The condensed version of his argument is that due to wage suppression and offshoring the rich are getting richer and everyone else is getting poorer. Since the poor can't afford to buy goods which spur economic growth, the entire economy shrinks. This cycles over and over until the economy crashes.
The problem is Capitalism. Capitalism in itself is inherently evil and brutal for the 99% of the world that is not part of the capital owner class. And if you're not part of the capitalist owner class, then you're one of the exploited. Capitalism does not work without economic worker exploitation. Capitalism creates lower classes in order to exploit and profit off of-prison slave labor, migrant worker exploitation, racism is even part of this.. perpetuating the lie that there are races/classes of people worth less than white people.
It's an interesting question to ask "Is a starving person Free?" I would argue that he is not. A man is free when he determines his own course of action, but a starving man is subservient to anyone who can feed him. He has no say over anything he does, so he is basically owned by someone else. If you say that he is free, at the very least you must admit that there are things in life that are more important than freedom. Food, for instance.
A part of the story that should be added is the story of how nature has come into private hands without compensation to the rest of the world's population for what is a privilege and not a right. Adam Smith raised this issue in "Wealth of Nations" and urged on his contemporaries that society collect the rent that arises as land increases in value because of aggregate demand. Thomas Paine also analyzed the way landed property is controlled and in "Agrarian Justice" declared that those who controlled land owed society the ground rent in exchange for the privilege enjoyed. Later in the 19th century, Henry George expanded greatly on this analysis in his writings. George argued the case for a labor and capital goods basis for property. Returns to labor and capital, George declared, are legitimate private property and should not be taxed. The legitimate source of public revenue is the annual potential rental value of land (i.e., of nature, generally), because no individual causes land to come to have exchange value.
@@nomisteaks because he calls a mixed economy, capitalism, is he stupid or a liar. Politics and government is the overwhelming problem, and their manipulation of money to the advantage of their friends and massive corporations. That a socialist, who openly admits he has no solution, who is incapable of even describing the problem, is listened to for even a second is amazing.
yakyakyak69 I am only going to say this once 1. There is no such thing as FREE MARKET and there can NEVE - EVERRRR be. 2. Govt. involvement is not always bad 3. Capitalism requires inequality, poverty and even slavery and coercion. Slavery by wages and coercion through poverty. If you want to reply do it in SMALL comments that are to the point. If you are going to write inane walls of text about how i don't understand "freedom" , spare me the bullshit. If you want to reply that "this is not real capitalism but *crony capitalism* " or some other euphemism to try and scape goat your pet ideology AGAIN i will not bother replying to this idiotic statement. Have a nice day,
***** I overheard some guys at Princeton some weeks ago. They said that after studying what label to put on the US as a society with economics in mind. The answer was "oligarchy". Free markets in some way would surely be nice though.
karsy579 Full free market is impossible - from a logical point of view. The problem with capitalism is that eventually those who control the means of production and wealth decide they want more power. In other words, power corrupts ( duh :P ) A full free market is impossible because: a) a free market would be eventually be monopolized by one "player" => not free b) the government regulates against monopoly => the market is not free This is why Libertarianist ideologies are completely bonkers. Check out Richard Wolff's analysis - really powerful stuff.
***** that is why right wing libertarian ideologies are like that! Left Libertarians aren't exactly mainstream in the US, but they make a lot more sense than corporation worshippers...
I have come back to this video every year since it came out and it only gets more depressingly relevant as the years go by. He called it all and nothing's changed in the intervening 13 years. If you're reading this and aren't a member already: Join a Union.
Better yet, join a communist party. Unions are a great first step, but ultimately limited in their capacity to actually challenge capitalism itself. Most, if not all, big unions in the imperialist countries are pro capitalist unions, meaning there is no real fight for the interests of the working class in the foreground. Unions are often heavily influenced and controlled by capitalists or capitalist-friendly opportunists/careerists/bureaucrats and only operate as "co-management" organs to keep workers feeling complacent. There are far too many examples to name of unions being hijacked by corporate interests that continually mislead workers and do more harm than good. In the end, unions of this character not only pose zero threat to capitalism, but they actually help perpetuate capitalism by "stabilizing" it (allowing capitalists to maintain their power in exchange for small wage increases or other compensation). The great minds of Marx, Lenin, Luxemburg, and others have already proven long ago that capitalism cannot be reformed, rather it must be overthrown. The ruling class will NEVER give up their power and stolen wealth voluntarily, or without a fight. We really are facing the hard truth nowadays (especially facing the global environmental catastrophe) that there are only two options: socialism or barbarism. There is a lot of work needed to UNDO all the anti-communist propaganda spread by the capitalists over the last several decades. This educational work is especially important within workers unions so that they can begin to gain a new, revolutionary character rather than serving as mere employee management tools.
We're not debating it because capitalism can only tolerate so much criticism, but not questioning of whether it should still be around or not. Simultaneously, the people who own the money and the media tell us incessantly that all alternatives to capitalism are worse than it.
+Gustavo Menezes Form a group with me (we can discuss the structure of this group) to discuss how to change that. I would like to discuss this subject with (not limited to) like-minded people. Kind regards
+Gustavo Menezes It's called libertarian-socialism lol. Socialism without a state is the only logical way. We know socialism with a state doesn't work, we know capitalism without a state is a fantasy contradiction, we know that capitalism with a state barely works.
Anarchism is a legit school of political thought, in this day and age only an uneducated twat can still think it means edgy punk kids breaking windows. Have you taken your knowledge of politics from MTV? Do yourself a favor and go read the Conquest of Bread.
Since globalism dis-empowered labour because of the resulting competition of a global labour force, wages have been collapsing globally for the majority of the population. As pointed out in this video they compensated for that by issuing cheap credit, they also compensated for it by subsidising private sector wages with state welfare (e.g. tax credits). Well the 2008 crisis brought the end to the cheap credit cards, austerity measures are also wiping out welfare spending. So people are being left with their stagnant wages with nothing to prop them up. So business world, where is your demand going to come from now? Global businesses refuse to pay their labour a living wage, yet they expect this same labour to go out and spend to keep their profits growing each and every year. It's not a situation that can be sustained, you cannot grow spending in the face of falling wages. Arguably globalism which was supposed to liberate Capitalism has in fact broken it, with it only being a question of when this whole thing will collapse.
AnnoyedDragon The 1% don't make a profit by selling you stuff. They wait until the economy collapses and then buy up your assets for pennies on the pound.
What is your definition of globalism anyway to me sounds like a global socialism. As far as I'm concern free market paves the road for what we think globalism is.
Your using vague terms. "Globalism" which was "suppose' to liberate capitalism...?? Where do you get the notion of globalism? As far as im concern its a vague term that has positive connotation such as world peace and end to world hunger. It is but free trade that brings countries together. A global market. Then how is this "suppose" to liberate capitalism? And what does that even mean? The use of terms are vague.
