[P2P-F] Worker Ownership, Scale of Production, and Use Value

Tue Mar 15 20:59:14 CET 2011

I feel as though much of the complication here comes from a misuse of the
terms "means of production."  In the case of the network technician, the
plumber and the computer repair person you are mistaking the "product of
labor" for the "means of production."  The product of the labor is what is
produced/output by a production process, while the tools are what is used in
that creation.  In the case of the plumber worker ownership does not mean
owning part of the house (the product of labor), which they have already
agreed to sell back to you (otherwise you would never let them work on your
house), the "means of production" is the tools they use to work on the pipes
(snake, PEX crimper, etc).  Even though some of your examples produce "means
of production" (for instance fixing a hard drive) that is still the
service/product of labor (we can use capital to produce more capital).  In
the case of the server farm something distinctly different is happening.

It is also not a valid comparison to say a server farm should be owned
privatly because the repairer of a hard drive should not own the hard
drive.  In one case you are providing the service of a fixing hard drive to
someone who already owned the hard drive while in the other the service is
web host (which implies access to the hard drives, software and other
infrastructure).

Further theories of worker ownership don't exist in a vacuum, but are rather
part of broader theory of distributed ownership of capital.  Few would
suggest that an individual can't own an olive tree (though the worker who
picks the olives should certainly own some/many of the olives), but many
would suggest that agricultural resources should be held in common, use
distributed via a community decision making process and actual working
conditions controlled by a democratically managed organization.  These
theories would say that an individual should not own 100 olive trees.  It is
a fallacy to suggest that something that works on a small scale (private
ownership of capital for personal use) will work on a large scale.

Sincerely,
Joe Rinehart
Worker/Owner
Firestorm Cafe and Books
48 Commerce Street
Asheville, N.C.
Cafe: 828.255.8115
Cell: 828.333.4162

p.s. It's generally polite to use multiple gendered prononouns (he and she)
when describing workers or degendered pronouns (they), otherwise you are
indicating that you feel there is a certain limitation on the part of our
female compatriots.

On Tue, Mar 15, 2011 at 2:43 PM, Patrick Anderson <agnucius at gmail.com>wrote:

> Worker Ownership is a very widely accepted as
> being the obvious answer to wage slavery.
>
> It is said that Workers must have at least *some*
> Ownership in the Means of Production lest they
> otherwise be exploited by those owners.
>
>
> But when the situation is on a very small scale,
> the idea seems to break-down and become almost
> absurd - for would you have a network technician
> become part owner of your home network because
> you hire him to install some wires and configure
> your router?
>
>
> Let's try "stepping through" the logic of this - the way
> a programmer might "step through" a program as he
> is trying to debug what, *exactly* is wrong, and so
> what *exactly* must change.
>
> We will do this by reducing the scale to just one
> owner, and then slowly increasing the scale...
>
>
> Imagine you own a single Olive tree.
>
> You pick the fruit yourself and turn some of them
> into oil - all for your own, personal use.
>
> You use all of the outputs of that tree and you do
> all of the work.
>
> One day you slip and hurt your back. You can no
> longer pick the Olives, but the work must be done.
>
>
> If you hire someone to work for you, should that
> worker have some ownership in your personal tree?
>
> If yes, then should the mechanic that fixes your
> car become also co-owner of that vehicle?
>
> What about a plumber that fixes your pipes?
> Should he become part owner of your home?
>
> What if you hire someone to fix your laptop?
> Should he become a stakeholder of that device?
>
>
> Why do these questions seem illogical?
>
>
> What if the Olive tree is co-owned by you and your
> neighbor?  What if an orchard is co-owned by 10
> people?  What if by 100?  And 1,000?  1,000,000?
>
>
> The same of the other questions.
>
> What if the car is co-owned by 2 people?  3 people?
> 4, 5, 6, 7, etc...
>
> What if the house has more than one owner?  What
> if it is an apartment complex?
>
> What if the laptop is a massive datacenter?
>
>
> When does the answer to the question of "Should
> the worker have ownership in the Means of Production"
> switch from "Obviously NO" to "Obviously YES"?
>
>
> But maybe this is simply the wrong question.
>
> What am I missing here?  Why should the end-user
> retain full ownership in some cases, and under
> what circumstances should the workers become
> shareholders?
>
>
> I suspect it has something to do with whether the
> owners are using the product directly as compared
> to them selling it to other agents.
>
> When the product is used directly, it seems we do
> not have a problem with the users retaining ownership
> of their trees, cars, houses, etc.
>
> But if those owners intend to *sell* some of the
> product, then I think we feel the workers then
> deserve part of the Profit that will likely be
> collected from those buyers.
>
>
> So when Production is Imputed - where the owners
> of the Means of Production use all of the outputs
> of that production and nothing is sold - it seems
> under that condition, that Workers do not need
> ownership ... since I guess it would do them no
> good anyway.
>
> When the owners do not sell the product, there is no
> Profit to divide-up.
>
> Also, when all user-owners have sufficient ownership in
> the Means of Production, the usual tactic of stopping
> other Workers from accessing those Means (to increase
> wages) cannot be achieved by Workers gaining ownership
> for themselves, for when the users have sufficient
> ownership, they can allow any worker to reverse-bid
> for that job.
>
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