How Boston Is Becoming the City Where Workers Rule

Beyond capitalism. Democracy at work. For $1,000 you could become an owner of Democracy Brewing, a Boston co-op brewery owned by its workers. You could pay it all at once or have it deducted from your paycheck a little at a time like Emmanuel Gonzalez, 28, a server at the brewery since September 2019. "I’m generally a more positive and relaxed person, because I feel I’m working toward something. I feel I’m not just being a wage slave."

How Boston Is Becoming the City Where Workers Rule




Top: Victor Carpino working behind the bar at Democracy Brewing, a co-op brewery owned by its workers. Bottom: Customers enjoy craft beers at Democracy Brewing. | Mark Peterson/Redux for Politico Magazine

 

I approve of this model.

...with one caveat- can the other workers force a buyout if someone isn't pulling their weight? $1000 isn't a lot in the grand scheme, and theres plenty of folks out there who will slack even as a partial owner.

 

Slackers can be voted out. There's a trial period of 1 year. It's only $1,000 because it's a new small business. It'll go up if the company grows.

 

It's still a capitalist enterprise, just like any other. A larger number of 'owners' doesn't change that.

 

Markets have existed long before capitalism. It's not what differentiates capitalism from feudalism or slavery.

 

There is no slavery in the 21stC. All employment is voluntary.

 

Union bosses have come a long way I must say.

 

Not what I said.

 

What did you said?

 

I said markets are not unique to Capitalism. They existed in feudalism and slavery as well. Capitalism "arises only when the owner of the means of production and subsistence finds the free worker available, on the market, as the seller of his own labour-power". - Marx

https://www.socialist.net/marx-s-capital-chapters-4-8-surplus-value.htm

 

Marx was a privileged supremacist, posturing to fool the bourgeoisie into thinking they were onto something.

Capitalism is the VOLUNTARY exchange of labour for money. Every transaction freely entered into by both parties. Try any other system and not only will your labour earn you nothing, but you will have no choice but to provide it according to the needs of the State.

 

Sorry. This system's time is up. It has lost all legitimacy.

 

So you want a master/slave scenario? That's incredibly regressive.

 

This thread is all about workplace democracy. You're the only one talking about state capitalism.

 

We live in capitalist democracies. All 'workplaces' and labour transactions are voluntarily entered.

It appears YOU want a non-voluntary model.

 

Yes I want capitalism abolished so that we can finally have democracy.

Yes, Power Corrupts. That's Why Socialists Want to Democratize Society - Jacobin

 

Without capitalism democracy cannot exist. Democracy is fundamentally 'choice' and 'freedom'. Without the surplus generating power of capitalism, we can never afford choice and freedom.

You can have one or the other, in a world of seven billion humans and finite resources. You take capitalist democracy, or you take totalitarian communism. There are no third, fourth, or fifth options. The world is too crowded and resources too finite for anything but those two models. Take your pick.

 

Hate to tell you, but judging by historical trends, getting rid of capitalism tends not to bode too well for democracy.

 

So in your little world, if anyone owns a business it's capitalism, and if workers collectively own a business it's still "capitalism", but when the state owns and controls businesses suddenly it's not (state) capitalism.

I have news for you. Worker ownership and control of the MoP is socialism. Social Security and SNAP are not socialism either BTW.

 

There is no historical trend.

 

Why do you put 'owners' in quotes? Don't you believe they are bonafide, actual OWNERS?

 

wow. You don't know your history. Look into Russia, China, Mussolini's Italy, and our own system in the early 1900s.

 

yeahright, like we should now suddenly start believing you. LOL!!!

 

You are losing the debate so you stuff a few words into his mouth? LOL!!!!

 

Yeah and without vanilla ice cream chocolate ice cream cannot exist? LOL!!!!!