(October 12, 2011 at 7:57 am)reverendjeremiah Wrote: "myth"? In america before trade unionism came into popularity, it was common for a corporation to enclose an entire city, or area. The workers had no choice but to buy their food and commodities from the corporation itself. The workers eventually were no longer paid in dollars, but in company credit. Food and commodities were imported by the companie at the cheapest price they could find, and then the prices were artificially inflated when sold to the lower worker. workers who complained were beaten, or punished by not being allowed into the company store for a few days. company credit was always given to them at a lower percentage of the dollar amount on paydays, if paydays even came on time. Sure, many were allowed to leave (which was their excuse for saying "see, you arent slaves"), but their names were blacklisted as a "trouble maker" or as a "communist" and then shared with many other companies so that you could no longer find work in the immediate area.
That's why we advocate a government to protect the rights of the people and a global market economy in which the sort of isolated cooperation required for that to function simply can't be effectively organised. If there is a company behaving like that, even if they aren't violating the rights of others, the opportunities for someone to undercut them or steal their employees is tremendous. The most effective way for any business to stay in operation long term is to provide consumers with goods at a price they are willing to pay and keep their employees well enough paid so they aren't available to the competition, anything less introduces vulnerabilities in the business that will likely be fatal.
.
