Sorry I would rather not :/
Sorry I would rather not :/
For my city, just for a very specific example, it takes less than one afternoon and 80 bucks total (no fees and almost no capital fund requirements) to open a corporation. It takes weeks if not months to open a coop and it costs 2500 bucks PER member.
I don’t know the specifics of all cities and states everywhere in the world. But the system is built to benefit private corporations much more, as it’s a capitalist system where owning capital equals power, and workers are a commodity.
Like the literal law. In most places it’s a much more involved and expensive process to even open a coop compared to a traditional private company. It takes more paperwork, more fees, more capital funds etc. Also, getting investors in (when they can’t own the coop, as they are not workers) or even loans from private or state banks/institutions is much harder. There are several programs incentivising people to open private companies, giving them tax credits, making the application and approval process easier, giving access to funds and education etc. How many there are for coops? In most places around the world there are 0. In what ways does it appear the opposite to you…? Like this all seems very self-evident to me.
The system literally disincentives and makes coops less competitive.
Opening a coop is harder, more expensive, have less subsidies or tax benefits, less opportunities for investments/loans etc.
And all of this makes running coops more expensive, thus less competitive, thus the ones that do manage to open either can’t grow or die.
When capitalism. That’s when.
Edit: to clarify, it wasn’t much better before capitalism. But it was less all-encompassing. Feudalism was a shitty structure, worse even than capitalism tbh. But it was much easier to escape it. Not just in the “survivalist hippie camp” that still exists now. But even in everyday life. The system wasn’t shaping every facet of human existence. Only production relations (which is the big one yes). But capitalism has shaped everything around us. Our places of work, sure, but our personal lives. Our inner lives. Everything has been commodified. Mental health, religion, wellness, friendships, love and relationships, families, sickness, children etc. etc. etc… That is the main reason capitalism is worse than anything before it. No other system had the capacity to destroy the planet. None. To destroy all life in it. All in the name of profit. An immaterial, formless concept. Not even a real thing. And there’s not much we can do it seems. I mean there is, and I think it’s pretty clear. But I bet even that gets commodified soon. Bring on the politicians/capitalists death match reality game shows I guess…
Holy shit… bro please don’t be racist like this in public. You should keep this shit to your brain and feel deep shame for it. No one ever taught you that?
The Chinese didn’t break any laws or “steal” anything. China had different copyright laws, and western companies agreed to share technology as part of their agreements with the CPC to operate in the SEZs. If they didn’t want China to have the tech, they could’ve just not taken the deals and go build their factories in India, or Bangladesh, or Malaysia etc.
And what you describe as the “Chinese mentality” is just literally capitalist logic, aka, psychopathy. It’s projection. The Chinese are winning, so you assume they are the apex capitalists, the Patrick Batemans. But you couldn’t be more wrong. They are winning by finding a different game, and playing it better. The rest of the world is following their lead, and your place on the board is soon to be extinct. So you panic and turn to dumbass things like racism.
There sure are billionaires in China. But they don’t control the political structure like the billionaires do in the US. They are controlled by the political structure. When has it been the last time the US or EU executed a billionaire for harming the environment?
That’s because the Chinese experience was very peculiar. When American and European investors and industry giants went abroad to outsource manufacturing, they brought in the capital and left with the profits. But the capital, and technology or knowledge, never spread in the colonies or neo-colonies. When China “opened up”, they were real clever about it. They said: “sure, you can open your factories here where there is an abundance of cheap labor. But in exchange, we want the knowledge and technology”. And since opening up China to foreign capital has been the wet dream of capitalists and proto-capitalists for the past several hundreds of years, they accepted the deal. So China was left with the know-how to be able to set-up their own national industries. And the profits of exporting manufactured goods was used for strategic industries and infrastructure, unlike most colonial and neo-colonial experiences where the profits are just pocketed by a national bourgeoisie.
The state is a tool, and currently in most of the world it’s a tool of the 1%… people really forget about the French, American, Dutch etc. revolutions? Where the capitalist class violently overtook the state from the aristocracy and rebuilt it to serve them?
After the lease period you should be able to buy the product at a discount tho… so no, it’s not a lease.
I buy what I believe will be best for me. I don’t feel bad to buy from x company instead of y. I just buy it and don’t give a fuck.
I am VERY aware that my individual consumption actions will have 0 impact on anything.
I don’t think you understood me. What I mean is “which product do I consume under capitalism” is a useless question. No consumption under capitalism will lead to a better world. Buying from fairphone or apple will make 0 difference to what actually matters.
Revolution is not a state of consumption. And surviving under capitalism won’t make revolution less likely either. So it’s a false dichotomy. Buying apple instead of fairphone won’t make a revolution less likely.
Cause capitalism was born with the Big Bang and will die with the heat death of the universe right buddy? Lmao.
You are very naive if you think fairphone is trying to “do good”. They are, like every single corporation under capitalism, trying to make a profit. They found a niche and are carving their market share within it. If they could, they would become Apple. If you don’t think so, again, you’re being naive.
It doesn’t matter if they are “bad” or not bro. The issue is the system. And it’s not a matter of morality. I don’t give a fuck if it’s “evil” or “good”. Even in a perfect capitalist world where all companies were “fair”something, we would still be destroying the planet with climate change and exploiting the labour of people in the third-world.
And who cares about “perfect”? I only care about meaningful change that helps not destroy the planet. Buying a fairphone is not it.
The only thing that will help is a fucking revolution. So the BEST thing any of us can do is to radicalise those around us and organize.
There are no “good” brands under capitalism. The issue is not of the moral failing of individual companies. We can’t solve the issues of capitalism by “consuming” right.
You think fairphone have no slave-labour rare-earth metals in them?
It really doesn’t matter… there is no ethical consumption under capitalism. Just use what’s more practical or better in any way for you.
Those are only loopholes if they are allowed to exist. If people do those things, but then get fined/persecuted as they are infringing on the spirit of the law to limit executive/worker pay ratio, then they are not loopholes right?
The classic “non-western governments that are not lapdogs for imperialism are regimes”.
Honestly the let’s plays will be epic tho. Pure chaos.