Why capitalism?

You know when you do posts like this it is hard to know who your talking to.

 

Read the last page, dear.

 

Capitalism and democracy are both messy and chaotic systems that leave a lot to be desired. But they are still the best ones, cuz they ensure that good products at a fair price will survive, and shitty crap that is overpriced will not. Also, they allow the citizen the freedom to choose what to buy and who to have in government. It is the price of freedom, the risk of failing.

Now, if there was ever a real communist state, it might be worth exploring, but Russia, and any other communist government that I can think of are communist in name only. The ruling class lives in luxury, and never gives up its power once it has attained the position of authority. The difference is that in a free society, you can kick them out of office.


The down side is that democracy means the mob rules, and capitalism opens the door for some people to become grotesquely wealthy, beyond any ability to ever spend in the next century. There must be some constraints to the freedom, for social reasons.

 

The artistrocrats greed under capitalism will doom the entire human race sp to escape from the insanity of the aristrocrats would mean leaving Earth, hmm how much would a space ship costs :H

You have oil peak where when oil production starts shrinking do to less oil in the ground will cause capitalism to crash due to a growing energy shortage due to shrinking energy capacity (due to shrinking oil production)

You have global warming where the pollution that the aristrocrats pumped out for greed will cause mass starvation due to shrinking output from farms due to Earth's enivorment life support system failing.

You have pollution it self that even without global warming will cause the down fall of man.

And these are just the big ones. The road of capitalism leads to nothing but death and destruction so since I don't think I can ever afford a ship to escape the fate of Earthling the only other option is try to prevent mans downfall.

 

If I could afford a spaceship, I wouldn't leave. This planet is way too beautiful.

I don't think it is completely hopeless. That is the best I can do, as far as optimism goes.

http://www.xs4all.nl/~mke/exitmundi.htm


Here is a taste of what to look forward to........pick your favorite.

 

Well, you're right that it wouldn't completely dissuade you from earning money in the sense that you probably still wouldn't quit your job and watch TV all day. But it WOULD give you LESS incentive to be productive. If you can't pass your inheritance to your children, you're less likely to buy a new house. If you can't pass your inheritance to your children, you're less likely to start a new business once you pass middle-age.

Those other restrictions you mention that already exist also lessen the incentive to be productive.

Yes, I think that wealthy people are to some degree (depending on circumstances) morally obligated to give to charities. But I don't think they should be legally required to do so.

Ah, but should the government be in the business of deciding what is "necessary" and what is "excess wealth"? No one had computers thirty years ago, and society didn't grind to a halt. Personally I think the only things that are "necessary" are those that people truly can't live without: Food, medicine, shelter, clothing, etc. Everything else could be considered "excess wealth," whether that wealth is spent on a night at the movies or a $10 million zeppelin. I don't think it'd be fair to restrict one but not the other (I'd rather NEITHER are restricted)...doing so would be representative of a political policy based on resentment of the wealthy, rather than what is truly best for society.

I was just using the global economy as an example. What if the United States has another Great Depression beginning tomorrow, the American standard of living declined to the world average, and you are one of the fortunate few who are not financially affected by the Depression? You would then be "rich" even by national standards...but would you still be against the right to give your children a good life?

I disagree. I know that I don't work for the sake of the "economy" (a fairly abstract thing to devote one's productivity to). I work for my own benefit (and when I'm older, probably for my children's benefit).

If I had a choice between working for a 10% increase in my own wealth, or a 10% increase in the US economy with no change in my personal wealth, I'd choose my personal wealth. I think most people would.

You're right, unrestricted capitalism does lead to problems like that. But there's no reason we can't essentially have capitalism, plus a few regulatory laws to protect against monopoly, pollution, false advertising, etc. We don't need to resort to socialism to correct those problems.

Libertarian/Marxist is an oxymoron.