I haven't read many comments about the drawing or animation process that had to be done for this video so here I go. Great work on producing this video. I might not agree with some of the points being made but its great to hear another side of the conversation. The presentation of this conversation in the animations and drawings was awesome and intriguing. Very cool.
Well... You forgot to mention that money is debt and created out of thin air since the dollar is no more backed by the gold standart. This also is the reason why inflation is escalating because there is just no limits of dollars being put into circulation. This is why there are more billionaires, the federal reserve loans unlimited amount of dollars, creating more inflation of prices and economic bubbles that look like the economy is growing when in fact the people's debt is growing and they benefit from people's debt.
So, your solution to a risk of escalating inflation, is to return to a system that guarantees escalating deflation? That couldn't possibly be bad for the economy!
Rowan Evans It would be better to have deflation than to continue making money out of thin air. Because having a currency with nothing to back it is totally good for the economy. -_-
Rowan Evans It's not a "solution to a risk of escalating inflation", it's a solution to definite, current and inevitably accelerating inflation. The idea that you can have a prosperous economy without competing currencies is even more insane then the leftist intellectual gymnastics in this video.
Maxime Laneville What do competing currencies have to do with it? Is this supposed to be the means by which inflation gets "inevitably accelerated"? Are you advocating that gold must exist as a currency in competition with government issued ones?
Rowan Evans Haha nooooo the only way that a currency inevitably inflates is when a government monopolizes it (and in this case, counterfeits it). And no I don't think the government issued currency can compete with anything because it has no real value. It only retains value in the present economy BECAUSE other currencies are banned by the government. I don't advocate gold, bitcoin, or any specific currency I'm just pointing out the basic economic reality that a healthy economy needs competing currencies because it's a basic fact that often get left out of the discussion.
The largest downside of capitalism is that it is not equipped to handle the looming shadow of job loss as robotics replaces people. This is why capitalism is on it's last century and why a new economic system must emerge.
socialism is inevitable...we should make that transition smoother by taking actions collectively instead. Eventually most tasks will be done by robots and those robots can't be owned by certain companies. All of us need to be the part of that company, have shares, and since everyone is going to be part of it...it should be owned by govt a public entity.
answerOfstupids No, it should be jointly owned by the people and the ceo, therefore giving the people power. Which they don't have at the moment. Government owned businesses is not the way to go, learn from the past. Again, the businesses should be jointly owned by both the people and the CEOs.
doodelay Question, why can't the workers own directly? Or the consumers, in the case of utilities? Actual ownership by the people directly involved. Why should a CEO, chosen by capitalists, be part of the equation at all? Why shouldn't leadership be chosen by the workers directly?
@riKringkast, it's worth mentioning that many Scandinavian countries had a system which was close to a Capitalist free-market before the current one today. Sweden is the best example of this. 150 years ago Sweden was a very poor country and it was riddled with crop failure. There was a lack of health services, sanitation, overcrowding, etc. Many people lodged in with other families and disease was pretty abundant. Between 1850 and 1950 the average Swedish income multiplied 8 times whilst the population doubled. Sweden had the fastest economic and social development in history. During this time, the life expectancy rose by almost 30 years and infant mortality fell dramatically. This was all during a time where the taxes were very low and the public sector was tiny than in the rest of Europe and the United States. After this, Swedish politicians started placing taxes on people and disbursing handouts on a large scale, redistributing the wealth that workers had already created. In short; Sweden's biggest social and economic successes were when Sweden had an almost laissez-faire economy, and before wealth was widely distributed by the welfare state. Simply saying that these countries are fantastic because they have this, this and this -- whilst ignoring the history is with respect, rather silly.
Wonderful lecture, certainly reminds me of Einstein's words--that the choice is between Socialism or Barbarism, not meaning, of course, to step over the speaker's support of Marxism with some topic of Socialism. But without a doubt, as he implies, it is certainly nearing a time, one long overdue by now, mind, at which we as humans must evolve beyond our early predatory stage--surely we are better than that. Surely we don't need to compete for resources, there are enough for all of us and then some if we start making goods meant to last and not meant to make money fast. I should think it is soon--the wage gap increases and old advocates become increasingly aware that in a system built on competition, you can only have as many or more losers than winners, and in a time of such understanding as ours, do we all really wish to spend our lives trying to win, when it makes others lose, or when we ourselves lose? What is it all worth then, anyway? Great lecture, wonderful animations, glad to have seen it. c:
I find that people often like to argue straw man points when it comes to open discussion about the problems of "free market" capitalism and alternative solutions. Instead of building an open environment where people dialogue about solutions to the worlds problems we constantly achieve antagonistic debates about unrealistic expectation of "real" capitalism. No matter how you slice it market economics: socialism, communism and any form of capitalism are wholly incapable of resolving the world's problems of war, scarcity and environment. The first step toward realistic solutions means looking at that statement objectively, if not scientifically, and w/reason. Next, any real solution begins with the very real assumption that the real wealth of any nation is in its natural resources and its people. Here we can begin by making one another increasing aware of this reality and begin working toward a more humane life-style through the elimination of scarcity. All social systems, regardless of the political philosophy, religious beliefs, or social mores, ultimately depend upon natural resources -- i.e. clean air and water and arable land area -- and the industrial equipment and technical personnel for a high standard of living. The money- based system was designed hundreds of years ago and was hardly appropriate for that time. We still utilize this same outmoded system, which is probably responsible for most of today's problems.
What the Hell is with all the pausing? With the enormous effort that went into animating the video, you would think they would've taken a few minutes to make sure it all actually flowed together.
Centralization of power is the main issue. It enables a few people to manipulate and rig the economy in their favor. Multiple decentralized equalitarian communities, such as anarchist syndalicism, are feasible. State Socialism doesn't work. It only centralizes power, no matter how benign it's intentions are.
I am a strong believer in individual rights. My moral premise is the Golden Rule: measure others the same way you measure yourself and treat others the way that you would want to be treated. It naturally follows from this premise that we should have a set of rules which treat everyone fairly and allows everyone to achieve their goals. To the last question, yes.
How many books would you have to read in order to gain the understanding of this empirical verification of capital gain? How many years of studying? I just gained all that knowledge in 15 minutes on youtube. Me wasting my time on this proves the fact that as capital increases that labor decreases. Alan Watts was right on how jobs would become useless in being replaced by automatons, the Pantheistic Buddhism integrating consciousness into the cloud computer? Or Christ? You have choices to make.
Indeed! Marx also mentions the trajectory of humanity into mere machinery for capital accumulation and even extrapolates this to conceive that generalized mental labor will be discreetly machinated which, if you're generous with thinking about abstractions and consider he wrote it like 200 years ago, is pretty much a prediction of the whole goal of developing AI, which I found pretty amazing/awesome if nothing else. But I definitely agree that this sort of backlash against religious dogmatism from the enlightenment essentially threw out the meaningful spiritual baby with the totalitarian bathwater, and perhaps worse is that it wasn't really "thrown out" so much as it has changed in appearance. "The market" and broad enforcement capitalist realism narrows our imagination/collective goals to the point of effectively having instituted the same dogmatism in a different distorted lexicon. Basically Nietzsche's underlying point in decrying the "death" of god. Yeeeeeeeah...not lookin' too good for this whole humanity thing.
