., I can only say that the workers, with their infinite common sense and good will, will find a way to organize and manage themselves. Those who think otherwise are in good company--the certain failure of the colonists to govern themselves was good reason for many an American to choose the Tory side.
PH408014@BROWNVM.BITNET (Tim Johnson) (02/13/90)
From: Joseph Sullivan <JWS@BROWNVM.BITNET> >I can only say that the workers, with their infinite common >sense and good will, will find a way to organize and manage themselves. Aha! Now I get it! Joe is widely known at Brown for his regular witty postings This must be another of his jokes. Yes, the infinite common sense and good will of the workers Hoo Ha Ha hee hee. Joe, you have indeed outdone yourself. Now that I get the joke (infinite common sense and good will, you are a comic genius) I am laughing so hard I have tears in my eyes. Such a straight sober approach before you sock it to us with the punch line. You almost had me convinced! Another classic in humor (infinite common sense and good will! Sheesh, you kill me) from Joe. -Tim
JWS@BROWNVM.BITNET (Joseph Sullivan) (02/13/90)
Jimbo writes: Socialism is a form of political organization, not a corporate system (or words to that effect). I can only say that your statement is inaccurate. In the US, Socialism is a system in which workers own and manage the means of production. Nothing more or less. For more info, read any of the works by Norman Thomas, Eugene Debs, Morris Hillquit or Victor Berger. They're probably in your library.
AJP93@CAMPUS.SWARTHMORE.EDU (02/14/90)
'From each according to his ability, to each according to his need" is a phrase from the Communist Manifesto. While Communism and some forms of socialism are linked, they are hardly equivalent. My definitio of socialism involves control of the means of production democratically. People decide for themselves who has control, rather than being controlled by corporate bureaucracies. Socialism is, at its base, an economic organizational structure: not a political system. Because it is based (that is, the form of socialism I'm talking about) on fundamental systems of democracy and justice, it tends to fit in with other movements that advocate political justice. --andy perrin