Give me liberty, or give me lattes!
A reflection of the dangers corporate paternalism presents to laissez-faire capitalism, drawing parallels between the historic Pullman company town and modern tech companies.
It’s 1880. You are a company man living in a company town. Last year, a once in a lifetime opportunity came up: working at the Pullman Palace Car Company designing the next generation of sleeper cars. You are a mechanical engineer by training and have developed quite the expertise in rail wheel science. George Pullman himself sought out your skills. In return, you were promised legacy in the burgeoning railroad business, building the future of transportation to be used by millions. The piston wheels you design will quite literally propel the American economy forward.
You were one of the first to settle in Pullman Town. It is the first “all brick city”, and you have the privilege of living alongside other engineers of your caliber. Conversation is always lively and the town is kept in pristine condition. Not once have you caught a stray piece of trash blighting the crimson cityscape. Nor, during leisurely time off, can you find yourself without things to do. You can take the wife and kids shopping at Pullman arcade, listen to live music at the Pullman theater, take in some sun at one of the many open space parks. Or if feeling introspective, you can leaf through finely bound novels at Pullman’s library. Every Sunday, of course, you dutifully take your family to mass at the Pullman Church. Life was good, made simple by the Pullman Company. The media mythologized Pullman as an industrial utopia. So thousands of others just like you flooded into the Pullman Company Town.
While the Pullman era may seem a distant memory, its ethos have found a new home. Now, by tech companies. Indeed, big tech expertly honed the Pullman Playbook to attract top talent in a fiercely competitive job market. Company cafes have in-house meals, use the finest organic ingredients, and feature rotating menus to keep things fresh. After breakfast, employees meander over to the company cafe, staffed by seasoned baristas, for their customary morning latte. Even on-site laundry is offered. All of these benefits are, of course, provided free of charge.
Modern life is filled with complications. Big tech is more than willing to shoulder these responsibilities so their employees can focus on what really matters: churning out more lines of code. Or more generally, permitting employees to over-index on skills that maximize company profits. Therefore, while a company church may sound antiquated, tech companies have not shied away from funding secular charades and political causes as a spiritual stand in.
Living in Pullman, however, was not without its drawbacks. It meant adhering to a draconian rulebook imposed by the Pullman corporation. All property in Pullman belonged to the company with no path to individual ownership. Alcohol was prohibited, and even storing a whiskey bottle in one’s private quarters was strictly forbidden. Public gatherings were banned. Corporate spies reported on the inner lives of employees to snuff out dissent, specifically searching for any signs of unionization. To that end, company inspectors reserved the right to enter any house in Pullman, at any time, under the pretext of ensuring housing is on par with company standards. The punishments for violating Pullman’s faux laws ranged from sharp fines to termination and forced eviction, particularly if one dared challenge the corporate agenda. Indeed, it is not an exaggeration to describe Pullman as a corporate panopticon.
The story of Pullman is terrifying and it stands as a cautionary tale. Just the right amount of amenities can induce a man to keel over and surrender the liberties hard-won for him just a century prior. We can see echoes of this corporate paternalism in modern tech companies under the guise of benevolence. For instance, in addition to the food, Google offices are adorned with large displays of primary colors (presumably to promote creativity) which subconsciously infantilizes their adult workforce. Company issued computers come pre-installed with spyware that intercepts every keystroke, logs every website visited, and tracks periods of inactivity. The unstated truth is that an institution cannot take on roles traditionally reserved for the individual or the family without also asserting its fatherly dominance. It quietly nurtures a dependence that erodes its employees' sovereignty. But the most striking difference between Pullman and tech companies today is the latter is not only seeks to control their employees but, as we will soon discuss, society at large.
Before doing that we must first discuss why this even matters. It matters because anyone who advocates for minimal governance must acknowledge the threat corporate paternalism poses. When we think of laissez-faire capitalism flourishing, one thinks of fierce competition among goods and service providers. We wish for competition so intense that monopolies never develop in the first place, or, in the case that they do, are naturally tempered should they misuse their power. This essay argues that avoiding monopolies — the unelected oligarchs of capitalist anarchism — demands a society bubbling with individualism and high agency. Yet, one would expect the highly skilled Pullman laborers, these domain experts, to possess such qualities. We are talking about people who were of high enough agency to pick up their stakes and journey west to a then relatively undeveloped Illinois in the pursuit of opportunity. Yet even men of this character saw themselves acquiesce to corporate whims.
As one Pullman employee famously lamented in an interview, “We are born in a Pullman house, fed from the Pullman shops, taught in the Pullman school, catechized in the Pullman Church, and when we die, we shall go to the Pullman Hell.” While he is clearly aware of his own helplessness, his sense of liberty, his innate drive towards individuality, remain paralyzed by amenities. Frankly, this fact should strike fear in the heart of any laissez-faire capitalist with a shred of intellectual honesty.
When considered under the lens of the economist, the hopeful Pullman itinerant acted quite rationally. America was undergoing a bumpy transition from an agricultural society to an industrial one. Factories demanded long hours, paid low wages, and the working conditions were unsafe (to put it mildly). Nonetheless, hungry Americans flooded into already overcrowded cities to fill these roles. The rapid growth vastly outpaced urban development. Once beautiful cobblestone streets became unrecognizable under piles of trash. A thick stench of filth hung low in the scorching afternoon sun. So when contrasting the typical living conditions with Pullman’s well-maintained town, stable employment, and amenities, moving to Pullman is a no-brainer. It is cut-and-dry utility maximization.
