How to get everyone wealthy: unregulated capitalism

Discussion in 'Economics & Trade' started by endfedthe, Mar 2, 2013.

  1. johnmayo

    johnmayo New Member Past Donor

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    And who would you steal the money to do this money from?
     
  2. RedRepublic

    RedRepublic Banned at Members Request

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    There is no such thing as "sufficient socialism", you either have worker-ownership of the means of production or you don't.
     
  3. johnmayo

    johnmayo New Member Past Donor

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    Honesty. At least some socialists know who they are. Good for you. These other socialist do not realize what the end game is.
     
  4. unrealist42

    unrealist42 New Member

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    Well there you go, Stalinist socialism suppressing Anarchist communism.
    The difference between Socialists and Anarchists is that Socialists believe Capitalism can be changed to work for everyone while Anarchists believe that capitalism is so corrupt and unjust that half measures like Socialism just will become corrupted and used to perpetuate Capitalism's unfairness through a more cynical guise. Therefore Capitalism and all its accoutrements must be abandoned wholesale if an economy is to serve the people.

    There is a reason why Bakunin was ejected from the Second International.
     
  5. RedRepublic

    RedRepublic Banned at Members Request

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    I would use the term socialism and communim interchangeably most of the time. If we're getting technical, socialism is the beginning of communism after capitalim has been abolised, not a half-way stransition.

    Bakunin or whatever his name is was an antisemite, and whatever analysis he offered is clouded by this idealist element.
     
  6. gabriel1

    gabriel1 New Member

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    sure worked well in dickens day
     
  7. Lord Joar

    Lord Joar New Member

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    Time to start posting on this forum, then.

    There are several problems with laissez- faire economics combined with a night-watchman state. I will list some of them:

    1. Your possibilities and chances on the market will depend heavily on the status of your parents. The richer the parents, the better the education, the more important the contacts and so on. Let's say that you grew up in a poor home with a violent alcoholic father. Your family could not afford getting you any education. Most people you knew were criminal at young age. You get it. A person in that situation will not be succesful. It's as simple as that. It is therefore absurd to punish this person for "not working hard enough" by saying that it's his or her own fault that he or she cannot afford that life- saving surgery and let him or her die. Wage is simply not an effect of how hard you have worked or how lazy you have been (in most cases), and one should therefore not treat it as such.

    2. Companies will by default act in whatever way maximizes their profit the most. This is sometimes, but far from always, by creating better products and/or lowering prices of said products. They will also be drawn to using slave- like employment as long as that can be hidden from the consumers. This is the reason for the working conditions in some asian and south american factories, where people work for a dollar an hour handling toxics without any safety. People die, the companies know this and they know that they could stop this, but they don't care as long as that means they can lower their costs. The ambition to maximize profit also encourages companies to not care about the enviroment if that is profitable. Customers not wanting to buy products that damages people or the enviroment will not solve this, as noone has the time to look up how everything he or she buys are being produced. The companies will not behave, simply put.

    3. Information will be controlled by money. Rich people will control TV and so on, giving only the truth they want people to see, covering up the rest.

    4. Monopolies will be easily created. Monopolies are bad for everyone except for those who own them. Higher prices, no competition, and so on.

    5. Then we have the "dictatorship of ownership", as it is sometimes called. Some people own companies, some do not. A great chunk of the produced wealth in a company goes to the owners (who do nothing) instead of to the people who actually created this value. The richest people on this planet does not usually work, they use ownership to parasite on other peoples' labour. Their only function in the economy is to move money. If that could be done without these people we would all get a lot more money (and that's what socialism has been trying to do, so far without succes).

    6. It leads to greater income differences. This increases criminality, decreases average life spans, and a whole lot more stuff. When people get paid less, they have less money to spend. This means lower demand, which is not good for the economy at all. Lowering wages does actually not create jobs.

    There are more problems, which I do not have time to list right now. Social democracy, as it is in most european contries and some other, solves some of these problems, but not all.
     
  8. unrealist42

    unrealist42 New Member

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    I am also inclined to make little distinction between socialism and communism. In fact I believe that Bakunin's criticism was originally directed at the communists and their dictatorship of the proletariat. To him dictatorship was dictatorship no matter who it was supposed to be for or by.

    How much do you actually know about Bakunin, or Anarchism?
     
