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Mondragon Corporation

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Re: Mondragon Corporation

#171

Post by ianleeclark »

rayiner wrote: post #164
spamizbad wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Forcing profits is bad too. Just look at Boeing to see where the naked pursuit of profits can lead. It literally kills people.

Nobody is forcing profits. If you want to start a non-profit aerospace company, nobody is stopping you.

> Nobody is forcing profits.

Shareholders?

> If you want to start a non-profit aerospace company, nobody is stopping you.

Yeah, just found an aerospace company. You don't need anything beyond hard-work and a can-do attitude. Definitely don't need decades worth of relationships, unimaginable capital, or readily hirable talent. You just gotta believe in yourself.

Re: Mondragon Corporation

#172

Post by chishaku »

glitcher wrote: post #153

Wow that is quite a lot of employees, but this excerpt came across a bit odd to me: > At the end of 2014, it employed 74,117 people... > By 2015, 74,335 people were employed So the increase of 0.29% over a brief although somewhat ambiguous period of time is supposed to tell me what?

That in 2014, there were 74,117 employees and in 2015, there were 74,335 employees.

Given the size of the company, I imagine this data exists in a tabular format and someone was just converting to a (maybe imperfect) natural language representation of the data.

Re: Mondragon Corporation

#173

Post by cambalache »

hooverlunch wrote: post #159
sudoaza wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

interesting, does the value ever change? did you pay that $1.000 at any moment or was discounted from work at any moment? what about new members?

No, it deliberately stays fixed to reduce barriers to entry for new member-owners.

Can I apply to be a member from abroad?

Re: Mondragon Corporation

#174

Post by TOGoS »

dls2016 wrote: post #137
jp555 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the alternative 100% top-down central-managed solution to ensure no externalization happens ever? In theory that's appealing (especial from the view from Chomsky's academic ivory tower), but then in practice every time it's been tried it hasn't worked well at all. Chomsky is smart, but not very useful because "In theory there's no difference between theory and practice, but in practice there is" - Yogi Berra

Is the alternative to bank robbing a top-down central-managed solution? No, we simply penalize the behavior. We could do the same and penalize exploitation by corporations. Hold individuals accountable. Extreme fines. You may argue this would be complicated, but so is a lot of existing legislation surrounding international trade.

I won't say it would be 'complicated', because in theory that sounds very simple.

In practice, powerful corporations have enough influence over the government that regulating them in that manner isn't possible without flipping the whole system on its head (i.e. removing the profit motive that drives monopolization and cost externalization).

Re: Mondragon Corporation

#175

Post by zajio1am »

AshamedCaptain wrote: post #22
Arkhaine_kupo wrote: post #14

So some thing that are a bit less glamorous than described on the article is that one reason this works so well is because of the conditions of the place it runs in. This coop comes from the basque country, a northern autonomous region of Spain. It is a fairly rich area, with a huge port and industrial past and a pretty tight knit community. This generates an environment that allows for certain things to happen. One…

To advertise something as "it's better because it's basque/$COUNTRY" is not xenophobic at all. First, because by that definition then almost everyone would be (e.g. french). Second, because there are actual objective benefits of sourcing local products (e.g. environmental). I also really doubt what you explain is universally applicable as it looks to be a very large corporation anyway.

> To advertise something as "it's better because it's basque/$COUNTRY" is not xenophobic at all. First, because by that definition then almost everyone would be (e.g. french). Second, because there are actual objective benefits of sourcing local products (e.g. environmental).

Perhaps it is not xenophobic, but it definitely is populist nationalistic retoric based on in-group/out-group dichotomy.

The fact that nationalists of every country do that is no excuse.

Re: Mondragon Corporation

#176

Post by rayiner »

ianleeclark wrote: post #171
rayiner wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is forcing profits. If you want to start a non-profit aerospace company, nobody is stopping you.

