Why is Socialism et al, a bad thing?

[pip]

Well why?
I'm really rather interested to hear what kind of strange occult things are belived to go on under its guise.

3...2...1...

ELUCIDATE!

[Blse]

Considering the confusion of what constitutes socialism, let me give the technical poli sci definition first:

What is it?

Socialism is hard to define first and foremost - it ranges from the mild central European social democracy to Stalinist tyranny. The core idea is that the market system features an inherent class struggle between capital (those who own the factors of production) and labor (those who must sell their time and labor to capital). Labor is seen as the inherently weaker, albeit more populous party. Since capital can refuse to pucharse the labor of workers, but workers cannot live without selling their labor, capital has the inherent advantage and is poised to exploit labor. That is basic Marxist theory and all forms of Marxism follow one or another version of this theory.

Socialists adopt the Marxist view of captalist society as being defined by the minority that is capital exploting the majority that is labor. They therefore advocate government action to remedy the power imbalance between capital and labor. Typically this means marganinalizing or strongly tampering the market system. In the most extreme cases, it has meant outright centralized control of the economy.

Why is it bad?

Because the market system tends to be more efficient in raising living standards than any other system (so long as certain conditions like perfect information and perfect competition are present, it automatically aligns private and public interest to create a situation in which people's needs and desires are quickly met). The tampering advocated by socialists tends to introduce inefficiencies. Typically it distorts incentives - it gives some people the incentive to over-produce and others the incentive to underproduce. Centralization or complete nationalization is a complete disaster because a central buraucracy is simply unable to re-create the incentive structure needed to maintain a complex economy. The result is lackluster economic growth, which may, depending on the extent of socialist policy, keep an entire country impoverished.

From a liberal (classic or modern) point of view, many of the interventions socialists advocate for the sake of resolving the inherent class conflict in capitalism seem as a blow to liberty. Liberals generally beleive that coercion should always be minimized. Thus, unless a market failure occurs, government should keep out as much as possible (this applies to the Obama administration too by the way, since socialism is not present within the mainstream of American politics). Since liberals do not think of capitalist society as being defined by an inherent class struggle but rather as a collection of free agents making decisions as to which path of action best serves their interests, socialists' tampering of the market system looks like an uneccessary and thus unjust infringement on liberty.

Lastly, most forms of socialism have failed to fundamentally reduce class conflict. Cuba and the USSR were defined (in the case of Cuba "is") by a stark contrast between a ruling class and a subordinate class. If anything class conflict there seems more pronounced. In central Europe, socialism has not replaced the market system and all European countries are currently capitalist. Here socialism has merely created a welfare state regime that has reduced inequality but may have done so at the expense of economic efficiency (per reasoning above).

Hope that answers some of your questions. If you have more don't hestitate to ask... poli sci is my main field of expertise afterall.

[Prunesquallor]

It isn't.

[phej]

It isn't.

Why?

(answer before the mods eradicate both posts.)

[LaoTzu]

I'd rather share a beer with my neighbour than kill him in the Octagon.

That's why I'm Canadian (read:Socialist), and not American(read:Capitalist)

:)

[hubcap]

All "isms" are about who gets to be in charge of the resources. Advocates of the various "isms" will all use some emotional plea in order to advocate why their views are correct, but the bottom line is it IS about control.

Socialism is a system in which the government gets to be in charge of the resources. There are varying degrees of socialism, and varying degrees of relative wealth or poverty in those nations. Complete government control of resources is typically only seen in countries that practice communism. Compare Cuba and Canada. Both are technically socialistic but Canada has a much higher average standard of living than Cuba.

My personal view is that capitalism is a much better system of resource allocation, plus the individual decides on how to best pursue his wants and needs.

I believe government is inherently inefficient compared to private industry as there is no compelling reason for government to be efficient, while in private industry if a company is inefficient they go out of business..........unless the government gives them a bailout.

