• CorruptBuddha@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    1 year ago

    Starvation is the natural state of the individual. Society separates us from that.

    How so? Isn’t the point of this meme that you have to work in society (in general) to not starve?

    • surewhynotlem@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      work in society (in general) to not starve

      No. Capitalism requires that we ‘work’. I.e. provide output that is valuable to the capitalists. In a normal society, there are other forms of value that merit the person existing.

      But also, we’re human. One of the reasons I want people to not starve is that I’m not a sociopath. So sometimes the value a person provides to society is that they’re not starving in the middle of the street. There’s value in that.

      • SCB@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        output that is valuable to capital (owners)

        This is false. You need to provide output that is valuable to your consumers

        • surewhynotlem@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          No, the owner needs to do that to stay in business. You need to provide output valuable to the owners. The owner can decide whether you need to provide value to the customers or not.

          Example: Nepotism.

          • SCB@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            example: nepotism

            Because unethical acts that are bad business practice are such a great example.

            • surewhynotlem@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Nepotism isn’t unethical. The owner of the company has every right to do what they want with their capital. There is nothing that says the owner must act in a rational or profit seeking way. A CEO must act in a profit seeking way, but that’s because he is accountable to the owner.

              It’s also not necessarily bad business practice. You seem to be suffering under the misconception that the world is a meritocracy, and the ‘best’ person for a job should get it. That’s not how any of this works in the real world.

              Regardless, you seem like a creative chap. You can come up with other examples of when a business owner might keep someone on payroll that wasn’t directly to extract value for the customer and instead to provide value for other reasons. I believe you can do it.

              • SCB@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                I can think up all sorts of things, but that doesn’t make those things good business practice.

                • surewhynotlem@lemmy.world
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                  1 year ago

                  What’s “good”? Maximized growth? Maximized returns? Having your face on the TV the most times you can? Making a name for yourself in your town? When you’re the owner, you choose what ‘good’ is because it’s your business.

                  And to my point, since the owner picks what is good, they will employ people whose output is valuable to the owner.

                  • SCB@lemmy.world
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                    1 year ago

                    “good business practice” would be behaviors that are good for the long-term health of your business. These are objective, not subjective. You might want your face on the news but if it hurts, rather than helps, it’s poor business practice (just ask Papa John).

        • J Lou@mastodon.social
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          1 year ago

          This is false. There are many types of work that the market fails to value accurately. An example of this would be economic public goods. A producer of these will not be rewarded anywhere near the social value of what they produce

          • SCB@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            I didn’t say you’re rewarded commensurate to value brought, but rather that workers produce output valuable to consumers.

            The person I was correcting misattributed what work fundamentally is, from an employer’s point of view, to represent it from a point of view that seeks to “other” the employer.

            • J Lou@mastodon.social
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              1 year ago

              In some cases, the valuation of work by the market due to it involving economic public goods can be insufficient, so people producing valuable public goods are forced to take on another job. In the case of public goods, there is nothing for the employer to appropriate and exclude others from to charge consumers for access, so employers don’t value it despite it being valuable to consumers. I don’t believe they were mis-attributing what work is under the current economic system