I think this is one of the biggest misunderstandings of economics that socialists/communists frequently fall victim to. Economics is not a "zero sum" game. Wealth is CREATED. When one person gets richer, another does not have to get equally poorer. One of the great things about capitalism is that the rich get richer and the poor get richer. Don't believe me? Look at the upward trend in wealth over the past few centuries. Who is "richer": the average American today, or the richest king in Europe 500 years ago? I would most definitely pick the former.

Working to earn a better life for yourself is not a crime, nor should it be. The person who goes to college and eventually becomes a CEO usually has the same motives as the assembly line worker: to make money to better his life.

 

I think the Scandinavian countries have found a fairly good compromise. The highest earners pay extremely high taxes, and things like speeding tickets are a function of your wealth. One speeding ticket I saw was for $163 000. That is a lot to me, but to the guy who paid it it is like $350 or something to me.

The UK has a fairly good social safety net too, from what I can see. There is always a cost to be borne though.

Economics is a great course to see the actual implications of adding a tax, a tariff, etc. onto anything. There is a measurable drop in demand, and therefore the manufacturers have to find ways to stay solvent. It is a very fine balancing act, with no social safety net at one end, and no incentive to succeed at the other.
I found the economics courses I took to be very informative as to the mechanics of it all.

 

Sweden and Denmark are on the verge of bankruptcy because of their high deficit spending.

 

lol...............you kill me.

did they spend 55 Billion dollars more than they made LAST MONTH!?
The US has the highest deficits of any nation in history..........eh?
How many trillions of dollars is the US debt at now?
The pot calling the kettle black, slightly.

 

The US also has a budget much larger then a country like Denmark, a country of 290million people is gonna have alot more money to make and spend then a country of 5 million.

 

Well, the US definitely spends too much also. But as a percentage of the GNP, it isn't nearly as much as Scandanavian nations.

Anyway, why is that "the pot calling the kettle black"? I don't make the decisions for the US budget...

 

Then you haven't studied the Libertarian/Marxist experiment in Spain or read Ivan Illichs works on the mix.

The 2 works really well once you your realize Marxism works best with decentrilized goverment. Once you have a system that is a network of small goverments the people and the goverment can become one, making the goverment the collective will of the community.

Libertarianism fits in now perfectly since the power comes from inside the community unlike current Capitalism where the power comes from outside. This falls in line with Libertarianism ideology since the power stays very close to individuals.

Nope it is wealth usurpation since capitalism means everything has to owned. So instead of wealth belonging to everyone, they steal it from the people in order to sell it back to them.

Look at Boliva where a US company privitized not only water but rain water meaning if you caught a raindrop on your toung you would be charged with theft. Until the people resisted and returned the wealth of water back to the people.

This is the problem with Capitalism, to a capitalist land is worthless until you fence it off. Meaning until you can stop people from having free access to the weath it has no value. Capitalism idea of wealth is flawed, we are not richer since less have access to that wealth then before.

Yet the assembly worker is not responsible for poverty, death and the impending doom of man kind while the CEO is.

 

Explain to me how you would achieve wealth redistribution without a government (or some other entity) to redistribute it.

Way to completely ignore the point.

Was anyone actually arrested for drinking rainwater? I doubt it. Anyway, why must you offer examples of the most extreme forms of laissez-faire capitalism? I haven't seen anyone here who is arguing in favor of the privatization of rainwater.

We have less access to wealth than before? You didn't answer my question - who is "richer"...a European king from 500 years ago, or the average American today? Did that king have access to antibiotics, automobiles, television, personal computers, or any of the other great technology that has been invented as a result of capitalism? Those of us living in capitalist societies most definitely have MORE access to wealth than at any time in human history.

Explain to me the distinction then:

Both the assembly worker and the CEO got the education that they felt was necessary and affordable for their line of work.

Both the assembly worker and the CEO work to provide a better life for themselves and their families.

Both the assembly worker and the CEO want to do their jobs ethically and competently.