@@taina8622 No God is basically the equivalent of "dads not home! We can do whatever we want!", we're going to end up in a lord of the flies situation very quickly.
Read a book titled Capital in the Twenty-First Century by a French economist called Thomas Piketty. Afterward, if you are not exhausted or denying it, read "Capital and Ideology" by same owner, then a Brief History of Neoliberalism by the very speaker of this video.
well the thing is that if governement gets on the side of the workers, the owners of the industries will go offshore, because they a re moved by maximizing proffits, that´s it. So you move industries out of europe, usa,canada,etc. to countries like china, india,pakistan, south africa,etc. Then the workers in THOSE countries get screwed and ask for better working conditions, and eventually they get them, that wont solve it either cause capital will find new sweatshops like nigeria, kenya, etc. in a cycle that goes on forever. What we will see in the next few years i beleive is a massive kind of intervention or reseting in the economic cycles, throwing us into unknown unreveiled terrain where god knows what can happen, but one thing is for sure: the prime forces and interest of the market will always be the same: maximize profits, minimize loses in an ever increasing pace.
This was a great video and I admire the effort put into these animations. I don't think there is a one-size-fit-all solution for our global problems. The problem lies in the fact that modern capitalism developed closely with the state apparatus, which lawfully enforces more or less singular policies. Different regions with unique ways of life and subsistence should decide their own local economies, instead we were attached to a system that haphazardly attempts to serve a multitude of needs.
6 месяцев назад
I remember hearing from Steve Keen years ago (sorta paraphrasing Minsky) that Finance was meant to be the cost of doing business, and never a way a generator of profit and capitol.
+Sgt Moose Great, now you have quoted Thatcher, another beacon of equality and working class lover. (Mind the sarcasm) I think you're just taking quotes out of a google search and posting them. Please read some basic economics before you comment. Also, you should know financialisation by Raegan/Thatcher is exactly what led to the global economic crisis of 2008.
We were never at hayek. It's not even keynes, its a manipulated keynes. Hayek would have never bailed out the bankers, the video never even touches on it. You bail out the losers there is no end to the cost.
Why is there no debate and discussion on economics? Because it's a high entry level discussion, people can only chew what they can pretend to know about. Finance on the other hands takes hard facts and hard learning to understand let alone master. Hence economics is not a problem the common man can process, let alone solve.
***** There's no excuse for not being educated in today's world, all the information is a click away. Public libraries are in abundance, and all schools except for the tippest of the toppest are free. The unambitious will always be at a disadvantage to the ambitious, but that is no fault of society.
***** Mandatory education is just a benefit of maintaining a societal standard, if you don't have the agency to educate yourself than you're not as smart as you claim to be schools or otherwise. Meanwhile you try to water the argument of the internet down with baseless drivel then conveniently ignore the libraries who are not 50 bucks a month, luckily for everywhere fibre optic doesn't reach books do. Billions of people don't need access to the internet, billions of people have more pressing issues like "Lets try to listen to all these specialists the west keeps sending and not forget to feed ourselves." or "Lets reject foreign aid so a domestic market can start blooming" or "Maybe democracy isn't a great idea in countries racked by populism and superstition or foreign infiltrators." or "Lets dig a hole outside the city instead of throwing trash two steps away from my doorstep" Basic stuff that doesn't need the internet. It's not hard to reveal who is lazy. From top to bottom there are those who climb and those who wallow being "content", hence any system discriminates against the poor because the poor do not actively choose in life, not they let choices be made for them just like how the media regurgitates opinions for them to absorb in the same way you envision schools. So I will state again that it is immensely easy to separate the wheat from the chaff, because the ambitious choose their lives and do not let it be chosen for them.
I'm just saying that every time I pick up an economic textbook it makes my head spin, I'm not arguing that information is hard to access, there's also a problem of comprehending the texts.
+MGTOW Jesus The best way to listen to this is to wind the window up so the distraction of the artistry does not get in the way of the message. We connect with the human form talking to us, we connect with the human voice. The game of the hands distracts from the message. Namaste and care, mhikl
The answer is a switch to an economy based on the commons and mathematics (the blockchain). We need to transcend our view of money and power. Look up Jeremy Rifkin, he's got it. We are going to return to a truly free and global market with many currencies representing our belief in certain things, ideas, and cultures. Capitalism as it stands now (particularly in America) depends on perpetual growth and kicking the can down the road, forcing people and nations to take on debt. Now we are seeing the worst of all materialistic ideologies. The US dollar means nothing, the fed and government keep it going with manipulation and misdirection. But hey, we can't do anything about it until the infrastructure of the new global economy really starts to take off. It starts with us as a people, support decentralization, open-source technology, and the dedicated shift to renewable energy.
In fact, most dictionaries agree with Rand's definition of freedom: Merriam-Webster Dictionary: "Definition of FREEDOM 1 : the quality or state of being free: as a : the absence of necessity, coercion, or constraint in choice or action b : liberation from slavery or restraint or from the power of another : independence c : the quality or state of being exempt or released usually from something onerous freedom from care "
There's little specific reason why co-ops couldn't compete with multinationals on the same level, no? I think the only reason the biggest companies aren't co-ops is that there's so few of them, and they're less likely to agressively expand as they go by consensus and member-investment usually. That said, one of the biggest banks in the Netherlands started cooperatively, and several large companies in Spain are co-ops.
Act Free yeah, and that breeds innovation. The cure for economic crises is not the economic equivalent of playing soccer without the ball and then giving everyone a participation medal.
“They say that life is an accident, driven by sexual desire, that the universe has no moral order, no truth, no God. Driven by insatiable lusts, drunk on the arrogance of power, hypocritical, deluded, their actions foul with self-seeking, tormented by a vast anxiety that continues until their death, convinced that the gratification of desire is life's sole aim, bound by a hundred shackles of hope, enslaved by their greed, they squander their time dishonestly piling up mountains of wealth. "Today I got this desire, and tomorrow I will get that one; all these riches are mine, and soon I will have even more. Already I have killed these enemies, and soon I will kill the rest. I am the lord, the enjoyer, successful, happy, and strong, noble, and rich, and famous. Who on earth is my equal?” Krishna describing the anti-Christ and ignorance.
This video seems to skip the role of management. Western style free market capitalism is based on a triangle of labor, capital, and management. Power needs to be balanced between the three legs. Labor provides demand. Capital provides broad policy (i.e. vision). Management provides day to day functioning. Due to advances in management techniques (some technical, some social/legal) management has striped the other two legs of power. Thus the fundamental problem of capitalism has once again reared it's head -- Winners accumulate too much power, The winners come to control the system and inevitably move it away from its free market roots by making monopolies and the like.
