/biz/ - Business & Finance

Too stupid.

>>14405337
Because they don't own the product.

>>14405350
the uncomfortable truth

Workers don't have the stomach to engage in free enterprise. If you structured ownership that way then the economy would stagnate.

People don't think it be like it is but it do.

>>14405337
do poor gooks have the marketing ability and budget to advertise and distribute iPhones globally? Also, are workers going to steal phones and sell them? did these 'workers' come up with the design hardware and softward features for this product? communists are stupid

>>14405337
>Bosses don't work
Then why don't the investors fire them?

post the 3rd panel where millions starve to death

>>14405337
>female boss
heh

>>14405350
this is the redpill stupid people will never swallow, because stupidity comes with the unfortunate effect of associating intelligence with worth

direct marketing exists?

>>14405420
I want her to put that cigarette out on my ass while giving me a performance review desu

>>14405417
>Capitalism universally lifts people out of poverty
>koala-brained leftists still call for communism

>>14405337
What a stupid comic. Are the workers a hive minded collective that doesn’t need a leadership structure? Companies need leadership hierarchies to make decisions over a long period of time or they will fall into indecision and won’t be as agile.

>>14405350
Unfortunate truth. Nature is hierarchical and the masses need a leader.

>>14405394
Wrong. Co-ops like mondragon already do it

>>14405337
Who provided the raw materials whoops get fucked commie faggits

>>14405454
Ummmm sweetie. See the Mondragon worker cooperative

>>14405452
>communists
>call for anything
Marxism presupposes the individual has no influence. Communism will happen when capitalism shits itself.

>>14405505
Communism shits itself so often it needs a permanent diaper

>>14405337
Where did the workers get the tools and material to create the product?

Some niggers steal though

>>14405337

Did the workers invent the product?
Did the workers acquire the skills and equipment to make the product on their own?
Did the workers acquire the raw materials on their own?
Did the workers market the product on their own?
Do the workers continue to invest their own money in improving the product?

No.

The worker goes to a place, gets told what to do, and gets gets a secure paycheck for it.

>>14405475

>front for ideological and ethnic separatists
>"run" by the "workers"
>proves that as a rule workers can collectively make market decisions as a unified entity

You can't see past the curtain huh?

>>14405482
The workers, again...

>>14405337
>"their" products

>>14405523
>I don't know shit about marxism and strawman

>>14405562
I can but you can't.

>>14405452
Capitalism is not beyond criticism; for example doctrinal capitalism calls for open borders, and allowing immigration which expands the labor pool, depressing wages. Capitalism is also very receptive to fag and trans shit and uses its advertising as a propaganda vehicle to demoralize the population.

The solution is a third way.

>>14405598
IT WILL WORK THIS TIME

>why don't your workers become thugs to renege on their voluntary contract?

>>14405563
By what means did they extract them and from whose land

>>14405410
because they don't work either you dolt

>>14405337
Honestly, Marxists think industry is agriculture.

>>14405482
workers you inbred bootlicker, do you think bosses go and mine all the raw materials by themselves?

>>14405618
It will work eventually. That's the fucking point.
If it doesn't work, the world is not ready and capitalism must continue

>>14405337
god, what a strawman.
marx says the owner effectively charges rent for the worker to produce, because the worker doesnt have the capital (machines), but the capitalist does

>>14405654
holy shit.

>>14405337
There is literally nothing stopping people from getting together, building their own factory all by themselves, and building, marketing, and selling their own products.

>>14405684
Workers don’t own the land dipshit

>>14405730
They can if they take it from the owner

>>14405337
In many cases because people are too dumb to actually budget and save and invest in their own equipment and company.

In other cases the government actively prevents them or introduces so much red tape that entering the market takes time and may not even be guaranteed to be approved. If it requires patents you are just straight fucked for 20 years. This is the real issue most of the time.

IP law being cut would be extremely beneficial to the economy. Even steam engines didn't proliferate until after the patent expired and people could actually innovate on it's initially shitty design.

>>14405369
This. I don't get how that could even be a proposal?

>>14405697
Dude capitalism is turning into a bigger nightmare than the USSR.

Capitalism Is Amazing

>>14405793
Someone could stub their toe and you faggots would rant and rave about capitalism.

They're free to if they please.
So long as they invest in their own means of production.
Oops.

