Corporations=Collectivism.....

[hypnagogue]

Well, basically a Joint Stock Company difers from a Corporation in that the shareholders are liable for debts that the company might acrue. The effective difference is that investing in a join stock company carries with it not only potential benefit but also a degree of responsibility.

 

[Signzit]

Like there is really any difference...

http://www.ronpaulforums.com/showthread.php?t=122762

Splitting hairs over which group of Chattel is protected from the other "elevated group" of Chattel. It's a no brain'r; the Chattel that generates the most returns win. (Think RailRoad)

This thread a prefect example and a microcosm of the Game In Play, and no one understands the rules. Running around spouting off repeated dogma as gospel.

Think, dig, understand- stop playing.

Vested people turning a blind eye; makes me sick. Which are you?

What, who, where, me?

Ignorance is bliss, huh?

I know... "It's too late, there's no turning back now!" Right?

 

[AceNZ]

Lots of confusion in this thread....

Corporations are simply financial collectivism in my views.......

The title of the thread is Corporations = Collectivism. Collectivism is a system where the group is more important than the individual, where individuals are sacrificed for the benefit of the unnamed and unknowable others and where the means of production are owned or controlled by the group.

The first corollary of that definition is that only governments can be truly collectivist. In a corporation in a free society, employees are free to leave if the company gets oppressive.

But I think you're really saying something else:

It is a group of investors stamping out individual proprietors......through superior capital

That's not collectivism. That's capitalism. It's called competition. You're using "stamping out" in an attempt to characterize competition as something evil, when it is in fact the opposite. Competition is the life-blood of a healthy economy and of a healthy social system. Why should a less efficient individual proprietor's business survive when a large corporation can do the job much more efficiently?

I don't think anyone has directly addressed the quote you brought up several times:

In The strange death of capitalist individualism, J. A. Banks argues that "liberal capitalism" has been succeeded by a system of "private collectivism", based upon large, hierarchical, and often transnational corporations. These corporations regard their employees and even their high-paid executives as dispensable, interchangeable commodities, ignoring their individuality and only purchasing labour that requires a minimum set of skills.

This is really an attack on capitalism and individualism, disguised as an attack on collectivism.

Employees are hired to do a job. That's not collectivism, private or otherwise. No one is being forced to take those jobs. Employees are working for their own benefit as well as that of their employer.

Why does the amount that executives are paid have any bearing on anything? Again, this is a thinly-veiled attempt to inflame the reader. The desired response is "how unfair!" But employees -- executives or otherwise -- are paid on the basis of how important or useful they are to the corporation. The company has free choice in who they hire and how much they pay. Employees have choice in where they work and how much they're willing to accept. There is no coercion.

What the original author is implying is that executives should work for less than what they are worth, and that "regular" employees should be paid more -- not in return for any value they add, but because they are "individuals." THAT is collectivism.

Oligarchic directors with vastly inflated salaries lead from the top of steep corporate hierarchies and are often unaccountable even to shareholders.

A corporation's Board of Directors, and thereby all of its employees, are always accountable to shareholders. To say otherwise implies fraud or other illegalities.

Private collectivism contrasts with the traditional capitalist mode of production, in which individual capitalists employed workers, invested in capital and collected profits directly, rather than a collective organization (the joint stock corporation).

Nonsense. So a corporation is different from a partnership. Big deal. That doesn't make it evil.

 

[buffalokid777]

The title of the thread is Corporations = Collectivism. Collectivism is a system where the group is more important than the individual, where individuals are sacrificed for the benefit of the unnamed and unknowable others and where the means of production are owned or controlled by the group.

The first corollary of that definition is that only governments can be truly collectivist. In a corporation in a free society, employees are free to leave if the company gets oppressive.

But I think you're really saying something else

Actually the title should have read

Corporation= a form of financial collectivism

And what you said supports my point.....

The role of corporations based on the current systems destroys individual proprietors

It is the role of a corporation to produce a profit for the corporation which is a group.

We have seen time and time again huge multi national corporations want to destroy the competition of individual proprietors to make a greater profit by eliminating them.