  9. RedRepublic

    RedRepublic Banned at Members Request

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    I have a basic knowledge of the various anarchist movements, that is I understand what their general concepts and political programs.

    I know less about Bukanin but reading the various debate involving him it is evident that he had an irrational hatred of Jews. In a few of his arguments it goes so far as to ignore class distinctions in favor of supposed Jewish conspiracy theories. I'm not taking this out of context either, Bakunin characterized the Jews as being just like the steriotype of the time.
     
  10. johnmayo

    johnmayo New Member Past Donor

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    I have to respect a guy who knows exactly where he stands and does not play word games with it like most libbers.

    Just a point though - anarchists are capitalists in the purest sense. They do not like government interference at all with their ability to trade and do what they please. Socialism and communism are opposites of anarchy.
     
  11. Adam Smith

    Adam Smith Newly Registered

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    This shall be my first post, as well, in response to Lord Joar:

    1. There is inequality in every society, but with free-market capitalism, all citizens have the chance to work their way up the social ladder to increase their prosperity, wealth, and well being. The situation you describe is indeed very unfortunate, but is very unlikely, if not inexistent, in Western democracies. What you describe is closer to the poverty of the third world. At least in the free-market system, such a person could find a job in the un-skilled labour market and earn a wage based on his productivity and human capital in the eyes of the employer. Socialist alternatives are much, much worse.

    2. There are a few points here.

    Firstly, if a company exploited workers for profit, they would lose credibility with the consumer, which can affect their market share.

    Secondly, in the free-market system employees are not forced to work for the employer. If the employer company was paying slave-like wages, the worker can simply leave and get a job elsewhere that pays a higher wage. This is in comparison to a fascist or communist system where the workers have no choice in where they are employed, and what they are paid. If wages for the worker are no better elsewhere, then that is a problem with the wealth of the nation in general, not the free-market system. Indeed, the free-market system will lift the nation and population out of that state of poverty much faster than any other system. Your examples about the dangers of people working in certain South American and Asian factories are the result of poverty, not the free market system.

    Thirdly, through competition there will exist innovation to produce cheaper, better, more efficient products. Technological advancement can decrease pollution and waste. Private property rights will protect individual citizens from pollution (damage to property laws and damage to health laws). It's interesting to also note that empirically, centrally planned governments (socialist and communist) have not been a fix in dealing with pollution.

    3. Competition will allow opposing points of view, like it does currently. Let's be realistic here. If there was an attempt by the media of a mass cover-up, a new media group would spawn in opposition. That's how a free market works. What's the alternative? A government-owned media? Would that be a good idea? There are hundreds of precedents in history telling us the exact opposite.

    4. Monopolies accomplished in a free market are extremely rare, and they are not bad things. It means that the company that achieved the monopoly did so by offering a cheaper and better service/product to the consumer. In order to keep their monopoly on the market share, they would have to continue offering the best service/product to the consumer, or they will lose to competition. The only monopolies that are bad are government-enforced monopolies. In such a case a company does indeed have no competition, and no threat of competition. These monopolies can exploit the situation through higher pricing.

    5. The owner of a company will always get a larger profit as it was his investment that created the factories and jobs in the first place. You have to also remember that if a company directs too much of its profit towards salaries, they fail to effectively re-invest in the company, and will subsequently fall behind and lose to their competition.

    6. Greater income differences is really quite irrelevant, as all will increase in wealth in a free-market system. Regarding people being paid less leading to lower demand, you're putting the horse behind the cart. It's not consumers that create jobs, it's the savers and those who invest capital into the economy.

    Adam Smith
     
  12. Drago

    Drago Well-Known Member

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    Would love to hear your perfect alternative. Mind you, governments are already pressing default. So you don't have endless money at your disposal.
     
  13. Lord Joar

    Lord Joar New Member

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    The situation is not far-fetched at all. Just look at all the poor areas in the US. My dad grew up under conditions similar to what I described, and that's in Sweden. Social mobility will never be 100%, especially not in a society where your access to education is restricted by your parents' money. Heritages and contacts are other factors. It's about the whole environment you grow up in. If you have friends who are motivated, study hard and you help each other you are going to do a lot better than the average person. If, on the other hand, your friends and classmates are more interested in drinking and smoking or just looks down at school things are going to be a lot tougher.