Here is a link where Milton Friedman explains why capitalism is a superior system to allocate resources.

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[larkin]

I'd rather share a beer with my neighbour than kill him in the Octagon.

That's why I'm Canadian (read:Socialist), and not American(read:Capitalist)

I love Canadians (I swear!) but they're not socialist. On the spectrum, further to the left than the U.S., certainly. I make this distinction because some of the posters to this forum are quite content to brand any state intervention, any regulation at all of the supposedly free market here in the U.S. as "creeping socialism" - stuff like the really awful, anti-free market laws prohibiting child labor and establishing the 40-hour work week.

As for why socialism is "such a bad thing", I think Blse gave a very thorough definition of why I would call myself a modern liberal (or a libertarian socialist, by other countries' definitions) rather than a socialist. But from a political messaging perspective, the answer is The Cold War.

In the U.S., saying someone is a communist is a slur on par with being a nazi. But while calling someone that today is just a little too McCarthy-like for the public debate (still, there's been a truly appalling resurgence of Joe McCarthy sycophants on the far right), calling someone a socialist has become the next best thing. It's the new communist!

It has the added benefit over the communist slur of merely triggering people's fears of things without having to say, in public, the rather laughable and false accusations they mean to imply. (Although, the less those fears are triggered, the more openly they have to be said, hence the town hall meetings.) And most of the people who toss it around casually have no idea what the distinction between communism, socialism, and what basic regulation actually is. Nor do they care.

[SelfMadeBum]

We have a Democratic Socialist state here and it works for us. The government provides from taxes many necessary services (transport, roads, school etc.) yet we enjoy individual liberty. It's kind of halfway.

There's nothing evil about socialism. As a matter of fact, I think the free market has the potential for much more harm than good.





SelfMadeBum added to this post, 6 minutes and 39 seconds later...

My personal view is that capitalism is a much better system of resource allocation, plus the individual decides on how to best pursue his wants and needs.

I believe government is inherently inefficient compared to private industry as there is no compelling reason for government to be efficient, while in private industry if a company is inefficient they go out of business..........unless the government gives them a bailout.My problem with that view is simple - The objectives of private enterprise and that of a government are vastly different. For businesses, the first priority is profit, not the welfare of the people, as a government's first concern. Therefore I do not trust private companies to provide certain services that are necessary. Yes, they may be more efficient, but when you put the welfare of citizens in the hands of private companies, they have control over pricing and the quality of the product/service. If persons are priced out, they have no recourse.

The government may not provide the best product/service, but at least their aim is to provide for all, and not only who can afford it. So let private businesses do their thing and let the citizens who can afford it go to them but the ones who can't afford it need their governments to provide an alternative.

Health care is an excellent example.

[Zsych]

*looks at the medical system in the US, and realizes what happens when capitalism hits something that people seriously want/need*

Everyone acting independently, and people working to their own overall benefit - not something I'm likely to believe in.. if only because I know I don't do a great job of it myself.

As for socialism - I think the base idea wasn't that horrible, but as Blse says, managing incentives can be a problem if things are improperly managed.. or rather.. whatever idea you're dealing with, ultimately its the details of the implementation that make it good or bad, and we have no awesome implementations of socialism as reference (except perhaps the progress China managed to make - which has definitely been raising the standard of living there).

Democracy too and the capitalist system, has no awesome implementations.. although the US has survived so far, I honestly don't expect it to be doing too well 20 years from now. And if you look at the laws that exist, and many of things that happen... its insanity.

The world needs a better system of government. The problem is that the creation of such a system requires huge amounts of power, and motivating the masses, which is not easy to do - plus, there's the bigger question of what such a superior system would be.
I think that at least, all of the laws and legal precedents in the US, need to be reviewed for why they exist, whether they make sense, and whether or not they just need to be booted.

