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What is Capitalism?
Posted on: September 14, 2006 - 8:13pm
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What is Capitalism?
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That's not capitalism. It's the political wing of Ayn Rand style Objectivism calling itself capitalism. The difference is that capitalism is a free market with private ownership of property. Objectivism isn't a completely free market because there's still a compulsory local monopoly on force for judicial purposes, which is incompatible with private ownership of property. Judgement requires at the very least your otherwise productive time and probably your money as well, in the form of a lawyer.
That would make sense to me if I smoked it through a rose colored crack pipe.
Thank you noncohort! That I can understand!
Simply put:
Capitalism = A meager attempt to rectify 10,000 years of feudalism.
Capitalism is to Feudalism,
as Intelligent Design is to Creationism!
It's got a bullet proof doctrine, and a shit load of spin.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
It had me, it really had me.... until
It didn't address the human equation. The driving need to be in control that makes us the animals that we are in nature.
Physical is not the only force. Money, ego, and ideology are sometimes more powerful than simple brute force. The picture of Tianenmen square illustrates that. Those three things are necessary within a capitalist society and there are light-years worth of difference between each human with regard to them.
I want all three gone. No money. No ego. No ideology. No problems. You are left with help, be helped, or be indifferent. No rise, no fall, simply exist for each other and progress wherever possible, whenever possible.
When a cure is found, the whole world knows and gets it.
When a tragedy occurs, the whole world either fixes it or makes room for the displaced.
Everyone gets the same tv, computer, and means of transportation.
Everyone gets the same education and gets tested for their aptitude. Their continuing education will progress according to their ability. Their responsibility is dependent upon their ability. If Johnny will make a good doctor then Johnny has the chance to be a good doctor. Johnny will have the same amenities that Fred, the factory worker, has. Both will have the equal availability of knowledge. There are no secrets, patents, or copyrights.
Anyara in the former Tehran, now sector 20?, will have the same medical availability as Talshaida in the former Sudan and Connie in the former Michigan. She will also have the choice to have an abortion, put the baby up for adoption, or raise the baby.
Raul will know what prostate cancer is and its treatments as easily as Phillip.
Mind altering drugs, including alcohol, are destroyed in front of the users, not kept for evidence. You will be searched when asked, killed if you refuse.
Guns are no longer needed. Cameras are everywhere. Murderers are tried, and when convicted are sentenced by the victim's closest family member to whatever decreed.
Thieves are given to the regional government for work detail in the equivalent of one year per pound of property stolen.
The world will be policed by the same force with the same laws. The police force will be policed by the people. Dirty cops will be handled by cops from other places. No one becomes a policeman in the region in which they were born.
OK OK. Enough of my dreams. You can go back to your regularly scheduled reality now. Sorry. I'll dream quietly over here.
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Wow! This is some good crack. That was beautiful.
First, I'm going to sum up your IDEOLOGY in as few words as possible: "I know what is best for you. If you are so ignorant as to not obey and accept my commands, you will be shot."
Is this approximately correct? If yes, then let me then say "You are a fascist asshole, no better than Adolph Hitler". If no, then please show me where you have said anything contradictory to the above attempted sumnation of your beliefs.
Yes it does. Force and fraud are the two forms of control which are definitionally harmful.
Correct, fraud is a violation of rights also. But you don't mention that one.
Money, ego, and ideology are ways of convincing one to action. So far as such action is voluntary and done via convincation, there's nothing wrong with it. If there is, I would love to see you attempt to justify.
With the man standing in front of the unmoving tanks? That was witholding of force as means to an end, not the power of anything else.
But the three things are not bad.
How are the three things bad?
Progress is limited and in the absence of money and thus prices it would be impossible to rationally allocate effort toward progress.
In the absence of money and thus prices, there would be no rational means of allocating resources to determine which medicine to make more of, thus creating shortages, thus desperation, thus violence.
Voluntarily or through use of force? if it's voluntary you can't make the whole world do it, if it's through use of force or threat thereof then you are in the wrong.
Even though "there are light-years worth of difference between each human"?
You fascist asshole.
The collective is the sum of it's parts, that is, a group of 1 million individuals is 1 million individuals. The good of the 1 million collectively cannot be had by harming any particular one. You can only hurt the collective in an attempt to help it by not respecting the individual.
Guns are needed to prevent the murder, dumbfuck. I'd rather be alive and have a dead attempted murderer at my feet than be dead and know the murderer is dead too. GUNS ARE NEEDED.
Because one pound of dirt is as valuable as one pound of gold, right? And because there's really no need to pay back the victim of the crime.
And how will the police force be policed if the people don't have guns?
Good, stay the fuck out of my reality. As soon as you want to start imposing your reality upon me, your skull will be thorougly ventilated. You want my guns, come take them yourself.
It's just a dream, asshole.
Ever read 'Brave New World'?
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I haven't read it yet, but I do have it. I have a lot of other reading that I have to do as well which takes priority over it, but I do have it and will read it eventually.
Was I wrong in assessing your beliefs as "I know what's best for you, obey me or die"?
And just because it's a dream doesn't mean it escapes criticism. I have a dream too, but when people criticize it, I defend it. You aren't even attempting to defend your fantasy world where you know things you cannot possibly know.
We're so far from making my 'dream' become a reality that it's pathetic. I'm not even ready to exist in that kind of society myself.
My only defense for my dream is that it is mine. Feudalism, Capitalism, Fascism, Socialism have all been tried. Some would say tried and failed. I prefer to keep an open mind. Perhaps one day the libertarians will convince me that mankind doesn't need as many rules.
