quoted me
>>The NYT has an example of what I've been talking about - how
>>managers undercut the interests of owners, while not neccesarily
>>benefiting those of workers.
>
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then replied
>
> Aren't the sort of CEOs and board members (be they of accounting
> firms or other corporations) who have the ability to undercut the
> interest of other shareholders actually _owners_ themselves, rather
> than just managers?
Yes. But the auditors are not. Auditors are what I would classify as coordinators and you would classify as skilled workers.
My fundametal point is supported regardless. Worker owned and controlled co-ops (which have existed in the U.S. - though I'm not claiming a worker co-op in a capitalist society equals socialism) generally show better productivity rates, and need less management than other firms in the same industry. Mondragon in Spain (which is still partially worker owned and is not very worker controlled) in spite of all my criticisms of it, outperforms more conventional forms of capitalism. Capitalist owners could extract more profit in the short run if they would turn their coroporations into worker managed firms, and simply took a tithe greater than their current profit margin.
But they won't do it for two related reasons. One is that workers would make the change in conciousness Marx always expected - realizing that they don't need owners. The second (which may fudnamentally the same as the first) is tha loss of control. A worker run Washington post might well gradually drift away from the reactionary establishment line, even with advertisor pressure. Capitalism is about power as well as profit. I can't serously imagnine owners accepting the loss of power this kind of change would produce. In short in it is not even utopian. It is a contra-factual that helps illustrate the tremedous loss the top-down management capitalism needs imposes, over and above the far worse losses we normally pay attention to.