> Nobody is forcing profits. Shareholders? > If you want to start a non-profit aerospace company, nobody is stopping you. Yeah, just found an aerospace company. You don't need anything beyond hard-work and a can-do attitude. Definitely don't need decades worth of relationships, unimaginable capital, or readily hirable talent. You just gotta believe in yourself.

> Shareholders?

The system doesn't force anyone to make a profit. If you borrow capital from people, your investors may demand a profit. But that's between you and your investors. Nobody is forcing you to take investment or sell equity in your company on the public markets.

> Yeah, just found an aerospace company. You don't need anything beyond hard-work and a can-do attitude. Definitely don't need decades worth of relationships, unimaginable capital, or readily hirable talent. You just gotta believe in yourself.

My point is to contrast a system where everyone is forced to be a non-profit or co-op (@jp555's hypothetical), and our system, where you are free to be a non-profit or co-op, if you want to. If you can't raise capital or hire top-notch employees under that structure, then that's a problem with the non-profit/co-op organization, not a shortcoming of our economic system.

Re: Mondragon Corporation

#177

Post by Pi314151 »

youdontknowtho wrote: post #59
whoisjuan wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t know exactly what OP is referring to, but the Basque country in Spain is a region with certain separatist political actors that advocate/push for the independence of the Basque Country. In the past this included ETA which was a separatist terrorist group from the Basque region. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ETA_(separatist_group) ETA was most definitely a terrorist group, infamously known worldwide for thei…

ETA was a terrorist group, but they publicly announced an end to violence in 2011. They began the process of deescalation after 9/11. It should also be mentioned that the UN had said that the Spanish occupation of the Basque region violated human rights.

UN has never said that Spain is occupying the Basque Country.

Re: Mondragon Corporation

#178

Post by anoncake »

andreilys wrote: post #151
dbingham wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, that's not the alternative. The alternative is a system that isn't profit driven, where all the companies are worker cooperatives. In that system, there are no stock holders demanding ever greater returns, those doing the work are always completely in control. They can choose to do "just enough" to live a good life. Or they can choose to focus on the more fulfilling aspects of their work, and not on the profit. I…

“ The alternative is a system that isn't profit driven, where all the companies are worker cooperatives.” Enforced by a central top-down bureaucratic organization. In this hypothetical world would you let foreign companies motivated by profit compete in your country that only has worker co-ops? Or would you have a closed down market, similar to North Korea that only Approved Co-ops would be allowed to work in?

> Enforced by a central top-down bureaucratic organization.

The comment you selectively quoted ends with "But it's not top-down centrally managed.".

Re: Mondragon Corporation

#179

Post by macspoofing »

ianleeclark wrote: post #156
wuliwong wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my mind a "market systems" implicitly includes prices which means there would then be profit and loss. I could imagine a market of 100% barter and no generally accepted currency but I do not think that is what most people mean when they use the term "market systems." There is a lot I'm unaware of, possibly market systems without prices is one of those things?

> In my mind a "market systems" implicitly includes prices which means there would then be profit and loss. Why does a price necessarily include a profit or a loss? This is a self-referential belief: my price includes a profit or loss because a prior price includes a profit or loss which would earlier ... etc, etc.

>Why does a price necessarily include a profit or a loss

It includes a profit or a loss because you need to eat and provide for yourself. If you're making chairs but the cost of materials is larger than what you sell those chairs for, how are you going to provide for your family? If you want to save up for a house or a car, or family vacation, how are you going to do that if you don't sell your chairs with a surplus (i.e. a profit)? A market-based system necessarily implies a profit motive.

Re: Mondragon Corporation

#180

Post by wwatson »

We have a software cooperative in Austin Texas (vulk.coop). We also have a monthly virtual (using zoom) and in-person meetup group https://www.meetup.com/Austin-Software-Co-operatives if you want to know more about software cooperatives. There are papers on cooperatives found here: https://www.meetup.com/Austin-Software-Co-operatives/about/. If you want more information (or even if you just want to rigorously debate) about organic entities, worker owned entities, cooperatives, etc., I would join that group.
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