“Looks like your work isn’t up to my standards, so I wont be paying you for this one. Better get back to it.”
The problem is once you start doing it like this you quickly realize that a lot of positions, especially managerial ones are actually accomplishing jack shit, so then you redefine what accomplishment means so you can preserve the power structure and you’re almost back at square one, only worse. And of course there are positions and tasks that cannot be quantified as easy. I.e. what do you do with r&d which can take long time without producing results. In addition people tend to game the metrics, when they are measured on these metrics.
Bruh you smart as hell. Most managers at my job don’t do as much actual productive work as the really hard working average associates. In terms of raw, physical stuff that actually gets accomplished, it’s not the managers doing the heavy lifting. But at the same time, basing compensation off of accomplishment is problematic. I’m a lot stronger and faster than some of my fellow employees who do the same tasks as me, but it wouldn’t be fair to pay me more just because I do more. I only do more by virtue of my random luck to be a physically fit person. If compensation was based on accomplishment I would not want the old people I work with breaking their backs to keep up with someone like me ya know.
If compensation was based on accomplishment I would not want the old people I work with breaking their backs to keep up with someone like me ya know.
Old people should be retired and living on a pension, and young people should at least be guaranteed a decent standard of living. That would fix a ton of the problem you’re describing.
Bruh you smart as hell
I know. My mom told me so :P
The more time passes the more my dislike for managers grows. At best they are overpaid secretaries, most of the time - just the capitalist equivalent of petite lords and nobles. The decision making they do could and should be done by workers.
Dude this is one of those things that are so terrible on so many levels that it makes me dizzy just thinking about it. I hope this post isn’t supposed to be an endorsement of that because this is just awful.
I don’t hear it said enough in explicit terms, so it’s worth saying now.
Meritocracy is bad, you should not want it as a leftist.
On top of what you’ve said, I’d add that it’s an op, never true, and the original word is a parody of the idea. Even if it worked in theory, it’s not a good thing.
From each according to their ability, to each according to their need. That is what we’re aiming for.
You don’t need a hierarchy based on talent to do that. That will erase the thing you’re trying to achieve. People can manage themselves on democratic grounds, more or less.
This isn’t even hypothetical. For a while, the game company Valve operated this way. They voted on each other’s salaries, they had no official titles or bosses. Employees in aggregate are generally pretty good, in a non toxic environment, about evaluating the talent of another employee and coming up with what a fair salary would be.
Workplace democracy might seem like a meme, but it’s a real, practical thing.
From each according to their ability, to each according to their need. That is what we’re aiming for.
They voted on each other’s salaries, they had no official titles or bosses. Employees in aggregate are generally pretty good, in a non toxic environment, about evaluating the talent of another employee and coming up with what a fair salary would be.
The Valve scenario is a great example of what we should be working for right now, but it’s pretty far from “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need.” If your coworkers vote you a high salary, they’re doing that more on some meritocratic principle than on consideration of what you need.
Until we’re in a completely post-scarcity society, workplace democracy (combined with the means of decent living guaranteed to everyone) is a better target than “from each according to their ability, to each according to their need.” A democratic workplace where income is determined by peers gives workers incentives for being more productive, which (at least according to Blackshirts and Reds) was lacking in the USSR. It also acts as a check against the most productive workers turning reactionary.
I read a book called Drive! by Daniel Pink whose underlying premise was this:
People dont give a shit about pay as long as their needs are met. Which is true for me atleast, I dont want more pay often I want more free time. Especially if my taxes make working more a diminishing return or in general make my life more miserable. The book barely mentioned the pay part too, which was an obviois indicator that the book is garbage.
It says that: What you as a business owner needs to do is align your employees wants with your own. And if that means giving them more free reign and less working hours, that’s good. You should do that.
My problem was how seedy and manipulative it is, the assumption that you can and that you should try to manipulate people to have your fucking gross capitalist goals. It also had the jeff bezos-y squeeze every bit of juice out of the lemon you can, but in five hours instead of 8.
That sounds pretty typical of management texts I’ve had to read. Often they have a surprising (to me) awareness of what makes working at the bottom rung of an organization miserable and alienating, but improvements to that situation are always subordinated to the needs of “the organization” (i.e. the bosses). I expected Pure Ideology going into reading them, but often instead found class consciousness, albeit of a kind that is deeply cynical at its core.