The way I see it corporations currently have unfair advantages to individual proprietors.....

Corporations are shielded from individual and shareholder liability while individual proprietors are not.....

Corporations can use superior capital to be used less efficiently by selling for a loss to drive out individual proprietors through superior capital and then make up the losses once the competion is driven out.....this is not capitalism....it is predatory capitalism.....

Corporations can use their capital to drive up the cost of redressing congress and pricing out the individual proprietor from the same....

Look at the bailout on wall street.....the profits are privatized....yet the losses are now socialized thru the bailout and the taxpayers will pay for them......I don't think there is one person on here who thinks this is right....the bailout of wall street is government interference at its worst.....

But my biggest problem is the current corporat law forces anyone who wishes to compete against the corporations.....to become a corporation if they have any hope to compete because corporations have greater rights under laws than individual capitalists....and that's not freedom.....

And that's my point....if the current corporate structure is kept.....it will eventually destroy the individual proprietor....and I don't think this is right....

And that is the premise of the book I mentioned.....that If corporations are allowed to continue in their current form....the only ones who will be able to conduct business profitably are corporations which will destroy Individual capitalism and our long standing tradition of easy entry into business......

 

[AceNZ]

The role of corporations based on the current systems destroys individual proprietors

Corporations compete -- both with other corps and with sold proprietors. The reverse is also true. Sole proprietors compete with corps, and can potentially put them out of business if they succeed.

It is the role of a corporation to produce a profit for the corporation which is a group.

Of course. Just as it's the goal of sole proprietors to make a profit.

We have seen time and time again huge multi national corporations want to destroy the competition of individual proprietors to make a greater profit by eliminating them.

That's the nature of capitalism: to out-compete your competitor. As long as they don't use force (coercion, fraud, etc) -- whether direct or obtained through a government franchise of some kind -- then that's a good thing for the economy.

The way I see it corporations currently have unfair advantages to individual proprietors.....

Corporations are shielded from individual and shareholder liability while individual proprietors are not.....

Corporations can still be sued. Corporate employees are only protected against liability in certain limited cases. How does that provide an "unfair" advantage?

Corporations can use superior capital to be used less efficiently by selling for a loss to drive out individual proprietors through superior capital and then make up the losses once the competion is driven out.....this is not capitalism....it is predatory capitalism.....

Why is driving a less-efficient competitor out of business a bad thing? Doing so allows customers do acquire products at lower prices. The market can potentially expand. More people can be employed. Those are good things, right?

The idea that large corps can arbitrarily raise prices after putting competition out of business is totally fallacious. If they tried to do that, new competitors would appear, selling products at lower prices.

Corporations can use their capital to drive up the cost of redressing congress and pricing out the individual proprietor from the same....

The whole corporate / government connection is where the real problems are. Its not corporations that are evil -- it's the immoral collusion between them and governments.

Look at the bailout on wall street.....the profits are privatized....yet the losses are now socialized thru the bailout and the taxpayers will pay for them......I don't think there is one person on here who thinks this is right....the bailout of wall street is government interference at its worst.....

See above. The problem is government.

But my biggest problem is the current corporat law forces anyone who wishes to compete against the corporations.....to become a corporation if they have any hope to compete because corporations have greater rights under laws than individual capitalists....and that's not freedom.....

There is no "force" involved. You are perfectly free to compete against a corp as a sole proprietor. I've done it myself many times. Successfully. There are even ways to raise lots of capital that don't require a corporate structure. It's just one business structure option out of many.

Even if corps were eliminated, if the government collusion aspect remained, so would the associated problems.

BTW, tight corporate / government partnership has a name. It's called fascism -- which actually is a form of collectivism.

 

[buffalokid777]

Ace you keep helping me out.......

But I have a question???

How is selling for a loss by a corporation more efficient to drive out a profitible sole proprietor competitor, then the corporation raises the price over what the profitible sole proprietor competitor used to charge be more efficient....this is predatory capitalism and it is alive and well in america....just answer me that.....It lowers the price because they are selling at a loss....then raise the price over what the competition used to use.....this is NOT more efficient...it is predatory

 

[buffalokid777]

BTW, tight corporate / government partnership has a name. It's called fascism -- which actually is a form of collectivism.

