An employer's motive is to increase the profit made by a business as he directly benefits from the profit made - and to do this he will be happy to hold down wages. Employees paid wages have a profit motive to do the minimum work necessary to receive their pay because they have no guarantee of profiting when the business does well. It is only when employees have a direct link from the profitability of their business to their pay packets that they will be motivated to do all they can to make the business more profitable.
Just ask John Lewis.
An employer hires people to increase profits, yes, why not? What else should they be doing, charity? Run out of cash, unable to reinvest for new machines/etc and go bankrupt and fire everyone? Seriously profits are funnelled into savings and investments, and those are what keep the economy prospering. Without someone making profit and saving their incomes, you would not be able to get loans, nor would new innovations get loans and new enterprises would not be born. What would your alternative utopia be?
A wage is the price of the hour of work that an individual is willing to produce for the employers. He does not work because he likes working, he works so he can get an income, which he can use to buy and consume goods and services. The wage is set by the value of the work he employer is doing. If he is creating lot of value, his wage will be high. If his service is highly demanded, he will be paid more, than someone that produces a service for which there is lesser demand. Demand and supply meet; a wage is set.
In a free market the wages will have no pressure to move up or downwards once the natural equilibrium is achieved. The wage is neither 'fair' nor 'just', it simply reflects the value of the labour the employee is producing for the market. The value is formed by the market demand in relation to the finite supply of said good/service.
When the business is doing well, the employer can hire more workers and buy more machines and expand production. Why the increased demand for his product should increase the wages is a mystery. When the business is going badly, he alone will bear the risks and losses involved, not anyone else.
If the workers want higher share of profits of the company, they can buy shares of the company if those are sold on the market.
Another alternative is that if they are unwilling to work for the company for the naturally set wage, they can always switch job or start their own enterprise.
You cannot force people to sell their property. That is not 'fair legislation', that is theft.
Who would define the price for the shares of this now public company? It cannot be market determined, because markets are based on voluntary participation; demand and supply as determined by free acting men.
You are forcing entrepreneurs to sell their property, how is the price of that said property formed?