    The amount of money it would cost these companies to provide humane working conditions (not killing people) in the third world is nothing to them. They would only have to lower their profit or raise their prices slightly. But they don't, since these workers have nowhere else to go and the companies can get away with doing it. If it's not for the profit it's because of the tough competition on the market. We can see that these problems are created when markets are unregulated and that they could be solved by putting requirements on the working conditions of the people who have produced products that are to be sold in the countries where their consumers are.
    And it's not like most people in the west are drowning in jobs either. Most people can't just quit their job and find a new better one like that.
    When it comes to pollution, the market forces are not nearly enough to solve them. That's more or less why we have pollution in the first place. It's for now more profitable to burn coal and oil than to invest in renewable energy sources, and it will remain so for far too long. It's more profitable to just fish all you can right now, instead of fishing an amount that allows the fish populations to recover. That's why we have overfishing. It's more profitable to make furniture from rain forest wood than other wood. It's more profitable to drown the soil in poison for your farming and cut down more forest for more farming land next year, when the soil is useless. Unregulated markets doesn't work for any of the cases where you win in short term but lose in long term.
    It's true that this kind of acting can affect market shares, but this effect is negligible and not nearly enough to solve the problems on it's own. An area where regulations are required.
    A planned economy could easily solve all pollution problems (not that I'm promoting such an economy, they have other problems), but they haven't since they have always been centrally administrated by a dictator more interested in propaganda than the well-being of people. And that free markets would be the best way of reducing poverty can be discussed.

    A government-owned media? You mean public service broadcasting? Like BBC? Nothing wrong with that. In a society where everything is unregulated and the government does nothing but security things would be worse. A person who were rich and motivated enough could buy most major media and work against ideas, political parties or uncomfortable science. Around half of the population in the US believes global warming is either made up or not man-made, which is rather telling.

    They're not that rare. I'm relatively informed when it comes to the industry of technology and software and always takes the example of Microsoft for market monopolies holding back development.

    Microsoft has a monopoly on operating systems for desktop computers in the form of windows. It has been here for so long that people don't even compare different operating systems when they're buying a new computer. A lot of people doesn't even know there are alternatives. It's preinstalled on pretty much every premade computer you can buy, effectively more or less forcing you to buy it if you want a laptop (unless you want a chromebook or mac, that is) and makes everyone who doesn't want to be bothered buy a copy by default when they are getting a new desktop.
    Is this because windows is the best operating system? Yes and no. Since windows is the by far most popular operating system, all games and all software is released for windows first. Bugs get fixed on windows first. Windows gets the best drivers. And so on. But has it the best base? No. Linux has the best base. Linux is constructed in a way that makes it run faster, virus- proof, faster updated, way more open, free (!), and so on. But since it's less popular for desktops it doesn't get the same software support. Windows becomes better only because it is more popular. Microsoft can use this position to get higher prices, and they have far less competition than they should have. They are basically holding back development.

    Solution? Make the companies have to sell the computers separately without a preinstalled OS, and inform people about the alternatives. Those who still wants windows buys it separately and installs it themselves (even as it is now, Linux could well replace Windows for most people).

    Government monopolies are far better (when applied to the right area of the economy). This is because the people have democratic control over them, preventing anyone from abusing them.

    The share holders are being rewarded way too much. Sure, their investment helped, but an investment is in itself only an act of moving money in the economy, it's not worth that much and it's not worth being rewarded eternally for. Way more of the profit should be put in the hands of people actually working.

    Another classic example is land owning. A person owns land. This person then rents the land to people using it to do stuff. This people then makes money without actually producing any wealth, he or she is only using ownership.

    Greater income differences does not mean faster economical growth. It's irrelevant if a guy owns tonnes of money, if there's no considerable demand there is no reason to invest it. To get more investments you have to have a demand to fill, which is being created by people having more money.

    - - - Updated - - -

    I don't claim to have a perfect alternative, all systems have their problems. But a mixed economy (social liberalism/social democracy) would be a better alternative.
     