>>14405604

>I know what you are but what am I

>>14405715
He has a point though

>>14405337
Workers are cogs. Tools. They do not possess the agency to capitalize on their own time and labor. If they did, they wouldn't be mere workers.

>>14405760
Ok now we see what the commies really want which is seizing power through violence.

>>14405793
That's what Marx state. It is amazing - until it stops working

>>14405811
Not a commie either fuckface

>>14405832
No he doesn't faggot.
I love how communists spit so much venom at businesses despite having 0 clue of how businesses actually work.

If CEOs did nothing, why would investors pay them millions of dollars? Makes a lot of sense you troglodyte

>>14405654
This isn't an answer to his question dumbass.

>>14405838
That's not exclusive to gommunism though, how do you think that land was acquired by capitalists in the first place? The government had likely seized that land by force from someone already inhabiting it and sold it to the capitalist for a modest sum.

>>14405654
>work hard, go without, and save money for years
>companies need money to become better and I have money to provide them
>I don't deserve it because now I'm not "working for it" even though I'm providing the exceedingly rare service of having money in an economy at record low savings rate

>>14405788
Marx stated through some BS that if you made the product then you own it, regardless of who owned what was used to make the product

>>14405867
Investors invest to reap profit

torture communist faggots
Unironically burn them at the stake

daily reminder joseph gobbels said he would rather die under communism then capitalism.

>>14405975
Helicopter rides

>>14405957
>invest money in company so you can make money
>Spend a lot of money on CEO who doesn't do anything
>Losing money
>don't fire him, just keep him around to suck up paychecks without contributing

>>14405350
Usually this

You know these threads really are illuminating in some ways. Commies can't detect their own bullshit. Advocates of Capitalism can't detect the multiple layers of their own bullshit. Fascists can't resist the urge to inject their bullshit into everything and giggle at everyone else's reaction to the smell because they no longer recognize their bullshit as being shit.

>>14405337
Because Marx is FOMOing at the top without taking the risk and work of investing early

>>14405399

Yeah it's called Huawei

>>14405919
the tool is useless without a person's labor

>>14405452
The communist government of China owns 51% of a Chinese company, that company then does business on an international scale, including buying up American soil as a LLC that's traded on the NYSE and hiring lobbyists to control politicians.

Is this an example of Communism or Capitalism?

>>14406003
Fine. Whatever. You have a point.

>>14405957
Investors invest because they want a payment for the service of having and providing money (read: arbitrary resources) which no one ever does because most mindlessly consume.

If more people saved and invested, investors would naturally make less profit. But the fact that no one does makes doing so much more profitable.

If anything, investors are the better humans because they consume less than what they produce for the rest of humanity. This is compared to everyone else who consumes the same or even more than what they produce.

>>14405998
Technically he did

>>14406003
>2019
>companies needing to be profitable

>>14406050

>He thinks Communism is state-owned enterprise

>>14406107
Bruh. Read Lenin

>>14406049
The tool was never made without someone producing and having excess resources to make it.

>>14406119

>all Commies are tankies

I'm not a Commie and even I know that's horseshit.

>>14406050
>China
>communist
They are currently capitalist applying accelarationism according to the recipe Marx outlaid. Cant skip capitalism.

>>14405337
Because the owner provides the value of consistent wages and risk minimalization

>>14406050
China is ethno fascist
>>14406107
“Communism” is government control of the means of production

This discussion is off topic.

Remember Big Brother is watching you

>>14406193

Go back to memeland.

>>14406193
>ethno fascist
>muh middle-class ideological squibbles
>stalinist techno-paganism vs anarcho-market-syndycalism vs anarcho-capitalism penis fencing match incoming

>>14405855
WHAO edgy and very cool based

>>14405337
There's more introverts than extroverts.

Introverts can never do sales beyond retail and even then, that's pushing it.

>>14406063
Thank you. It's rare that anyone admits they were wrong. You have some intellectual honesty.

>>14406334
to be fair, women werent such a huge a factor in consumer spending then

>>14406246
>>14406253
>socialism “with Chinese characteristics”
>third way economics
>strong nationalism
>authoritarians government
>92% Han
>government encouragement of Han settlers into Tibet to claim territory
>exporting Chinese workers abroad instead of hiring locals
>inherent hierarchy in Confucian ideology

>>14405337
Work has no intrinsic value.

