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Comment by rglullis | Hacker News Reader

It's interesting that he states right at the beginning that he uses money as a proxy for power and then leads us to the conclusion we should object the concentration of money. Why don't we just go straight to the source and eliminate the mechanisms that allow for the concentration of power?

I'd like to propose two very simple rules:

   - no business entity can have more than 150 people.
   - no individual can take part in more than one business.

You can have as many non-controlling/non-voting shares on any business entity, but you can only contribute directly to one.

Put those in place, and you destroy corporatism and with it you destroy the concentration of power. Politically, it's much easier to sell "no one should have this much power" over "no one should be allowed to amass so much money". Left and Right could easily be united on this.

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Your solution is interesting, but would it really work if everyone else wasn't also doing it?

I have difficulty imagining how that society could compete economically, politically, and militarily unless they were already relatively tiny and focused (like a petrostate). I think you'd be losing economy of scale while making it much more difficult logistically to pursue any large scale engineering, military, or even social projects.

Yeah, it is definitely is a game-theoretical problem for sure, like arms stockpiling. At first, like all radical changes it would certainly be a shock.

> I think you'd be losing economy of scale while making it much more difficult logistically to pursue any large scale engineering, military, or even social projects.

That, I don't agree. If software is eating the world, we can and should be using it as leverage to make individuals more productive. 150 people is a number big enough to get a good balance of specialization and coordination.

>> Politically, it's much easier to sell the "no one should have this much power" over "no one should be allowed to amass so much money". Left and Right could easily be united on this.

Haha. I think some of the folks in Washington have more power than the billionaires and they would be making the rules.

In terms of simple limits, let's prevent companies owning/buying/selling other companies. Or block corporate ownership or residential property. There are many other things that could reduce concentration of power. Let's ban campaign ad funding by out of state entities - including political parties.

I agree with all the things that you are proposing - maybe I wouldn't block corporate real estate ownership, I'd rather have "progressive property taxes", as to make it impossible to have any profit from large-scale renting - but I think that they would also be impossible to pass on Washington today. So, if we are just day dreaming, we should really go for it. :)

> no individual can be a part of more than two business.

Do boards count? What about non-profits?

> - no business entity can have more than 150 people.

I'd note that future businesses will be less people dependent. Many businesses have > $1M revenue per employee. Perhaps some can even hit $1B per employee, this becomes trivial if you make everyone a contractor / gig worker.

Just like in accounting, the counting for the purposes of this rule can begin to get creative.

Boards especially would count. My proposal is to limit the concentration of power in individuals, so they should not be able to have any influence in more than any one business.

> Many businesses have > $1M revenue per employee. Perhaps some can even hit $1B per employee.

Yeah, but by limiting the size of the corporation, we get:

- more competition, and consequently a reduction in profit margins.

- more localized/niche offerings.

- less chances from the incumbents to buy out potential competitors. (Screw you, Facebook)

- more companies trying to succeed by commoditizing their complements.

- less capital going to loss-leaders. (Screw you, Google)

> but by limiting the size of the corporation

Or perhaps we just get concentrated capitalization in employee reduction? If machines don't some how count they'll just approach the limit of machination .

* 1 CEO who takes 98.8% of the value

* 149 robot maintenance staff who make just above median salary

* 1 Billion robots each making $1 of profit.

What is binding the technicians to stay at "just above median salary"? Why wouldn't they be able to negotiate? If they can generate so much profit by employing capital, why can't they go to another financier and start their own companies?

This is not some philosophical puzzle of pirates sharing a treasury. There are tons of other choices for everyone involved, and none of them have to lead to such extreme concentration.

> Why don't we just go straight to the source and eliminate the mechanisms that allow for the concentration of power?

Money, and it's concentration, is the mechanism that allows that.

> no individual can be a part of more than two business.

> You can have as many non-controlling/non-voting shares on any business entity, but you can only contribute directly to one.

That...seems rather contradictory. I think your simple rules are not so simple. Because your explanation of “not more than two” is that it is either “a lot more than two” or “not more than one”, depending on what kind of involvement is being referenced.

Also, just as advertisers drive advertising-dependent businesses with no direct voting stake, non-voting owners can substantially influence business decisions, especially if you set up a legal structure that means that most capital will often come from them by limiting the ability to participate in voting ownership.

I edited it to clarify, but I think given the context you could understand what I mean.

> just as advertisers drive advertising-dependent businesses with no direct voting stake, non-voting owners can substantially influence business decisions

That seems to be arguing past the point. Can you give a more concrete example?

Money can be a proxy of power, and you're right about all of this, however money alone already isn't the entirety of it. Money managers tend to have far more power than many of the otherwise richest people in our society. Society tried to deal with this in the past by the dismantling of the JP Morgan trust, but since then it seems almost as if Vanguard group and Blackrock have essentially just taken over that same exact role.

I thought Vanguard saved money by outsourcing all decision making and power to the people who chose the stocks on the S&P 500 and the market which they use to weight every stock in their funds.

Just make a hierarchy of businesses and control the business on top?

I don't think you'll be able to find a couple of simple rules that can't easily be dodged.

It's easy to verify if a subsidiary is only working for the interests of a parent company. You could quickly and promptly dissolve any company that was convicted of doing so.

What if it's only partially working for the parent company?

More generally, there's a more simple way of converting money to power: Employment. As long as you have freedom of contract, you can pay somebody money to do stuff for you.

> you can pay somebody money to do stuff for you.

Yeah, but you can't tell them they can only get money from you, to do things that are in your interest. Your competitor is free to bid for their time/services/products as well.

As long as the company is not working exclusively in the interest of any single customer (in this case, the "parent" company), it's fine by me.

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