• unfreeradical@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    I have the argument I am paid less than the value I create.

    All businesses exist for the purpose of generating profit for their owners.

    Without workers providing labor to a business, the business could not operate. All value generated from the operation of a company is generated by the labor of workers.

    Profit is the value generated by the labor of workers minus the wages paid to them.

    If the wages paid to workers were not less than the value generated by their labor, then the business could not generate a profit.

    The reasoning is so simple that a child could understand it, and you could understand it too, if you were not so pigheadedly anchored to your narrative about “idiotic communist BS” and “everyone had nothing”.

    I have friends and family who care about me. work is about producing an income to do the things I want to do in life.

    Unless your friends and family would be willing to pay you as much as your income from your job, you profoundly misapprehended the meaning of my comments.

    The very instant conditions change such that your labor is no longer profitable for a company, you lose.

      • unfreeradical@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        A business owner takes a risk. They supply the capital to run the company.

        the owner loses his whole investment and possibly his home.

        Business owners don’t “supply” capital. Business owners own capital.

        Anyone who has access to capital is far less vulnerable generally than workers, who have no capital.

        Workers live under continuous precarity.

        What is the net worth of the owner of your company? What is the motive for being a business owner? Do you really think you are less likely to become homeless than him or her?

        The whole the “business owners take all risk” is just some tired neoliberal apologia that is intended to mislead.

        • Neuromancer
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          1 year ago

          They supply the capital. That is why they are the owner.

          WOrkers have capital. Who do you think money, car, homes, etc are?!?!? I am a worker and I have a fair amount of capital saved up.

          The company I work for is about 28 billion. My share is about 1 million. The company I own is worth about 28 million. I started with the capital from my day job and grew it and in the beginning, I was taking on a lot of risk.

          The owner/shareholders are the ones who take all the risk. The worker has zero risk. If times get bad, they can go get another job. The company I work at could go bankrupt tomorrow and I would be fine.

          • Zorque@kbin.social
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            1 year ago

            That’s not capital, that’s just things. Capital is material wealth that gives you bargaining power on a larger scale. You don’t have that bargaining power just because you “own” a car or a house. In most cases, the bank essentially owns those things, and lease them to you for the interest rate it charges.

            The worker has zero risk. If times get bad, they can go get another job.

            If you think that’s true, you haven’t been paying attention to the job market at all.

            The company I work at could go bankrupt tomorrow and I would be fine.

            And ninety-nine times out of a hundred, the shareholders and owners will be fine as well. They’ll have insurance, or backup plans. Or they’ll foist all the debt onto the workers. The only time they’d truly feel it, is if they’d make monumentally stupid financial decisions.

          • unfreeradical@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            Owning is not supplying. Owning is holding. Supplying is transferring possession to another party. When you hold ownership of a business, you maintain control of the business, as it operates, and you collect profit from its operation. You never deplete the supply of the business you own as a natural consequence of its operation.

            Capital is assets that have productive value, such as businesses or rented properties. Cars and homes that are used by their owners are not capital, and neither is cash deposited in a bank. Most capital is owned by a very small cohort of society.

            Business owners own capital. Workers own essentially none.

            You have very deep confusion about extremely basic concepts, a condition that is not being helped by your snarkiness and hostility

              • unfreeradical@lemmy.world
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                1 year ago

                Ok. Capital is just cars and cash.

                The article you referenced explains (emphasis added)…

                While money itself may be construed as capital, capital is more often associated with cash that is being put to work for productive or investment purposes.

                I think my time is better spent now supplying my capital to a local drinking establishment.

                Enjoy ranting.

                  • unfreeradical@lemmy.world
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                    1 year ago

                    The act of investment is purchasing (or exchanging) capital using cash or other assets.

                    A business may acquire funding from investment, but in such a case the investor is trading cash for equity, bonds, or some other investment asset representing the present or future value of the company, or generated by the company. The investor is not supplying capital, but rather purchasing capital (or trading capital).

                    The idea that the investor is supplying capital to the company is only a metaphor.

                    Someone may lose money from an investment, but most capital is owned by immensely wealthy individuals, whose situation is vastly removed from that of ordinary workers, who actually do face the risk of losing their only home or their only car.

                    Even small businesses are owned by individuals who have chosen to become business owners in order to profit from others’ work. Any risk they assume is through an attempt to enrich themselves from gains not shared with workers. By not sharing their gains with those who are working to create them, business owners, large or small, are not helping workers, but rather preventing workers from advancing.