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A document to help you start a tech cooperative

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Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#71

Post by dragonwriter »

vinceguidry wrote: post #64

I've tried starting a few companies and it eventually became clear that without significant revenue coming in, the cofounders need to be either particularly motivated by the vision and capable of putting aside personal politics to achieve it, the former being easier to achieve than the latter, immediate personal goals are going to slowly take priority and your startup will die a sad death. Once revenue is there, ever…

> Workers cooperatives were a big thing back in the heady days of the early 1800s. Most died out fairly quickly but a few caught on and lasted for a good while. The story was the same throughout, the cooperative eventually ossified and could not retain the magic in the face of broader economic change.

Ossification and failure to remain vital in the face of changing market conditions is a pervasive problem for businesses that become established, not something special affecting labor coops.

OTOH, Mondragon still seems to be going strong.

Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#72

Post by neon_electro »

ohthehugemanate wrote: post #45
marricks wrote: post #17

Back in 19th century USA, during industrialization, the idea of working for someone came across to many as a form of wage-slavery. Going from farming or trade-skills to factories working, one gave up any control in their own worker rights and planning of their business. It seems fundamentally unfair that in most industries you don't have any real share of the company, or any say in the direction of it. People who con…

More tech co-ops are great. The gig economy needs a unionization proxy to fight the ever worse contracts people are offering. But > "People who control those companies are solely executives or wall street share holders, not the people who spend countless hours making the company run and function" You imply that you think workers should all own equity in their employer. That sounds cruel and arbitrary to me. How is it…

I can't speak as someone with experience starting a successful business, but you have two examples in your post of something going wrong in a business and a part-owner of the business being penalized for it.

They're fair examples, but why do you shine no light on the other side? When businesses are successful, shouldn't everyone who had a hand in that share in the rewards? To me, that's the argument for including workers in the ownership of a company.

Structure it however you want - if the people putting in the money to start the business deserve more ownership because of that, that's your right. But don't paint an incomplete picture.

Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#73

Post by neon_electro »

amorphid wrote: post #36
Alex3917 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> People who control those companies are solely executives or wall street share holders, not the people who spend countless hours making the company run and function As an entrepreneur, it's actually pretty difficult to find folks who prefer getting compensated primarily in shares rather than cash. If you want to have significant ownership in a company that usually isn't much of a challenge.

I hear that. When I ran my business, I had trouble trying to give shares to people who already worked for me!

Did those shares come with any actual power with respect to how the company is run? Were you trying to offer any decision-making ability to your employees?

Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#74

Post by yochaigal »

woah wrote: post #68
yochaigal wrote: post #62

I have founded two worker co-ops; both in the tech sector. Whenever one of these posts hits reddit or this website, there is a surge of interest - and then nothing. Our rate of growth (400 or so worker co-ops in the US) is abysmally slow; if anything I've seen more co-ops fold than start anew! Our conferences seem to bring more and more each year, though - just not workers; instead we get specialists, folks from soci…

Does it offer distinct advantages compared to a regular job (aka employees get paid more)? I've been around a lot of communitarian stuff in my life, like cohousing and hackerspaces, and a lot of it seems to be driven by people who enjoy meetings.

It really depends. In IT (where VC is king) it is really hard to compete on a monetary level. On the other hand, benefits are pretty good - healthcare, time off, sick days etc. Also, having a direct say into how your business functions is a pretty huge benefit, in my eyes.

In other industries (repair, baking, house-cleaning) I'd say it pays a lot more than average.

Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#75

Post by yochaigal »

morisy wrote: post #65
yochaigal wrote: post #62

I have founded two worker co-ops; both in the tech sector. Whenever one of these posts hits reddit or this website, there is a surge of interest - and then nothing. Our rate of growth (400 or so worker co-ops in the US) is abysmally slow; if anything I've seen more co-ops fold than start anew! Our conferences seem to bring more and more each year, though - just not workers; instead we get specialists, folks from soci…

I seriously considered it for my organization a little over a year ago, and while ultimately it wasn't the right fit I think a clear document and explanation of how someone else would do it would have been very useful to think about. I think part of the reason that they haven't succeeded is the necessary capital and scale of technology organizations these days. It seems there's a hollowing out of the mid-tier of boot…

Yeah, this is one of the reasons why it is so important to start as a co-op, rather than convert later.

Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#76

Post by neon_electro »

tacostakohashi wrote: post #56
marricks wrote: post #17

Back in 19th century USA, during industrialization, the idea of working for someone came across to many as a form of wage-slavery. Going from farming or trade-skills to factories working, one gave up any control in their own worker rights and planning of their business. It seems fundamentally unfair that in most industries you don't have any real share of the company, or any say in the direction of it. People who con…

A huge proportion of the workforce are employed by listed, publicly traded companies. Those workers can use their salary to buy as many shares as they want on the open market, and also sell those shares whenever they want. The fact that people tend not to do this very often tells you that people don't actually want to have any "real share of the company, or say in the direction of it".

When 7 in 10 Americans can't afford to sock away more than $1,000[1], can you really argue that they don't _want_ to buy into the stock market?

[1] https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/personalfinance/2016/10...

Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#77

Post by tacostakohashi »

neon_electro wrote: post #76
tacostakohashi wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A huge proportion of the workforce are employed by listed, publicly traded companies. Those workers can use their salary to buy as many shares as they want on the open market, and also sell those shares whenever they want. The fact that people tend not to do this very often tells you that people don't actually want to have any "real share of the company, or say in the direction of it".

When 7 in 10 Americans can't afford to sock away more than $1,000[1], can you really argue that they don't _want_ to buy into the stock market? [1] https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/personalfinance/2016/10...

Yes, I could mount a fairly convincing argument that they want to buy into the stock market less than everything else spend money on.

Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#78

Post by marricks »

ohthehugemanate wrote: post #45
marricks wrote: post #17

Back in 19th century USA, during industrialization, the idea of working for someone came across to many as a form of wage-slavery. Going from farming or trade-skills to factories working, one gave up any control in their own worker rights and planning of their business. It seems fundamentally unfair that in most industries you don't have any real share of the company, or any say in the direction of it. People who con…

More tech co-ops are great. The gig economy needs a unionization proxy to fight the ever worse contracts people are offering. But > "People who control those companies are solely executives or wall street share holders, not the people who spend countless hours making the company run and function" You imply that you think workers should all own equity in their employer. That sounds cruel and arbitrary to me. How is it…

I think it's easy to see my attack on the system as an attack on yourself and wall street. I tried to skirt the line and be vague in terms of what I think ownership and control should be in a company, but many people feel the current system is quite messed up.

Most workers nowadays are not unionized, and it's declining[0], giving people with the "largest responsibility" pretty much all the control and profit. Clearest demonstration of the problems with this is the skyrocketing disparity[1] or massive top CEO pay disparity[2]. Yes, start ups and smaller companies aren't anywhere near that bad, but that's where the dream of a start up leads to, and most US employees work at large companies.[3]

Anyways, the point in my comment was solely that workers should have a large say in their company, and the blood sweat and tears of founders should be compensated, but far above everyone else? Sure, people who provide capital should be compensated, but should they decide what worker compensation is? Should they get most of the profits? I think there's ample room for improvement.

I also echo what neon_electro says about focusing solely on risk and omitting reward.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Labor_unions_in_the_United_Sta...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Income_inequality_in_the_Unite...

[2] http://fortune.com/2015/06/22/ceo-vs-worker-pay/Z

[3] https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2016-04-20/big-compa...

Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#79

Post by sctb »

_delirium wrote: post #11

It's fairly normal among workers' cooperatives to assign equity to people in proportion to how much work they currently put into the company. This is the basic premise, not some kind of new innovation. If you object, may I humbly recommend considering the alternate diagnosis, that it is you who is a parasite leeching off the workers?

This veers into the realm of personal attacks—please don't do this here.

We detached this flagged subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14135706.

Re: A document to help you start a tech cooperative

#80

Post by neon_electro »

tacostakohashi wrote: post #77
neon_electro wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When 7 in 10 Americans can't afford to sock away more than $1,000[1], can you really argue that they don't _want_ to buy into the stock market? [1] https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/personalfinance/2016/10...

Yes, I could mount a fairly convincing argument that they want to buy into the stock market less than everything else spend money on.

I don't need shares of stock to survive. I do need food, shelter, and access to transportation to my source of income. Am I missing something about the risk of investing in the stock market when basic needs could be put at risk? (i.e., a dollar put into the stock market could have been a dollar put into savings to help me in times of need)
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