Capitalism- Inherently bad or grossly misunderstood?

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by UndercoverElephant

Scientology is not crazy. It's evil. L. Ron wasn't a fool. He designed scientology very carefully as a means of extracting large amounts of money from idiots. The evidence that it is not crazy is that it has proven itself to be very, very effective at doing what he designed it to do.

For once, UE, I largely agree with you. It is crazy to the extent that its adherents actually believe in the nonsense; it's pretty clear that many of its leaders don't believe it at all.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by kevsta

ok enough off-topic bickering with you about semantics now, the reality is that billions of people are stuck in perpetual debt, some of their own making, and some "on their behalf".

technically you are correct if you want to apply the ancient definitions, but practically in the real world the situation is the same, even if living conditions are somewhat improved from the debt slavery of old.

As I said at the beginning, all you have to offer is semantic homeopathy.

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we can only have actual capitalism if institutions always fail when they make terminal business decisions, when they are bailed out by piling debt onto future generations, those people are born into a choice of debt payment or take your chances on a different farm.

Well, I certainly advocate letting businesses live or die on their own merits, and I strongly oppose the pattern of ever-increasing government debt. No problem there. You're still wrong on the other stuff, of course.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

As I said at the beginning, all you have to offer is semantic homeopathy.

Having read the classic "arguing over the meaning of words" between you and kevsta, I conclude that your are more guilty of "semantic homeopathy" Pixy.

Whether it is a tax to service government debt or a payment to the bank to service individual debt, it is still money that an individual has no legitimate option to withhold.

Perhaps it would be better if you focussed on the substance of kevsta's argument instead of worrying about whether he used the right term to describe people who have payment obligations.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by psionl0

Having read the classic "arguing over the meaning of words" between you and kevsta, I conclude that your are more guilty of "semantic homeopathy" Pixy.

Whether it is a tax to service government debt or a payment to the bank to service individual debt, it is still money that an individual has no legitimate option to withhold.

Wrong.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

Wrong.

Care to elaborate?

[kevsta]

Originally Posted by psionl0

Care to elaborate?

lol, expect visionary thoughts along the lines of:

Quote:

"I'm right, you're wrong (and stop ranting) "

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by psionl0

Care to elaborate?

Certainly.

If you owe a debt that you can't repay, or that is not worth repaying, almost all countries have personal bankruptcy laws. If we were still operating under the 19th century Poor Laws, or if you live in a country that doesn't allow personal bankruptcy, then you may have a point, but the point is against the laws of your country and nothing else.

And if you object to the taxes being levied to repay your country's national debt, leave. Again, if you are not allowed to leave, that is a problem with the laws of your country and nothing else.

That declaring personal bankruptcy or leaving your country of residence might somehow inconvenience you does not argue against the fact that you can do these things.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by kevsta

lol, expect visionary thoughts along the lines of:

Wrong.

[kevsta]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

Certainly.

If you owe a debt that you can't repay, or that is not worth repaying, almost all countries have personal bankruptcy laws. If we were still operating under the 19th century Poor Laws, or if you live in a country that doesn't allow personal bankruptcy, then you may have a point, but the point is against the laws of your country and nothing else.

or debt that is excluded from bankruptcy laws, in a country that requires citizens to pay your taxes whether you still live there any more or not?

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

And if you object to the taxes being levied to repay your country's national debt, leave. Again, if you are not allowed to leave, that is a problem with the laws of your country and nothing else.

so assuming I wanted to stay in the 1st world, where exactly are the fabled "debt free lands" to be found? anywhere (with consistently reliable internet) I could go to and not be charged punitive tax rates because they have previous debt that is nothing to do with me?

having already done the free-range "move" to a different farm 6 years ago, I now find myself in sunnier happier climes, completely free of personal debt, but paying / generating 46% taxes when netted out on a declared income of less than €20k per annum.

the only escape from permanent debt servitude is to go outlaw.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

Certainly.

If you owe a debt that you can't repay, or that is not worth repaying, almost all countries have personal bankruptcy laws. . . . . .

It seems like you are still responding to kevsta. The fact that individuals who can't pay their bills have options certainly minimizes the "slavery" aspect to debt.