[phej]

There's nothing evil about socialism. As a matter of fact, I think the free market has the potential for much more harm than good.
I respectfully disagree, independent of is a choice between varying amounts of the "free market" or "socialism," both have same potential for harm. The problem is not the system, but the people in the system. (This explains why a utopian versions of socialism or capitalism are doomed to failure.)
My problem with that view is simple - The objectives of private enterprise and that of a government are vastly different. For businesses, the first priority is profit, not the welfare of the people, as a government's first concern. Therefore I do not trust private companies to provide certain services that are necessary. Yes, they may be more efficient, but when you put the welfare of citizens in the hands of private companies, they have control over pricing and the quality of the product/service. If persons are priced out, they have no recourse.
The free marketers will counter with the claim that although profit is a priority, the consumer can always vote with her feet and dollars which aligns private companies with consumers.

[rickster]

I love Canadians (I swear!) but they're not socialist. On the spectrum, further to the left than the U.S., certainly. I make this distinction because some of the posters to this forum are quite content to brand any state intervention, any regulation at all of the supposedly free market here in the U.S. as "creeping socialism" - stuff like the really awful, anti-free market laws prohibiting child labor and establishing the 40-hour work week.

As for why socialism is "such a bad thing", I think Blse gave a very thorough definition of why I would call myself a modern liberal (or a libertarian socialist, by other countries' definitions) rather than a socialist. But from a political messaging perspective, the answer is The Cold War.

In the U.S., saying someone is a communist is a slur on par with being a nazi. But while calling someone that today is just a little too McCarthy-like for the public debate (still, there's been a truly appalling resurgence of Joe McCarthy sycophants on the far right), calling someone a socialist has become the next best thing. It's the new communist!

It has the added benefit over the communist slur of merely triggering people's fears of things without having to say, in public, the rather laughable and false accusations they mean to imply. (Although, the less those fears are triggered, the more openly they have to be said, hence the town hall meetings.) And most of the people who toss it around casually have no idea what the distinction between communism, socialism, and what basic regulation actually is. Nor do they care.

Yeah American jingoism is getting a bit less difficult to stomach with each passing year, as the country heads down the crapper thanks to unregulated capitalism.

And while still the richest country on the planet, the US can't manage to do what most other countries have managed to do: find the will to provide some universal healthcare, without bitching about the cost like it's the 11th fucking Commandment being violated.

For all its shortcomings, here in Australia at least 20,000 people aren't dying each year because of no health care, and the economy seems to be doing much better than the U.S.

Capitalism as a religion? Shove it. It's bullshit.

[Tristan]

...the market system tends to be more efficient in raising living standards than any other system (so long as certain conditions like perfect information and perfect competition are present, it automatically aligns private and public interest to create a situation in which people's needs and desires are quickly met).

We can't harness perfect information or competition. They don't exist, and planners are hot and quick to remind us of that. But most interestingly, the absence of perfect information and perfect competition is exactly what prevents a socialist economy from working as planned, either. Everything which plagues a capitalist system, "market failures," they are so named, plagues a socialist system in mirror-image fashion. Where there is income inequality under capital, there is political inequality under labor. Concentration of power prevents any possible gains to peoples' standard of living. Socialized workers are the modern descendants of guildsmen, and they form a brotherhood aimed at protecting their profession with every political trick a manufacturer uses to kill competition in his sector. Political capital takes the place of financial capital, and a socialist system is all based on who you know, if not so much what you have. There is a power elite sitting atop the socialist heap that can work the bureaucracy to obtain whatever it wants and do what it pleases, at least within the same limits as the business power elite we tend to hear about more often. The strong still prey upon the weak, the only difference being that strength is measured by a different ruler. The failure of corporations to act with decisive foresight is replaced by the failure of government to do the same. Peoples' reluctance to give to charity is replaced by an obtuse redistribution effort that nets no greater benefits for the poor. Artificially boosting peoples' means simply causes real prices to rise, and historically, efforts to control prices have invariably led to the most disastrous abuses of all.