>>14406136
well who gets to profit from the tools then? the person who made them, or that person's boss?

>>14406105
> making green
> texts that a
> re nonsense
> pretending to be
BRILLIANT!

>>14406517
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-uber-ipo/uber-unveils-ipo-with-warning-it-may-never-make-a-profit-idUSKCN1RN2SK
yes and?

>>14405919
Weird. Their product is the labor, not the materials.

>>14406049
That's why they get paid for their fucking labor.
????

>>14405350
fpbp

>>14406500
The laborer profits by getting paid to provide their labor, something they voluntarily agreed to. The boss profits from the tool by selling it, or loses money by failing to. The boss risks losing money whereas the laborer gets income regardless.

You could easily have a business where laborers are just as much at risk of losing money as the boss is, but it would never succeed because laborers are risk-averse and want stable incomes, otherwise if they took risks they wouldn't be laborers in the first place.

>>14405337
They can if they all pooled together and bought/built a factory.

>>14405482
El burro.

>>14406050
that's national socialism

>>14406048
China isn't Communist

>>14406881
Cup of coffee is a meme

They could but then the economy would stagnate, not collapse but stagnate, because there would be no capitalists and capital for entrepreneurship which would transform the way things are done.

>>14406881
"voluntarily agreed to" is a lie, on paper you are correct, but in the real western world either we work for somebody or we starve. some people manage to break out and work for themselves, but you can't do that without some savings to fall on first, which most people never get to have. the tiny wage we're paid is what we're stuck with.

>>14405399
the answer is all yes. do you even own any stocks? like all you do is vote on stupid shit, and if you own a decent % of the company, you talk with the other people who also own a decent amount of the company, and tell the Cxx retards (assuming they arent also someone you know with a high ownership%) to just not act completely fucking retarded once in a while.

>>14405613
>doctrinal capitalism
words
>calls for open borders
what even is this? you just protect your property if you so choose, theres no "calling for X" or whatever, theres no ideology involved
>allowing immigration which expands the labor pool, depressing wages
unless it is high skilled labor, which is what would be in continually higher demand given innovation
>Capitalism is also very receptive to fag and trans shit and uses its advertising as a propaganda vehicle to demoralize the population.
why do you think this? what makes it more or less susceptible under an ideology?
>The solution is a third way.
let me guess, national socialism? cult of personality?

>>14406050
Fascism

>>14407020
>but in the real western world either we work for somebody or we starve

You could always grow your own food, though the government may stop you at which point it's a failure of government, not the free market.

Also that's just called life and it doesn't just go away under communism or anything else. Someone would still need to work to grow food for themselves and others to eat under communism, except in that case you are forced to and enslaved by your "community" to do so.

>>14406107
um... yes, I believe that is exactly what communism is

>>14405337
>why the fuck everything cost money

>>14407164
this

>>14406973
This guy gets it

>>14407169
>You could always grow your own food

you still need to own land for that

>>14405452
I love this comic and all the seething redditors who say NO NO ITS NOT THAT SIMPLE THE WORKERS ACTUALLY DID ALL THE OTHER STUFF TOO

>>14406107
There's never been an instance where that wasn't the case.

>>14405337
because they don't own the means of production, what the workers produce is not theirs since the tools/materials for producing the goods/services are owned by the owners of the company.
It is litterally what "das Kapital" was about, collectivizing the means of production.

>>14405654
yes they did, they just spend it on investing rather than other stuff (bills/food/luxuries/etc)

>>14405793
why do you think lack of government encourages fagshit

>>14405855
the THIRD WAY, omg HOLY SHIT, he's one of THOSE GUYS everybody

>>14405337
Fuck off commie spinning kike

>>14405337
the funny thing with this trash is that under communism the worker is no better
they still have a shitty life and don't get the benefice of their work. capitalism allow anybody to compete if they think they can do it

>>14407219
Land owned and protected by the government rather than having land ownership determined by reasonable use and occupation of the land so that a person can't just buy land and own it on paper despite never doing anything with it. Where a free market can determine the owner to be illegitimate due to disuse of obviously productive land in the hands of someone else.