After all, I've already been convinced that the bible's rules are ridiculous.
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If you're willing to challenge a few core beliefs, I'd gladly be the one to convince you that mankind doesn't need a lot of rules. You have to give up beliefs that:
1. It is possible to know what is best for any partiular individual
2. You somehow know what is best for any particular individual
3. You somehow know what is best for all individuals
4. There is something inherently bad about money
5. There is something inherently bad about selfishness
6. There is something inherently bad about ideology
7. People have an inherent drive to control other people
8. Government is a way to control other people that supresses the ability for some people to control other people (which is obviously self-defeating)
If you're willing to rationally analyze these and other beliefs, I can probably show you where your train of thought jumped the tracks of reason.
I can personally tell you that my drive not to be controlled is far stronger than any drive I have to control others, and that my shotgun is my means to not be controlled rather than my means to control others.
That's not fascist, that's wonderful.
Some people try, sometimes.
Not that the TVs are all the same, but maybe that they are all free according to need. One person shouldn't of course get to have 10 free TVs.
You may say your a dreamer, but your not the only one.
Yup, yup.
Ok
Ooooooooooh! You lost me there. That's just bleak!
I like guns and cameras. And guns that look like cameras are cool too. It's wrong to say that I can't have any.
Well, I'm against the death penalty. I'd rather conduct experiments on convicted murderers than chimpanzees.
Well that should be up to the regional democratic government.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
We might be interpreting it differently. By "cure" I assumed he meant "the physical chemical medicine". It is fascist to compel a doctor or factory to make the medicine and give it to people for free. The formula and recepie on the other hand, that's different. I don't think people should be compelled to give it out, but I disagree with protecting the developer with patents and such.
That's why I called him a fascist.
He doesn't want democracy. He wants the whole world to do exactly as he says. It's part of the pretense of knowledge that collectivists have.
I agree. Seperate the powers. We have 200 countries today, let's make 7 billion countries.
Countries implies borders. Borders imply separation. Separation is bad in my opinion.
A fair and just world still needs the hands of democracy. Finding the cutoff between simple majority rule and societal consensus is key. Both of your responses to my wish to ban alcohol and drugs is proof that particular rule would be a long way off.
However, the problem with rules now is that somewhere else those same rules are not followed or even made. A world order requires the whole world to follow it. Otherwise, you sow the seeds of discontent with uneven enforcement.
You keep your gun now out of fear, paranoia, and the need for a type of insurance. I have several. In fact, if someone knocks on my door after 9pm and before 7am they get to see what a P95 looks like. The goal of my dream is never to need one.
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My 7 billion countries plan was kinda a joke. It's a total abolition of countries, giving all people the same rights any country has, including absolute exclusive dominion over geographical land areas, exclusive lawmaking in that area, et cetera.
Seperation is not inherently bad. Sometimes seperation is necessary. If two want to be seperated, forcing them to be together creates conflict and violence. When any number desire seperation, they must be allowed to. The Civil War was fought for this reason. The south disagreed with the government's proposed allocation of money, so they seperated. When the Union refused to allow seperation, you got the bloodiest war in American history.
A fair and just world is incompatible with democracy.
I have a better idea. You can submit to majority rule if you want to, but if you disagree, you are free to do something the majority disapproves of despite majority disapproval.
It's not a long way off. It's a long way since. "Prohibition" ring a bell? 1920s, 18th Amendment, 21st Amendment? We study history to learn from the mistakes made by others, not so we can repeat previous failures and call it progess.
I personally am happy about this. It gives me choice. I am not happy with the laws in Florida, hence I am moving to New Hampshire where they have no sales or income taxes, no seatbelt laws, very lax gun laws, and the NH Constitution Article 10 assures the right of the people to overthrow the government.
Actually I want to put holes in paper. Such a piece of paper full of holes depicting the silhouette of a human sits in the window on my door as an ominous warning. All rational people dream of a world where guns are not needed, but rational people must accept that such a world does not exist.
Y'know, whenever anyone starts in with the 'all atheists are the same' bullshit, I'm sending them to this thread. lol.
Prohibition and State vs. Federal rights were put to the test too soon. I have agreed that our present civilization isn't ready for such a world. Even after the evolution of our society takes place there will still be the vestiges of our anarchic past and present.
You said that you're moving away from Florida because New Hampshire is better situated with your preferred worldview. What I am proposing is that New Hampshire and Florida be the same with the only difference being the weather. In like manner, Irkutsk, Johannesburg, Rio Di Janeiro, and London would be the same as well.
Why a silhouette specifically? Is there a mental projection needed? My grandfather ingrained in me the fact that a target is a target regardless of what/who it represents. I used to laugh at the pistol range when people would put up targets of Saddam H., Hitler, or Osama. These same people would have a high percentage chance of 'choking' if they really did have such a shot.
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You didn't even bother to contradict the seperatism not being bad idea. Is that too sacred a doctorine to be questioned?
If you want to live in your world, that's fine. The moment you force me into your world, you start having problems.
A silhouette because the holes are in vital organ locations. Heart and head. Also because generally circular targets tend to be used for slow, more precisely aimed shots, while sihlouettes are seen more as a fill-the-guy-with-bullets target. I want people to get the break-into-my-place-and-I'll-fill-you-with-bullets idea. That way human scum is more likely to move on to the next house and I won't have to fill them with bullets.
