It’s not financial survival of the fittest
 
Today, I was thinking about entrepreneurship, ownership, profit sharing and communism and I said to myself - this is a blog post!
Well, I’m a big proponent of entrepreneurship. There are countless opportunities out there. Opportunities for the smart, the not so smart, the wealthy and the poor. Really, the only requirements are ambition and determination. There’s no more productive worker than the one contributing to his/her own enrichment.
I’d love to see everyone become and entrepreneur, but there’s a problem. The successful entrepreneur needs people to work for him/her. So, if I’m talking about everyone needs to go out and take opportunity by the hand, how can I turn around in my own life and ask someone to help me enrich myself, rather than themselves?
That’s where profit sharing comes in! More companies should do it! The US has seen it’s best economic progress when productivity increases. Take that money and give it to your employees.
Karl Marx, the father of communism like to say “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need”. However, I’m a capitalist. I believe in the first part of Marx’s quote, but the second part has to be voluntary. That’s why I believe Charles Koch, CEO of Koch Industries (the largest private company in the world) puts it best: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his contribution“.
So, you may see the gaping hole that Marx’s one liner covers and Koch’s doesn’t. That is, what of those people who have been given less ability to make contributions that pay in a capitalist society? Well, since some will be helpers and some will be owners, the owners spark productivity by giving the helpers a stake. Higher productivity equals more wealth and progress for both owners and helpers. In the end, all “classes” as Marx would put it benefit as well as society as a whole.
The bottom line, there’s a lot of opportunity and few people taking advantage. Part of the problem with maximizing opportunity is getting productive workers. The easiest way to make a worker productive is to provide incentives. The best incentive is ownership.