Just another of the many reasons why we don't buy Nestle products at home, and I didn't allow them at our congregation back when I was head of the kitchen - they're a sh!t company, dumping sub-standard products in poor nations that they would never sell at home. (Not to mention stealing their water for pennies on the dollar.)
Property and Contract in #Economics: The Case for Economic Democracy by David Ellerman
This book makes 2 arguments.
The employment contract is the core of the #capitalism rather than private property
The employment contract is invalid because it violates #WorkersRights to #democracy in the firm. All firms should be structured as worker #coops for economic justice
My father-in-law is a farmer, and has always supplied his crops to farmer cooperatives. Year after year, the cooperatives' financials improve, but the margins for farmers shrink. Reading the financial statements (which are public but well hidden, of course), it's discovered that each year the executives' salaries, the president's, and the employees' increase, and bonuses are awarded to them when the harvests or profits are better than previous years. In practice, the farmer doesn't benefit, except marginally, from a particularly good year for the cooperative. He's been a board member for years and, when he tried to raise this issue, he was gradually and 'elegantly' dismissed from his position, replaced by figures less agricultural and more bureaucratic.
Many Italian public entities own private but publicly owned companies. These entities are obliged to use these companies, often with lower service quality and higher prices than the free market. In theory, this should be an advantage for the community, but in practice, it leads to a decrease in the competitiveness of service prices and lower revenues for local companies, made non-competitive by the obligation. The result is that, year after year, the costs of services increase and we hear about 'record budgets', but, in fact, the only ones earning more are the presidents, board members, officials, and employees. The citizen, however, sees the cost of the service increasing year after year.
I read everywhere about controversies related to the CEO of Mozilla's compensation, and I'm not surprised. It doesn't matter whether it's about distributing 'sugared water (quote)', hardware, public services, agricultural products, or anything else: when there's a lot of money involved, the figures 'at the top' are very, very far from what really happens below. It's pure business.
Regarding this, I will tell an experience related to the BSD Cafe - but I will have to phrase it well as I don't want to be misunderstood or generate controversy and/or bad feelings.
Much of Italian entrepreneurship (especially post-war, but not only) has been tied to people passionate about a product, who have built empires (Ferrari, Lamborghini, Del Vecchio with LuxOttica, Ferrero, and many others). When the boss is actually a Leader with vision and passion, things can work. And it's not a matter of money. Money may come, but as a consequence, not as a target.
When, instead, a 'generic' entrepreneur is put in charge, the product loses its importance - like when a computer company was led by someone who, until the day before, sold 'sugared water', precisely.