What has the CEO done that makes him responsible for "poverty, death, and the impending doom of mankind"? Show a little ingenuity in starting a company? Providing consumers with a product or service that they demand? Providing other people with jobs? What has he done that's so horrible?

You resent the idea of anyone else succeeding in life. You resent the idea of anyone else earning money creatively, instead of working for someone else or for the government at a job they hate. You aren't interested in wealth equality; you're interested in punishing the rich.

 

You still have a goverment but it is the people of that local community and a network that connects that community with the rest of the goverments.

See you don't need people with guns taking stuff from one person to give to another with Libertarian/Marxist. You just need to provide free access to the wealth. Turning commodity back into commons thus the goverment doesn't have to worry about as much as the USSR did since the goal is free access not redistribution.

No "you have this land" and" he has this land" or even "This is the peoples land and we will run it for you", just make it a common and let the community figure out how to share it.

So instead of being annal about "From each according to their ablity and to each according to their needs" you are more libertarian about it and figure if the system is fair the community can worry about it thus not of the goverments concern.

For collecting yes.

Before the 18th Centry Enclosure Acts people had access to huge tracks of land for free only catch was you had to share but still you technically had access to more land and resources then the richest people today. Of course you didn't have enough time in your life to every hope of using any more then a insignifant fraction of those resources but they were legally there for you.

So pre 18 Centry Enclosure a peasant had more access to wealth then anyone today only flaw was the peasant had no way of using any more then a tiny part of that wealth.

After 18 Centry Enclosure act the commons are turned to commodities under the scarcity model making the vast wealth of the world divided in sold. So now you need money for access to the wealth that before a peasant had free access to thus wealth usurpation. To add insult to injury the technological advances today that would have allowed peasent to get more out of the commons is instead used to lower their quality of life. For example Automobiles means longer commute time then before General Motors killed mass transit since as Ivan Illch pointed out in "Energy and Equality" the Automoblie is very inefficient from land required for roads and parking to cost of ownership (including pollution).

The CEO pollutes that earth, exploits the worker and brainwashes the consumer into thinking they need their product.

 

Quality of life is not directly related to wealth. In a study done about 10 years ago, a province in SE India was given an equal quality of life rating as the US. The types of things they measure are literacy rates, crime rates, divorce rates, longevity, general health, infant mortality rates, etc.


The interesting point to note is that the per capita income in that province was one sixty-fifth the per capita income of the US. So they are living just as good a life with less than 2% of the wealth per person.

Think about how that translates into a potential redistribution of wealth, with the priority being to increase the quality of life for all the worlds people.

Right now the inequity is so bad that around 22 000 children starve to death every single day. Another 28 000 children die for lack of basic medical care.
That is 50 000 children that die every single day, when there is enough resources available to stop this horror. Instead, billions are spent on military equipment, used to kill.
It is a very clear commentary on the low level of our ethical standards.

 

It would provide less quantitative incentive to be productive. I think, though (and here I may be wrong, it is really up to the scientists to decide. They’re always so far behind.), that our incentive to work comes from our psychological egoism. The reason we work hard is because ‘we’ must in order to live. It would be unfair to limit the meaning of the word ‘live’ to a monetary value. There are more important things that work will bring; happiness, stability, and escape. And there are more valuable things that we can give our children than money; ethic. In this sense, one might argue that being productive and giving excess wealth to the neediest would provide better qualitative incentive to work.

This rests on the premise that the only reason we do things is to pass them on to our children. In other words, the best thing we can pass on to our children are of the material realm.

I can’t agree.

North Americans are of the most productive people in the history of civilization. I would think that people would be as productive with this restriction in place. Again, we can not underestimate the qualitative value of our drive, of our psychological egoism.

You think that some wealthy people are ethically obligated to charity but ought not be legally obligated?

How does that work?

If law is merely an executive extension of a legislative system of ethics, should not those things that are ethically required be legally required?

Should they? Perhaps not. Unfortunately they do. The government of Ontario has declared that people earning under sixty-two hundred annually can not live. Further appeal to these numbers: ~$8,100 – $34,000 taxed at 22.05%, $34,100 – $35,500 @ 25.15%, $35,000 – $68,000 @ 31.15%, $68, 000 – $71,000 @ 33.16%, $71,000 – $115,000 @ 37.16%, $115,000+ @ 40.16.

Whether or not they should, they do. They increase tax according to wealth meaning they have some measure of what wealth is excess and what is necessary.

I don’t quite understand how I would suddenly become rich. I’m of the working class. I’m not of the Hilton family. If the American economy came to a sudden halt the rich people would still be the rich people and the poor people would still be the poor people. The only thing that would change would be that the rich Americans would no longer be the rich global citizens. Their position on the global map would decrease but their standing within the borders of their sovereign land they would still be the wealthiest. Part of my argument lies in the idea that in such a situation trust fund babies wouldn’t be in a position in which they are able to make money. Whereas a person who has been forced to work for life all of his life would as they have that invaluable work experience. It is one of those gifts a parent can give their children that doesn’t seem to get enough value in our world, self sufficiency.

The fact that “most people would” choose personal wealth is a testament to the qualitative worth of the psychological egoism I mentioned earlier. I mean to say, about the economy, that you want a strong and sufficient economy in order that the wisdom you impart on your offspring can be used to it’s potential. In order that an economy remains strong it must have strong actors. The more the merrier. Sharing inheritance amoung the neediest is a way of increasing the number of economic actors and the strength of the economy in which your children would operate.

 

Do you have a car? Does it run on gasoline (an oil product)? You may say well, no I have a bicycle. What are the tires made of? In fact, what is the frame made of. You cannot produce steel without the cheap energy derived from fossil fuels.
What about your teeth? Do you brush them? With what? A plastic toothbrush? A petroleum product. Perhaps a wooden toothbrush. Where would all that wood come from? Cutting down forests. Even the flouride in your toothpaste is a by-product of industry.
The very computer you are on requires gallons of petroleum to produce the plastic in its componets. Or are you on a wooden, organic computer?
Let's say the damage is already done by producing your plastic computer. What about the energy that runs it?
I am sure that you would not like to admit it, but I am sure that you contribute to the problem as much as the rest of us.
If you truly wanted to help stop pollution, you'd be living in the forest somewhere farming soybeans with no pesticides, no fertilizers, no toothpaste and no soap and no medications for the many illnesses you will contract. And then you'd die unmissed because no one would be willing to be there with you living like a cave man.

 

Yet there is a finite amount of oil on Earth thus way the only logical conclusion is to reduce consumption as much as possible. So instead of roads all over the place you have desprawl and mass transit that saves land,energy, and increases mobilty while reducing pollution.

 

marx a capitalist? hahaha... libertarianism and marxism are two opposite things.

that's all i wanted to say.

 

Large scale questions about overall civil and governmental structures, sociental laws/mores, etc. have too many variables to yield to analysis, regardless of the societal goals spoken to by the structures and the suggested changes.

Only suggestions regarding very small and incremental changes can make any sense, and yield to analysis and some certainty as to the results of the change.

The system is highly distrubuted and parallel, making medium to large scale change impossible in the short term. There is no 'control point'. Medium to large changes cannot be 'installed', they must 'evolve'.

And, in general, it is not even possible to ascertain the result of many individual changes over many years, except in hindsight. This is because the overall structures are complex enough, that it is 'only the structures themselves that can embody any meaningful model of their behavior'. 'Principle components'for the pupose of analysis, modeling, and prediction cannot be found.

These national and international structures are complex enough, that even the infinity of perspectives and relativity associated with low level quantum behavior tends to apply. In other words, nothing is 'simply that' ot 'simply this'. It is a complex web of interacting Poisson distributions that, in general, cannot be 'fixed'.....because it is never clear what is 'broken'.

Considering this, everything already in place and unfolding everywhere in the world is already nominally 'optimized' and balanced.