>>14406046
>tfw your stuff is used in the wild
Feels good bros

>>14405337
Obvious oven dodger is obvious

>>14406631
Is this your big checkmate? An article where the company SAYS SOMETHING and you're like "well that proves it lel"

>>14405337
I don't know
why aren't they doing it?
go ahead pussy, what are you waiting for? LOL

fuck off kike
sage
kill all communists

Inherited wealth and inherited capitalist habits.

>>14405793
if you have a problem with the child sex slave just kill it

>>14405723
this

>>14405723
people in the united states who call themselves communists are generally too stupid to make anything like this happen. they need someone else to do it for them.

>>14407926
what's an example of a capitalist habit?

>>14405723
how will "they" sell their products and distribute the profits they make from it? It's way more convenient if one person does all this, which is why most successful businesses are run top down

>>14408488
>distribute the profits
clarification: distributing the profits to THEMSELVES, it's unclear cause in talking about communism some retard might think the distribution is happening to "duh peepole" or something

>but they can just distribute it evenly
not fair, the work is never done evenly

>>14405337
your average /biz/ poster doesn't even recognize the guy to the right of marx, don't bother. they'll understand soon

>>14408553
It's clearly Charles Darwin

>>14408553
who is it then

>>14408663
Engels I think

>>14408553
Santa?

>>14406650
>the product is the labor

>>14408663
Kropotkin, the other big communist people know about.

>>14405337
Suppose some rents a fishing pole from you and get some fish. Then you demand the rent and the guy tells you he did all the fishing without you so he won’t pay you,

Same thing with factories and corporations, owners have the capital and the profit they “take from workers” is really the market rate for renting that capital,

Capital, as fishing pole, can and is obtained through direct labor or other enterprises so it simply all fair and round.

Commies stop whining

>>14405697
>It will work eventually

>>14405793
This is the kind of thing that was fervently proposed by Engels.

>>14405855
Oh, so you're a literal fag?

>>14407355
keked, checked, but ultimately I disagree my man.

>>14405452
Capitalism universally creates poverty and systematically makes people lose.

>>14410420
Yeah remember all those socialist countries that got worse after bringing in free markets?

>>14405350
Based and dumpiled

>>14410434
>MFW poverty is heavily increasing every year in the states.

Yes, please tell me how capitalism helps without greed?

>>14405337
because I'm the ideas guy

>>14410481
>poverty is heavily increasing every year in the states.

The government is responsible for that

>>14405337
you need someone to make the initial capital investment first for whatever you will sell on the market dummy

>>14405337
Post the full comic nigger.

>>14405825
They did until it was all stolen. Do you not have basic economic history knowledge? Do you not know what primitive accumulation was?

>>14405723
If only every worker had a few millions in capital, the necessary connections, and a regulatory environment not full of lobbyists all working against them.
The main problem with capitalism is the unrelenting accumulation of capital and the moat it creates.

>>14406881
That make sense as long as it is the original business owner that runs the business rather than crooks with connections receiving a bundle of money printed out of thin air by the central bank who then proceed to purchase the business from the owner and driving down the value of money at the same time.

Shareholder economics is nothing but rent-seeking, what risk has a professional CEO taken by bringing himself onto the company board by "relationships" who then proceed to drive the business to the ground while profiting himself.

How the fuck does share based compensation even make sense, it's like giving the guy that mowed your lawn a share of ownership in your house because he works for you. Don't give me that bullshit motivation when shares vest in such a short time frame that the long term sustainability of the business is not considered at all by the CEO.

>>14405337

But they can, yet they choose not to start a business

>>14405350
First post is unfortunately best post.

>>14411358
if you look at the average work history of a CEO they usually have been with the company for 30 years and started at the bottom.
Your connections bullshit is a myth. You don't become CEO because of daddy. And even diversity hire CEOs have impressive backgrounds.

#2. CEO wages aren't even that impressive. If McDonald's CEO worked for free, each worker's pay would increase 3 cents per paycheck. No one would even notice.

>>14410579
This.