[WaeV]

There's nothing evil about socialism. As a matter of fact, I think the free market has the potential for much more harm than good.
Why do you think that?


The objectives of private enterprise and that of a government are vastly different. For businesses, the first priority is profit, not the welfare of the people, as a government's first concern. Therefore I do not trust private companies to provide certain services that are necessary. Yes, they may be more efficient, but when you put the welfare of citizens in the hands of private companies, they have control over pricing and the quality of the product/service. If persons are priced out, they have no recourse.
It is in my opinion better to have a free market because while businesses' priority is profit, when you add a citizen with money into the picture the goal becomes that citizen's welfare. See, the business wants to make money, and the way to do that is to trade goods or services for the citizen's money. If the citizen's priority is his own welfare, than the system's priority (business + consumer) becomes the citizen's welfare.

Free Market System:
Government's priority: Citizens' (and by extension businesses') rights
Businesses' priority: Profit (Enabled to make profit by gov't)
Citizens' priority: Their own welfare (Enabled to free choice by gov't)
Overall system priority: Welfare of citizens

The free market is a very liquid system. Those who provide the most goods or services for other get the most money (in theory), and those with the most money have the most power to determine what goods or services get sent their way. Thus one's consumption is linked to one's production.

If the government's priority is man's welfare directly, however, then the businesses and citizens do not require a priority.

Socialist System:
Government's priority: Citizens' welfare
Businesses appropriated by the government
Citizens' priority: Irrelevant
Overall system priority: Welfare of citizens

Since one's consumption is no longer tied to one's production, it makes the most sense to set the consumption of all citizens to an equal amount. (If you wanted the two tied together in the first place you should have stayed with a free market.) Rather than each person deciding what they need for themselves, everyone decides what everyone needs (assuming a democracy is kept - and I hope you aren't suggesting a dictatorship/socialism combo).

The government may not provide the best product/service, but at least their aim is to provide for all, and not only who can afford it. So let private businesses do their thing and let the citizens who can afford it go to them but the ones who can't afford it need their governments to provide an alternative.
Only if those who do not use the welfare system are not required to support it. Otherwise, the citizen who "can't afford" something could be the guy that wasted his paycheck rather than pay the bills. You can front the check for the welfare system, I'll go live in Galt's Gulch.




*looks at the medical system in the US, and realizes what happens when capitalism hits something that people seriously want/need*
*looks at the Veteran's socialized medical system in the US, and realizes what happens when socialism hits something that people seriously want/need*

Everyone acting independently, and people working to their own overall benefit - not something I'm likely to believe in.. if only because I know I don't do a great job of it myself.
You would rather have someone else run your life for you? You would have the government's purpose to be your welfare rather than your freedom?

As for socialism - I think the base idea wasn't that horrible, but as Blse says, managing incentives can be a problem if things are improperly managed.. or rather.. whatever idea you're dealing with, ultimately its the details of the implementation that make it good or bad, and we have no awesome implementations of socialism as reference (except perhaps the progress China managed to make - which has definitely been raising the standard of living there).
I haven't been looking at China. I'll have to skip this one.

Democracy too and the capitalist system, has no awesome implementations.. although the US has survived so far, I honestly don't expect it to be doing too well 20 years from now. And if you look at the laws that exist, and many of things that happen... its insanity.
I don't expect capitalism in the US to be doing so well in 20 years either. A trend mayhaps?

The world needs a better system of government. The problem is that the creation of such a system requires huge amounts of power, and motivating the masses, which is not easy to do - plus, there's the bigger question of what such a superior system would be.
I think that at least, all of the laws and legal precedents in the US, need to be reviewed for why they exist, whether they make sense, and whether or not they just need to be booted.
Mm, I could agree with that. As long as they are judged with the ideals of the constitution held in mind.

[hubcap]

Yeah American jingoism is getting a bit less difficult to stomach with each passing year, as the country heads down the crapper thanks to unregulated capitalism.

Do you really think capitalism is unregulated in the United States?

