How does it feel to be poor?

And here is why you are wrong:

There are no pure democracies and there are no purely capitalistic economies.

A capitalistic system does not rely upon desperation, only upon private property and trade.

You have a tree and I have a chicken. You make a chair out of wood and trade it to me for a dozen eggs. That is capitalism.

There is a publicly owned tree and a publicly owned chicken. You make chairs; I feed the chicken and collect the eggs. We give this to the government or the cooperative we work for and they give us each a chair and some eggs. This is socialism.

There is a publicly owned tree and a publicly owned chicken. You make chairs; I feed the chicken and collect the eggs. We give this to the government. The government gives the chairs and eggs to who it decides needs them most. This is communism.

I don't know what an "affluence based system" is. It sounds from your description like communism except that apparently no one has to work. Who makes the chairs and feeds the chickens I have no idea. Maybe it's the underpants gnomes.

~Raithere

 

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The underpants gnomes are busy leave em out of it. Crappytalist.

 

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An affluence based system is a system of intelligence and affluence that does not rely on desperation.

These are the results of Capitalism:
First. Capitalism is a system in which all means of production are privately owned.

1. Capitalism perpetuates a society that is codependent on private resource owners. It is as much a psychological dependence as it is a physical dependence. Because the society is dependent on private entities, there is no institutional guarantee of basic human necessities. Although some capitalist countries at least guarantee protection of a certain level of human rights, others guarantee much lesser protection of human rights.

2. Capitalism creates a competitive market that exhausts LMH for the sake of marketing over the sake of:
-Protecting the earth.
-Populism.
Capitalism is based on a very primitive “survival of the fittest” model in which self interest must be placed above human rights in order for it to function.


3. Artificial scarcity. Capitalism suppresses technology, and ensures scarcity. It creates a false sense of economics based on a false perception of a scarce planet. Capitalism ensures desperation.


Either way, your descriptions of the 3 systems are inaccurate.
1. Private entities produce shirts and coconuts, and trade among themselves. State does not produce anything, and does not participate in trade including weapons, oil, and drugs. Individuals have no guarantee of First World standards, and therefore, are unequally obligated into labor based on self interest and survival of the fittest. Individuals create coconuts and shirts for their own profit, market them, and trade them off to whoever can afford them the most. There is no control over amount required, so all surpluses are trashed. High degrees of LMH are used to produce tons of tons over tons of goods that end up in the trash using more LMH to handle the disposal and management of waste.


2. Socialism: The state controls production of essential consumer goods. Essentials and their amounts are decided by the state who trades with the individual. The state decides how much individuals should get paid, and how much goods should cost. In the end, the individual is obligated to labor. Labor is furthermore created by the state out of thin air so that all individuals have labor. Individuals are obligated into labor based on what the state believes is best.


3. Communism. There is no private ownership. There is no individual apart from the collective. State control production of all goods. All goods are distributed equally among the collective. The state ensures all individuals are working, and decides what work each individual does.

 

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How informative.

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No, they're not. You're confusing the systems with their imperfect implementation.
As I've already said there are no nations that operate exclusively under any one system.

~Raithere

 

True. However, there is a level of scarcity. We don't have infinite resources in the planet. The point of artificial scarcity is that the poor is not poor because of scarcity, but because of a highly uneven distribution of resources. So the focus of economics should be the istribution of resources, rather then scarcity. I've done a little work on that, so whenever I do an analysis, I actually use different variables...

 

How is the uneven distribution of resources unnatural?

It seems rather that uneven distribution is the natural state and that any economic system is an artificial design to alter that distribution.

~Raithere

 

Why not make the distribution more even, so that everyone can survive well?

 

Are you insane?
We have the resources, manpower, and capacity to provide everybody with a real first world experience for their stay here on earth.
Obviously, we are not doing it. If we are not doing it, there is something wrong. Is it that we do not have the resources, manpower, and capacity? Not bloody likely. It is because of destructive resource management. Destructive crappytalist economics = a shithole stay here on earth.

 

Sure. How exactly?

The thing is that it's not a simple problem. For instance, let's say there's a drought and farm production falls. People don't have enough to eat. So we take a bunch of food from someplace and bring it to the starving people. Now a few things might happen.

One is that a sudden surplus of free food crashes the price of food; farmers go out of business and next year there aren't enough farmers still working to feed everyone even with a full crop.

Two, the drought is part of a larger climate change or has a 20 year cycle. Now, with artificial supplementation, rather than the local population decreasing (as it would do naturally), the population actually increases. So next year you send even more food... repeat

Three, we go drop off food. But when the people come to get the food some other people attack and kill them.

Four, we drop of food. But armed militants come and take the food and then sell it or keep it for them selves.

Five, we offer seed grain for planting. But some nut-job "environmentalists" convince the local government that "genetically modified" food is a grave threat and could be poisonous despite all evidence. So the government refuses aid and lets its people starve instead.

These are all real-world occurrences. Complications to what would seem to be a very easy task.

~Raithere

 

Yes cool skill there is. People like you.

