Quote from: Vandroiy on July 24, 2013, 08:50:34 PM

Quote from: crumbs on July 21, 2013, 10:43:56 AM

"Control structure optimization"? You start with the dubious assumption that since [partial] ownership increases a party's interest, and thus work performance (a doubly dubious notion: Surgeons do not do surgeries on their family members, actors get stage fright during performances (in which they're fully invested), not rehearsals (in which they're not), etc., etc.). As i pointed out earlier, incentivising work (oh, let's say a salary) improves performance, but the law of diminishing returns kicks in early, and, as i've pointed out, .1% of Google would be enough to keep me *riveted* -- at 50% my ego might get the better of me & i'd start treating the company as a toy (i wouldn't be able to spend that much money in my lifetime anyhow, so why not?)

There will always be examples of people doing crazy things just because they're people -- that's human nature. But rationally, there is no limit to the usable amounts of assets. You can pass them on to children, or use them to secure your future against increasingly unlikely problems.

It's hard to tell how to better organize things. Owning 0.1% of Google when it was a start-up wouldn't have motivated people much. The prospect of randomly losing one's share has the same effect. We don't know if full private ownership is the optimal solution, but it is a solution better than other plans people come up with. As for people wasting the funds or going nuts: remember they can do this exactly once, then other investors take over. The market systematically removes such actors and the problem with them.

I'm not talking about people going crazy -- merely that there is a point at which having greater stakes in a company ceases to add extra incentive, think in terms of law of diminishing returns. Adding progressively more fertilizer yields better crops -- up to the point where adding more makes no difference, and past that -- kills the crop. Another thing to keep in mind is you're playing a nearly zero-sum game -- by giving the uberboss total ownership, you're taking away potential incentive from his underlings, and their underlings, etc., etc. Is it better for the captain to own the whole ship, or might it be safer for the crew to have a stake in it too? They'd certainly be less likely to mutiny

The same thing holds for startups -- offer employees shares in the company they can't unload 'till the IPO -- you got a captive workforce. Keep the whole nut? you ain't.

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Quote from: crumbs on July 21, 2013, 10:43:56 AM

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It might fail at times but this is part of the competition -- and thus evolution -- amongst investors. If they have others conduct their business their job becomes ensuring the productivity of these executives. If they close one company to strengthen another in excess of the loss, this is still a net benefit.

Net benefit? To whom?

To the total of any type of party involved... I don't get the question. Huh

If the total efficiency of the result is higher, society gets a net benefit. Since it's capitalist by assumption, the resulting company produces something people want. If the market pays more profit margin for the new company configuration, it seems that either many people or other companies find it more useful.

People are not driven by dispassionate greed. If lone leaders solely controlled large corporations, the world would be full of (Spruce Geese? What an awkward plural), and almost no Cessnas. Wealth would become even more concentrated -- elite making extraordinary toys for the elite, with 0 interest to make toilet paper.
Of course, following your reasoning to its logical conclusion gives us a world of monopolies -- if economics of scale hold for some industries -- what's to prevent them?

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Quote from: crumbs on July 21, 2013, 02:16:22 PM

You realize that outside of Ayn Rand books, the poor protecting the rights of the rich to get richer are just dupes to be laughed at, right?

Quoting this too, because it is the core point I don't believe. IMO the correct statement would be "The poor who protect the rights of the corrupt and fight the productive rich are digging their own grave".

No, i stand behind what i said.

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In being driven by jealousy instead of rational thinking, people think in categories of "rich" and "poor" instead of "productive" and "counterproductive". This clouds their judgement and produces major inefficiencies.

I think they may be driven by something more naive, like infantile sense of fair play. They are simpleminded & irrational enough to feel that it's not right for one baby to be born rich, while another's dirt poor. They feel that it may be nice to share, if only amongst babies. Do you sort-a understand, or does it take a sharp pitchfork to get such commie faggot notions through to you?