I propose that the least we could do is try both. We should try libertarianism and authoritarianism to determine which is more conductive to general happiness, safety, production, fairness, et cetera. This doesn't play nice with your seperation-is-bad idea which I pointed out was wrong and you didn't bother to acknowledge, but at least you would be able to prove that your ideas work better than mine. And if we do not rely on evidence, we rely on faith, and if we rely on faith we don't have a lot of standing calling ourselves atheists. I would prefer that 10 generations with 50% of the population 100% libertarian and 50% of the population 100% totalitarian pair of systems and the winner take all than unlimited generations stuck forever halfway between the two. Obviously that's not my choice to make, but I'd prefer it.
But why take away people's choice?
If someone is happy with the way Florida is run, let him move to Florida, if someone would rather live in New Hampshire, let him live there, everyone is happy this way.
If every place is the same you will make the great majority of people unhappy, regardless which way of governing you choose.
Individual happiness and satisfaction is not his goal, it's the collective good as determined by him. Collectivists like him believe that the collective is somehow more than the sum of it's parts and that the individual good must always submit to the collective good.
What happened to the question? Capitalism?
"Capitalism" is a totally free market of private ownership of property. The Capitalism.org tour was put together by Ayn Rand Objectivists. Their idea of capitalism is a monopoly on judicial, police, and military services, but with everything else being a free market.
I derailed the 'capitalism' part, shadowofman. Sorry.
As is evidenced, capitalism requires rules governing the idea of 'fair trade'. I want 'trade' gone.
My distinguished discussion partner, Zhwazi, has a completely different idea than that as well. He doesn't want regulations at all. Either he has more 'faith' in the human animal than I do or he is a nihilist in my opinion. A 'system of free trade' has always been a bad description. I get visions of Mad Max when the thought crosses my mind.
Of course, in his blog, he speaks against assumptions. Unfortunately, his assumption concerning my dream being solely by my design is false. The people must reach the point where the rules apply universally and make sense universally.
'Bregna' with a controlled birth-rate instead of cloning doesn't sound too bad either. Hmmm.
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I'm glad to see that someone is reading my stuff. I'm not a nihilist.
Capitalism doesn't require "fair trade" it requires "free trade", the parties involved will both ensure that it is fair in their own self-interest. What can be considered "fair" can only be arbitrarily determined. Capitalism also does not require rules to be imposed to govern "free trade" or "fair trade". To govern "free trade" is to destroy it. To govern "fair trade" is redundant.
How do you expect to do without trade? Even under communism a trade is made. And what is inherently wrong with trade?
If you read my post titled "Arguement Against Anarchy 1" you'll see what I think about having faith in people. I think that a "distrust" for lack of a better word, of other people is a result of a healthy fear of that which one does not understand, but that the fear is actually pretty unfounded in most cases, and that most people are as perfectly rational as you are. It is perfectly rational to not trust other people, but unfounded to go so far as to attempt to control them or delegate such a task to a government.
I don't know where I spoke under the assumption that you were the sole author of your dream.
Also, it isn't assumptions I have a problem with. It's arbitrary statements, things for which there is no evidence or support whatsoever.
I do agree that rules should be unform everywhere. But they should be limited to "do not involuntarily deprive others of their life, liberty, or property". You seem to want to do it through one-world-government, I want to do it through no government at all.
I don't see what's wrong with "You can do whatever you want as long as you don't hurt other people." What is wrong with that?
In my opinion the beauty of capitalism is that takes all the bad things from our nature (greed, the inclination to compete rather then cooperate) and makes them serve the common good.
Sure, it promotes inequality, but I am yet to here why it's a bad thing.
Another thing one might argue is that it's the people that advocate regulation that need more 'faith' in mankind.
After all, people make regulations, and people enforce them - the same people who you don't trust to live their own lives without regulations.
There is a good example of how greed serves the common good. The private food industries and the private medical industries. The food industries make cheap food that makes you sick. For the common good of all. And then the medical industries make expensive medicines that cure your symptoms. The stockholders are second only for the health of the masses. It's a win-win if you ask me.
And equality is a good thing, because well......it's a truth to be SELF-EVIDENT!
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
'fair trade' and 'free trade' are bigger pipe dreams than mine in my opinion. lol. I'd like to point out that 'free' can also be arbitrarily determined as evidenced by our present government calling our nation 'free'. Not to govern 'free and/or fair' trade is societal suicide because there will always be those facets of society that wish to control. I'm sorry, that is the way it appears to me.
Eliminating trade by providing all needs negates the desire for people to cheat. There will still be those that can't get past that.
To use the drug analogy yet again:
If you take away the addict there is no need for the drug. You'll still have the drug and the drug dealer until all of the addicts are gone.
I worked for a company that had dealings with Enron. We cashed in to the tune of $102,300 in savings over a three month period prior to the revelation of accounting fraud. My $1,200 bonus was dependent upon this operation. Do you think for one minute that I would have called the SEC asking how they were able to provide me with stock at 2/3 the price of my normal vendors? Fuck NO! Are we, the company and I, responsible for their deceit? No. Neither in a free market nor a fair market can this example be justified as a 'good' thing.
Richard Scrushy had 31 vehicles and a hot wife for lying concerning HealthSouth's dealings. He's not in prison, just real estate. (close to the same thing. lol.)
In our time, people left to their own devices will often disappoint. Sad, but true.
Right there.
I try to avoid doing this as much as you do.
This seems to be a contradictory statement because there are rules but no governing body to enforce them. I read this in the blog too but decided to give you enough rope to hang the idea in here on your own.
And when someone hurts you..... what recourse of action are you left to pursue?
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Promoting inequality isn't bad enough in your opinion?
Thus the reason for universal rule and universal enforcement of which I dream.
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That depends on what sort of equality you mean.