However, that doesn't change the fact that taxes and debts must be paid. An individual might be able to avoid both by going bankrupt but when the government's creditors start getting nasty, everybody pays.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by psionl0

It seems like you are still responding to kevsta. The fact that individuals who can't pay their bills have options certainly minimizes the "slavery" aspect to debt.

Yes.

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However, that doesn't change the fact that taxes and debts must be paid.

So what you're saying is the fact that taxes and debts don't have to be paid doesn't affect your claim that taxes and debts must be paid?

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by kevsta

or debt that is excluded from bankruptcy laws, in a country that requires citizens to pay your taxes whether you still live there any more or not?

For once, you have a good point. The student loan laws are predatory and should - no, must - be abolished.

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so assuming I wanted to stay in the 1st world, where exactly are the fabled "debt free lands" to be found? anywhere (with consistently reliable internet) I could go to and not be charged punitive tax rates because they have previous debt that is nothing to do with me?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...by_public_debt

Quote:

having already done the free-range "move" to a different farm 6 years ago, I now find myself in sunnier happier climes, completely free of personal debt, but paying / generating 46% taxes when netted out on a declared income of less than €20k per annum.

the only escape from permanent debt servitude is to go outlaw.

That is, as we've already established, simply a lie.

[kevsta]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa;8476938[url

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_public_debt[/url]


That is, as we've already established, simply a lie.

?? "we have established" ?? yea alright whatever.

your link is meaningless and contains zero countries within my parameters of "first world" and "no previous debt requiring punitive taxes from me"

this link is more on topic

all we have actually established is that you are very good at saying "no it isn't" and "you are wrong"

once again, I have only 2 choices, either I pay taxes to service debt that is not mine, or I slip outside of the system, and that's one more choice than many people realistically have.

just fact.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by kevsta

your link is meaningless and contains zero countries within my parameters of "first world" and "no previous debt requiring punitive taxes from me"

Wrong. Anyway, while excessive debt is clearly a bad thing, why would any government want to run with zero debt? That means (for example) that there is no government bond market.

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once again, I have only 2 choices, either I pay taxes to service debt that is not mine, or I slip outside of the system, and that's one more choice than many people realistically have.

Wrong again, of course. It's you who is imposing these restrictions on your movement; it's you who is choosing to pay these taxes rather than inconvenience yourself.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

So what you're saying is the fact that taxes and debts don't have to be paid doesn't affect your claim that taxes and debts must be paid?

You may twist my words to make it appear that I have contradicted myself if you wish.

However, I suspect that you know that this wasn't my point at all.

[brenn]

Originally Posted by Tsukasa Buddha

No. If you think barter==capitalism your definition is revisionist and too vague to be useful. And wrong.

No, my definition is not wrong. It just does not fit your agenda. If you think economic exchange by barter is findamentally different than using "money" or whatever your point is, then you really aren't even up to discussing this issue. Reading over the thread a little, it seems not many are. It's like a group of children trying to win an argument by redefining words.

[Tsukasa Buddha]

Originally Posted by brenn

No, my definition is not wrong. It just does not fit your agenda.

My agenda is going with the standard definition of words.

Quote:

If you think economic exchange by barter is findamentally different than using "money" or whatever your point is, then you really aren't even up to discussing this issue.

Your strawman is noted.

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Reading over the thread a little, it seems not many are. It's like a group of children trying to win an argument by redefining words.

I bow before your clear mastery of redefining words.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by psionl0

You may twist my words to make it appear that I have contradicted myself if you wish.

However, I suspect that you know that this wasn't my point at all.

Whether it was your point or not, you're still wrong. First, no (with a valid and troubling exception that kevsta pointed out), individuals are not forced to pay their debts; they do have other options. Second, no, individuals are not forced to pay debts incurred by their government; they do have other options.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by brenn

No, my definition is not wrong. It just does not fit your agenda. If you think economic exchange by barter is findamentally different than using "money" or whatever your point is, then you really aren't even up to discussing this issue. Reading over the thread a little, it seems not many are. It's like a group of children trying to win an argument by redefining words.

