the revolution - founding alternatives

[Lathe]

the way I see it, the only way to end the hold of the bourgeoisie elite over the proletariat is to reject their institutions and found our own. In this way, we are more free from their remnants. I am going to start a business soon, by the end of October, and need some advice.

The business is a sole proprietorship that manufactures gun parts. This means one person owns it. I would have prefered it to be a cooperative but in Texas there are only 3 forms of businesses that are recognized by the tax code; sole, partnership, corporation. The sole prop. gives me the greatest tax leniency and the ability to hire workers not as enmployees, but as 'contractors.' (no taxes paid by me on contract labor) Here's how it works;



the company is ruled over by a constitution
all workers who wish to work herein must join the due-free union and sign the constitution
everyone works the same hours. 20 per week. 4 days at 5 hours each day.
at the end of each week the money is divided into reductions. first the overhead is taken out (materials and taxes). Then 10% of the remainder is kept aside for a rainy day fund. The remainder is payment.
pay is divided equally amongst all workers based on hours worked.
The goal is to have everyone earning $20K per year.
I own some of the machines, the bulk of the rest are common property and are owned by the workers in whole.
all rules and regulations are voted on by the workers as a whole at the quarterly meeting.
the meeting is presided over by the elected board. They count votes and keep order. They may not dismiss anyone, nor make laws.
everyone gets a chance to speak.
My role as the owner is simply to act as a figurehead and chief toolmaker. I am forbidden from making rules or from amending those that have been made.
workers are hired only if there is enough profit to hire the worker at standard pay.
no one is ever laid off. if the profit is stretched so this as to that we all make a penny a week, so be it. We do not abandon workers.
we do not sell to any government agencies, individual sales only.

These are just some bullet points about how we are organized. I've written out an 11 page constitution, but would like more pointers as to how I can improve the system that I'm working on.

[MarxSchmarx]

Make sure you read these points before proceeding any further:

http://www.infoshop.org/AnarchistFAQSectionJ5#secj511
http://www.infoshop.org/AnarchistFAQSectionJ5#secj512

[Lathe]

alright, I've read it and although it goes heavy into theory (and unrealistic scenarios) as to why cooperatives don't dominate the economy, it has nothing to do with what I'm asking.

What do individual workers want? What rules would you like to see in place? How would you like to see things organized.

[MarxSchmarx]

I think the point was that the capitalist system has stacked the deck so heavily against businesses like the kind you are proposing that they are unlikely to be an engine of social change.

At the end of the day, workers can only stay employed in businesses that survive the capitalist system. If your business, however well organized, cannot function in a capitalist economy, you are unlikely to employ workers for very long by definition.

My sense is that you can get your internal system as egalitarian as possible, and hell it might even succeed for you and your small operation. But the fact remains that your ambition
to end the hold of the bourgeoisie elite over the proletariat ... (by) rejecting their institutions and found our own is for very real reasons inherent to the capitalist production process (outlined in part in those links) almost surely a dead end.

If you are dead set on pursuing this, personally the one advice I can give is that every org needs clear, concrete and acheivable short to medium term (2-5 year) goals. So have something about that, and focus on that rather than vague long-term programs like abolishing capitalism.