  14. unrealist42

    unrealist42 New Member

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    There is a subtle difference between anarchism and capitalism. In the purest sense anarchism is an endeavour of the collective where all gain benefit from the voluntary action of individuals acting in concert towards a common goal. In the purest sense capitalism is an endeavour of the individual who gains personal benefit by convincing and coercing others to act in the forwarding of their personal goals. Anarchism does not like government because it is just one more agent of coercion. Capitalism does not like government because it prefers to be the sole agent of coercion. A subtle difference.
     
  15. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    USA
    hong kong
    korea

    everywhere in modern era u fool

    remember clinton was an idiot who had a net boom from 80s low tax high success and investment period and alf woulda been better and done less damage, and ross perot is why clinton won 43 to 43 over bush sr

    remember governemtn should not give any welfare
    should not atop aotmic power of private trains
    should make nasa productive by sneding debris into sun from atomic powering everythign by ellectric grid
    run private trains union free end all unions
    do fairtax.org
    mass prduce lustron homes, plstic block filled with concrete homes, and end all public school and money to college
    allow private hospitals to buidl 100 per state and trian million doctors per state
    end AMA
    replace lawyers with software and end deadweight loss of legal free
    end adjudication from benhc
    end all case law
    end all pensions although this is simply sub set of ending welfare, these pensions were never earned
    end fed
    dont let any governmetn anywhere in usa deficit spend or borrow at all

    those are few simple things to get poor much richer

    democrats make poor poorer

    prices fallign makes you rich

    governemtn has no righ tto take from someone who produced something

    end fractional reserve banking
    end goldman sachs
    no bialouts
    no feds giving money to states
    no drainging red states to bail out (*)(*)(*)(*)bags liek CA
    :)

    yehahh
    yeah
    yeahh!!
    remmeber your not me
    obama is worst president of all time
     
  16. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    capitalism has nothing to do with anarchy

    capitalism is let people produce, they own what they do, and let them trade
    0 regulation
    courts to adjudicate disputes
    army for defense

    simple
    and unlike parasite capitalism democrat want, since they admit socialism cant work, unregualted capitalism make spoor richer faster

    - - - Updated - - -


    unregulated capitalism
     
  17. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    I think you miss that the government regulation itself causes the problem, and is then used to justify more intervention.
    un regualted simply means people left alone
    if a trade does not benefit both people, it wont happen
    all the bs of 2008 only happened due to government
    its silly to blame market or wall street
    people naturally wont bet thier own money on siilly things
    remember the fed was created in 1913, governmentalizing the monetary system, adn great depression soon followed
    obama and democrat morons spend 20T, adding 10T to deficit, and unemplyment still sky high
    what if they had left that money in pockets of the people?
     
  18. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    Why mention anarchy and capitalism ? Strange. Capitalism believes in private property ...
     
  19. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    quite the opposite
    a system was tried in 19th entury and failed miserably: socialism (as it faield in other centuries)
    capitalism is simply parasted by government that sucks from its produce
    simpel idea si to get rid of governmetn flees and let all produce grow faster and help poor more than current failed democrat policies hurt them
    capitalism is best for poor and everyone else
    quite the opposite capitalism is left ot clena up mess of government like great depression and 2008
    remember 2008 caued by fannie freddy fed and government whic are all 3 mostly by democrats
    without fed and without ability to debt spend government would be far less damaging and economy would grow much faster
    remember clinton was moron and net boom was from 80s innovations bearing fruit
    reagan showed democrats wrong in thier face
    yet they write smear after smear lol
    krugman is a fool and you can wipe your bum with phd econ from any government school
    end all government schools
    end all public school
    end all money to universities
    let think tanks produce
     
  20. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    say what?
     
  21. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    remember banking system si by definition government since 1913 created fed
    I say end fed
    and no governmetn in usa should be allowed to borrow or debt spend
    also cut gov spending 99%

    - - - Updated - - -

    whats market concentration?
    governmetn intervention created monopolies sound more liek what you speak of
     
  22. endfedthe

    endfedthe Banned

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    people on foodstamps due to LACK of capitalism
    too much governemtn stealing products fo capitalism liek bloodsuckers and giving to cronies
    replace lawyers with software
    sick?
    let more hsopitals be built nonstop
    see
    freedom
    see?
     
  23. bwk

    bwk Well-Known Member

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  24. bwk

    bwk Well-Known Member

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  25. Neodoxy

    Neodoxy New Member

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    Why are you using improper English?
     

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