Cookie-cutter, low-impact, remedies will not cure COVID fevered hyperinflation. The current mix offered by NCEO is thin gruel where chicken soup is needed. Here is my recipe.
It is not more social democracy. This will only make hyperinflation worse. State socialism, especially in the hands of the current authoritarian administration, would be even worse.
Hyperinflation results when public policy leads to negative feedback loops and rational expectations collapse. If the public sector breaks down, the alternative that remains is some form of economic and social separatism, preferably a loose one. By loose, I mean that, while insular activity occurs, exchanges in goods, services and people continue with the outside world. Not everything (including people) must be made and stay in-house.
Finding the balance is a make-buy decision. Such decisions are implicit in the current economy. In purely competitive economies, perfect information and freedom lead to perfect economic solutions. Capitalism turns information into a closely held resource. ESOPs and COOPs open the books to members. The better the information, the better the decisions.
The difference between an ESOP and a COOP is how voting occurs. ESOPs vote by share, COOPs by employee. A COOP could be an ESOP if each member had one voting share and the remainder in preferred shares.
In the current market, employees are in their own with social democratic assists. This secures education finance, retirement security, education and a limited safety net from subsidies to bankruptcy protection.
Housing, clothing, food, leisure, transportation and other consumer goods decisions are taken at the personal level, as are purchasing additional services over and above those provided publicly. Some of these may be funded by the employer as well, such as work uniforms, transit subsidies, company cars, cafeterias, daycare, health insurance and technical training.
In times if both pandemic and hyper inflation (or to just improve the lives of members), ESOPs can create tighter relationships with providers of goods and services to guarantee availability.
Alternate payment relations, from barter to standard labor hours exchange, as well as interlocking or common ownership insulate the firm from financial and biological disruption. This is called vertical integration, as opposed to monopolistic or governmentally imposed horizontal integration.
ESOPs and COOPs have, or at least can have, lower executive pay and more equal salary structures, with incentive bonuses and equity more broadly distrubuted. Indeed, in a labor hour based exchange system, one person's labor us as valuable as another's.
Longevity and innovation would be rewarded with additional shares, rather than unequal wages. Family subsidies would be separately paid, ideally with direct or virtual subsidies.
ESOPs can buy or merge with localized grocery stores, provide low or no cost housing with lower pay to younger or single employees. ESOPs and COOPs can hire doctors, buy contingent care and specialist services from hospitals, purchase timeshares, pay for post-secondary education or provide low or zero interest loans in exchange for a service requirement.
This would all be peonage if provided by a capitalist firm. It is not if it is cooperatively owned by members. Doing so is to democratically take make-buy decisions. The degree to which these options are practical depends in firm size. Multiple ESOPs or employers may jointly purchase consumed services as well, for example, a jointly held office park with a dedicated clinic or daycare (both for sick and well children).
In times if crisis, it may be easier to find cooperative partners. If such relations had already been in force, the impact of the current pandemic would be more easily managed. The best immunity to COVID is to get sick and recover. Having your own medical staff and supplies means you can determine how that decision is made. It also means enough toilet paper.
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