Nobody has ever managed to create a monopoly through a free market, absent government intervention. All of the real, coercive monopolies which restricted supply to earn monopoly profits at the expense of consumers were created with the help of government. All of the classic examples of suppsed monopolies persecuted under antitrust laws were increasing production, improving quality, and bringing their products to consumers at ever falling prices. This includes Standard Oil and John Rockefeller, Andrew Carnegie, and Cornelius Vandervilt was actually a monopoly breaker. He defied a government imposed monopoly on steamboat traffic on the Hudson river.
Role of management ?Tell me how valuable is your vision for making more money straight from money mister creative entrepreneur ? And labor provides demand my ass, under this system it is the capitalist class that solely creates the demand, the laws of supply and demand just direct the labor. "the fundamental problem of capitalism has once again reared it's head -- Winners accumulate too much power, The winners come to control the system and inevitably move it away from its free market roots by making monopolies and the like." Well since it always finishes like this why on Earth you think it has "free market" roots ? How many more years we are going to repair and patch a system that cannot meet even the basic needs of human society ?
Ilian Kulishev A free market is one where market participants are free to enter and leave at will. They are economically efficient since success breeds imitation and new ideas quickly permeate the entire market. Of course this isn't always a good thing. For example intellectual property laws are designed to limit the free market. Also, economic efficiency is not the end all, be all of life. Having dirt cheap food for 9 years running then no food in the tenth year would be bad, even if the average cost was lower than moderately priced food at all times. BTW, since no one is free to leave the health care market, "Free Market Health Care" is a lie.
Ilian Kulishev You are confusing capital with management. Capital uses money to make money. Management directs workers in useful directions. During the corporate "reforms" of the late 1980s businesses were being bought, broken, and sold. Workers were losing jobs so they thought this was bad. They supported rules that made boards of directors beholden to the companies CEOs (that's management) instead of stockholders (capital). Since then CEOs usually pay themselves bloated salaries for shipping jobs overseas. In other words they ship their own work (managing employees) overseas while giving themselves a raise. Both employees and stockholders (often retired employees BTW) suffer. But there's nothing they can do. Management has most of the power. Also, in our consumer society it is spending workers who provide demand for products. The hundred or so billionaires just don't eat that many hamburgers (for example).
There is no "exploitation of the workers", as the employee's labor is worth less to him than it's worth to the employer, and the reason for that is that the labor + capital equipment makes the labor worth more. The employer has the capital equipment, the employee does not. The employee is paid MORE than his labor is worth TO HIM sans capital equipment, and the labor the employer receives is worth more to the employer than the compensation he pays to the employee. It's a win-win. No one is being screwed. (And Marx was a fucking idiot).
@ riKringkast, (since this new reply system is new to me), I actually get what he's saying, though I phrased my original half-joke poorly in making that clear. The wealth inequality isn't a crises in distribution, as I see it, but a crisis of envy in the human psyche. That was the point I was trying to make; that when we focus on what other people have, and how come we don't have it (I speak as a blue-collar worker by choice), we are arguing from greed and envy. If we want what other people have, the solution is to be creative and work for it, not to claim that the rules of the game are rigged and demand an end to the meaning and justification of hard work; the rewards of owning what we've worked hard to acquire and cherish. It's this sense of entitlement, in my own analysis, and in the analysis of others far more intelligent than myself, that has caused the incredible violence and destruction that is holding the world back. Also, while the quote was abbreviated, it wasn't taken out of context.
***** Do I detect another fan of Stefan Molyneux on the RU-vids? That last sentence sounds like a quote from The Story of Your Enslavement... in any case, kudos for the sentiment, though I humbly disagree with your view that people are sheep-like and thus cannot be convinced or argued with, even those that sound dogmatic or prone to spewing slogans. I've read too many letters written by long-time religious fundamentalists to people like Sam Harris, articulating how they were de-converted despite the cynical attitudes of other intellectuals, to believe that argument will never get through to people; indeed, it's all we have. I myself was a former Christian and former statist. We may not get everybody, but if we convince 2-3 people, or even just plant a seed about government, or religion, it's worth talking to hundreds who won't listen. And, if we're lucky, someone else may enlighten us about something we thought we knew as well along the way.
John Doe Jr. Which he? I was talking about the animator on the white board. If I could do that, that's all I'd do. There is a problem with Capitalism, by the way, at least the new Pope thinks so.
The issues of "capitalism" in this video appear to have nothing to do with results coming out of a free market, but rather the catastrophic consequences of governments meddling in the market. I think it's misleading to say this crises belong to capitalism. I would argue that they are issues caused by governments.
I've been looking around for a critique of capitalism that doesn't take the issues governments make, and blame capitalism as the cause of these issues. This video and others I've seen are critiques of crony capitalism. They are excellent critiques, I should mention, just not critiques of what they think they're critiquing.
Jason Colby What you call “crony capitalism” or “corporatism” is simply already the standard feature of capitalism. The whole fundamental of capitalism is to maximize one’s own capital for the sake of.. well.. capital.. The capitalist state ensures this through infrastructure spending, the issuing of money, and enforcing capital maximizing based properties (“private property in factories, corps, enclosure of the commons, imperialism, etc”) . www.filmsforaction.org/news/the-iron-fist-behind-the-invisible-hand-corporate-capitalism-as-a-stateguaranteed-system-of-privilege/
Gosh. He gets so much right in here while at the same time getting SO much wrong. He's right, Capitalism can't solve it's crisis problems, not because it's a flaw in capitalism, but because capitalism pretty much DOESN'T exist in the major economics of not just the US and Europe, but in the whole world. It's silly to think Capitalism is part of the problem.
The last 3-4 minutes are a beautiful and horrific characterization and problematization of the current economic situation. When the gap between the haves and havenots widens, you have to ask yourself in which category you and your children will fall into.
Gotta make an important distinction between the free market and crony capitalism. Under the free market, corps get no subsidies. There is no mortgage interest deduction. Big banks are allowed to fail. Crony capitalism is really a partial merger of state and corporate power, something that Mussolini called fascism. And fascism is national socialism, not the free market. We are heading in the direction of this merger between state and corporate power in the US, one little piece of legislation and bail-out at a time. But none of this should be confused with the free market.
