>From: hal@finney.org
>Subject: Re: Bugs in free markets.
>Date: Sun, 3 Sep 2000 15:56:46 -0700
>
> > Hal wrote:
> > > Corporations are a matter of people getting together cooperatively to
> > > organize their efforts. How can it be evil for a group of people to
> > > voluntarily organize, and to offer jobs to others? Every aspect of
> > > the process, from the formation of the corporation, to the job offer,
> > > to the acceptance, is voluntary and agreed to by all concerned.
> > ...
>
>James Wetterau points out,
> > Actually, corporations receive limitations on their liability.
>
>Yes, of course this is right, I was ignoring this aspect in my brief
>description because the original concern seemed to relate to other
>aspects of corporations than liability limitation. Their size, their
>political influence, their heirarchical structure and ability to fire
>people at will, all were named as threats, and it was to this that I
>wanted to respond.
>
>Hal
And on that note, consider how the Unemployment Compensation or Workman's
Comp systems actually work in practice. Unemployment compensation requires
the worker to prove that he or she was fired or laid-off due to no fault of
their own. The worker is forced to pay into the system, and then it
requires him to put up with virtually anything on the job with no recourse.
If he quits because the boss is a sadistic jerk who spends every day
psychologically torturing him, he gets back none of the money he paid in.
And stress only counts in Workman's Comp if it can be proven to be sudden
and out of the ordinary. If you get high blood pressure due to months or
years of being bullied or insulted, then that's your problem.
At the Teamster Union warehouse where I worked for five years in the late
'70's, the company simply ignored any and all safety regulations, on the
theory that it was cheaper just to pay the arbitrarilly capped workman's
comp settlements. They also ignored any and all health regs regarding the
"health foods" which they supplied to most of the health food stores on the
West Coast, on the theory that they didn't have to do anything until the
Health Inspectors actually ordered them to. If you were buying vitamins in
the late '70's thru mid '80's, you almost certainly bought some from their
hot, filthy, rat-infested warehouse.
These systems were built out of joint political agreements, BTW, between our
wonderful "progressive" union reps, politicians who needed money, and
industry lobbiests, all of whom have strong vested interests in keeping the
workers under their thumb. (Just try getting help from your local union on
any job issue if you're on the losing team in the last union elections.
I've been there.)
These are just a couple of little examples of the twisted structure that has
evolved in the name of protecting the worker or the consumer, but which
invariably serves concentrations of power instead, all consequent to the
machinations of our wonderful "progressive" friends.
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