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A billionaire wrote this letter to Google a year ago. How likely is that Google's layoffs and actions since then are at least partly because of this? (lemmy.world)
submitted 2 years ago by to c/workreform@lemmy.world
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[–] 21 points 2 years ago (3 children)

Yeah, I'm not sure I really get this whole "reduce employment" logic. Like if some product just isn't profitable and you lay off the employees you hired to work on it, that's not surprising, but if the employees are doing something profitable, and you actually needed to hire that many to get whatever it was you hired them for done, shouldn't it be more profitable to a company to keep them, even if one had a large number?

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  • [–] 34 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

    Moreover, if all the oligarchs are doing it, and they are, who will be left to buy their products/services?

    They're breaking their own ponzi scheme economy for a few more quarterly profit boosts because there's nowhere else to grow/metastasize. Media companies are making less media. Food makers are making less product types. Their profit is coming out of gutting workers and their ability to produce what their economic sector produced in the first place.

    This is a terminal stage market capitalism fire sale. The snake is eating its own tail having conquered the board.

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  • [–] 15 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    Because this is the End of the Line. The snake has found its tail and Oroborous awakens to transform the end into the beginning. An ideology of everlasting consumption will eventually consume itself.

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  • [–] 12 points 2 years ago* (1 child)

    Especially on a finite world with finite resources.

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  • [–] 7 points 2 years ago (2 children)

    Bold of you to assume the stock market has anything to do with finite resources.

    When the ultra wealthy and their companies run the system into the ground they will buy up the failed stocks and cheap land that nobody else can afford then come out ahead when the economy recovers like they have in the previous economic crashes. They can afford to buy low and cash out when it is high because they have zero pressure to act at any given point in time due to their ridiculous wealth and zero legal repercussions.

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  • [–] 9 points 2 years ago (1 child)

    But even then there reaches a point where they run out of things to buy, and people to buy them from.

    Eventually they poison the one thing they worship: the sanctity of private property rights. It has to serve at least some portion of the populace if it's going to remain tenable, but they're doomed to discover and undershoot that number.

    The Western world spent a century demonising socialism with "they'll take your home and car" but it rings hollow when you have neither.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    Bold of you to assume they were talking about the stock market

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    Upthread:

    This is a terminal stage market capitalism fire sale. The snake is eating its own tail having conquered the board.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    And? How do you get stock market from that? They are obviously talking about the economy as a whole and not the stock market

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (1 child)

    The stock market is the reason for chasing quarterly profits and a massive part of what gets counted as the economy. It is the main driver of all the shitty late stage capitalism practices we are discussing.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago

    The stock market is certainly part of the problem but it’s not everything.

    Capitalism in its entirety is the issue. Capitalism is based on infinite growth which is unsustainable and impossible.

    The stock market is just a tool to extract wealth from the populace. Without the stock market it would still happen but with less efficiency.

    You have the same problems with or without stocks.

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