Capitalism is not simply using money; it's about the ownership of the means of production and distribution. Neither simple barter, nor trade involving money, automatically implies capitalism is in effect.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

Whether it was your point or not, you're still wrong.

Originally Posted by psionl0

The fact that individuals who can't pay their bills have options certainly minimizes the "slavery" aspect to debt.

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

First, no (with a valid and troubling exception that kevsta pointed out), individuals are not forced to pay their debts; they do have other options. Second, no, individuals are not forced to pay debts incurred by their government; they do have other options.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by psionl0

Originally Posted by psionl0

However, that doesn't change the fact that taxes and debts must be paid. An individual might be able to avoid both by going bankrupt but when the government's creditors start getting nasty, everybody pays.

As I said, wrong.

[respect]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

Yes.


So what you're saying is the fact that taxes and debts don't have to be paid doesn't affect your claim that taxes and debts must be paid?

All debts must be paid. Things like bankruptcy can change who pays them but they are still paid. If you lend me $50 and I refuse to pay you back (and you have no legal recourse, perhaps because there is no binding contract) you pay the debt. And, in practice, lenders can write bad debts off of their taxes which shifts some of the burden on to the government.

[stevea]

Originally Posted by JJM 777

So we conclude that pure Capitalism is not a good choice, practically everyone thinks that some Socialism is necessary. Opinions vary about the ratio with which Capitalism and Socialism should be mixed.

No such conclusion was argued anywhere in this discussion. It's a red-herring you invented. Your attempt to divert the thread from your losing position.

I do not believe that "some Socialism" is necessary or desirable. That we may have great difficulty finding an example where this is practiced is not a counterargument. This is not the point of the current thread. Ig you wish to start a separate thread on the practicality of "pure Capitalism", I may participate.

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No, but it sets the consumer in a disadvantaged position, which results in the consumer getting less value for his money.

Yes, every piece of information is an advantage or disadvantage - but the buyer isn't informing the seller unnecessarily either. If you know or suspect item X will be in high demand or low supply do you inform the seller before purchasing X ? No !

You have every right to ask for information, or to revise contract terms for a purchase and the seller has every right to reject your requests and terms . It works the other way too.

You have the attitude that the buyer has no power and the seller is in complete control. That's ridiculous, but it feeds your feelings of powerlessness and therefore resentment. I assume you have zero formal training in economics.

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Yet you assume that consumers are worse off when facing such an adversary, vs. when the population is facing a company owned by the people themselves, which thus is not an adversary of its customer-owners.

I referred to a free market exchange as being adversarial and therefore creating efficiency.

In a socialist markets, as in the old USSR, prices are fixed by committee (monopolistic state pricing) and products are produced by government factories where no one is motivated by customer satisfaction. In the socialist systems, since prices don't reflexively control supply, and demand, this is instead managed by creating a secondary currency of 'tokens' SO you have to obtain a government token to buy bread or meat or a car or ... .

Yes consumers and society at large are far worse off in a socialist marketplace. The allocation of resources is inefficient. Trade itself is highly inefficient and as I've repeatedly said this is due to the substitution of central planning in place of the dynamically changing variables that drive supply and demand.

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Russia and China are hardline Capitalist countries.

That is utterly ridiculous - even today, but I clearly was referring to the previous "non-capitialist" regimes. Please read more carefully.

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I didn´t say that buyer bribery is widespread,

Yes you did ! In post #280 you said ...

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Corporate or communal buyers often get bribed by the seller

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... except medical doctors are commonly in a compromised position when choosing which medication to prescribe, [...] medicine costs are compensated according to the cheapest applicable medicine on the market,...

It's the same result here under a quasi-capitist system of medicine. Private insurance and Medicare often refuse to pay for a patented meds UNLESS there is no generic equivalent for the specific condition. Here many/most physicians don't prescribe the patented meds unless there is justification, since it just means more work for them to revise the prescriptions.

So what does this prove about the corruption & bribery of physicians that you falsely imagine ? You are beginning to sound like a conspiracy nut - everyone is corrupted by the nefarious cartoonish Gordon Gecko ?

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A big difference: "outright bribery" vs. "perfectly legal".