I'm for equality under law - everyone has the same rights, no one has any privilidges.
I see nothing wrong with economic inequality, and I would like it explained why you think it is.
What if one person works harder then the other, why should they be compensated equally?
What if someone comes up with an idea that greatly increases production efficiency, why shouldn't he be compensated for increasing everyone's standard of living?
Universal rule and universal enforcement by the same people you don't want to trust.
How does that change anything but scale, in the question I've asked?
It's just my opinion, but you can't pick and choose the kind of equalities you like and don't like. When you accept economic inequality, you deny the majority of the people the rights and priviledges of the few, when it is more than possible to include everyone.
The 'work harder' arguement has no validity at all. The hardest working people on the planet get paid the least. The rich were either just "super lucky", as Bill Gates rightfully refers to himself, or craftier in manipulating the economic environment. It's Social Spencerism.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
"Free trade" is voluntary trade. It's very real and happens all the time. It's trade where you are free to accept or decline without force or fraud being initiated against you. "Fair trade" is everywhere "free trade" is because voluntarily interacting parties both think the trade is fair otherwise they wouldn't be voluntarily interacting. They are not pipe dreams.
Words are arbitrary by their nature, meanings are not. I mean free trade to mean something very specific, and that's trade that is made with no threat involved.
That's just stupid.
I agree that there will always be those parts of society that want to control. I believe they are the ones that go into government where they are beyond question, where they get "sovereign immunity", where they write the laws and control the guns. The best way to minimize the damage of the part of society that wants to control others is to minimize the government.
So your proposed solution is actually the very problem itself.
It does not eliminate trade, it compels it. There's a difference. You produce for the community pool of goods and services because if you don't, you get shot. You're still trading, it's just not free trade.
That had nothing to do with the selection you quoted and I don't know where I tried to say that what Enron did was a good thing.
The word "often" is by it's nature arbitrary. Those that are left to their own devices and fail are not an excuse to prohibit people from being left to their own devices, which you seemed to be implying.
I never assumed you were the sole author of your dream. I said that you want the world to do what you say, I never said you were the first to have that idea or that what you say is entirely your own idea.
Your working assumptions tell me otherwise.
Do you believe there is truth to the statement "The collective is greater than the sum of it's parts"? If not, why do you think the individual should accept harm for the collective good (for example, not being allowed to own guns)?
There is no contradiction because you do not need a governing body to enforce rules. I don't depend on the police to enforce rules against assault, I depend on myself. I am not a governing body, yet I enforce the rule.
See my blog entry titled "Supplanting the State: Courts and Law" for an explanation of how it would work.
Yes you can.
Equality under law is justice.
Equality of economic position is theft.
The goal of someone seeking equality under law is not equality, but justice.
The goal of someone seeking equality of economic position is not justice, but theft.
When you accept economic equality, you deny the minority of the people the rights and priviliges of the majority, when it is more than possible to include everyone.
What you said was incorrect because you have a fundamental lack of understanding of how people get rich. Accepting economic equality lowers the standard of living. Hence Commie Russia was so poor, East Germany was nowhere near as developed as West Germany, and Cuba is a shithole. Accepting economic equality destroys the incentive for innovation.
People make money by allocating resources in such a way as to meet demand. Some people allocate resources better than others. Some people have more resources to allocate than others. But that does not stop people from becoming fabulously wealthy. The "infinite bootstrap" principle makes it a simple fact that it is possible for everyone to become wealthy. Some people become wealthier than others because some people, i.e. lower and middle class, only allocate the resources of their education, time, and energy, while other people, (the upper class) allocate their money and property in such a way as to meet demand, then use the surplus of value they created and repeat the process.
There is no injustice that some people think their time, energy, and education are the only resources they can allocate in such a way as to meet demands (usually of an employer). The public school as well as society at large essentially taught them that for 13 years, it's no surprise that they think that way. If you want equality, do all you can to teach this to the lower classes and if they take heed of it, they will become wealthy as well. The difference between the rich and the poor is how they think, and the free market rewarding richthink and punishing poorthink is beneficial to everyone. Without it, everyone would be poorthinkers, and we'd have less resources being allocated to meet our demands.
Being rich is a way of thinking. Learn how to think like a rich man and you will become rich. Reject education and you will remain poor.
You are incorrect to think the rich got there by being lucky. You just do not understand how they did it and so you assume there is no reason they could have done it. There is a method to it, it's a way of thinking, and you aren't thinking that way yet.
First a few points.
Does not compute!
The goal of someone seeking inequality of economic position is theft.
Who is the minority in this statement, when every one is equal? Who is the Majority? Is it the people with the ideas? Why can't they share these ideas with the rest, concidering these ideas will effect everyones life?
Well it lowers for the minority. I understand the point your trying to make, siting examples like USSR. Though I would say that USSR is a bad example of what I'm advocating. Sweden would be a better example. Are there any examples of a liberatarian nation that you would like to site as better than the capitalism we have here?
OK. I want you to help me understand your point of view. Help me take the first step outside of poorthink.
I don't have much money. I'd like to be able to invest, and get richer. I want you to pick a publicly traded company stock that would have made me rich. It could be in existance now, or over the past 50 years, whatever. If you can show me that this company made it's stockholders rich with money that wasn't generated by exploiting a labor force, I'll begin to start richthinking.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
Yes. That's not contradictory to what I said though. Those people are people like Lockheed's owners. They are funded by theft. I am not advocating economic inequality, I'm advocating tolerance of economic inequality. I don't like economic inequality either, but it's something that must be tolerated for the simple fact that some people produce more and consume less than others.
