This used to be the accepted standard but it seems today that people think any amount of profit should primarily be directed toward paying wages. (either bigger wages to existing employees, or to new employees, or both). You have multiple sub-conversations in this very comment section wondering aloud why Block didn't invent make-work or "new projects" to keep the 4,000 employed.

The idea of a job being some task that needs to be done is being lost in favor of the view that a job is something you give 8 hours to in order to fill up your bank account every two weeks. It's becoming so detached from the concept of production/productivity that people literally start inadvertently talking past each other when they discuss things like layoffs or employment. I find it very common in AI jobloss discussions; the Citrini article over the weekend was subtly full of this variety of thinking. For instance, his prediction that corporate profits would rise while consumer spend dropped are literally incompatible realities, but a natural conclusion of the "the purpose of a job is to give people money" type of thought.

Incredibly interesting to see, but the social contract, or at least the perception of what it ought to be, is definitely shifting.

> that corporate profits would rise while consumer spend dropped are literally incompatible realities

These are not incompatible realities.

I would be willing to accept the statement that corporate revenues increasing and consumer spending decreasing are incompatible realities.

But it’s feasible to think the following occurs:

- labor income falls

- consumer spending drops

- corporate revenues drop

- corporate profits moderately increase because profit margins get much higher

- government deficit continues (which, from an accounting perspective, means other accounts are in surplus, potentially US corporations)

I’m not saying I strongly predict the above, necessarily! I just don’t think it’s correct to say it’s not a conceivable reality.

> that corporate profits would rise while consumer spend dropped are literally incompatible realities

on a macro-level yes; CEOs are only thinking about firm-level though (other tech firms will act differently or tech is small part of total economy, many ways to rationalize). they should be assuming others will follow in their footsteps but they are not incentivized to model that or think in the longterm.

But something something trickle down!

Or perhaps public doesn’t owe corporates bailouts when push comes to shove?

Block has never been bailed out.

Wasn’t mentioned in the parent comment either.

Edit P.S. Should the individuals who don’t receive a job from a bailed out company get proportional tax refund?

It has gotten plenty of government support and easy cash though.

I feel like the idea that X doesn't owe you Y is fundamentally at odds with the fact that humans are a cooperative species and survive the best when they are cooperating. A choir can hold a note together because individuals can stop singing to breathe, safely covered by peers who will take their turn to breathe later. What is the point of organizing socially if not for the benefit of all society members?

I know we have to balance inefficiency and optimal allocation of resources... but I agree it doesn't seem optimal for social wellbeing to remove people from their access to health and risking their ability to house and feed themselves without a financial need to do so (like Block going bankrupt).

"humans are a cooperative species"

Humans are violent, self-centered tribalists. What species are you referring to? Not homo sapiens.

And every other civilized society except America builds internal power structures that inhibit violent self-centeredism. Maybe it's time we do the same?

I think we Humans can be both cooperative species and violent,self-centered tribalists species and definitely all the grey area between the two at the same time as well.

I do mean homo sapiens. Humans are a cooperative species. They will hunt and gather together in loose communities naturally, sharing excess resources even if individuals are not directly contributing to the resource creation due to being too young, too old, sick or injured. Having inter-societal competition doesn't mean we don't still have cooperative society. Just because ants will fight other ants in different colonies doesn't mean ants are not a social species.

outside of the west yes.

This has always been and always will be an excuse for the person saying it to be a "violent, self-centered tribalist". Humans have worked together for the benefit of the community for the longest time. Rugged individualism is inherently linked to capitalism.

Tribalism implies cooperation

Telling on yourself

I don't live in a cave, so humans probably cooperated at least a few times over our history.

(This is also my go-to argument against zero sum economics)

fundamentally you see jobs as more important than the end product. this is a tension i keep finding in many minds.

I see fundamentally human wellbeing as more important. Jobs are just the structure society has built as a gateway for this.

exactly - end consumers like you and me will end up having to pay for their jobs indirectly.

i personally want products i purchase to be cheaper and i don't want to be paying for products that are costly simply because they are hiring people for "human wellbeing".

i would rather people work in productive places than just exist in a company for some reason.

Alternatively, instead of things being cheaper, you could receive that amount more money.

who? the employees? for doing what? i don't want to live in a world where people are getting paid when they don't add any value

I too spend my life ensuring that my only purpose in life is creating shareholder value

you are literally complaining about the idea of having more money

more money for doing nothing? i don't want to live in a world like that. what part of this is not clear?

two options

- the 4000 employees can still be employed in block - thats around $600,000,000 that goes into literally no value and this is price borne by us consumers

- or the 4000 employees get fired and work in different companies that actually require them so that we as consumers can actually buy more products

by choosing option 1, you not only accept that as consumers we pay more for the product, but also miss out on other valuable work the 4000 employees can do. no good economy runs this way.

Then I suggest fixing society or finding a better one

I actually don’t think you do. At the least, the question then becomes “is wellbeing most well served by paying a small number of software engineers a lot of money”. That is prima facie absurd.

> with the fact that humans are a cooperative species and survive the best when they are cooperating.

I dispute that this is a fact. Maybe within a small group, but startups shouldn't be possible if masses of more cooperating people led to better outcomes. A large company should always win there and that does not happen.

> What is the point of organizing socially if not for the benefit of all society members?

We don't come anywhere close to this on a global scale. Most countries aren't this way on a national scale.

Startups generally _don't_ end up with better outcomes. Large companies stay stable, startups are volatile and often end in failure.

Stability means removal of volatility, which means to stay stable they end up becoming more generalised, rather than the laser focus a small team like a startup can have. That laser focus can work out when applied to the right problem at the right time, but is very much not a guarantee.

So you think companies should hire and pay employees they don't have any use for out of charity?

You are trying to pitch marxist theory to a bunchof liberals. It won't end well. (and it's not, judging by the first comments)

I don't think it makes a lot of sense to put those responsibilities on individual firms. In the USA, achieving maximum employment has been a mandate for the Federal Reserve to achieve through monetary policy. There are many advantages to allowing individual firms to optimize for productivity. There are also a lot of harms caused by forcing firms to adopt unproductive methods. Even Keynes' joking solution for unemployment was that the treasury might bury bottles of money for private industry to dig up.

that's not the job of a company. companies are suposed to be profit centered, their purpose is to make money.

what you're talking about is the role of government. govt should be supporting policies like you are suggesting, by for example allowing for universal basic income or uniersal basic land or services, etc.

Why? This is asserted throughout this HN thread as an obvious truism, but it seems precipiced on some dramatic right wing free market concept of how the world works that I can't tell is coming from the libertarians of hacker news, or is some kind of USA concept.

Why should society let the concept of a company exist if it is actively detrimental to society at large, for the gain of a very few?

You can believe that only if you don't care about getting a revolution in your country or extreme populist movements gaining traction. When large numbers of people feel economically disposable, the issue stops being about an individual firm’s right to hire and fire and starts becoming a systemic stability problem.

But if you are okay with getting some heads chopped off with a guillotine from time to time, feel free to believe that.

If firms laying off employs they have no use for causing a stability problem then you do indeed have a systemic stability problem which need much deeper fixes than any one firm can provide.

Are you arguing for or against capitalism here?

You sound like you are laying blame at the feet of companies following employment laws when you should be complaining to the government that makes the employment laws the company is abiding by.