In reality, the perfectly legal activity does the same job as outright bribery would, if you scan for candidates until you find a candidate whose ideals are exactly what you would like to bribe politicians to do, then fund his face on TV, so he gets elected and promotes "his own original ideals".

Your anti-business paranoia and hatred is showing again. NOT ALL businesses are criminal, and NOT ALL politicians are corrupt, NOT ALL political contributions by business result in corrupt politicians providing state favoritism and advantage. This is a relatively rare case of criminality, but some of the examples are spectacularly bad, e.g. corn-ethanol subsidies in the US.

I agree that this schema needs reform, but I do not agree that business interests have no place in political discourse. No one will address these important business issues unless they are funded.

The primary fault is corrupt politicians, but political corruption is not restricted to capitalist states, and in fact is less prevalent there.
http://www.transparency.org/cpi2010/results
Note especially Chile as an good example of a free market capitalist state surrounded by counterexamples. Or compare Taiwan, Japan, S.Korea vs China and SE Asia.

Socialism is not a means of reducing political corruption, but of enhancing it by placing more power in the hands of the state. A power that is not harnessed to creating value for others (the profit motive).

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Democracy and privately funded political campaigning don´t mix fairly. Therefore there is no fair democracy in any country really.

You point to a very real problem, but your blame assessment is wrong (distorted by your biz-hatred) and you propose no reasonable solution. Two of the largest categories of political contributors in the US are Lawyers and Unions in that order; neither capitalist. I am not dismissing that big businesses are major contributors & influencers too.

So how do we stop ALL of this heavy funded political process distortion without also destroying free speech ? Unions and Business (and perhaps even lawyers) DO have real and valid interests that the public should be made aware of before voting. In the US there are very limits on what any individual can contribute to any one candidate or party of political comittee,
http://www.fec.gov/pages/brochures/contriblimits.shtml
But none of this prevents any interest from spending on "issues".

The US has a publicly subsidized scheme which also places caps on spending, but politicians choosing to avoid the public money can spend as much as they have. The public subsidy makes it nearly impossible for any 3rd party to participate and so is an impediment to a democratic process IMO.

Pure public funding still doesn't address the free speech issue of anyone with money.

So A/ NOT a problem of capitalism, B/ No solution is presented by you that doesn't also negate free-speech rights.

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Two, plus virtual operators reselling their bandwidth. At least one of these is an international company, everyone is welcome to try, but sparsely populated large countries are not an inviting place for many overlapping telecommunications services.

Finland has a population density of 16/km^2, which falls between Canada at 3.5/km^2 and the USA at 32/km^2. The entire Western USA including big population states like Texas and California has a population density just below Finland (14.75/km^2). Yes, there are many places w/ no coverage - but nearly any highway or even very small towns are covered. Yes rates are relatively high in more sparsely populated nations (US is high, Canada even higher), but that doesn't preclude competition. Nome Alaska (population 3,731) has 4 prime and 5 resell cell carriers.
http://www.visitnomealaska.com/nome-faq.html
You have 2+resell. Actually from what I read Finnish cell rates rates not at all bad, but of course this doesn't include the 'edge cases' mentioned.

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Pricing is not rocket science. If a company owned by the people sells to the people, profit margin is less of an issue, other factors of costs and revenues are basically similar.

More like quantum mechanics. Your blatant ignorance of basic economics is showing with this simplistic view. You believe in a command economy and fail to understand the major implications. These notes are not a substitute for a one semester undergrad macro-econ class but perhaps you can learn the definitions of the things you blithely ignore ...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economics
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economic_problem
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outline...l_organization

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Market_economy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marginal_utility
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_price_system
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_signal
vs
http://www.investopedia.com/terms/c/command-economy.asp
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planned_economy
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economi...lation_problem


If you still think a command economy can deploy resources as efficiently as a market economy -then read it all again and post a detailed question.

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Estimated public demand.

An estimate based on WHAT ? In a free market you get moment to moment feedback on demand and also on costs. Most large businesses have departments setup to track prices and costs and hedge against changes.. In a planned economy a bureaucrat pulls a number from his arse. Once you do this for a few commodities, then all pricing is based on the cost of pixie-dust.