If so I would suggest you come here and try to start or run a business.

[Doppelbock]

Socialism has been shown, repeatedly throughout history, to not work very well. For a much better argument than I can ever present of *why* it fails, I refer you to F. A. Hayek's "The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism."

[rickster]

Do you really think capitalism is unregulated in the United States?

If so I would suggest you come here and try to start or run a business.

Yes. The current shortage of money is a direct result of banking regulations being steadily eroded since they were put in place after the Great Depression. That's why it's so hard to start or capitalize a business now. If you're talking about a small business of course, no capitalist countries in practice ever support small business - despite saturation spin that they do.

Much as I love Americans and the Constitution, I came to despise what the country was becoming and bailed out 15 years ago. My quality of life here is much better. :)

[hubcap]

Yes. The current shortage of money is a direct result of banking regulations being steadily eroded since they were put in place after the Great Depression. That's why it's so hard to start or capitalize a business now.

Much as I love Americans and the Constitution, I came to despise what the country was becoming and bailed out 15 years ago. My quality of life here is much better. :)
No system is perfect. However, regulatory expansion has been the rule rather the opposite in this country since the Reagan administration.

Glad the Australian thing is working out for you. What about the way the crime rate has shot up there since the government took away the people's guns?

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[themuzicman]

Well why?
I'm really rather interested to hear what kind of strange occult things are belived to go on under its guise.

3...2...1...

ELUCIDATE!

Technically, socialism is government control of the means of production and distribution. Thus, something becomes increasingly socialized when the government begins to take control of it.

For some things, this is good. Roads are an excellent example. There is simply no good market solution to a coherent road system. However, we can observe our government run road system and see more than enough fraud, waste and corruption on a governmental level to make us question whether it really is best. But no one has come up with a coherent solution yet.

However, for those areas where multiple companies may compete, socialism is bad. When the government controls an industry, there is no competition, and thus no incentive for improvement, for cost cutting, for serving the customer. The entity moves at the whim of the government and the political controls that exist around it. Thus, you have the postal service. Inefficient, high costs and wasteful. Competition from private companies have forced the postal service to improve it's package delivery, and this has had some spill over into letter delivery, but everyone still understands "it got lost in the mail." (Don't get me wrong, we should have a postal service so everyone gets mail, but it's not the best service in the world.)


So, why is socialism bad? Experience tells us that it is ultimately a failure. the USSR was a socialist/communist nation (socialism was the economics, communism was the politics.) Their centrally managed economy simply could not take what should have been an excellent opportunity to produce and sell natural resources, and bungled it miserably. They could hardly feed themselves. And the primary reason was government control. People simply aren't motivated to perform when their employer has no motivation to excel.


Same applies for medical care. What we see in socialized medical care around the world is that governments don't look for inefficiencies to cut costs and improve service. They find ways to ration care. The elderly are euthanized or at least advised to go home and die. Those requiring expensive surgery are put on long waiting lists, so that a certain percentage will die before getting what they need. Or people are sent to third world countries for surgery to save money. Ultimately governments solve cost problems by reducing and limiting services rather than cutting costs and improving efficiencies because they have no competition, and the former is just easier. One only need look at attempts to remove fraud and waste from medicare and medicaid in the past to see that governments don't do those things well.


So, regardless of all the logical arguments and philosophical pontifications, History and experience tells us that socialism is ultimately bad and a failure because the government is running it. The evidence is all over necessary government run institutions from the military to the post office.

And, in the end, history trumps logic every time.

[rickster]

No system is perfect. However, regulatory expansion has been the rule rather the opposite in this country since the Reagan administration.

Glad the Australian thing is working out for you. What about the way the crime rate has shot up there since the government took away the people's guns?

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Are you kidding? The Deregulation & Money Control Act of '80? Garn - St Germain '82? repeal of Glass - Steagall in '99?