The minority is those who produce more than the mean, the majority is those who produce less. Before you distribute something you have to produce it. Don't focus so hard on the distribution that you lose sight of production. Production always comes first.
I'm opposed to copyrights and patents too, so it's not that they can't share the ideas. The problem is, the people don't necessarily have ideas. They have no reason to think of them. An idea that might make production less expensive might not be tried simply because the factory manager that might have thought of it had little motivation to spend his time at home thinking how he could make his factory do more with less.
And that's the problem. Without rewards, there would be no producers. It's a simple fact of animal nature, what gets rewarded gets done. If there is no reward for producing a lot of stuff, why would anyone want to produce a lot of stuff? There is no reason as convincing as reward. Thus, production will fall behind consumption creating shortages and everyone is worse off because there is less stuff to go around. If a lower standard of living is anything other than having less stuff, then I don't know what a low standard of living really means.
I'm afraid not, as there's a government everywhere and governments have a great interest in destroying the free market to expand their control. A nation is not necessary though. Let me simply say that internet commerce is the most free market you will find outside the black market. And it works very well. Taxation and regulation of internet commerce are scarce when it's even discovered that it is applicable.
I'm new to investing also, so I can't point out any specific investments. I have heard stories of companies selling stock for 1 cent per share when they're started and selling for $3 per share by the time it starts being publicly traded. Companies whose stock do that are small companies though, which are prone to going bankrupt, so any stock you buy is more likely to be worth nothing in 1 year than to be worth anything in one year. But the risky investments are where the money is at. If you play not to lose, you'll never win.
And you'll have to define "exploit". To this day I have never heard a good definition of "exploit" phrased in such a way as it might be inherently bad except for slavery, but people that use "exploit" are not usually talking about slavery.
Let's say we are owners of two factories.
We produce the same thing, thus compete with eachother.
Let's say you have a much more efficient method of production then me, which allows you to be walthier then me.
We are not equal economically, so how did you steal anything from me, or anyone else for that matter?
The minority are the people that produce more wealth which is taken from them and given to those that produce less in order to make everyone equal.
They can share those ideas, but what is the incentice to sit hours and hours developing this idea to make it workable, when doing some simple 9 to 5 job will give you the same effect?
Another thing is, it is more then likely that even if you decided to share your idea, there will be dozens of "comrades" on the way that will try to take away your credit (that's what kept happening in the good ol' U.S.S. of R).
Ah, so now you suddenly know who the minotiry is.
Ask Bjxrn what he thinks of Swedish socialism.
There was another Swede on IG forums that said he busts his ass working all day and earns a whooping 50$ more then his unemployed friend.
That must give a great incentive to work your ass off, eh?
How about Microsoft?
And don't even get me started on it beeing a "monopoly", but this aside, even if you think it is, they didn't start as one but had to work their way to their present state, so they should be a good example.
It's us owners that are stealing from our workers. Competition between companies is fine in my opinion.
So let me re-write the statement.
When you accept economic equality, you deny the people who produce more wealth the rights and priviliges of the people who produce less, when it is more than possible to include everyone?
DOES NOT COMPUTE!
I know the minority is the rich. But, the people that produce the most wealth are the laborers. Ideas! They are worthless without the workers. Fuck the idea guy! He should get no more than a pat on the back from everyone whose life he made better from the idea. After all, his own standard was increased same as everyone elses. And that should be enough. Sometimes labors come up with great ideas to increase productivity. Rather than start your own competing company, share the idea so all can benefit.
Look, I don't know what the answer is. I don't really think there is an answer. All I'm saying is that there is a better way than this. There can still be CEOs making all the decisions, but they shouldn't be able to make that much more than their laborers. Worker profit sharing? I don't know.
They are already sharing the wealth, right? That gives great incentive to share the labor responsibility. Win-win!
Assimilate the unemployed into the work force, lowering the labor per worker.
Well, I don't think microsoft is a monopoly really. I personally believe that microsoft is expoiting the consumer (with windows anyway). I'm not computer savy at all, but it's a digital language, right?. Is it really worth the cost? The nature of the business also allows them to hire on more of a temp basis. Reaping insane profits to the stockholders, while the PRODUCERS of the products probably got laid off after ayear or two. I don't know anyone though.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
ex‧ploit2
–verb (used with object) 1. to utilize, esp. for profit; turn to practical account: to exploit a business opportunity.
2. to use selfishly for one's own ends: employers who exploit their workers.
3. to advance or further through exploitation; promote: He exploited his new movie through a series of guest appearances.
Slavery is exploitation, but so is paying less than a living wage. Especially when the ablility to pay more is an option. We can argue over the "arbitrary" degree of the exploitation, but the definition is simple.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
What, exactly, is a living wage, and why is anyone entitled to it?
Pay more than what? Working is ALWAYS a choice. What I can pay does not dictate the value of labor or a product. What said labor produces and the value of it does. Artificically inflating these costs and values simply inflates the cost of living across the board.
I always ask this question: if you advocate a "living wage" aka a "minimum wage", why not simply make that wage $100 an hour? Then everybody would be rich, right? Right?
What's wrong with my proposition? Am I not simply adding to what you advocate?
When we add artificical costs to goods, we jack up the cost of living for EVERYONE - and it is the people on the bottom who get hit the hardest.
Working of your volition is never exploitation. You're working because it betters your situation, not for the exercise.
You think you're getting the shaft? Quit. Strike. Protest. Bargain collectively. There are means at your disposal. However, if there are lots of people willing to do your job for less money, obviously, you have little postion to bargain.