Every time the light comes on, the free market roaches run back and forth all over the conversation, and I try to stomp on at least a few....it's hopeless, I know, but here goes; Every success (as perverted as the measure of it is in this system) is lauded by you market purist's as "the free market", but every failure of it, is simply ridiculed as "crony capitalism". How convenient it must be, to reject anything that doesn't fit that tidy little model, and embrace anything that does. Would you get real? Please? Cause I for one, am sick of the schizophrenia... The "merger" was there from the get go. There is no division. It is a big and messy system of greed, one up man-ship and usury that is out of control and consuming itself. You can't pick little pieces of it out and say "this is our ideal, if only everything hinged on this principle there would be harmony". There is nothing in serving oneself above all else that is principled! Mussolini meant to merge the people with their work, and with the fruits of that work. That is much closer to a principle. Did it go terribly bad? Of course it did, just like it did with Hitler. Of course, if you claim as your system one built upon the most base instincts mankind has, it's success or longevity is hardly something to trumpet about. The cost of that "success" also has a very nasty looking under belly. One we don't talk about much, huh? Instead, we have "Dictator" in our own image; the iron boot of corporatism.
pjamesbda I readily admit that the free market system has disadvantages. I am just sick of the free market taking the blame for things like corporate subsidies, bailouts, bribing politicians etc. that are explicitly against free market ideals. This is why we need to make a distinction between crony capitalism and the free market. The two are, in many cases, opposites. To be blind to this distinction is to leave yourself open to misunderstanding and error. So I have a question for you: can you name a criticism of the free market? I'd love to discuss the good ones. I am just sick of discussing straw men.
freesk8 What is the "free" market? Governance and capitalism go hand in hand from the beginning of civilization. Who will enforce property rights, currency, and transactions if not the government? The word "crony" means "friend," so the phrase "crony capitalism" implies that friendship has bought these advantages, not the money itself. I can assure you, it's not all about friendship. Money doesn't care whether it's going against your supposed "free market ideals." Like the Marx quote in the video says, "capital cannot abide a limit." In other words, your "free market," which looks for any advantages it can profit from, has overtaken government, not the other way around. Therefore it seems to me that what you're wishing for is a government that restricts (rather than enhances) the advantages that excess capital affords. Welcome to the club.
There is a distinction between collaborative private enterprise and the price-fixing of essential goods ike petroleum, which the American oil companies do with gasoline, and which constitutes them as a cartel. I agree that the Silicone Valley giants including Walmart could afford to pay higher wages and offer more benefits to their employees and still make a decent profit, but their election not to as you have pointed out is part of the nature of the free market beast. Capitalism is not a perfect economic system nor is it always fair, especially when there is corrupt collusion between private enterprise and government, which is known as "crony capitalism." But it is nevertheless a better alternative than coercive collectivism. Written By: Atelston Fitzgerald Holder 1st
" Capitalism is not a perfect economic system nor is it always fair, especially when there is corrupt collusion between private enterprise and government, which is known as "crony capitalism." But it is nevertheless a better alternative than coercive collectivism." Why end it there? That isn't the end-all-be-all, is it? It's the best we have so we just have to deal with it? That's beyond limited. Typically, most defenders of capitalism speak as if the only alternative to it is what most would regard as historically failed socioeconomic systems (e.g. socialism/communism). While ignoring a more realistic mix between the most successful aspects of both. To deny that there are aspects of communism/socialism that make much more sense than a free market is, for lack of a better word, delusional. Unchecked capitalism (free market) isn't a solution. Nor is complete socialism. Obviously it's favorable to see what actually is proven to work for the betterment of MOST people (not some), and apply those in a common sense way. The most progressive countries in the world have much better policies than the U.S. in this regard. Many of the Nordic countries, and Canada for instance have free health care -- you can even go to school for free in some regions -- and they're heavily involved in advancing social mobility and welfare. Yet they're just as involved in capitalism and banking as the U.S. despite provably being much harsher on banking criminals than the U.S. -- Iceland jailed their bankers for instance. There's ample evidence to suggest that a mix of both sides of the spectrum provides, realistically, the best benefits to PEOPLE. People should never settle for any social system. If people are suffering, then change it! And the way capitalism is going right now, regardless of who or what you want to blame, many in the world are definitely suffering.
XSilvenX I disagree. I don't find any of the aspects of communism or socialism to make sense. Yes, Canada and the Nordic countries do have both free education and health care, but they're bad, atleast here in Finland. Also, the Nordic countries and Canada both have freer markets than the U.S., and that's why they are better places to live in.
John Doe Jr. You're desperately wrong, and the fact that you can't find a SINGLE thing "right" with any aspects of communism/socialism, besides showing how tragically unreasonable you are, proves how transparent and shallow your agenda is. -- www.upworthy.com/a-senator-tried-to-outsmart-a-highly-respected-doctor-it-didnt-work-out-too-well-for-him?c=slt1
XSilvenX I'd just like to point out that communism, as a socioeconomic system, has not been achieved. It's definition has remained the same for hundreds of years: a stateless, classless system with common ownership of the means of production. This is what all communists and socialists (in the traditional sense of the word) hope to achieve. There are many ideologies regarding the best way to achieve such a system, but unfortunately a combination of western and soviet propaganda has considerably blurred the definitions of communism and socialism leaving many people incorrectly believing that the USSR actually practiced communism.
The best argument against communism or any other form of government is that they all have a monopoly on the use of force. Wars and world wide economic depressions are only made possible by government coercion and force. A true free market society exists under voluntary agreements between individuals. Consider how many wars would be waged if the soldiers were free to return home at any time? Politicians could not initiate much offensive action under those conditions. Essentially the soldiers themselves would be voting with their feet as to whether or not the war was worth fighting. They say that today's military is an all volunteer force. That is true to the extent that they voluntarily sign away their individual liberty when they join. After signing up they must obey orders to make war or they will be forced into prison. Marx said, "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need." Marx must use force to take from One so that he can give to Another. A centrally planned economy as envisioned by communists, socialists and dictators will end in slavery, starvation and war. Watch Bolivia
If you have no coercive apparatus then you have no property, and if you have a volunteer based society without a state and property, that isn't free-market capitalism. That's communism.
Thomas Sutton "If you have no coercive apparatus then you have no property". Actually, it is VERY MUCH possible to me to own property without me having to INITIATE violence or force on other people. If I point a gun at you and say, "give me your (fill in the blank with whatever item you wish)" and you give it, I have just used coercion on you. It was NOT a voluntary trade. However, if I were to offer you something you want (like money) in exchange for that item (and I didn't use force or threaten to use force) then I did not coerce you because I was not causing any harm to you.
FurryMurry7 But property rights must be enforceable. If there was nothing to stop me, I could just go around declaring that your belongings are mine. Some socially agreed on mechanisms for exclusion or entitlement must be in place to support property rights.
Ryan Marsh I completely agree with you! =D And, fortunately, these "socially agreed on mechanisms" already exist. It's called "commonlaw". In a nutshell, commonlaw is basically laws (or rules) that exist outside of government. These are laws that everyone knows and understands. "Common Knowledge", if you will. To illustrate: imagine I went to a restaurant, ordered a turkey sandwich, ate it, and refused to pay, saying "well i never signed uh contract that said ah promise 2 pay for muh food." LOLZ But seriously, everyone would know that what I'm doing is wrong, even if we were living in a stateless society. This is commonlaw at work. And EVEN IF the fear of jail were taken out of the equation, I would still have a damn good reason to pay my bill. I need a job. I need an apartment. I need money (loans, credit cards, etc.). And with all of those things, someone is going to check on my TRUSTWORTHINESS. (another way of saying trustworthiness is "credit"). When word gets out that I keep ripping off restaurants, a lot of people are not going to want to interact with me. Restaurants won't want to serve me. Employers won't want to hire me (for the good jobs, at least. Maybe I could be a dishwasher making a not-enough-to-live-on wage). Banks and finance companies won't want to lend me money (which I will desperately need, since I can't get a good job). And the list of this kind of "economic ostracism" goes on and on for me. In short, we could say that if I turn to a life of ripping people off, my life will turn into a living hell. The best medicine is prevention, not cure. The fear of such economic ostracism is usually quite enough for people to respect property rights.