Oh yeah the guns thing - I'm a NY boy and they confiscated my weapons @ Sydney International Airport...bastards! It's come back to bite them on the ass: I could have kept a lot of crime at bay. :)

[hubcap]

Are you kidding? The Deregulation & Money Control Act of '80? Garn - St Germain '82? repeal of Glass - Steagall in '99?

I was referring to all regulation not just financial regulation. If you don't believe that governmental regulation is onerus just try to build an oil refinery or a chemical plant.

[themuzicman]

Regulation isnt' socialism. Granted that sufficient regulation begins to cause an industry to take on socialist issues (see AT&T pre-breakup), but regulation itself isn't socialism.

[SirJac]

So, regardless of all the logical arguments and philosophical pontifications, History and experience tells us that socialism is ultimately bad and a failure because the government is running it. The evidence is all over necessary government run institutions from the military to the post office.

And, in the end, history trumps logic every time.

What about public education? It's certainly a market where private companies can compete, but I don't think you could seriously argue that doing away with public education would be good for any nation over the long term.

I'm of the opinion that any ideology is inheritly bad. Good ideas can come from them and should be utilized but fully embracing an ideology is never the best choice. Capitalism gives us the idea of market forces, utilization of market forces in public policy is a good idea since it makes it more efficent. Socialism identifies inherit inequalities that weaken the base of a nation, giving some ideas of how that base can be strengthened.

Even though the two ideologies are mutaully exclusive, the good ideas that spring from them are not. Concepts such as internal markets or private/public partnerships can be utilized to take advantage of the best of both worlds and give results far better then can be achieved by either ideology alone.

The post office is actually a great example of using ideas from both socialism and capitalism to give enhanced service. Government run post office gives a basic service at relatively low costs that is available to anyone, but has its weaknesses. Consumers looking for enhanced service instead have the option to go to a private company such as fedex for faster service and enchanced tracibility at a higher cost. Both work together to give far better service then could be acheived by embracing one or the other.

[jtcambridge]

Socialism as embodied by the original set of Marxist political organizations is merely a temporary state preceeding communism. The elimination of private markets and the collectivization of certain key industries (namely agriculture) has consistently resulted in capitalistic reform at the end of the day. See Russia from Stalin to Khruschev and China from Mao Zedong to Deng Xiaoping. The most efficient way of running things seems to be by way of centrally planned technocracy, which in itself naturally tends to form an elitist class. This inherently defies the definition of an egalitarian society and can only be corrected at the expense of efficiency, thus at the expense of the living standard of people.

The original response was the best one though. I kind of answered the question from an assumed angle. The short answer is that maximum efficiency isn't achievable under the ideals of communism/socialism/any other egalitarian society oriented approach to government. I'm assuming the goal is maximum efficiency over social justice, though, which may be a bad way to answer the question either way.

*shrugs*

[Prunesquallor]

Why?

(answer before the mods eradicate both posts.)

Well bad governments, ie dicatatorships pretending to be communist/socialist are bad. (Which is why the Soviet Union is a bad example)

Insane jingoistic capitalistic welfare-hating homeless-hating, equality-hating nations are also bad.

Since the government has more control, one needs to have a very good democratic system in place (ie, not Russia). This the will of the government really is, overall, the will of the people instead of imposed from above as if the government is some alien outside organisation (a very common characterisation of government in the States, but then, your "democracy" is pretty weak). If you have a genuinely representative government, then serving the citizens is the #1 incentive, not a casualty "side effect" of profit and competition.

(That said, keeping hold of some powers/options/etc. an possibilities of resistance for when/if the government proves inadequate/goes rogue is an important consideration.)

It also helps a country react properly to things like climate change, environmental protection, health, education etc. things that are not necessarily profitable and huge corporations would not do on their own because they're greedy bastards and don't care about consequences down the line. And no, we don't put senior citizens on ice floes, leaving them to perish. But a certain capitalistic system does allow poor people to die like flies (but then, they don't matter anyway, do they? They're probably lazy and it's all their own fault.:rolleyes:)

I would still prefer 100% socialist over 100% capitalism, but I'm not sure that the extremes of either are that great. Leaving a little breathing room is probably best. But towards the socialism side. Yep.