But it was the Panic of 1893, one of the worst economic downturns in U.S. history, that finally weakened Pullman’s oppressive vice over his employees. The Pullman company saw mass layoffs and reduced wages yet refused to adjust rent. Workers felt apprehension about an uncertain economic future. These feelings coupled with a growing disgust for corporate paternalism set the stage for the Pullman Strike of 1894. It grew from a local cause into a national movement, garnering support from nearly 250,000 laborers across 27 states, ultimately concluding the Pullman Town experiment. All residential land-holdings were to be sold back to the government.
Perhaps the latent ideas of Emerson’s Self-Reliance, a still highly influential piece in that day, stirred awake, encouraging a rejection of the infirm and pathetic state that is corporate paternalism. Indeed, when compared to us, these 1800s Americans were temporally far less detached from Enlightenment ideals of liberty, freedom, and natural rights. Despite being constrained both technologically and geographically, they nevertheless remained in touch with these core American principles. Today, in contrast, the malady of tech paternalism infects our society and our culture.
First, the explosion in popularity of social media renders constant connectivity the new norm. As political power is downstream of cultural power, social media algorithms thus act as a centralizing cultural force, breeding a tacit conformity to the amorphous gray blob: The Algorithm. Second, its addictive nature in of itself is a blatant affront to one's sense of liberty. Increasingly, more people are becoming aware that social media is unhealthy (ironically, this fact is even discussed widely online). But like the Pullman employee mourning his situation, as a society, we clearly lack the wherewithal to quit en masse. Third, the ease with which young people will allow applications to send them "push notifications" is particularly alarming. We have truly allowed the invisible hand of corporate paternalism, one much more sinister than George Pullman, into our homes. The company may demand undivided attention at any moment. While one might argue that he needs his phone to alert him of a new deal, or a flash sale, he fails to realize that his time and attention are priceless. The same kind of Pavlovian training that sent shivers up your spine in Psych 101 is used against you daily.
As a result, a young man in the West today might find his liberty reduced, and his individuality diluted. He is positioned to lead a quiet life of desperation with his inner voice overpowered by the deafening thuds of technology.
The overwhelming influence of technology companies is reminiscent of this classic Tocqueville quote. However, one minor alteration is made: government is replaced by technology.
The will of man is not shattered, but softened, bent, and guided: men are seldom forced by it to act, but they are constantly restrained from acting: such a power does not destroy, but it prevents existence; it does not tyrannize, but it compresses, enervates, extinguishes, and stupefies a people, till each nation is reduced to be nothing better than a flock of timid and industrious animals, of which the technology is the shepherd.
The way in which technology has centralized is particularly surprising when contrasting today with the 1990s. The early Internet promised an infinitely expansive digital frontier. It promised liberty. It promised self-reliance. Each of us, just by virtue of existing and owning an ethernet cable, were granted our own Walden’s Pond at which we could homestead. And compared to the construction of Thoreau's delightful little cabin, the cost of constructing a website, both in hosting fees and labor, is near zero. Tools sprung up to abstract away the technicalities of development so one could focus his efforts solely on self-expression. But in a dramatic volte-face, we instead opted to be digital renters. Like the Pullman employee that may not own property, we find ourselves siloed into a handful of corporate controlled platforms.
In a culture that cultivates self-sufficiency, monopolies are not a cause for concern. However, Pullman’s shadow looms large over modern American society. The corporate paternalism wielded by tech companies today extends far beyond the workplace or even a small company town. They shape our daily lives, our sense of individuality, and our notion of liberty.
Before wrapping up, we must first address the elephant in the room. It may perhaps appear the reader is being taken down a windy road toward regulation. Indeed, it is often very tempting to look to regulation as a panacea. Perhaps merely producing that thought is itself a sign of the times. On this I will defer to Hayek. Regulators, however empathic they may seem, are molded from the same clay as common men. They are no less susceptible than you and I to short-time thinking. And those who rise to the top, by their very nature, are more susceptible to abusing the power the position affords. It is an unfortunate flaw of humanity that those who seek to lead are most unsuited to do it.
So, if regulation isn't the solution, where should we turn? The answer may lie in re-engaging with our core American values. For noninterventionism to succeed — indeed, for any democratic society to function, it will require a renewed commitment to individuality, liberty, curiosity, and self-reliance.
First, boutique communities that emphasize the individual ought to be prioritized in favor of social media. Second, recognizing that our foremost responsibility is to our kin and our fellow countrymen, not the wider world. Localized support systems serve to counteract feelings of isolation and dependence that the corporate paternalist preys upon. Third, that the spiritual decline in this country has opened the door for institutionalized secular dogmas to take the place of the individual and the family. Such dogmas, therefore, are readily adopted by the corporation. Lastly, an acknowledgment that a vacuum of cultural emptiness opens when young children are indoctrinated to repudiate their forefathers. In teaching one to reject her identity, she is ripe to also reject those values which were so bloodily fought for.
The task that lies before us is great but so too is the reward: a life of meaning, a life of purpose, and a life of freedom.