Notes Graber: "Credit and debt comes first, then coinage emerges thousands of years later and then, when you do find “I’ll give you twenty chickens for that cow” type of barter systems, it’s usually when there used to be cash markets, but for some reason - as in Russia, for example, in 1998 - the currency collapses or disappears." So hundreds of societies existed before the creation of money and they used debt/credit transaction. This is one (of many) things Rothbard/Austrians get wrong.
I do not have a dog in this fight, but I find it perplexing that Sociologist use Marxian analysis to study Capitalism. However the Scholars who actually study Capitalism, Economists, rarely even mention Marxian critiques. And usually, this dismissal of Marxian analysis is done without much respect. I can only conclude that Sociologist's, or anybody else, who uses Marxian critique of Capitalism is not taken very seriously by anyone but fringe Sociologists and others of that ilk. After watching Zeitgeist video's, Sociologists debates and other Anti-Capitalist videos, I can not rid myself of the conclusion that people using Marxian Critiques are merely Pseudo intellectuals with a chip on their shoulders. Sociologists seem the most overly emotional,
its easy, marx points at several problems with american-style democracy. it hurts the establishment so economists (who work for what we call the establishment btw) talk about marx in denigrating terms. if they do otherwise they put their career at stake as the establishment is very vidicative. besides, all thats interesting with marx is him pointing at social issues created by/because of economic laws as well as excesses made possible by capitalizm in its extremes. its not fag blabber, its economists who use economy to have power over government so over us. they zeitgeit fags are only a sickness of today- they talk compassion to hide their own weakness.
besides, marx is 50% utopian bullshit-his economical views- and 50% critique over social issues created by/because of capitalizm -pure social issues- thats why it is irrelevant to economists. as sociology is a half-science cuz poor sociologists dont know much about economics and economics determine social wellness- the best way to keep everybody in the dark, but were into another debate, and its too long for yt comments
First, learn that not every noun is capitalized, second, learn that plural nouns don't have apostrophes. Then make an argument. I didn't even read your post, because nobody would take it seriously. Big words, though. At least you can spell.
So the problem that was created by government intervention, should be solved by more government intervention? What about allowing the banks to fail? Governments took on the liability of the banks and now governments are mired in debt, we didn't solve the problem, we just moved the deadline.
And absorb the liability? You do know that let's the bankers off the hook, right? If anything is nationalized, it's the savings portion of the bank, allowing the investments to fail per market forces. Possibly only after the bank has been declared bankrupt. This protects the average citizen form liability they didn't sign up to, while retaining it for those who are responsible for the situation.
What do you call this kind of smart revolutionary people that is so grecefully helping us understand the world and informs us of progress and other awsome stuff that makes you just want to learn more and more and contribute to the world??
I don't believe in homeownership, I want to learn how to get out this money state that I am in... I feel like the answer is going to come to me because my mind has changed a lot but I don't really know to many like believers. I want financial freedom for my daughters and myself. Still trying to figure out the smartest and fastest and cheapest way. Than I'll move to a third world country or something and live in a tree house! LOL!
You should not make critical parallels of what we have now, with Capitalism. We do not have Capitalism by definition. Even the most economically free areas of the world (Hong Kong, Singapore, New Zealand etc), are not *purely* Capitalist societies. So a great deal of the notion this video's based upon is a false one at that. Much of what he says in this video, is correct. The massive financial structure and centralised pools of economic power do exist and do subjugate the average worker. However, this is Corporatism, not Capitalism. This is the end results of political power becoming deeply intertwined with financial bodies which create these excessively powerful financial institutions which get to 'create policy' on economic matters. This spans from this sense that the state tries to hire 'experts' and academics to run the gritty details of their often ill-thought policies. These policies face the normal problem of a 'top-down' approach, in that they're enforced through the monopoly of force, through taxation, the state legal structures etc and are too far abstracted from the markets and the individuals the policies effect. This leads to mass inefficiencies in the way currency is organised and recognised. Then you start to see these financial bodies trying to regulate against their own failures and inefficiencies, badly. Capitalism would work, perfectly, and would be symptomatic of a free, voluntary society if it was allowed to be. If by Capitalism, we mean the simple act of voluntary exchange of time, commodity and labour between consenting individuals, or groups of consenting individuals.
You're arguing semantics, I'm pretty sure the narrator knows we don't have pure capitalism. Pure capitalism is theoretical, it has never existed and never will.
The capitalism Harvey is talking about is the one that exists. i.e. the subordination of labour power so that a profit can be extracted. If you want to extenuate that exploitation without refrain through the abolition of the state, which provides cover to the citizens when capitalism goes bad (like it did after the great depression which happened when state intervention was next to invisiable), then you are calling for nothing short of unhindered tyranny. Plus, to get there, what are you going to do with the monopolies that already exist? The only way they are going to be overcome is through collective action in the best traditions of socialism.
Vicente Brizola Pure capitalism is a fiction, a utopia, same as "everyone is equal, we are all happy" pure communism. Unless you're talking about something else, pure cap = totally free-market capitalism, and that's not possible: you will always have a public part in any economy, some laws, powerful people gaining an unfair advantage. A perfectly equal competitive playing field is impossible: perfection doesn't exist in real life. Markets are never completely free and thus pure capitalism cannot exist.
ytandyf84 what makes those in government more moral than the average person? And what gives corporations the power to exploit, if not the state? Monopolies only exist because of the state, in a free society a monopoly could only exist if gratified by the consumer. They exist now through bail outs and subisidies etc. You should not make the assertion that we would be subject to pure tyranny without explaining why that would be the case. Personally I don't believe we need the state in order to be moral. If your concern is the existence of monopolies, why assume then that more state is the fix? When it is the cause to begin with? In terms of the great depression, it has been empyrically been proven to be the fault of the Federal Reserves bad reactionary policy to a normal market blip that caused the run on banks
The FACT is that child labor began falling as the prosperity derived from capitalism (improvement in compensation, working conditions and living standards began a century before 1836) made it possible for families to forego the income that their children could provide, particularly where industrialization was taking place. That unions had a vested interest in reducing competition for their labor (from children and freed blacks) explains things they "urged" but doesn't change the reality.
youre out of luck because they have bureaucratic state capitalism (also known as stalinism). The state replaces the corporations of the west there. the state then distributes the resources, as a corporation would in the west. But in north korea, workers still sell their labour on the labour market, as they did in the soviet union.
North Korea is as socialist as the US is Marxist-Leninist. In other words, you can put a dogs collar on a cat, but it's still going to be a cat regardless what you call it. The same is the case with North Korea and other so called "communist" states. You can put the name tag on them all you want, but that's completely irrelevant if what they're actually doing is something else.
