At 16:03 19/03/2013, SL wrote:
This story has been forwarded to you from
http://www.alternet.org by Keith Hudson
I've been following this initiative - seems very relevant to innovative
thinking about the future of work. While 30 jobs in a laundry doesn't seem
like much, I imagine the conditions of that work are important to how
those folks feel about themselves.
-------------------------------------
Why Unions Are Going Into the Co-op Business
http://www.alternet.org/food/why-unions-are-going-co-op-business
Excellent article by Amy Dean. If we are to have a practical socialist
future then, as the United Steelworkers Union President says "We need a new
business model . . . " But, as Amy Dean suggests at the end of the
article, the new (Mondragon-type) model is still vulnerable to globalized
competition from countries with lower wage rates. (Even the Chinese are now
facing this from several other Asian countries such as Thailand, etc. This
means that China might not succeed in pulling up the rural half of its
population anytime soon.) So what should co-operatives do?
Michael Peack, Mondragon's spokesman in the piece, doesn't have an answer.
He can only hope that labour costs will rise elsewhere -- and quickly
enough. I wouldn't hold my breath on that.
The only way forward for Mondragon-type co-operaives is to broadly raise
their skills level, with particular concentration on the highest priced
skills. The present elite in any country is not going to persuade the
government to help because they already recruit enough professionals to
keep them in a dominant position. Co-operatives must set about the
educational task all by themselves. The factory workers of the 19th century
in England almost succeeded in getting this started themselves but failedd
when the civil service captured education with free schools etc .
Keith
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