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Apple Inc.

This begs the question - what do you trade for iPhones or for fuel and how is that priced and how is this production volume determined.

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If you imagine that Russians never invented anything under USSR, check the facts and then come back. Creativity is a basic state of human beings.

Agreed - however they FAILED MISERABLY to translate invention into any consumer directed production - so there is no Russian iPhone and they have been reduced to a mere seller of resources. I will argue this is precisely b/c there is no motivation in that system to efficiently serve customer demand.

You missed my point - or ignore it b/c you cannot rebut. Why would anyone invent the iPhone as a mass market product when your state will steal it from them ? (Answ: they won't, just as they didn't in the USSR).

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Energy production is an example of money automates which every Leftist government keeps as a state monopoly. Unnecessary to allow private hands to take profits which the government is fully capable of producing. If something goes wrong, democratic processes drop some heads from the top of politics until people feel good again.

No offense, but I can't parse this ungrammatical comment. There are state and city owned power facilities in the US and the best are competitive when there is no competition, and the worse are mismanaged messes. As I have repeatedly explained sending a one-bit piece of information every few years at the voting both is not comparable in any way to the amount of information in competitive free market exchanges.

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Yet these same humans are able to run private companies

.

Yes, exactly, b/c they run them for personal profit, but are constrained by free-market exchanges to only make trades where their customer also benefits.

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Lower bounds are exactly what drives Socialist thinking. USA is happily having a 15% poverty rate. I said afore that in my system some 20% of commerce would remain in private hands, that leaves enough playground for the truly creative and valuable.

Driving thinking and accomplishing it are two very different things; that's the main problem with socialism - wonderful intentions but a failure in terms of practical economics. No one here is happy about the US economy in recent years. But your figures lie.

Official 'poverty rate' is not a fair comparison unless you define poverty identically in all cases, and it is not. So for example Finland has no official poverty rate, however I see estimates between 7.5 and 12.5% when OECD "50% of avg income" is used (and the US around 14-15% as you say). But as the per capita GDPs are similar, this ignores cost of living differences. Your purchasing power is MUCH lower, perhaps by 24.8%.

http://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living...untry2=Finland

To give an example the US poverty rate is ~$23,000USD for family of 4, but to get the same purchasing power in Finland should require (see link) ~25,224.02 EUR, which is around the third decile (30%) of Finnish population disposable of gross incomes but only the 22% percentile of US income. So if you believe 15% of USers are poor in 2011 (and it's a matter of definition) then perhaps a third more or ~20.5% of Finns might equally poor in real terms in 2010. And yes - even this is not a fair comparison as it depends on household size and other factors but it's several steps closer to the truth.

http://pxweb2.stat.fi/temp/070_tjkt_...1272355379.xls

==========


I do sincerely wish to thank you JJM_777 for your not-too-flamey and reasonable discussion. We differ, and I cannot respect opinions that I consider ill-informed, but you stand far above most of this forum's participants simply be avoiding much name-calling and strawmen as methods of argument. best wishes.

[brenn]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

Capitalism is not simply using money; it's about the ownership of the means of production and distribution. Neither simple barter, nor trade involving money, automatically implies capitalism is in effect.

It may not fit your argument, but the first man trading a stone knife for an antelope leg had a completely free market in which he was the owner of the means of production and distribution. How is that example incorrect by your definition? I'm sure the first free market exchange was not actually a stone knife and an antelope leg, so feel free to argue with that, but anyone should easily understand the point.

Originally Posted by Tsukasa Buddha

My agenda is going with the standard definition of words.

Websters agrees with me.

Quote:

cap·i·tal·ism noun
\ˈka-pə-tə-ˌliz-əm, ˈkap-tə-, British also kə-ˈpi-tə-\
Definition of CAPITALISM
: an economic system characterized by private or corporate ownership of capital goods, by investments that are determined by private decision, and by prices, production, and the distribution of goods that are determined mainly by competition in a free market

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Your strawman is noted.

You wouldn't be a real JREFer if you went a whole page without typing "straw man." however that was not an example of one.