Oh yes, I am quite aware and it is alive and well in america

 

[buffalokid777]

Corporations can still be sued. Corporate employees are only protected against liability in certain limited cases. How does that provide an "unfair" advantage?
.

Because when a corporation is sued and loses....the stockholders pay for the mismanagement and the legal fees.....

When an individual is sued and wins because he is innocent.....he pays for the legal fees out of his own pocket.....

The only way a sole proprietor who is innocent can compete with a corporation when unfound litigation comes into play is to become a corporation so the legal fees can be spread against the shareholders.....

Monsanto has become a master of using this tactic to bankrupt individual proprietors......

 

[jglapski]

Corporations are individualistic. Individual shareholders make individual decisions to invest their capital or not to. As individuals, they elect their representatives based on their own property, to make decisions on their behalf. The corporations hire employees based on a responsibility to those shareholders.

It is individualistic. It can become partially collectivist when the government requires corporations to do certain things, like pay taxes, adhere to socialist dictates such as regulations, where the individual interests of the shareholders are made subservient to "the public" or "stakeholders."

 

[jglapski]

Ace you keep helping me out.......

But I have a question???

How is selling for a loss by a corporation more efficient to drive out a profitible sole proprietor competitor, then the corporation raises the price over what the profitible sole proprietor competitor used to charge be more efficient....this is predatory capitalism and it is alive and well in america....just answer me that.....It lowers the price because they are selling at a loss....then raise the price over what the competition used to use.....this is NOT more efficient...it is predatory

So what?

Cornelius Vanderbilt tried this tactic with Jay Gould back in the 19th century. He lowered rates on the Erie railroad, trying to drive Gould out of business. They went back and forth, and then Vanderbilt lowered them to a ridiculous level. Then Gould simply decided to change tactics, and he contracted with Vanderbilt, thus taking advantage of Vanderbilt.

But suppose a corporation "drives out" a competitor because it decides to set prices below its marginal costs in the short run. Who cares? A new company can come along and open up shop and compete with this company. Efficient capital markets can finance anything where there is an excess profit to be made; it will go where it can most effectively be employed. That corporation will not continually operate at a loss, or else it will go out of business.

Microsoft didn't lose market share to Linux or Apple because the Justice Department used fascist antitrust laws to mess up how they used IE. Microsoft produced a piece of shit in Vista. US Steel once was a great company. So was GM. So was LTV.

 

[jglapski]

This argument is as false as saying that the division of labor is somehow collectivist because we lose our independence in producing everything ourselves.

 

[danberkeley]

Ace you keep helping me out.......

But I have a question???

How is selling for a loss by a corporation more efficient to drive out a profitible sole proprietor competitor, then the corporation raises the price over what the profitible sole proprietor competitor used to charge be more efficient....this is predatory capitalism and it is alive and well in america....just answer me that.....It lowers the price because they are selling at a loss....then raise the price over what the competition used to use.....this is NOT more efficient...it is predatory

I take it you have not read Dominick T. Armentano's Antitrust: The Case for Repeal. Also, I have a question for you: If you are an "individual proprietor" and a "large multi-national globalist corporation" goes predatory pricing on you, what would you do? I would buy up all the cheap goods that "large multi-national globalist corporation" is selling and stock up on it for when the "large multi-national globalist corporation" eventually raises its prices. Anyway, who practices predatory pricing?

 

[AceNZ]

It lowers the price because they are selling at a loss....then raise the price over what the competition used to use.....this is NOT more efficient...it is predatory

This is the tired-old "Wal-Mart is evil" argument.

Maybe an example would help. Let's say a sole proprietor, call him Ace, sells tires. Based on his costs and the efficiencies of the scale of his business, tires cost him $70, and he has to charge at least $100 per tire to be able to stay in business. He'd like to be able to charge more, of course, but if he did, he would earn less overall because fewer people would buy them.

Now Wal-Mart comes to town and starts selling tires for $50 each. The people in the town are thrilled. Tires now costs half of what they used to. Many more tires are sold than when they cost twice as much.

