Problems with business

[Non-RedNeck Westsider]

And if you look at it from the cartoons point of the owner is doing the heavy lifting as actually selling the products is the most important step in business. If you can sell there is something out there to sell but just be able to produce products even if they are useful does not involve taking in money.

I actually like this and am going to spin it even a bit further.  We all know that you can get far with great selling skills, but everyone knows that the 'real' money in business is made when you're buying, not selling.

[Uncle Marx]

I'm a labor guy but this is ridiculous. I own a business first of all few times in history has the bottom line (Profit) been 70% or the startup costs not taken years and a fair amount of risk to pay back and likely takes multiple investment cycles before a true ROI is reached.  You can support labor having good conditions and fair pay without trying to spin that the Capitalist is the beneficiary of a one way relationship.

Everything you just said has already been addressed. Whether it's 4 days, 5 days, or 3 years, so long as the business stays profitable, the surplus produced by the workers will supersede the initial capital investment, rendering the cartoon true.

p.s. If you're what constitutes pro labor, we need to redefine the term oxymoron.

[Uncle Marx]

And if you look at it from the cartoons point of the owner is doing the heavy lifting as actually selling the products is the most important step in business. If you can sell there is something out there to sell but just be able to produce products even if they are useful does not involve taking in money.

Typically it's not the case that the shareholders, board of directors, or CEO (any of whom the man in the suit could be), also work on the sales floor. It's also still the case that in order for the man to have something to sell, someone else had to make it. Moreover, just because he can sell the item - presuming the man in the suit is also the salesman - it doesn't follow that this entitles him to $35 instead of $15. And the cartoon again, remains true.

For some reason people are quick to think a difference in pay actually means a difference in hard-work. I don't see how a man doing sales is "heavy lifting" compared to the people producing the product (which frequently entails actual heavy lifting...)

[acme54321]

You aren't factoring in risk here.  Typically the owner of a successful business leverages large amounts of his personal time and finances at the startup of the business.  Should the employee be entitled to the rewards of the initial work put into the business by the founder?

[JeffreyS]

The cartoon is just seriously misleading to act as though business owners would make 70% over costs. It creates a disconnect from a rational discussion of treating workers fairly.

[JeffreyS]

When I say I am a labor guy I mean I support the right to unionize, a minimum wage being based on a living wage , companies who rely on the government to subsidize their workforce pay a tax penalty, the right to a safe workplace and maintaining a vibrantly regulated version of capitalism that keeps anyone from dominating markets so as to encourage a competitive place for labor to leverage their product (which is labor).

See how I can explain my pro labor stance without acting like ownership brings nothing to the table.

[strider]

The reality is for small business, sometimes that guy making 15 only brings in 10.  When you figure out the problem and get the guy up to 25, the government increases taxes, the suppliers raise their prices and gas goes through the roof.  You still aren't making much, if anything.  And yet, you were the one who spent that large amount of cash to buy the equipment, the equipment the guy just broke and now he sits on his keyster for the next 6 hours until it gets fixed.

There have been times as a small business owner that I have done well.  There are times I haven't.  In neither case have I ever figured out what I made per hour.  It would convince me to go find that job at Mc Donalds.  I would make less over all but would actually get to go sailing a lot more.

I started my working career in big business.  When the leadership still believed in showing loyalty to the employees and employees still wanted to be loyal to them.  I reported to a VP who started at the bottom, worked his way through college and ended up the VP of Engineering.  When he retired, the new VP of Engineering had a MBA. Sort of says it all. All of a sudden, if you worked hard , looked out after the company's best interests, you were literally black balled and not allowed to move forward.  Only if you kissed that proverbial did you get ahead.  The stockholder became more important than the customer and so everyone looked out after themselves and others whom they felt would help them move up.  Product became secondary to keeping that stock price up. Must protect that golden parachute. Frankly, if the cartoon is correct, everyone involved deserves it. The employee doesn't care for the work he puts out and the employer doesn't care about the employee and to take it further, only cares about the buck.  In the end, some bigger fish comes along and gobbles everyone up and everyone loses in the end. OK, so maybe that owner does get to retire with millions, but is he happy?

[BridgeTroll]

UM... are you a student or professor at one of our fine local universities?

[ben says]

UM... are you a student or professor at one of our fine local universities?

UNF

[BridgeTroll]

UM... are you a student or professor at one of our fine local universities?

UNF

Student I assume?

[Tacachale]

UM... are you a student or professor at one of our fine local universities?

UNF

Student I assume?

I think that's a fair assumption

[FSBA]

I would recommend an adding Introduction to Microeconomics to his course list then