Now ask yourself why things cost as much as they do or cost more or less here than elsewhere. Ask yourself why we ship production overseas. Ask how tariffs and taxes and "living wages" affect this. I don't think it's hard to figure out.
Goods are worth what people are willing to pay for them. Labor is worth what people are willing to work for.
I am against religion because it teaches us to be satisfied with not understanding the world. - Richard Dawkins
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Theft is involuntary deprival of property. Workers are volunteering and they are getting wages in return. It's not theft.
Interestingly, you didn't expand on how it doesn't compute.
I have no idea how this is supporting anything you have said previously.
If he cannot be rewarded for coming up with the idea, he isn't going to bother to concieve it. If you abolished profit incentive for coming up with new ideas, you would abolish almost all new ideas. Our standard of living, rather than increase at the exponential rate it is now, would stagnate.
How can you want fairness when you won't let the thinker of an idea make a profit off their idea? That appears to be a contradiction.
If you cannot say what that better way is, you cannot rightly say that a better way exists.
Are you still clinging to that labor theory of value or is it just me? Because I thought I refuted that.
No it doesn't. It gives great incentive to stop working and live off the production of others. People are egocentric. They think about the world as it affects them, not as it affects the collective.
Why not keep the labor per worker the same and just increase production by hiring more?
What? Did you read the question you asked that he answered? You wanted a company that became really rich without exploiting it's workers. He gave you one. You change the topic. WTF?
And how is this wrong? What is so inherently bad about exploitation?
No it isn't. That wasn't part of the pertinent definition. It said "to use selfishly for one's own ends" it made no mention of wages. You either need to find a new definition or re-evaluate what you believe constitutes exploitation.
A wage is a price. I don't know how I can make this any clearer. Do you exploit Coca-Cola when you buy a 12 pack of their product for $4? Especially when the ability to pay more is an option. It's the same fucking thing. A wage is a price paid for time, energy, and talent. But it looks absolutely absurd when you apply it to Coca-Cola, doesn't it? Because maybe if you don't pay the extra dollar per 12 pack, Coca-Cola might have to downsize and fire hundreds of employees. If you hire a freelance computer technician to come to your house and fix your computer, will you pay him according to what you think his labor is worth, or according to how much is needed for you not to be exploiting him? If all you have is $120 and he charges $20 per hour for a 4 hour task, would you pay him $80 or would you pay him more? Because the ability to pay more IS an option. You do still have to buy food for yourself from that $120, and pay your ISP bill. So would you exploit him? Would you take it to a computer company and exploit by proxy by paying them to exploit the technician instead?
The whole arguement about exploitation is absurd if you step back for a minute and look at it objectively.
You guys are good.
You would say that a living wage is arbitrary, but it should be democratically (tyranically) determined by the masses. In my opinion, under socialism, there would be no need for a minimum wage. Everyone would have all they need to live for free.
You could do that but you'd screw certain industries that don't make that much profit, like restaurants. I'm more in favor of the idea that within each company, the highest paid is restricted from earning more than 5X the lowest paid. I'll call it the Anti-Explotation Act.
Obviously working betters your situation. The alternative is digging in dumpsters. That doesn't change the fact. If a company is as profitable as, say, Wal-Mart, and if there is an abundant, exploitable workforce, people have no choice but to work for whatever wages the company wants. The company could pay the workers more and keep its prices the same. But they won't because they can exploit instead. A corperation is bound by law to do everything it can to increase profits at the expense of anyone. EVERYONE chooses to work, and most just want to be less exploited.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
Ok, it's not theft. Just exploitation.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
It doesn't compute because the laborers are an equal part in production. That's it.
The reward is shared by all. The standard of living is increased for all. I'm not aqainst a little monetary incentive.
How about the highest paid can't be higher than 5X the lowest paid in any given company.
No. You said that someone else refuted it. Who?
You don't have to think that it's wrong to selfishly use and to exploit. I just think that it's wrong. And most people agree with me I think.
Sure, but why produce more than is needed. So you can manipulate people into thinking they need more than they do, for a profit?
Yes it is!
To use one, selfishly for profit. That could be slavery. That could be using someone's labor to create one penny profit for yourself. That's the definition. Only defining when the line of decency has been crossed is arbitrary.
The Coca-Cola example fits into exploiting a product. That is definition 3. 1 and 2 deal with exploiting people.
The argueument is not absurd. It's arbitrary, but not invalid. It's my opinion that exploitation of labor is over the line of decency, under current, global, capitalist regulation. Of course it could be that government influence in the creation of corperate rights is the reason for this. I think it's more complex than that.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
Laborers are not part of production. They're selling their labor inputs to the employer who puts it to good use and sells the product to someone else.
Well then why should I think up an idea when someone else could think up an idea? I'd have more free time, my standard of living would increase just ask quickly...Why should I do it? Suppose I don't think the increase in my standard of living is worth the effort that will probably have to go into it.
How is that better?
Well Marx recanted on it in Das Kapital Volume 3. And it's so easily disproved that it shouldn't even hold any water. It's not a real economic theory of value, it's a moral justification to hate business owners.
I might make the counter-arguement that without the capitalist building factories, so it is actually the worker that is making a living off the capitalist. It's a two-way trade. Neither class lives off the other. They depend on each other. If they did not depend on each other, the leeches would never have been able to attach.
You didn't answer my question. What's inherently bad about exploitation? What's inherently bad about selfishness?
Because human wants are insatiable.
So as long as all of your profit is goods and services and not money, you're not exploiting them?
You misunderstood the example. You can either exploit an employee directly or exploit them by proxy by buying from a corporation.