AGAIN THAT IS NOT CAPITALISM THAT IS GOVERNMENT PLUS FREE MARKETS SO CORPORATISM, AMERICANISM, EUROPEANISM, KEYNIAN ECONOMICS, IF THAT IS "CAPITALIST", SO THAT IS ALSO SOCIALISM
+Lowmomome I think you took the term capitalism a little bit too literal buddy. Now, I'm not an expert but I do know for a fact that it's not about writing everything in capitals. That's called advertising.
+Lowmomome Yes it fucking is Capitalism, you libertarian-parroting childish moron. It's not "pure" Capitalism, but neither is a horse a "pure" Unicorn. They're both impossible fucking absurdities. The more "free" a market is, the more it comes under the control of the richest, who twist it directly to their own benefit - remember the "working in your own self-interest" shit that you fools spew? That gives them *more* money and thus *more* absolute control over the resources of an entire country, or more. So unless you want absolute 0 government, which means legalized mass-murder among all the other disgusting things humans are capable of, you will have a government that's completely owned by the richest, who again, use it to the fullest for "their own interests". Libertarians are complete fucking dumbasses. (cue "I'm not a libertarian!!" excuses)
HAHAHA AND SOCIALISM?, IT ONLY PUT EVERYONE IN THE HAND OF A FEW, BUT NOT THE "RICH", BUT THE RICH (THE POLITIANS), WHO ONLY SCREW THE MIDDLE AND LOWER CLASS, THE LOWER BY MAKING A WELFARE CLASS DEPENDENT ON THE GOVERNMENT AND SLOW INCOME MOBILITY, AND THE RICH?, THEY DONT GET TAX INCREASES in a liberal society more taxes on the rich are not pay by them because they are so greedy, they are payed by they workers, (middle class), and the cusumer who pays more, THE RICH STAYED THE SAME
+Lowmomome "HAHAHA AND SOCIALISM?" Changing the fucking subject, what a shock. We were talking about the definition of Capitalism, you tap-dancing goalpost moving " THE RICH (THE POLITIANS)" THE KOCH BROTHERS, AND SHELDON ADELSON, ARE *POLITICIANS? THEY DONATE BILLIONS TO THEMSELVES? "MAKING A WELFARE CLASS DEPENDENT ON THE GOVERNMENT" Asshole's excuse, straight from the Heritage Foundation Lie-tank. You dumbfucks really believe that it's just a coincidence that this lie fattens the rich, don't you. "Let your fellow Smericans starve to death, cuz, morals". "THE RICH STAYED THE SAME" No they fucking HAVEN'T, they gotten 4 times *richer* since rightwing Kkkuntservative Reagan started pushing the de-regulation "less government" lie, that YOU are also trying to push, stupid fuck. But yea, go on and tell us how the legalization of dumping lead and mercury into rivers and streams, and child prostitution, is necessary to counteract "cronyism". Since every law is just a way for big business to 'suppress competition', and any little trace of government still left is blamed for what Corporations want to do in the first place. You're *fucking morons*.
ok, so I will not argue with a liberal shit, because is like talking to stalin about human rights, se you don't have common sense?, ok, i did miss a point, the rich will always will get richer and faster, with taxes or no taxes. SO LETS TALK LIKE A DEMOCRAT AND THEY LOGIC SO YOU MORMON SHIT WHAT OUR CHILDREN TO BE THOUGHT CREASIONISM!!!!!! We don't want public education in the first place SO EVIL CORPORATIONS CONTROL EVERY ASPECT OF OUR LIFES, Dude corporations depend on profit, governemnt don't, they only depend on people's productivity, THEY OWN US Who was the guns, government or corporations SO I WILL WIN THE ARGUMENT UNLESS I SAY SOMETHING LIKE YES WE DONT WANT WELFARE, LET THE POOR DIE, LET THE RICH GET RICHER, TAKE THE GOVERNMENT OUT OF THEIR PATH, THEY WILL CONSUME EVERYTHING AND LEAVE US POOR!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! /\ | That my friend is almost what the liberals do with their policies AGAIN, IF CORPORATIONS ARE SO GREEDY, THE WELFARE MONEY WILL END UP THERE, BECAUSE TO WHOM YOU BUY FOOD, TO WALMART, YOU SAY THAT WILL BOOM THE ECONOMY, BUT YOU SAY THAT TAXING CORPORATIONS WILL BOOM IT TO?, AND THEN YOU SAY IT WILL CREATE JOBS?, POOR SALARY PART TIME JOBS AT WALMART? AND WHEN DID WE SAY "NO POPULUTION REGULATIONS" NEVER, WE THINK THAT GLOBAL WARMING IS CAUSED NOT BY HUMANS BUT BY YOU LIBETARDS WHO HAVE DESTROYED THE ECONOMY TO A POINT IN WHICH WE ARE STUCK WITH QUEMICANS AND MERCURY FOR OUR TECHNOLOGY, NOW BUSH AND BUSH AND CLINTON WEREN'T CAPITALIST NOR SOCIALIST, THEY WERE THE BOTH "CORPORATIST" BIG GOVERNMENT PLUS FREE MARKET EQUALS CORPOTARISM, LOBBING, CENTRAL BANKING, CRISISM, TAKE THE POWER AWAY FROM GOVERNMENT AND FOR COPORTATIONS IN WILL NO LONGER BE PROFITABLE OR GREEDY TO BUY POLITIANS, SO TO PROFIT THE CONSUMER WILL PAY THEM FOR A GOOD OR SERVICE THAT THE REAL DIFFERENCE, BUT TO MINIMIZE GOVERNMENT WE NEED NOT WELFARE, DEREGULATION (EXCEPT GREEN), AND LIMIT THE GOVERNMENT 5 TIMES MORE THAN THE CONSTITUTION THE "SOCIALIST" MICHAEL MOORE HATES CORPORATISM, BUT LIKES CAPITALISM AND LOVES SOCIALISM, LIKE YOU HE DOES NOT NOW THE DEFINITION OF CAPIALISM AND TRASH IT, THINKING IT IS CORPORATISM
Seven years later but here we go... That's not what he means and you know that. It's amazing to me that some people see this and think "maybe we should make changes, both big and small, to our economy" while others hear "we need to abolish private ownership and dismantle the competitive market"
Hey there mate, Norwegian here. Our government is a socialist welfare state. We're one of the richest countries in the world. We consistently rank as the best country to live in based on a number of different variables (happiness, health, education, living standards etc.). We have free health care for everyone. This free health care is very similar to Obama's affordable health care act, which you for some reason are opposed to. In fact, in principal it's the same thing.
Miguel 'Big Mig" Benavides Yeah, I still struggle with this issue myself. I really want to be open minded and so I am very willing to entertain new ideas, new theories, new solutions. But, even though I agree that there are many negative outcomes of capitalism, both inherently and as it is practices right now, I also cannot help but acknowledge that it was capitalism that managed to significantly raise the living standards of millions of people in the last 150 years. So, if someone can offer an idea of how we can keep the good stuff and move to a system that gets rid of the bad stuff, I'm happy to hear it.