[themuzicman]

What about public education? It's certainly a market where private companies can compete, but I don't think you could seriously argue that doing away with public education would be good for any nation over the long term.

That would depend on what replaced it. If you mean that there was no requirement for children to attend school, you'd be correct. if there was such a requirement, along with assistance for the poor, our education system might be improved.

I'm of the opinion that any ideology is inheritly bad. Good ideas can come from them and should be utilized but fully embracing an ideology is never the best choice. Capitalism gives us the idea of market forces, utilization of market forces in public policy is a good idea since it makes it more efficent. Socialism identifies inherit inequalities that weaken the base of a nation, giving some ideas of how that base can be strengthened.

I don't necessarily disagree. I think I said that socialization for things that cannot exist in a competitive setting was appropriate.

Even though the two ideologies are mutaully exclusive, the good ideas that spring from them are not. Concepts such as internal markets or private/public partnerships can be utilized to take advantage of the best of both worlds and give results far better then can be achieved by either ideology alone.

I don't think there really is any such thing as a private/public partnership. Ultimately it becomes a government controlled entity.

The post office is actually a great example of using ideas from both socialism and capitalism to give enhanced service. Government run post office gives a basic service at relatively low costs that is available to anyone, but has its weaknesses. Consumers looking for enhanced service instead have the option to go to a private company such as fedex for faster service and enchanced tracibility at a higher cost. Both work together to give far better service then could be acheived by embracing one or the other.

The USPS could give up package delivery and only do letters with little real effect on the industry.

[larkin]

I was referring to all regulation not just financial regulation. If you don't believe that governmental regulation is onerus just try to build an oil refinery or a chemical plant.

Yes, regulatory restrictions have increased for industries with environmental concerns, thanks to incidents like Love Canal, among others. Although enforcement is still lacking and is dependent on the administration.

Below is a list of industries - some financial, some otherwise - that have been deregulated in the U.S. post-Reagan:

- Energy
- Electricity Supply
- Banking
- Insurance
- Telecommunications
- Home Mortgage (remember home mortgage deregulation?)

[hubcap]

The government regulates practically everything, and the regulations have on the whole become exponentially greater during the last 3 administrations.

I doubt that you can purchase any good or service that isn't subject to governmental regulation.

[Jack Raiden]

Blse nailed the issue on the head. You can't exactly argue with history about government control.

Capitalism:
Pros:Efficient, Adaptable
Cons:Equality, Exploitation of Labor
Socialism:
Pros: Equality, Fairness
Cons: Inefficient, Stiff

In a fist-fight for survival Capitalism beats Socialism hands down. It all comes down to fundamentals. Don't misunderstand my position, capitalism definitely needs regulation to cut the sting from it.

[larkin]

The government regulates practically everything, and the regulations have on the whole become exponentially greater during the last 3 administrations.

Exponential, huh? What a standard! Any information that backs that up, any at all.

You also may want to check out this article (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) from Reason Magazine (the one from the Cato Institute, natch) explaining how there was no bigger deregulator than Bill Clinton.

[Autoptic]

Socialism:
Pros: Equality, Fairness

Equality isn't fairness when people are different. Some will have more taken. Some will be given more. Those with different requirements won't be allowed to exchange what they have (or would have) for what they want. The mob and their handlers make sure of that while preaching such bullshit.

[hubcap]

Exponential, huh? What a standard! Any information that backs that up, any at all.

You also may want to check out this article (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) from Reason Magazine (the one from the Cato Institute, natch) explaining how there was no bigger deregulator than Bill Clinton.
Thanks, nice article. It was simply about financial deregulation.

Here, try this one on for size. It points out the size of the increase in total regulation during the GWB years.

