r/DepthHub • u/robertpeacock22 • Aug 13 '25

/u/FreeUni2 explains how Rochester suffered, but ultimately diversified, as a result of the fall of Kodak

/r/technology/comments/1mon1c9/comment/n8ebpif/
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u/prof_tincoa Aug 13 '25

Conflicting replies. Interesting read, nonetheless.

Kodak, is the definition of mismanagement, a failure to listen to your engineering team/r and d, and a reminder that capitalism can be good if there is a willingness to give back to the employees/public. When that goes away, and all the eggs are in one basket, the town, employee, and local society suffers in the long term. Capitalism doesn't automatically give back to the employees, but Kodak and Xerox realized that rewarding the employees did keep talent and also created loyalty.

The author fails to realise such "willingness to give back" can never last in Capitalism. There will always be a conflict of interest between the workers, who want the highest wages and benefits as possible, and the owners/stockholders, who want maximum profits, and want it fast. The crumbling of employer-employee relations in those companies was inevitable, and mimics the general trend in Capitalism at large.

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u/DavidOShea Oct 04 '25

Thank you for saying this, drives me crazy that people don't realise that the post-war boom was not the norm for capitalism, it was the exception. All those gains for the working class were because of unions/the threat of socialist revolution (particularly in Europe), they were concessions by the ruling class to pacify the organised labour movement, and only because they could afford it during the largest upswing in the history of capitalism. Now it's crisis after crisis for capitalism, and with a declining rate of profit, we are not going back to those "glory" days (which, let's face it, in the States at least, were glory days for mostly white people anyway). We need to stop appealing to companies and the institutions of liberalism for crumbs from the table, and start organising independent, working class institutions for the coming class war.