+Miguel 'Big Mig" Benavides get past the labels. Harvey isn't arguing for anti-capitalism, rather for being anti-neoliberalism, the extreme interpretation of capitalism that is predatory, short-termist and re-distributes wealth 'upwards'. Harvey isn't anti-capitalist but much of his entire academic output has tended to emphasise the need to be more conscious of, alert to the inherent contradictions in capitalism. And for all those who think that regulation on finance will inhibit innovation - consider how much innovation might *actually* happen if the mega rich didn't hoard so much capital
+Demian Haki _"I also cannot help but acknowledge that it was capitalism that managed to significantly raise the living standards of millions of people in the last 150 years."_ Yes, capitalism is better than feudalism, etc., which is acknowledged by Marx and every serious anti-capitalist. But that doesn't mean we can't do better.
Cagedand Enraged I loled too.. The fact that leftists think we live in a capitalist society is all you need to know about the depth of their knowledge on capitalism:P
How do you tell a communist? Well, it's someone who reads Marx and Lenin. And how do you tell an anti-Communist? It's someone who understands Marx and Lenin. -Ronald Reagan
Great buddy, quoting someone under whom the inequality increased like wild fire. Keeping this great gentleman's quote apart, what's your understanding? I'm sure Reagan never even read Marx or Lenin to even make such a comment.
Sgt Moose So now you're quoting Thatcher on Socialism. Might as well quote Bush buddy. His insight on socialism perhaps as deep as Thatcher and Reagan, the beacons of equality and welfare.
Really. That's pretty amazing given that capitalism only dates back 30,000 years (ancient Mesopotamia) and socialism began as a French concept. And while devaluing the currency is a real problem, it has nothing to do with capitalism and planned economies of any kind for any reason are socialistic failures. There's a reason that Montagne isn't taken seriously - and, as it happens, its an incredibly good reason.
Ha ha ha...Academics are "seriously involved in the world..." give me a break! The David Harvey types are not seriously involved in anything based in reality. Take your own advice...
Millions of small businesses are thriving in the USA. Walmart efficiently delivers mass cheap goods to consumers who CHOOSE to shop there. The problem is corporations can/must buy political favors to dominate markets. Amazon made billions because its customers did not pay state sales tax. But other small online retailers began proliferating. Suddenly, Amazon lobbied for online state/county/city sales tax which is complex to compute and thus complicates business for online small competitors.
Manufactures need to demand more from their financers. It might be their money initially, but it's your business and your idea that's making them rich in the long run.
The problem is, we are NOT practicing free market capitalism. What you are observing in action is a mixed economy. It is not self-regulating because the government is regulating the hell out of it. We have a central bank, fiat money, antitrust laws, massive government spending, subsidies, bailouts, special privileges to certain businesses, government sponsored enterprises, tax incentives used for social engineering, welfare statism, offensive rather than defensive wars, SEC, FDIC, HUD, FDA...
We calculate that beforehand. The goal is that we want to bring a certain product to the people. We calculate how much resources is needed to produce that product. Then an automated factory can produce it and automated transport vehicles bring it to people.
People really don't understand the awesome beauty of the Free Market and the destructive power of government intervention. Free Markets are voluntary action, but governments are force and violence. if you want to learn about economics, i would recommend Milton Friedman, Henry Hazlitt, and when your ready, Murray Rothbard.
The efficiency is the reaso of the capitalism will always win. Address efficiency from a collective standpoint without sacrificing freedom and you will have solved the problems of communism.
"Private property ownership is the foundation of freedom." The founding fathers thought the same thing and that was the reason for awhile that the Declaration said the "Pursuit of Property." Then they realized not everyone will get that chance so they changed it to "Pursuit of Happiness." Sounds better and nicer. I don't think for a second that private property is a necessity of freedom. If it was we'd be much more inclined toward providing such a freedom to everyone... but clearly we haven't.
I'm not saying that it is always immoral to have personal goals. I'm just saying that a reasonable person should always try to achieve their goals in ways that are not exclusive to the goals of others. A also think it is sometimes fair to expect people to sacrifice some of their goals to accommodate the goals of others. I think we should learn as much as we can about human nature, then create a system that best fits that nature. I think human nature can be both selfish and altruistic.
I'm very interested in the origins of the idea that the free market is still a good thing in the technology-flourished world we have today. Correct me if I'm wrong, but It seems to me that it's your impression that the free market is still a very good way to build a society up upon today. The first question I have is: What is the purpose of the free market?
I didn't say it doesn't require justification. What we experience is the pleasure itself. That doesn't justify any particular action that gives us pleasure.
Just to be clear, barter is when two people have produced something and trade it through a spot trade. These happened mainly through long distance trades and by people who didn't know each other. A debt/credit relationship is when you have lent a person something as a mutuum: he is a "debtor." The parties may not even know what they want back from the debtor. No anthropologist has ever observed the Austrian account of barter (i.e. 10 chickens for 1 pig) resulting in money.
I never said the quote you ascribed to me. However, I do believe that all people should have equal access to societies basic goods, based on the principle that it is unjust for social institutions to reward morally arbitrary traits. If a person produces much it is because he is genetically gifted and he was raised well. Not all people have those advantages, and just because a person was born wrong doesn't mean he deserves to die. All people have the right to life.
To say that 'being treated fairly' is subjective, you are right, but then everything falls apart. By that logic, saying that murder is wrong is also subjective.
The right to decide who rules over you is a Basic Individual Right, and it's even mentioned in the declaration of independence. This means workers should have the right to fire their employers.
You missed my point. It doesn't matter why a moral action is performed (selfishly or altruistically), just so long as the moral deed is done. Selfishness vs altruism is entirely beside the point. "The bad man desires arbitrary power. What moves the evil man is the love of injustice." - John Rawls.
One problem, or at least incompleteness, I see with the Marxian crisis explanation: The United States was the OECD country with the worst wage repression and income divergence since the 1970s - yet the deepest economic depression seems to be in Europe, especially the PIIGS. So while I agree that income divergence was one of the main driving forces leading up to this crisis, there must have been other factors besides the degree of income divergence that determined how hard the crisis hit a given nation's economy; namely, the feasibility of the Eurozone.
Also the US has the reserve currency of the world, which means it can print money almost without consequence - it has used this ability to spend and spend, thereby softening the crisis. European countries can't just print money, or at least not so much, and so have been forced into austerity.
The anonymous internet professor barks "never a means of 'enforcing punishment.': "There is every reason to believe that our own money started the same way-even the English word “to pay” is originally derived from a word for “to pacify, appease”-as in, to give someone something precious, for instance, to express just how badly you feel about having just killed someone’s brother in a drunken brawl, and how much you would really like to avoid this becoming the basis for an ongoing blood-feud. "
