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

[Kevin Carson]

On Tue, Mar 15, 2011 at 1:43 PM, Patrick Anderson <agnucius at gmail.com> wrote:

> 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?

> 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?

Because, as Joe says, they confuse ownership of the means of
production with ownership of the product.   All the situations you
describe involve self-employed artisans of one kind or another doing
one-off jobs for customers, and using their own tools to perform the
service.  They *already* own the means of production.  A grocer who
owns his own store doesn't want a claim on my house because I pay him
to order groceries from the wholesaler, stock them and sack them up
for me.  Generally calls for worker ownership involve occupations in
which the alternative to worker ownership and self-management is
workers taking orders from a superior in a hierarchy, on an ongoing
basis.

The difference between a self-employed artisan, repairman, grocer,
etc., and employment by someone else is that the self-employed
tradesman has a hundred "bosses" and doesn't work under supervision or
depend on the whim of any one of them for 100% of his rent and food
money.

When you drop off your computer to be repaired by a self-employed
repairman, I'm guessing that if you try to hang around the shop and
watch over his shoulder and micromanaging how he does his work, he'll
probably tell you (perhaps politely, perhaps not) that you might
prefer taking your business somewhere else.  OTOH, when the repairman
is in a permanent relationship with a superior in a hierarchy --
whether the employee of a capitalist repair shop or the employee of a
computer owner's repair syndicate -- it's a lot harder for him to tell
someone nitpicking and micromanaging him to fuck off.

-- 
Kevin Carson
Center for a Stateless Society http://c4ss.org
Mutualist Blog:  Free Market Anti-Capitalism
http://mutualist.blogspot.com
The Homebrew Industrial Revolution:  A Low-Overhead Manifesto
http://homebrewindustrialrevolution.wordpress.com
Organization Theory:  A Libertarian Perspective
http://mutualist.blogspot.com/2005/12/studies-in-anarchist-theory-of.html