>Higher Education Act of 1965 creates tuition pricing bubble by guaranteeing loans from private banks of "whatever the dean of admissions at [x] cares to charge", as a result over 100 million people who'd otherwise be just fine are struggling because they have $500~ a month student loan payments
>FDA increases cost of drug approval from 400 million inflation-adjusted USD in the mid 20th century to 2+ billion today causing the price of pharmaceuticals and the closely-related costs of general healthcare to spiral out of control
>Federal government fails to protect American consumers from foreign market protectionism, particularly when it comes to pharmaceuticals; US citizens end up paying unsustainably high prices for both new and legacy pharmacological products produced in both the US, Asian and Europe so that European citizens and others can pay unsustainably low prices while still
>US government passes the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 (https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-1002-hong-1965-immigration-act-20151002-story.html)) allowing for non-european immigration and includes clauses incentivizing mass migration like birthright citizenship and sponsorship
>US government allows tens of millions of illegal immigrant as well as legal immigrant laborers to send money tax-free back to the countries they came from where the currency exchange rates are so favorable that the immigrant laborers can be making half as much of what a domestic laborer was and still be better off; particularly as they often live in rental houses barracks-style with sometimes dozens of people in the same home.
>Europe and Asia use tarriffs for decades to ostensibly lock American producers and manufacturers out of their markets while freely competing in America's

JUST

>>14411340
That's the main problem of regulation. Etsy and eBay allow for successful "communist" enterprises within capitalism.

>>14405337
They can that’s called a cooperative there’s tons of them.

>>14405350
>Too stupid.


Basically. Kind of other things beyond stupidity - it's also to do with other personality traits than simple intelligence,but yea they essentially lack something that's required.

All the arguments can be bypassed entirely by a simple thought experiment (or real one) where the CEOs and managers disappear one day. What happens? The whole fucking collapses within hours, everyone is out of a job.

It's as naive and childish as wishing away our political leaders.

People who think they do nothing or little are not aware enough to understand what they do, because it's a subtle kind of work and not as easy to understand as typing, driving, operating a machine, etc.

And these leaders justify their salary, as well, because they are rare, scarce and have specialist skills that the other plebs simply don't have.

>>14411179
>workers too stupid to replicate business
>resort to force and intimidation to take business
very nice

>>14405350
why is reality so cruel bros

>>14411611

>>14411524
This-but it might be exaggerated a bit, I remember Delta Airlines' CEO receiving "tongue in cheek" death threats from those wacky union communists over his $13.1 million dollar salary (about $145 per employee per year) a few months ago, and what's seldom asked in those circles is if $145 dollars is enough to "playfully imply" physical violence against someone than what of the upwards of tens of thousands of dollars the government takes from each of those same employees or the thousands they take from their employer almost punitively for their employment through payroll tax-and their open intent to take far more if they get the chance? Dunning-kruger surface level thinkers the lot of them.

>>14405369
Is a man not entitled to the sweat of his own brow?

>>14410481
hey maybe let's remove the niggers and see if "poverty" drops

>>14410481
>keep increasing the definition of poverty, captalism so evil!
you realize in most countries people eat rice, fish or beans 3 times a day, and may not even afford their own electricity? I've seen it first hand. That's poverty, and its caused by 80 IQ people mass breeding with 8 kids, voting in socialists and hoping the government will take care of them. They piss and shit on the street, gamble, drink beer all day then whine that they don't have it as nice as other places.

Then you see 300 pound welfare niggers eating steak dinners every week on EBT in "poverty", and their commie enablers telling them that this is exploitation

>>14405350
FPBP
The not so pleasant truth

>>14412235
The black population has been around the same percentage throughout the US' economic highs and lows so contemporary poverty must be owed to an extent to the inorganic market conditions fostered by the corruption and foolishness of the state that I'd posted about earlier.

Because of the black community's eccentricities they will probably remain on the lower rungs of the economic ladder with some notable exceptions for some time, but it stands to reason that they would be far better off today as a whole not having to compete with tens of millions of legal and illegal economic migrants who have the economic network in place allowing them to price both black folks and other domestic laborers out of entire industries. Too bad blacks will vote the same way until the end of time.

https://insights.som.yale.edu/insights/yale-study-finds-twice-as-many-undocumented-immigrants-as-previous-estimates

>>14405399
Did the chairman come up with the hardware and the software? No, he just attended meetings.

>>14413170
you're completely right, why not just become a chairman of your own business and become filthy rich?

>>14412192
Sure, unless you're just taking someone else's thing for your own

>>14405337
So why don't the workers just start up their own company and become the boss then if it's that easy?
Whoever made that comic is completely retarded.

