It is not realizing the potential of the individual if the most intelligent and talented are being used for their talent and intelligence, and not being fairly compensated by the pseudo capitalist in this economic system. Their wealth is stolen from them like the Doctors of communist Russia, who were paid the same as janitors to fill the pockets of the rich, because they have no choice but to work for unfair bosses who concentrate all the wealth at the top to executives. That is unfair because it perpetuates a system where the less talented, and less intelligent, can manipulate the system to concentrate wealth at the top. Well capitalism cannot and should not concentrate wealth at the top, because that is clearly against the principles of fairness for which capitalism is based. In a fair economic capitalist model, their wouldn't be billionaires like Steve Jobs or Bill Gates. That money would instead be fairly distributed to the many who are talented and intelligent who produce the profitable labor, rather than one individual or a few individuals who do a simple job of managing that talent. This management by overpaid executives can be done by the most basic educated person, and for much less than the billions of dollars that Bill Gates or Steve Jobs made for the same job.
People are not compensated for their potential. Intelligence and talent is used or is useless. If you don't want your intelligence or talent used don't do the work. Be useless. You have that option in America. In Russia, you did not.
should we have goaded them into an industrial automation race instead of an Arms Race after the Space Race?
A competition in better ways to produce what people want instead of better means of destroying people? Yes, Russia should have goaded us into that.
dude; we could have insisted they simply prove, the best things in life are free under that form of Socialism. are you claiming we would be worse off with a perpetual industrial automation race instead of any form of Prohibition or Arms race?
The Soviet Union was never socialist even though it always claimed to espouse socialist ideals, it was a communist dictatorship from day one. Where the Soviet Union failed was that the dictatorship became a self serving oligarchy, not the public serving technocracy that was intended. But then again this was over a century ago when technocrats were few and far between, the data they needed to do their work was non-existent, and there were plenty of self serving political operators willing to step into the breach. China seems to be having a much better go at it.
People are not compensated based on potential because all the wealth is stolen from the work horses of the company, and given to top management and executives. This is the psuedo capitalist system we are in, it is not real capitalism and its unfair to fool the people to believe they are compensated based on 'hard work', much less talent and intelligence.
I believe the use of war time social powers should only be delegated with the corresponding market based metric of war time Tax rates to prove the exigency exists, and is not merely a socialized diversion and political passion of the moment.
The common worker is the work horse for any company, but their compensation today is the equivalent of being under fed and under maintained horses. Even some of the false capitalists of slavery knew that well fed and maintained slaves had better productivity and worker output. Unfortunately many capitalists of today resemble the sadistic slave owners who fail to properly take care of their workers, and go as far as abuse them with lack of opportunity, complacency, and underpayment, leading to many of the failures of society such as high health problems, prison rates, and violence by guns. They are not given proper opportunities for reeducation and retraining to increase their productivity and command higher pay, even under the false assumption they would be fairly paid given that executives, top bosses, and shareholders make more money than the entire staff they oversee while mostly doing nothing. They sit idly by while collecting money off the labor of others, and even going so far as passing judgement on the oppressed laborer with labels like 'poor work ethic', 'ignorance', 'lazy', 'not ambitious' and glorified 'net recipients' to add insult to injury.
Because they are neither slaves nor farm animals. People are responsible for providing many things to the pets they keep, they are not responsible for providing those things to their neighbors. Even if they offer to trade dollars for labor with them. People have developed the unfortunate belief that becoming an employee means your life becomes the responsibility of those who employ you. That belief has been so abused that companies are aggressively responding by ending employment. Through robotics, expert systems, bio-fabrication, self assembling geometries, customer involvement, e-commerce, and other zero-labor models they are choosing to do without employees. Don't want to be treated like an employee? You never had to be. And you soon won't even have it as an option.
That is a paradoxical argument. When people in positions of power don't take responsibility for people without power it leads to the same conclusions you draw. Your goal is that people take responsibility for themselves, but they don't have the tools to do so if companies don't provide them with training or education. When you eliminate net recipients who don't take responsibility for themselves either through laziness or because they are unable too, there is no more economy to profit from as you have killed or depleted all the wealth of the consumer. Your escape as a business is to be like that guy who enslaved the Silver Surfer, and act as a parasite from country to country leeching all the wealth of each place from the consumers until their middle class dies, and everyone is poor. The problem with this economic practice in the long run is that this is the only planet we know and have, and without the total community of residents putting their efforts together and collectively reaching their potential, it is not possible to find a new planet and it will lead to self destruction.
The primary goal of any society should be for each member to take responsibility for themselves, which in some cases may result in some having to move and live within adjacent or distant societies where opportunities for their success exist. There is no 'added profit' to made by giving to those who contribute nothing the means to consume more equally with those whose contributions are producing both the products and services which are being consumed by taking from them some of what they earned as a result. The result is instead an economy which 'appears' to grow, but as a result of inflation and growing debt, which is destroying the middle class and leading to eventual self destruction or a major war eliminating a large number of the population world wide.
Your argument is people can't take responsibility for themselves, unless someone else takes responsibility for them. And you suggest I'm being paradoxical? ... with reasoning based on a comic book.
As noted compensation is not based upon "hard work" or education, job experience, worker skills, or productivity. It's based upon the "market rate" which is the "lowest compensation necessary to secure the labor of the employee" for the enterprise. For example if everyone had a four-year degree in mechanical engineering, a relatively high paying job today, the "market rate" for mechanical engineers would be the minimum wage. When we address compensation we need to address it from the perspective of what everyone is capable of doing as opposed to what some are capable of doing. Everyone has education, knowledge, and skills that results in productivity when employed so how do we ensure adequate compensation based upon this common denominator? By analogy all boats are supposed to float but they require enough water displacement so they don't sink. How do we keep the rowboat afloat alongside of the luxury yacht?
Solving for capitalism's natural rate of unemployment can also solve simple poverty. Why pay taxes for a war on poverty that doesn't work?
that is like asking someone who can't swim to take responsibility for themselves and not drown. It is easier for those with wealth privilege to take responsibility for themselves, while judging those without wealth privilege for not taking responsibility for themselves.
the market rate is rigged like everything else, people should be compensated based on hard work and intelligence in an efficient capitalist model. today they are compensated based on neither, its corrupted to the point there is no place to argue in favor of better compensation for those who work hard and have potential, and those with intelligence and potential. They both are deserving of better pay than they get now, but all the wealth of the business is given to top management/shareholders unfairly. one reason the middle class has accepted working more for less pay, is they allow the poor to work for a minimum wage instead of a living wage. if their pay is competing with a minimum wage, it looks like their doing good when their being stolen from by the business. they are fooled along with the poor of this capitalism, which isn't real capitalism.