If it is arbitrary it is invalid.
How is it possible to give someone a job and at the same time NOT exploit them for selfish gain?
It has certainly helped.
Come on!
Production = idea + raw materials + labor
I concede that there should be SOME monetary incentive. SOME!!!! It's a bit rediculous to make millions or billions.
I like the 5X wage idea. Is sharing the wealth of everyones collective hard work. Maybe the idea man put some extra time in, but he couldn't complete the vision without the laborer. Why shouldn't he share?
It doesn't really matter if Marx recanted. It could have been recanted by Engles in an edit. I'm more of a fan of both labor theory and marginal utility. Labor in particular industry can't be worth more than people would be willing to pay for the product, but the laborer should at least get a fair percentage of the profit from the product. Not 3 cents for a coat that sells for $100. That's in my opinion, exploitation.
But they are leeches, living off the blood of the majority. If only the government wouldn't get involved, the unions could demand more for their labor. Right?
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
Come on!
Production = idea + materials + labor
I concede that there should be SOME monetary incentive. SOME!!!! It's a bit rediculous to make millions or billions.
I like the 5X wage idea. Is sharing the wealth of everyones collective hard work. Maybe the idea man put some extra time in, but he couldn't complete the vision without the laborer. Why shouldn't he share?
It doesn't really matter if Marx recanted. It could have been recanted by Engles in an edit. I'm more of a fan of both labor theory and marginal utility. Labor in particular industry can't be worth more than people would be willing to pay for the product, but the laborer should at least get a fair percentage of the profit from the product. Not 3 cents for a coat that sells for $100. That's in my opinion, exploitation.
But they are leeches, living off the blood of the majority. If only the government wouldn't get involved, the unions could demand more for their labor. Right?
Well, since there is no god, I guess your right? There's nothing wrong with anything really. It's up to the exploited to determine if they are being wrongly exploited.
Very true! Buying from a company that wrongly exploits it's laborers is supporting the wrongful exploitation. Unfortunately most companies in my opinion wrongfully exploit there workers. It's almost unavoidable.
What is arbitrary to an individual can be and should be determined by direct democratic consensus.
When it is cooperative gain.
The real question is, how far is too far.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
One more thing than I'll shut up. (For now)
I'm really interested in this because I want to invest and make money, but I don't want to support anything that I'm morally against.
I didn't change the subject. I addressed the wrongful exploitation of Microsoft workers. They are hired on a temp basis, utilized for there intellectual labor, and given a very unfair portion of the profits generated. They should have gotten a bigger piece of the pie. That's why I think they were wrongly exploited. Hopefully the Tech Union will be formed sometime soon.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
I said "LABORERS are not part of production". Labor itself is. Laborers are not.
Why is it "rediculous" to make millions or billions of dollars off an idea that helps make millions of people wealthier?
Marginal Utility is a part of the Subjective Theory of Value. You can't believe in both Marginal Utilty and the LTV. That's like saying you believe God doesn't exist but Jesus is his son.
Without the government Unions wouldn't be making what they do now. Unions use minimum wage laws to keep unskilled laborers unemployed. So the Unions wouldn't have higher wages, but everyone else would.
He does share.
It was his idea that gave thse people their jobs in the first place.
It was his idea that increased their walth.
For example Henry Ford came up with an idea to increase production efficiency. He gave people jobs and he made cars affordable, why shouldn't he be compensated?
The 5x idea is shitty.
A cure for cancer isn't worth more then 5 wages of a burger flipper at McDonnald's?
A nuclear fusion power plant isn't worth more then 5 wages of a cleaning lady?
And what about shitty ideas? Will you compensate for them too?
What if somoene comes up with a machine that squeezes out toothpaste? Will he got the 5 wages of a shoe salesman?
All this 5x thing does, is discourage people from coming up with good ideas, and discoourage them from hard work in order to come up with a lot of shitty ideas.
Leeches? What the hell are you talking about? How are they forcing anyone to work for them anyway?
Unions? If the government wouldn't get involved they would cease to exist.
Ok, now it's your turn, give me an example of a company where the gain of the workers and their bosses isn't cooperative.
You misunderstand the idea. It's an alternative to the minimum wage. The cure for cancer has nothing to do with the prodution of McDonald's. And I'm not talking about the value of the powerplant. The wages of the highest paid employee sould not be more than 5X the wages of the lowest paid. The problem with minimum wage is that the business might not profit enough to even pay minimum wage. 5X is enough incentive to create new ideas and protect workers from wrongful exploitation.
That's not true. Unions aren't tied to the government. Unions formed in opposition to the actions of the industralists and the government. Strikers were gunned down by the army all the time in the early 1900s. The unions just got more powerful and corrupt as the government began to court their voter support.
Cooperation involves equal partnership. Any company that doesn't pay all of it employees equally, from the CEO to the janitor, is not very cooperative. Instead exploitation is the norm.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
If this is the case, than ideas are part of prodution, not the creater of the idea. Ideas are valuable, but not that much (maybe 5X more than labor).
Not really. If the laborers determine that their labor is worth more than the 'free market' is willing to pay for the goods, than they obviously need to reduce the value of their labor. Subjective in the sense that the population still decides the values thay are willing to pay for goods, while still giving the laborers a worthy share of the profit.
Please explain a bit more. How do minimum wage laws keep unskilled workers unemployeed? And how would that make union members less paid than everyone else? I thought unemployment exists because there are more people than there are full-time jobs.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce
Labor and ideas are both necessary parts of production and the ones who add both deserve to be compensated.
If I had an idea that would make everyone's life 100 times easier, is that really worth only 5 times as much as the labor that goes into it? Suppose I discover something like electricity. Electricity makes everyone's life 100 times easier than it would be without it. Do I not deserve to be compensated for this to the degree that it improves people's lives?
If they do that, they'll lower their wages even further. If they try to lower the value of their labor to below the minimum wage, they get fired.
Wages are a price paid for labor. Prices are set by the intersection of supply and demand. Not by what someone "thinks" it's worth. Someone could tell me I own something worth $20,000, but if I can't give it away, it's not even worth $0. And stuff like this actually happens. There was a story in the paper once about a guy that owned a building that the government appraised at $20k for tax purposes, but that the guy couldn't even give away, and he tried to give it away, he didn't want it. He eventually had to pay someone to accept the building. You can't judge prices except by watching what people will choose to exchange for. You can sit there and ask for $50 for a glass of lemonade. You won't sell any lemonade. You might think your lemonade is the best on earth, and that it's worth $50. But you just won't find any buyers. So if you THINK your labor is worth more than the wages you earn, go ahead and ask for more. Just don't think you have a positive right to get a job at that price.
If the laborers wanted profit they could buy stock in the company. They don't want profit. They want wages. Because they earn wages they are protected from their employer taking a loss and the employee losing money for that.
A wage is a price paid for labor. Prices are set by supply and demand. When prices are set by government, i.e. $6.15 per hour, there is a decrease in demand. When demand decreases, less is purchased. When less labor is purchased, employees get fired. And the employees that get fired are the employees whose labor is worth less than $6.15 per hour. All of the workers in that category are unskilled workers, the people that need those jobs the most.
Unions benefit from a shortage of unskilled labor. When the minimum wage was imposed, what happened to elevators? Before then they were worked by polite young men in suits. That's unskilled labor. What happened to the unskilled labor? They didn't have a job anymore, and were replaced with automated elevators. Who makes automated elevators? Skilled workers. Who repairs automated elevators? Skilled workers. What are most union workers? Skilled workers. See a pattern emerging? This doesn't just apply to elevators. It applies all over the economy.
If there was no minimum wage, it might be found to be cheaper to go back to the old system. That would increase the number of jobs for unskilled workers to match the number of elevators. This is just an example.
Suppose you want to dig a ditch. You can hire 5 guys with shovels for 10 hours at $5 an hour, for $250. Or, you can bring in a union worker with a backhoe, pay him $50 per hour for 2 hours, plus $150 to rent the backhoe.
Suppose the minimum wage is raised to $6 per hour. Now the unskilled workers don't have a chance to dig the ditch because they cost $300 and the Union worker with a backhoe is still only $250. This also allows the Union worker to raise his wages to about $70 per hour, and still be cheaper to hire than the unskilled workers.
Do you get it now?
When you raise wages, you're not just raising the employee's income. You're raising the employer's expenses. Employers do not like expenses. If they see a cheaper alternative, the workers get fired. If it's $5 to hire an employee and $6 to automate the job, the employee keeps a job. If the minimum wage is raised to $6.15, they get fired and the job gets automated out of existence.
Merely having the idea doesn't guarantee that you will be compensated to the degree that it improve's lives. You'd have to actually exploit workers within your company to get "compensated".
Minimum wage is flawed. Some industries can't support a minimum wage because there aren't enough profits. I can see that.
Ok.
That is how employers are able to exploit workers to the extent that they do. Keep work in short supply, so the demand for work is high. Workers will work for less than the other guy to insure employment. It has less to do with the supply and demand of goods or the profit generated from the produced goods.
I agree. And if you wasted there time producing that thing, than that's your fault. Or if time and wear have depreciated the thing to the point that it has no value.
The government shouldn't have appraised it at that price. The land should have been appraised, not the building. Especially if it was nothing but a pile of trash.
I agree. Ultimately, the prices of goods are set by supply and demand from consumers. You can't ask for more than a customer is willing to pay or they won't buy and everyone losses.
You could ask, but you won't get it. There are people that would work for less rather than go jobless, due to the low supply and high demand for jobs. It is more effective to form a union, strike, and demand higher wages. Or vote for representatives that will legislate in your favor.
Ok, buying stock is a completely different thing. That is buying a piece of the actual business. More to do with the profitablity of the business, rather than the profits already earned. They want BETTER wages that reflect the profits of the company.
You are confusing the prices of the goods produced and the price of labor with respect to supply and demand.
Wages are prices paid for labor.
Prices of labor are set by the supply of laborers and demand for jobs.
When the price of labor is set by the government, there is a small decrease in supply of jobs (agreed-not a good thing). That's why the minimum wage for waiters is lower than other industries. Less than profitable diners couldn't afford to pay $6, so the minimum is lower for waiters. I can see how unions (or more accurately, skilled laborers) would benefit from the small decrease in unskilled labor. This is something I didn't think about, but I see now as another flaw in the minimum wage.
The only way that the free market can fix low wages is to increase the supply of jobs, or lower the demand for them by lowering the population.
I see nothing wrong with either senario. Now if I was going to sell the ditch to someone for $400, I'd be exploiting all those that dug it.
Yes, minimum wage is flawed. And I will never advocate it as the best way to prevent the exploitation of the laborer. Even though I don't see it as a huge problem, it does lower the supply of jobs available to a growing population.
Employers generally don't like expenses, not for the sake of the business, but for the sake of the profit and profitability of the business. They could care less about the workers.
A daughter of hope and fear, religion explains to Ignorance the nature of the unknowable. -Ambrose Bierce