>>14405337
Because they are too busy working to make the product.

so standard. stop with the capitalist communist dichotomy. both are slavery

>>14405452
this works only in boomer-tier businesses

>>14412686
ha, true

>>14405350
FPBP
also
>too lazy.

>>14406050
China is not communist. Its a capitalist regime.

>>14406027
Remember, whatever side of politics you are on you are always right.

I dont accept bullshit into my heart, I just go with the flow. Im like the Italian guy in Catch-22, when the Italians were going off to war he waved the Italian flags, when the Nazis came to Italy he waved a Nazi flag and when the Allies arrived he waved an Ally flag.

You all just keep fighting each other, ill just be here, waving the flag of the victor.

>>14405475
Word? Now try to scale that globally and see how much the workers agree on how to sell their wares.

>>14406517
Uber and Lyft faggot. Subsidized nonsense. But I gotta say, I like having them around

>>14405337
wage-slaves like this want all the upside without taking any risk. Imagine believing being a CEO was easy.

>>14405723
Its essentially what cryptocurrency is. Decentralized platforms provide both the profit and cost of infrastructure to every holder.

>>14412128

>>14408946
Care to elaborate?

>>14412192
just dig a ditch for 20 hours and demand to be paid

>>14411340
and what are you going to do about this moat?
cry?

>>14405452
>who makes the product?
wagecucks
>who markets the product?
wagecucks
>who provides material for the product?
wagecucks at other companies
>who pays for the factory?
investors using money created out of thin air
>who provides the training?
wagecucks
>who risked capital in order to create a business?
probably not you

seriously this is terrible bait

>>14405337
>>14418004
owner and worker are nebulous terms to describe their economic relationship

>>14405350
Gotta hand it to you fren
Fpbp

>>14406027
that's because 99% of people who would post their political opinion on the internet are retarded. that number goes up to 99.9% on 4chin

>>14405452
You must understand that these people think communism would mean the current Western lifestyle, except they'd have a nice house and car for free and get paid to make artisanal dragon dildos when instead standards would naturally plummet and they'd have to get a job screwing nuts in a factory since the Western lifestyle is mostly sustained by stupid bullshit like crypto and credit

>>14406027
>>14415600
>>14418501
>bro everyone is wrong except people who literally don't pick a side

That just makes you the biggest retards of all since it's easier to criticize than it is to defend your own dumb ideas, dumbasses

>>14405369

Absolutely this.
Because they get hired and paid to do the Job for the Product. Which is at the end the Property of the Boss. Where the fuck is the problem here? I cant understand Communists or leftists here in germany trying to take more from your wage to give it to gibs me dat welfare ahmads and bununlululakakschaklakas

>>14418591
>quoting something nobody said

>>14418624
>lmao capitalists, communists and fascists are all wrong!

So what's your side then, bro

>>14418729
>debate me bro
Jesus Christ dude, this is why nobody wants to be your friend.

This may surprise you, but you can take the money that you earned as as a wagecuck and use it to become the capitalist. Too dumb to figure all of this out? Back to work then, wagie.

>>14405697

>>14410481
You mean the country where dumbass fucks have been voting for more and more government power and more and more socialist initiatives? Oh yeah, wonder why it's going increasingly shit.

>>14412235
Probably not even, considering at the core of it all, you have the federal government spending billions and billions of fucking dollars they do not have, every year.

To illustrate a point, if you were to round up every rich American in a communist scheme, and then confiscated all of their money and all of their assets, you would have enough money to cover the expenses of the Federal Government for about 8 months, and that's ignoring the 20+ TRILLIONS of debt they have accrued as of yet, if they had to pay their debts first they wouldn't even get any of that money and they would still be in an abyssal depth debt.
Government spending is absolutely tittyfucking bananas, and is a massive contributor to poverty in the United States Of America.

I think that, even if we consider the idea of black Americans being more likely to commit crime, I think that if they paid less taxes on whatever income they could get, and paid less taxes on things they bought, they would have more money, and they would have less of a need for crime.
If it was also easier to get employment, it would be easier to make money.
You could argue they still would, but I think it would still be less overall.

>>14405884
This would be great but the problem is money today is created out of thin air.

>>14405337
Communists dont understand economics because communists dont understand logistics.
Logistics are the most important part of the system.
Not the goods or services, but what puts it all together.