Ask Prof Wolff: How Worker Co-ops Handle Bankruptcy

A Supporter of Democracy at Work asks: "The concept of the productive worker being both employer and employee in all areas is brilliant and necessary to overcome the injustice of the potentially dangerous and egregious financial disparity between that of the upper earning and the lower earning citizens. However, not all such businesses will succeed. How is this scenario resolved?"

This is Professor Richard Wolff's video response.

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“Marxism always was the critical shadow of capitalism. Their interactions changed them both. Now Marxism is once again stepping into the light as capitalism shakes from its own excesses and confronts decline.”

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[emiebex]

Thanks Professor for laying this out in an informative conversation.

[paulschumacher]

Very lucid. I would think that worker-coops would be less exposed to failure because, given that everyone in the firm has strong input, they can change their products and/or methods to meet external circumstances.

[srtghfnbfg]

Where would I be able to read about a worker co-op economy? Im not sure I can find info about this anywhere other than here

[gomes]

I have a question, could the leader of this elected coop be less knowledgeable in their field than someone who isn't elected?
When someone makes a business does their stuff like ownership of game be taken?
Thanks.

[cev]

Oh, that's a terrible criteria for seniority and priority in getting new jobs: the size of your family? Rewarding those with the biggest family will therefore encourage everyone to have larger families and more kids. And we already have an overpopulated world infringing on wildlife/nature and consuming vast resources. Cross that one out.
And by contrast, not rewarding bigger families with better opportunities, would encourage people to keep their families smaller, so that the money stretches farther.

[oreagle]

When talking about creditor protection. The court first prioritizes Unsecured creditors before Secured creditors.
The logic is; ...a secured creditor knows how to protect itself. (big difference)

[cageybee]

I'm not sure how I feel about government controlled co-op bankruptcies, or the idea that it wouldn't be their fault if they went out of business. in capitalism this is true because the owner/board make decisions not workers, but in a co-op the workers all helped make the choices that drove them out of business. I feel like a more community level unemployment fund would be better than top down government control over something which is intended to be an alternative to state socialism, maybe a local jury-style commission could be assembled to decide what exactly to do with the co-op's assets afterwards in a way that won't be damaging, and then dissolved afterwards.

[mckenzydukhedin]

Hi iwould like to get to know about the socialist movement and how it works out for the best interest of the people I lik Mark teaching it great

Thank you mark

[AnchoviePossum]

there are alot more non-sense comments on this video than normal

[PCFLSZ]

Well Professor, how are these organizations going to get started? If your vision of worker owned businesses that fail lose nothing, what lender is going to provide funds to let them start up? For a new business venture, is the government going to decide who gets start up funds? I would predict you'll have a lot of applications for that start up money if the business founders know they have no risk of loss if the business fails.

Sounds like a real winner there. Why not provide some examples of companies that operate as you envision...in reality, not only in your imagination.

[PoliticalEconomy]

All of the cool people are partying in Davos. Why arent you there Dr Wolff?

[garrethoien]

This dork basically said there re no consequences of poor business management...we pretend to work they pretend to pay

[TC-eoeb]

Prof Wolff with another worker cooperative video lol. Prof Wolf has been producing his worker cooperative videos for decades now. According to Google there are only between 400-600 registered worker cooperatives in the entire U.S. Why do you suppose that is? Prof Wolff has taught thousands of students over his long career. I have yet to hear from any of his former students claiming to have successfully created a worker cooperative. Prof Wolff would have better luck selling time share units.

[jgalt]

Gee Professor that didn't seem to be the question that was asked, and the nonsense
regarding, slavery, feudalism, and capitalism was irrelevant. ( that all business can fail is
the reality, so why not use the "existing" economic systems even though you don't really
know what the words actually mean. or what these systems actually are? )

In this system workers get unemployment and all of this benefit is paid by
the "employer" so the "workers" are protected, while creditors may get nothing
and they are certainly going to LOSE, so the idea of being protected is a fiction.

Some more bad news...there are no worker co-op societies, and since the workers
are owners and have all contributed their democratic genius to the "failure" by
what "right" do they deserve protection...and how are their "creditors' protected
or are you assuming they have none just like you assume that they ( workers ) have decided,
what to produce and how to produce it and that THIS formula will actually
produce a profit????

And so much for the "benefit" of being a "partner" with you...that when you win the question
lottery, your question isn't actually answered or addressed...and the money better spent
buying used Harry Potter books, where at least the fantasy involved will be more
entertaining for a greater length of time.

[clarestucki]

This Wolff rant is not much nonsense the way most Wolff rants are, but what it IS is almost totally irrelevant to reality. In the first place there are very few worker co-ops that amount to anything as a percentage of the economy, and the few that do exist are seldon or never "capital intensive" ventures, therefore when one actually does go out of business, there is almost never even a NEED for an official judicial bankruptcy. Worker co-ops, like Wolff, are mostly irrelevant to the real economyies of the world.