Ace's business declines as a result. Eventually he can't make enough to support his costs, and has to close his doors.

The tires actually cost Wal-Mart $60, so they were selling them at a loss to eliminate competition. Wal-Mart's shareholders are basically subsidizing the cost of tires for a while, to the town's benefit.

After Ace is out of business, they could raise prices back up to $100 -- the same as Ace -- but their volume will drop off considerably. They can't go higher than $100 for the same reason Ace couldn't; there wouldn't be enough business at that price to make it worthwhile. So they settle on maybe $80. Low enough to maintain volumes and related efficiencies and high enough to make a profit, but still lower than Ace.

The reason they can charge less and get away with it in the long run is because they have efficiencies of scale that Ace doesn't that lower both their costs and the amount of margin they need to make it worthwhile. This is GOOD for the consumer and its GOOD for the local job market. More tire sales = more jobs. Everyone in the local economy is better off as a result, except for Ace -- and he deserved to fail, because he couldn't compete.

Also, if Wal-Mart were to develop enough of a "local" monopoly on tires and try to raise their prices to take advantage, then new competition would appear. That's a free market, and it's a good thing.

Because when a corporation is sued and loses....the stockholders pay for the mismanagement and the legal fees.....

Of course. They are, after all, the owners of the company. Part of what it means to be a stockholder is to delegate the operations of the company to someone else -- that includes mismanagement, unfortunately.

When an individual is sued and wins because he is innocent.....he pays for the legal fees out of his own pocket.....

Maybe, depending on the nature of the suit. The same is true for a corporation, though. If a corp is sued and wins, it has to pay its own legal fees too.

The only way a sole proprietor who is innocent can compete with a corporation when unfound litigation comes into play is to become a corporation so the legal fees can be spread against the shareholders.....

Monsanto has become a master of using this tactic to bankrupt individual proprietors......

Unfounded litigation is a form of harassment, and should be illegal. Monsanto's tactics are only possible as a result of a misuse of government. It's not a problem with corps. The same thing could happen if no corps were involved.

You are on the right track, but I don't agree with the target of the wrongs you are describing. The problem is government, not corporations -- or, more specifically, an immoral alliance between corporations and government.

 

[buffalokid777]

I take it you have not read Dominick T. Armentano's Antitrust: The Case for Repeal. Also, I have a question for you: If you are an "individual proprietor" and a "large multi-national globalist corporation" goes predatory pricing on you, what would you do? I would buy up all the cheap goods that "large multi-national globalist corporation" is selling and stock up on it for when the "large multi-national globalist corporation" eventually raises its prices. Anyway, who practices predatory pricing?

The problem with that premise is unless you turned your sole propietorship into a public corparation to raise the capital to buy said goods, or had had as much capital on your own as the capital raised by the many of the public corporation....that tactic would not be effective thus confirming my theory that sole propietorships cannont compete with public corporations without becoming one.

 

[buffalokid777]

This is the tired-old "Wal-Mart is evil" argument.

Maybe an example would help. Let's say a sole proprietor, call him Ace, sells tires. Based on his costs and the efficiencies of the scale of his business, tires cost him $70, and he has to charge at least $100 per tire to be able to stay in business. He'd like to be able to charge more, of course, but if he did, he would earn less overall because fewer people would buy them.

Now Wal-Mart comes to town and starts selling tires for $50 each. The people in the town are thrilled. Tires now costs half of what they used to. Many more tires are sold than when they cost twice as much.

Ace's business declines as a result. Eventually he can't make enough to support his costs, and has to close his doors.

The tires actually cost Wal-Mart $60, so they were selling them at a loss to eliminate competition. Wal-Mart's shareholders are basically subsidizing the cost of tires for a while, to the town's benefit.

After Ace is out of business, they could raise prices back up to $100 -- the same as Ace -- but their volume will drop off considerably. They can't go higher than $100 for the same reason Ace couldn't; there wouldn't be enough business at that price to make it worthwhile. So they settle on maybe $80. Low enough to maintain volumes and related efficiencies and high enough to make a profit, but still lower than Ace.