[Tsukasa Buddha]

Since we are on the topic, the Myth of Barter is an interesting discussion.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

As I said, wrong.

"OOPS! I dealt with the wrong part of your post"?

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by psionl0

"OOPS! I dealt with the wrong part of your post"?

No, that was you. I refuted your position precisely and completely. Go back and read it again.

Or, if you think your position still stands, please make a concise restatement of it so that I can address it without you getting lost again.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by brenn

It may not fit your argument, but the first man trading a stone knife for an antelope leg had a completely free market in which he was the owner of the means of production and distribution. How is that example incorrect by your definition?

It's orthogonal to what I'm saying. My point is that the simple presence of money in a system doesn't qualify it as capitalist.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

No, that was you. I refuted your position precisely and completely. Go back and read it again.

Nope. You definitely stated that debtors have options and when I pointed out that I had said the same thing you switched to the other part of my post.

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

Or, if you think your position still stands, please make a concise restatement of it so that I can address it without you getting lost again.

I doubt that I could explain myself in such a way that you wouldn't be able to twist it around but it might be interesting to try:

Originally Posted by psionl0

However, that doesn't change the fact that taxes and debts must be paid.

Debts and taxes are obligations that an individual can not just walk away from. If he is unable to meet those obligations then he must deal with that problem. Otherwise the system will deal with the individual.

Originally Posted by psionl0

An individual might be able to avoid both by going bankrupt

That is the fall back position.

Originally Posted by psionl0

but when the government's creditors start getting nasty, everybody pays.

Governments don't have the same options as individuals (although they may have options that individuals don't). When government debt becomes excessive then it lowers GDP which impacts on its citizens. If it defaults on its debt then that would seriously affect its international trading - again impacting on its citizens.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by psionl0

Nope. You definitely stated that debtors have options and when I pointed out that I had said the same thing you switched to the other part of my post.

I did no such thing. You reconstructed the sequence of replies out of order.

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Debts and taxes are obligations that an individual can not just walk away from.

You just walked away with the goalposts. You can declare bankruptcy; you can emigrate. While these are not free of inconveniences, they are alternatives to paying the debts or taxes in question.

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Governments don't have the same options as individuals (although they may have options that individuals don't).

True.

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When government debt becomes excessive then it lowers GDP which impacts on its citizens.

Who are free to leave.

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If it defaults on its debt then that would seriously affect its international trading - again impacting on its citizens.

Who are free to leave.

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

You just walked away with the goalposts.

More like you constructed a strawman.

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

Who are free to leave.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by psionl0

More like you constructed a strawman.

I asked you to restate your position. You can restate it again if you want.

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I take it that is the sum of your response?

[psionl0]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

I take it that is the sum of your response?

To the "free to move" bit, yes. It's quicker than giving a detailed analysis of how much it would cost to "freely" move to another country.

As for the rest of it, communication between us seems to be too poor for us to reach any sort of consensus.

[JJM 777]

Originally Posted by Belz...

Examples ?

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...004176,00.html

[JJM 777]

Originally Posted by stevea

I do not believe that "some Socialism" is necessary or desirable. That we may have great difficulty finding an example where this is practiced is not a counterargument.

Sounds fair, because also I believe that Capitalism is not necessary or desirable, and we may have great difficulty finding an example where this is practiced, and some use it as a counterargument.

What is the "Socialism" that is not needed "at all", is a vague statement.

1) Obviously some taxation is necessary to run a state, and it could be said that taxation rate is a Socialism rate, which hardly can be zero. 30% or 50% overall taxation rate would mean that the state is 30% or 50% Socialist and 70% or 50% Capitalist.

2) Obviously the state must also own at least some institutions, which can be said to be state-run companies. Typically at least the police force, army, and prisons. Usually also health care from birth to death bed, and a schooling system from baby care all the way to universities. How many percent of GDP runs through these state-owned institutions, can be said to be a Socialism rate of the country, which hardly can be zero.

Originally Posted by stevea

You have the attitude that the buyer has no power and the seller is in complete control.

The more organized has more control. (Allegory: why labour unions are such a devil in some countries and business cultures. Because they really make a difference to the bargaining power of employees.) Entrepreneurs tend to be more organized, sometimes also beyond what would be allowed by law, than consumers. Buyer unions that actually do the buying together are rare.

