[lbo-talk] A highly critical take on Fitch

[Nathan Newman]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Doug Henwood" <dhenwood at panix.com>
-I've got a paper around somewhere that points out that dispersed
-ownership, as in the predominantly English-speaking countries, is a
-more hostile environment for social democracy, since it's pitiless in
-its demands for cost-cutting and labor flexibility. Ownership in the
-soc dem countries is more concentrated.

But that doesn't fully explain the lack of social democracy in America in 
the time of the trusts and monopolies, when ownership was quite concentrated 
and coordinated.   That may be true now, but we have been talking about why 
unions were defeated and made more conservative in the mold of Sam Gompers, 
which happened in the time of massive corporate concentration and very 
little discipline from Wall Street in the sense of dispersed ownership.

-- Nathan Newman