The reason they can charge less and get away with it in the long run is because they have efficiencies of scale that Ace doesn't that lower both their costs and the amount of margin they need to make it worthwhile. This is GOOD for the consumer and its GOOD for the local job market. More tire sales = more jobs. Everyone in the local economy is better off as a result, except for Ace -- and he deserved to fail, because he couldn't compete.

Also, if Wal-Mart were to develop enough of a "local" monopoly on tires and try to raise their prices to take advantage, then new competition would appear. That's a free market, and it's a good thing.



Of course. They are, after all, the owners of the company. Part of what it means to be a stockholder is to delegate the operations of the company to someone else -- that includes mismanagement, unfortunately.



Maybe, depending on the nature of the suit. The same is true for a corporation, though. If a corp is sued and wins, it has to pay its own legal fees too.



Unfounded litigation is a form of harassment, and should be illegal. Monsanto's tactics are only possible as a result of a misuse of government. It's not a problem with corps. The same thing could happen if no corps were involved.

You are on the right track, but I don't agree with the target of the wrongs you are describing. The problem is government, not corporations -- or, more specifically, an immoral alliance between corporations and government.

I'll tell you ace, you make much more logical arguments than anyone else on this thread against my original post.....

Scholarpreneur made this post earlier on the thread.....

http://www.reclaimdemocracy.org/corporate_accountability/history_corporations_us.html

The states also imposed conditions (some of which remain on the books, though unused) like these:

* Corporate charters (licenses to exist) were granted for a limited time and could be revoked promptly for violating laws.

* Corporations could engage only in activities necessary to fulfill their chartered purpose.

* Corporations could not own stock in other corporations nor own any property that was not essential to fulfilling their chartered purpose.

* Corporations were often terminated if they exceeded their authority or caused public harm.

* Owners and managers were responsible for criminal acts committed on the job.

* Corporations could not make any political or charitable contributions nor spend money to influence law-making.

I think these are important safeguards to protect us from corporations going wild and interfering with the free market....what do you think?

The book by AJ Banks I found interesting, but the way we used to handle corporate law seems to me to stop most of the abuses I think corporations currently use and he laments about.....what do you think of the quote from the link above?

 

[AceNZ]

* Corporate charters (licenses to exist) were granted for a limited time and could be revoked promptly for violating laws.

No good. Who would make the decision of whether to renew a corporate charter? "Violating laws" is very vague. Which laws? Also, corporations don't violate laws; people do. People can already be punished (corporate charters don't protect employees who commit crimes).

A law like this puts too much control in the hands of government -- which in turn leads to more corruption, not less. Better to leave this kind of thing to the free market.

* Corporations could engage only in activities necessary to fulfill their chartered purpose.

* Corporations could not own stock in other corporations nor own any property that was not essential to fulfilling their chartered purpose.

No good. Again, who decides what's "necessary" or "essential"? Some bureaucrat? A legislator?

* Corporations were often terminated if they exceeded their authority or caused public harm.

What exactly does it mean to "exceed their authority" or to "cause public harm"? Bad for the same reasons as above.

* Owners and managers were responsible for criminal acts committed on the job.

Owners and managers are already responsible. If they order someone to commit a crime, or if they commit one themselves, they can be tried and sent to prison if convicted. The corporate veil won't protect them.

* Corporations could not make any political or charitable contributions nor spend money to influence law-making.

This is the only one I like. The whole system of lobbyists is a big symptom of what's broken in government today. Limiting the restrictions to just "corporations" seems incomplete, though. It would take some work to get the wording just right.

The problem, if you look into the history of corporatism in America, is that the legislators themselves created it -- so they're not going to be motivated to fix it. They used to do things like threaten to pass laws that would interfere with some business. That would force those companies to respond. Often bribes or other favoritism would be required to prevent the passage of the law. Then the corps started to play the game the other way, and worked to put "their" people into office... And lo-and-behold, the system evolved into the totally corrupt one we have today.

 

[tmosley]

No good. Who would make the decision of whether to renew a corporate charter? "Violating laws" is very vague. Which laws? Also, corporations don't violate laws; people do. People can already be punished (corporate charters don't protect employees who commit crimes).

A law like this puts too much control in the hands of government -- which in turn leads to more corruption, not less. Better to leave this kind of thing to the free market.



No good. Again, who decides what's "necessary" or "essential"? Some bureaucrat? A legislator?



What exactly does it mean to "exceed their authority" or to "cause public harm"? Bad for the same reasons as above.



Owners and managers are already responsible. If they order someone to commit a crime, or if they commit one themselves, they can be tried and sent to prison if convicted. The corporate veil won't protect them.



This is the only one I like. The whole system of lobbyists is a big symptom of what's broken in government today. Limiting the restrictions to just "corporations" seems incomplete, though. It would take some work to get the wording just right.

The problem, if you look into the history of corporatism in America, is that the legislators themselves created it -- so they're not going to be motivated to fix it. They used to do things like threaten to pass laws that would interfere with some business. That would force those companies to respond. Often bribes or other favoritism would be required to prevent the passage of the law. Then the corps started to play the game the other way, and worked to put "their" people into office... And lo-and-behold, the system evolved into the totally corrupt one we have today.

The same people who decided to grant them their articles of incorporation could take them away. Corporations don't have a right to exist, because they are artificial entities created by state governments. State governments should be able to disband them if they find that they are breaking the law.

I mean, name me one company worth more than a billion dollars that has been disbanded or broken up for any other reason than being a monopoly in the last 50 years. I could create an arbitrarily long list of crimes committed by corporations where NOONE was punished criminally, even though laws broken were CRIMINAL and not CIVIL.

In fact, I might work on that this evening.

 

[danberkeley]

The problem with that premise is unless you turned your sole propietorship into a public corparation to raise the capital to buy said goods, or had had as much capital on your own as the capital raised by the many of the public corporation....that tactic would not be effective thus confirming my theory that sole propietorships cannont compete with public corporations without becoming one.

The problem with your premise is that you assume that sole proprietorships are
incapable of raising capital. Besides, if the sole proprietor does need to convert
into a corporation, that is not a problem with corporations per se. It is a problem
with the laws that encourage corporations and discourage sole proprietorships.

 

[rockandrollsouls]

"I'll tell you ace, you make much more logical arguments than anyone else on this thread against my original post....."

I told you near the same stuff, buffalo. You're entirely dense and you still continue to argue your unfounded claim when ace is also schooling you. This thread should be closed.

"The same people who decided to grant them their articles of incorporation could take them away. Corporations don't have a right to exist, because they are artificial entities created by state governments. State governments should be able to disband them if they find that they are breaking the law. "

Wrong. A form of corporation would arise from the free market without government involvement anyway. Corporations are absolutely not immune to laws, and you are bullheaded for saying otherwise.

"I mean, name me one company worth more than a billion dollars that has been disbanded or broken up for any other reason than being a monopoly in the last 50 years. I could create an arbitrarily long list of crimes committed by corporations where NOONE was punished criminally, even though laws broken were CRIMINAL and not CIVIL."

Again, you could create an arbitrary list because you're pulling this out of the air. You didn't do one speck of research...This is YOUR opinion that you believe to be fact.

 

[danberkeley]

The same people who decided to grant them their articles of incorporation could take them away. Corporations don't have a right to exist, because they are artificial entities created by state governments. State governments should be able to disband them if they find that they are breaking the law.

Sure.

I mean, name me one company worth more than a billion dollars that has been disbanded or broken up for any other reason than being a monopoly in the last 50 years. I could create an arbitrarily long list of crimes committed by corporations where NOONE was punished criminally, even though laws broken were CRIMINAL and not CIVIL.

How do "corporations" commit crimes? If a corporation is convicted of a crime, who goes to jail? The piece of paper that is the Articles of Incorporation? The employees? The owners? The executives? Or the people who actually commited the crime? Here is an anologous question: If a father commits a crime under name of his family and is convicted of said crime, should the mother, children, the dogs, and grandma be sent to jail too?