Originally Posted by stevea

I referred to a free market exchange as being adversarial and therefore creating efficiency.

Efficiency does not necessarily follow from adversaliality. It only follows from the availability of an effectively priced offer, and adversaliality between sellers and consumers does not guarantee that the selling parties compete against each other as effectively as they could. "Price terrorism" is a word you hear when a company starts selling something for a really effective price.

Originally Posted by stevea

So how do we stop ALL of this heavy funded political process distortion without also destroying free speech?

You won´t stop it, because the rich will not fund a candidate that would oppose the current system, and in the current system you cannot win national or even state elections without support from the rich.

The situation would be improved by the state funding some national bulletins that give equal space for all candidates. Plus a law that bans major media from giving inequal space to the candidates during X months under elections. Now it goes so that the major newspapers and TV stations give 99% of all space to 2 leading candidates only, and the other candidates are as if they didn´t even exist. That effectively functions as marketing, and turns out as votes.

Originally Posted by stevea

In a free market you get moment to moment feedback on demand and also on costs.

I am not talking about a moneyless society. Everything has a price, including labour, land and natural resources. You argue based on differences which do not exist between Capitalism and non-moneyless Socialism.

I have also not mentioned that all salaries must be 100% equal. You argue that nobody can have an incentive to create in Socialism, because people are inherently greedy. I argue that if this is true (and it might not be true), then the state-owned companies would need to use salaries as the incentive. But I don´t believe that such incentives would be necessary to such an extent as they are in Capitalism. No one man is necessary in a war. If someone asks an exorbitant salary, the state would tolerate it only as long as it takes to educate a more moderately priced person to do his job. The salary levels of medical doctors would be halved in the long run. They are clever, but they are not above the population as much as their high salaries indicate.

To sum it up, you argue that Socialism cannot function (with an arbitrarily set required level of productivity) because of factors X, Y and Z. I argue that I have doubts about the necessity of factors X, Y and Z, but in case they are proven to be necessary, then Socialism can have factors X, Y and Z.

Originally Posted by stevea

what do you trade for iPhones or for fuel and how is that priced and how is this production volume determined.

Depends on the national strengths (no matter what the economical system of the nation is). Some countries make most of their foreign currency from tourism, others from oil, some from various mining products, some from production, some from design, some from offshore banking.

International trade is nowadays based on free competition and world market prices, only seldom to preferential deals between countries. I don´t theorize any reason why a Capitalist state would be motivated to support a Socialist system by buying something for a higher price than they can get from elsewhere. Quite the opposite, countries like USA love to punish Leftist countries for their ideology, I imagine that being treated as a trading partner equal to others would face some ideological friction with some countries.

Originally Posted by stevea

there is no Russian iPhone and they have been reduced to a mere seller of resources.

Not to badmouth the Russian people, they lived under dictators, and now live under a system that by all means is equal, and superior, to what mafia is in Italy. With the exception that in Italy the state police fights against mafia, so there is light at the end of the tunnel, but in Russia the police is the mafia.

Originally Posted by stevea

Why would anyone invent the iPhone as a mass market product when your state will steal it from them?

I have not said that the state would steal anything without proper market value compensation.

Originally Posted by stevea

Official 'poverty rate' is not a fair comparison

True, and the actual depth of poverty is of more interest than "earning less than 50% of GDP", which might be quite okay living if the GDP is high. This is where welfare states see USA as a warning example, certainly no "model for the world to follow" that it claims to be. In Finland nobody gets less than 400 EUR per month + housing aid or something, the welfare system automatically feeds money to anyone who for any reason gets less than that. We have no homeless people for other reason than some individuals drinking the state-given money instead of renting a house with it -- which is a flaw in the system, the poverty aid should be earmarked for housing and food.

National economies are helped or burdened by many factors for which the population is not to thank or blame. You either have oil and diamonds or then you don´t have them. Construction and heating costs are high in northern countries, you need 2-3 times thicker walls and windows than in temperate climates. Sitting on the edge of civilization geographically is also a disadvantage what comes to tourist revenues, which fall to centrally located countries with a temperate climate, France being the world leader.

