SoylentNews is people
SoylentNews
Following a number of CEOs pulling out of President Trump's American Manufacturing Council and Strategic and Policy Forum, President Trump tweeted that the initiatives have been ended:
Rather than putting pressure on the businesspeople of the Manufacturing Council & Strategy & Policy Forum, I am ending both. Thank you all!
The CEOs of Merck, Intel, 3M, and other companies had already left:
3M Co. Chief Executive Officer Inge Thulin stepped down from the White House's manufacturing council, adding to the corporate exodus as the backlash grows to President Donald Trump's ambivalent response to racially-charged violence in Virginia over the weekend.
Thulin joined the White House panel in January "to advocate for policies that align with our values and encourage even stronger investment and job growth -- in order to make the United States stronger, healthier and more prosperous," the CEO said Wednesday in a statement tweeted by 3M. "After careful consideration, I believe the initiative is no longer an effective vehicle for 3M to advance these goals."
Update: The members of the Strategic and Policy Forum reportedly disbanded the group before President Trump's tweet:
The quick sequence began late Wednesday morning when Stephen A. Schwarzman, the chief executive of the Blackstone Group and one of Mr. Trump's closest confidants in the business community, organized a conference call for members of the president's Strategic and Policy Forum. On the call, the chief executives of some of the largest companies in the country debated how to proceed. After a discussion among a dozen prominent C.E.O.s, the decision was made to abandon the group altogether, said people with knowledge of the details of the call.
Also at Bloomberg:
Trump made the announcement on Twitter, less than an hour after one of the groups was said to be planning to inform the White House that it would break up. [...] Trump appeared to be making an effort to get ahead of the news as the councils began to disintegrate. The strategy forum, which is led by Blackstone Group LP's Stephen Schwarzman, planned to inform the White House Wednesday before making the announcement public, according to another person familiar with the matter, who wasn't authorized to discuss the news publicly.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @12:12AM (3 children)
Workers owning the means of production is not necessarily antagonistic to the ideals of Capitalism
You clearly don't understand what Capitalism is.
You've indicated that you believe it to be an ideology.
Capitalism is an ownership model.
It consists of people with excess wealth investing money into a business.
Those people expect to make money from money by exploiting the labor of others--while the investors avoid doing labor.
...and Capital is only a representation of labor performed by The Workers.
Without Workers, there is no Capital.
...and in Capitalism, 1 dollar==1 vote.
In Socialism, only labor has value.
There are no outside owners.
Only The Workers have ownership of the means of production.
In Socialism, 1 worker==1 vote.
There's a silly line that goes:
In Capitalism, man exploits man; in Socialism, it's the other way around.
This is repeated by ignorant people who don't understand what Socialism is.
Next time you hear it, ask the moron babbling this nonsense how he could exploit himself if he owned the means of production.
...and it sounds like you are trying to lump in Entrepreneurism with Capitalism.
If you are the only employee and you have no investors, your business is Socialist.
If you have a payroll with non-owner laborers on it, your business is Capitalist.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday August 17 2017, @01:35AM (2 children)
Is it that simple, though? Is it enough to look at a single point in time to decide?
Ok, answer me this: if I'm the owner of a business that's fully automated**, what am I?
---
** Think expensive robots, not the ones every person can afford.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday August 17 2017, @02:48AM (1 child)
Yes, it actually is.
(The 2nd thought was predicated on the 1st, BTW.)
If you have investors who produce nothing within the company, yours is a Capitalist operation.
If you have employees who have no ownership in the company, yours is a Capitalist operation.
If your employees have ownership in the company but it's not 1 worker-owner==1 vote but is instead 1 share==1 vote, yours is a Capitalist operation.
(Probably called an ESOP: Employee Stock Ownership Plan.
Publix grocery stores and Dunn-Edwards Paints are examples.)
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by c0lo on Thursday August 17 2017, @04:29AM
Ok, so suppose the following cases:
1. I opened the fully automated enterprise with capital obtained from another business using seriously underpaid labor. When the current (automated) business got up and running well, I sold the previous one.
2. I took a loan form the bank to buy the robots and, lucky enough, I managed to pay the loan with the robots still good.
In both cases, I have no employees now.
In the two cases respectively, am I socialist or capitalist?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford