> I don’t want a vote on whether or not my bakery puts sesame seeds on the bread. I just want to buy a loaf of bread thanks.
You have an illusion of choice right now between sesame or non sesame bread through the low-resolution "voting" mechanism of the market, which doesn't actually consider your desires when counting votes, merely the profitability between your desires and a supplier's margin. If you like sesame, but if it's not profitable enough, too bad, no sesame for you. "They can charge more," "someone will fill the niche," yes we've been told that about capitalism for the last century, yet it's never been true, so I guess it was a lie. Think of all the products people want that we just can't get anymore because some big org decided we can't have it, or better yet, think of how nearly monopolized industries have leveraged their power to move markets towards more profitable directions. Clothes - big, baggy, unicolor blobs. Phones - black squares.
It's not only more ethical for breadmakers to he democratic, it's simply more efficient in terms of delivering what the people want and need. Markets are a low resolution, exploitable mechanism that can lead to contrary incentives. Better to just cast a vote.
By the way I would add that co-ops are more ethical because if it's set up correctly, nobody is profiting from your labor more than yourself. In a traditional org, the vast majority of your productive profit is captured and used in a way you have no say - lately mostly to line the pockets of shareholders and a captured boys club of nepo MBA types that often don't even have that much experience in your industry. In a co-op, you the worker decide what happens with the profit margin on top of your labor. You can use it to have more money for yourself (and your coworkers), or you can invest it more intelligently in the business than an exec thousands of miles away in the private jet your profit margin pays for. This also works out better for your customers and users.
[−]PaulDavisThe1st · 2026-07-02 Thu 04:33 UTC ·
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I agree with everything you've written here, and am a big fan of worker-owned co-ops. However:
> Better to just cast a vote.
It's not hard to see "do I buy the sesame or non-sesame loaf this week?" as a much more efficient method of voting and vote tallying than actually voting.
I think the most successful worker owned co-ops tend to appear to the outside world as more or less indistinguishable from a capitalist for-profit, but internally are quite different.
You have an illusion of choice right now between sesame or non sesame bread through the low-resolution "voting" mechanism of the market, which doesn't actually consider your desires when counting votes, merely the profitability between your desires and a supplier's margin. If you like sesame, but if it's not profitable enough, too bad, no sesame for you. "They can charge more," "someone will fill the niche," yes we've been told that about capitalism for the last century, yet it's never been true, so I guess it was a lie. Think of all the products people want that we just can't get anymore because some big org decided we can't have it, or better yet, think of how nearly monopolized industries have leveraged their power to move markets towards more profitable directions. Clothes - big, baggy, unicolor blobs. Phones - black squares.
It's not only more ethical for breadmakers to he democratic, it's simply more efficient in terms of delivering what the people want and need. Markets are a low resolution, exploitable mechanism that can lead to contrary incentives. Better to just cast a vote.
By the way I would add that co-ops are more ethical because if it's set up correctly, nobody is profiting from your labor more than yourself. In a traditional org, the vast majority of your productive profit is captured and used in a way you have no say - lately mostly to line the pockets of shareholders and a captured boys club of nepo MBA types that often don't even have that much experience in your industry. In a co-op, you the worker decide what happens with the profit margin on top of your labor. You can use it to have more money for yourself (and your coworkers), or you can invest it more intelligently in the business than an exec thousands of miles away in the private jet your profit margin pays for. This also works out better for your customers and users.
> Better to just cast a vote.
It's not hard to see "do I buy the sesame or non-sesame loaf this week?" as a much more efficient method of voting and vote tallying than actually voting.
I think the most successful worker owned co-ops tend to appear to the outside world as more or less indistinguishable from a capitalist for-profit, but internally are quite different.