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Since Bush took office in 2001, there has been a 13 percent decrease in the annual number of new rules. But the new regulations' cost to the economy will be much higher than it was before 2001. Of the new rules, 159 are "economically significant," meaning they will cost at least $100 million a year. That's a 10 percent increase in the number of high-cost rules since 2006, and a 70 percent increase since 2001. And at the end of 2007, another 3,882 rules were already at different stages of implementation, 757 of them targeting small businesses.

Overall, the final outcome of this Republican regulation has been a significant increase in regulatory activity and cost since 2001. The number of pages added to the Federal Register, which lists all new regulations, reached an all-time high of 78,090 in 2007, up from 64,438 in 2001.

[phej]

Equality isn't fairness when people are different. Some will have more taken. Some will be given more. Those with different requirements won't be allowed to exchange what they have (or would have) for what they want. The mob and their handlers make sure of that while preaching such bullshit.

meh.

Which Equality?

Equality = equal treatment under the laws, or
Equality = equal outcomes

(It's just like Liberty...)

[Autoptic]

“From the fact that people are very different it follows that, if we treat them equally, the result must be inequality in their actual position, and that the only way to place them in an equal position would be to treat them differently. Equality before the law and material equality are therefore not only different but are in conflict with each other; and we can achieve either one or the other, but not both at the same time.” Friedrich August Hayek

[Causa Mortis]

I personally accept John Anderson's position that the overall value of a system can be determined by evaluating a system's efficiency, justice, and liberty.

Capitalism as practiced in the US today clearly provides a high level of efficiency, a low level of justice, and a mid-range level of liberty.

Socialism as practiced in Sweden or Norway today represents a net gain over the US system, as they're at least as efficient in many ways, are more just, with little meaningful infringement on liberty.

Socialism as practiced in France or the UK today relative to the US system is basically a tradeoff between efficiency and equity.

Communism as practiced in the USSR and satellites was grossly inefficient after the death of Stalin, less just than even the most capitalistic countries in the world, and provided no liberty.

[Ham]

There is one crippling problem with all political systems, and it has 206 bones, 639 muscles and limited higher brain functions. People are stupid. Our brains are not equipped to cope with the world we've created for ourselves which is why we've developed systems to compensate for that. The problem is that the systems, like us, are imperfect and until we find a way to address that problem things are going to be shit. The only real thing we should be concerned about is having a system that creates a reasonable standard of living.

[hubcap]

The only real thing we should be concerned about is having a system that creates a reasonable standard of living.

We've got that so let's just keep it the way it is and not screw it up with all this notion of somebody's definition of fairness.

[Ray9]

Why is Socialism et al, a bad thing?
Well why?
I'm really rather interested to hear what kind of strange occult things are belived to go on under its guise.

3...2...1...

ELUCIDATE!


Famous capitalists:

1) Thomas Edison

2) Henry Ford

3) Bill Gates


Famous socialists:

1) Adolph Hitler

2) Joseph Stalin

3) Fidel Castro


Capitalist: His business is to give you a job.


Socialist: His job is to give you the business.


Who would you want living across the street from you?

[hubcap]

Socialists are great at giving away other people's money.

The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money.

[larkin]

Here was the original claim:

The government regulates practically everything, and the regulations have on the whole become exponentially greater during the last 3 administrations.

After pointing out that Bill Clinton, in fact, actively promoted deregulation across several industries listed above, including energy (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) (good lord, people's short-term memory regarding Enron) and telecommunications (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), among others, here's your follow-up:

Thanks, nice article. It was simply about financial deregulation. [...] Here, try this one on for size. It points out the size of the increase in total regulation during the GWB years.

I'm not sure what value you think this distinction - it's only about financial regulation, a summary dismissal that actually covers several industries (mortgage, insurance, securities, banking) - actually has. The article focused on financial deregulation, because for obvious reasons it's at the forefront of everyone's mind. But a.) