There's a whole eastern philosophy around this sort of sentiment. The idea being that things aren't inherently 'anything' but we do attach emotions or ideas to those things. You can take a 'meta' step back and notice this.
A worker coop would strive hard to avoid taking that action. In NA corps, this is among the first actions to take. The actual historical case, I reference is Mondragon, who has virtually no layoffs in its entire history.
What they do is shift workers from non performing sectors to performing ones.
They have economic cycles in Spain, and within the org itself, like the rest of the world but they deal with it more equitably.
In chess, tactics are usually shorter term moves that aim to gain material advantage or mate. Pins, skewers, discovered check, forks, double attacks, etc. These are usually in a time frame of around 2-3 moves. This is often described in chess terms as 'concrete' threats.
Strategy concerns more of theoretical ideas, long term possibilities. 10+ moves ahead. This involves pawn structure, where your king is positioned, how your pieces are developed, which side of the board left or right you might launch an attack, end game considerations, etc. How you intend to defend or win the game. This type of play is usually called positional. Whereby the placement of your pieces gives you an overall advantage. In GM level play this is very subtle and 15+ moves ahead. Positional vs. tactical.
As an analogy tactics are like cobra strikes and positional play is like a boa constrictor where tiny shifts strangle the opponent in the end. Both are lethal.
Well for one thing, in my anecdotal scenario, such transactions acrue no interest. It was the kind of debt anyone could incur and payback. Money lenders aren't under any obligation to give you a loan of any size. In that village there was a self-perpetuating obligation to provide the debt.
As for how it would scale, I don't know. Is the structure and culture of western urban society the only form possible?
Django unchained briefly visited that idea when Leonardo pondered why don't the slaves revolt or leave? The slave has nowhere to go.
Wage slavery, the term, was coined when industrial jobs were coming on to the scene in the north and there was still slavery in the south. Groups of laborers in these new factories soon went on protest. They self-described their situation as being similar to slave work/living standards but with a wage. Basically what we today would call inhumane.
This sentiment never diminished but instead was overwhelmed by the dominance of industrialized work in this format. Their protest fell on deaf ears because now all the jobs offered were like that and unions decided to fight for better working conditions instead of the system at large. Which leads us to today.
It's hypocritical when employees lambaste labor movements but will gladly partake the fruits of better wages and working standards.
It seem human nature will put up with a lot of things. An anthropological account i read: The anthropologist visited some area around Tibet. The system in place there required newly married women upon marriage to leave their husbands and work for the lord of the area, often as a concubine. After a year or so she would leave but not to return to her husband but instead go to a work camp where she would serve as a comfort girl. After that she returned.
The obviously shocked anthropologist asked why did people put up with this arrangement? It seems the reply was a "that's the way it was" sentiment.
This is true but the work that they do, they or their families will benefit 100%. "Free labor". It is honest equitable work. The system in place siphons that labor by people who control capital. Income inequality.
Perhaps society and its culture as a whole. Directly, it could be the community you live in or perhaps government.
Two examples:
1) I read an article where the writer took a job somewhere in the Pacific or Southeast in a non-heavily developed area. When he gets to the village he has no place to stay. How will I live?
What happens, which as a Westerner he did not expect, was that soon the community gathered at a spot and over the next few days built him his house! It was simple but in line with the community standard. The expectation was that when someone else had a need (maybe a house) he would return the favor.
2) In the scandinavian model, I believe you get schooling paid for until you find a job and then you have to pay the gov't back. Which is sort of the reverse in NA where you pay upfront and hope to recoup the cost yourself. With that model it seems the gov't has incentive to ensure there are enough jobs so that they can recoup costs.
It ends in global financial collapse. Then rises again! The US will gradually fade from dominance as every other leader before it. I wouldn't be surprised if we're witnessing it's decline right now. I don't see how it gets out of the major systemic mess it is in. Detroit, Louisiana, etc. is how it begins. A first world country bit by bit reverting to third-world status.
Until some place has a successful anarchic-type revolution (a la Spain & Paris) without an outside power coming in to overthrow them we're stuck with this legacy economic/political system and the best we can do is civilize it with prudent regulation (which we can barely do because it's been systemically corrupted).
Lincoln agreed as well. He did not endorse wage labor for similar reasons outlined by enraged_camel. That man was no dummy concerning slavery.
Lincoln advocated 'free labor' as the moral and honest form of labor. Which took as a given that labor is greater than capital. Its proceeds should benefit completely its worker and his family not siphoned by the few who have capital.
Industrialization has made the workplace of the farm or workshop obsolete but I believe the principle could be maintained if workplaces were employee owned and managed democratically rather than authoritatively.