[Belz...]

Originally Posted by JJM 777

http://www.time.com/time/magazine/ar...004176,00.html

Rather than have us read the whole thing, which parts, specifically, for the benefit of those reading the thread ?

[Londinius]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

Nope.


Scientology is crazy. I do not support jailing, much less killing scientologists just for their beliefs.


Yes, they're crazy. Well, not necessarily in the medical sense, but their beliefs are irrational. So?

Yeah, the same irrational beliefs that made people strap bombs on themselves and kill innocent people in the name of their beliefs.

I'd love to see the US not jailing the suicide bombers they'd arrested though. If you think Falun Gong is in anyway kinder than those Islamic terrorists who'd order their believers to conduct such criminal acts, then really, you don't understand it well enough as well as the destruction brought to the country, the society and the family members of those believers.

It inevitably prompts the question of whether it is justified for a brutal crackdown if it brings peace to the society, similar to a debate on death sentence.

While I do agree that the CCP is way more totalitarian in than the western world, to label them as murderers of the innocent is definitely an exaggerated claim often perpetuated by those in conflict with the government. Unfortunately such groups including Falun Gong and the Tibetan Independence Movement with their fabricated claims in the past have made them lost much of their credibility, at least among the academics.

By the way, in case you're wondering why capitalism has worked so well in China, it is precisely the totalitarian nature of the government that made the country a fertile bed for capitalistic activities.

Quote:

Start with the tens of millions killed by the Great Leap Forward and keep going until you get to how dissidents are treated today.

It is true that the Great Leap Forward was probably the biggest and stupidest mistake ever done by CCP, but to label the killings as murder clearly shows your limited understanding of the history. Sorry but often the people who make such claims do not really know what they're talking about, could not even name any of the key figures involved, perhaps apart from Mao.

For the simple reason that the massive famine and the deaths associated could not have been possible, had it not for the millions of the frenzied masses supporting the cause argues against the notion that the consequential deaths of the GLF were the results of an act of murder. This is very different from the Holocaust where innocent people were actively discriminated and killed, where the killings were intentional, in which case calling such an act murder would of course be justified.

I'd have loved to go into the multitude of causes that eventually led to the ludicrous end of the GLF but this would belong to another thread with the length of a multi-pages thread (a very complicated subject, and yes, this was part of my thesis during uni). But let's just say that the unprecedented optimism that socialism is superior to capitalism (which includes such events as the transformation of the Soviet Union into an industrialised country and their success in launching of the first manmade satellite in 1957 etc, which I should clarify, was the fake Stalinist version of socialism rather than those advocated by Marx or Trotsky), the cult of personality of Mao, as well as the actions of provincial officials exploiting the situation by making exaggerated claims of their yield (which took out from the stockpile allocated for the communes and the peasants) and their cover up of the resulting famine as main reason that led to disaster.

[brenn]

Originally Posted by PixyMisa

It's orthogonal to what I'm saying. My point is that the simple presence of money in a system doesn't qualify it as capitalist.

I never said it did. In fact, I said somewhat the opposite to the poster who implied that barter could not be capitalism: "If you think economic exchange by barter is findamentally different than using "money" or whatever your point is, ...."

[Tsukasa Buddha]

Originally Posted by brenn

I never said it did. In fact, I said somewhat the opposite to the poster who implied that barter could not be capitalism: "If you think economic exchange by barter is findamentally different than using "money" or whatever your point is, ...."

Repeating your straw man doesn't make it true. Your original claim was that we could trace capitalism back thousands of years before most recognise its development solely because of the existence of barter. Whether capitalism could feature barter or not was not the issue.

[PixyMisa]

Originally Posted by Londinius

While I do agree that the CCP is way more totalitarian in than the western world, to label them as murderers of the innocent is definitely an exaggerated claim often perpetuated by those in conflict with the government.

No.

Quote:

For the simple reason that the massive famine and the deaths associated could not have been possible, had it not for the millions of the frenzied masses supporting the cause argues against the notion that the consequential deaths of the GLF were the results of an act of murder.

No.