People who bitch and yell about how things are "not right" and "unfair" but never actually lift a finger to do anything, much less help anyone else because to do so would be an imposition upon your "freedom".

Face it cool skill, you're nothing but a politician and an aristocrat. All you are interested in is changing the power structure so that you get more power or at least the "right" to sit on your ass and do nothing but receive that which you are entitled to.

You have no comprehension of how things work or what problems may be involved and you spew nothing but ideological platitudes.
Your most cogent argument is, "rich people are stupid parasites". And your solution is, "intelligence and affluence".

Not much to work with... not much at all. I can get more work out of a fart.

~Raithere

 

hey raithere, im glad a fellow capitalist has joined me. I must warn you it is very frustratting to post here. We are a minority here and they stubbornly refuse to accept the best arguments. You are doing a great job by the way.

Just a note on fairness. I hear peole say capitalism is unfair, but you know waht sounds unfair to me? when a person diligently works hard their whole life, makes the most of what they have, try and get an education and pursue their dreams, they work so long and hard to attain a level of mastery in medicine, law, business, or other high-paying enterprise, and after putting so much effort into teh system to become the best person they can, they receive the same benefit from society as the high school dropout with no passion to improve, the one who is too lazy too work even for their own advancement, and are so devoid of goals that they end up taking some generic job they dont even want reserved for the least competent members of society.

 

--- George Carlin

 

Hey Jeff, sorry to disappoint you but I'm not a pure capitalist. I guess I tend to sound like one here because, as you pointed out, we're in the minority here in thinking that capitalism is not to blame for all social problems.

I think that the best solution probably combines aspects of capitalism, socialism, and communism. Some things such as national parks and some other types of natural resources are best held by the government for the public as "communist" holdings.

Other things, such as large corporations seem to work very well as socialist cooperatives (although this may be due as much to a culture of innovation and organizational differences). And I do find such cooperatives ethically appealing. However, I would tend strongly away from government controlled socialization... I don't see anything to be gained there (politicians and bureaucrats are the same whether they work for a corporation or a government).

I think the capitalistic system has a lot to speak for itself; spurring innovation, technological advance, improvement through competition, and efficiency. But it has its limits and its drawbacks as well. It doesn't respond well to human ethics, there are broad gaps in its efficiency, and it's prone to abuse.

Mostly I find there are overriding problems that recur no matter what economic system is used. These seem to be primarily issues of governance and organization, with "corruption" (a rather loose term, I prefer to call it politics and power brokering) being a problem in every system.

I concur.

~Raithere

 

Wrong. It is iditos who sit there, and claim that everything is fine because they refuse to stand up against a dysfunctional society. Such as yourself. You would rather participate in the dysfunction than make any effort to change the situation.
Who's the politician?

Exploitation I have seen many many times with my own eyes. People work all their lives in hard labor. Even college educated post graduates with alot of education. They get up ever morning, and come home late working their ass off for decades, and in the end, they have nothing. That is because the exploiters fed them an illusion. The illusion that if you work, you will be compensated for your efforts. Doesn't happen. Capitalism does not work that way. Capitalism does not compensate individuals for their efforts. It keeps them deprived so they continue to work.

 

Chatha, I believe it went more like this:


Proto-liberal, "I'm hungry."

Proto-capitalist, "Well then get up off your ass and pick some berries with me."

Proto-liberal, "I don't wanna. Picking berries is boring and it takes too long."

Proto-capitalist, "Then I guess you're going to stay hungry."

Proto-liberal, "Don't you oppress me!"

Proto-capitalist, "I'm not oppressing you. There are berries right over here! Just come get some."

Proto-liberal, "Well, you're already picking berries. Just pick some for me too."

Proto-capitalist, "I've done that the last 5 days in a row. I'm tired of working longer to feed you when you're perfectly capable of feeding yourself."

Proto-liberal, "You're evil and immoral. You just don't care about other people's wellfare."

Proto-capitalist, "Yes I do. I showed you where the berries are and which ones to pick. Now all you have to do is pick them."

Proto-liberal, "Don't you oppress me!"

Proto-capitalist, walking away, "Then just sit there and starve, you moron. I'm outa here."

~Raithere

 

Where did I ever claim that everything is fine?

Actually, most of the time this occurs it is because they failed to plan ahead. They were compensated but they blew all their money buying stuff they couldn't really afford and paid 24% on the loan. That's not their employers fault. Now if Enron happens to you, that's a different story.

~Raithere

 

Oh come on. You are just too mean to the liberal! At least carry him to the berries!

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Thye should try and blend in with the people too old to walk so that someone will bring berries to them and not realize that they are just lazy, not crippled. Oh wait, they already do that.

 

How about dragging him kicking and screaming?

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~Raithere

 

Still, rich people don't care about poor people. They like driving around and seeing poor people on the streets. It is the only hint of happiness in their depressed and subconsious life. Granted, some work hard for their money. Rich countries also don't give a rat's behind about poor countries. Its not rocket science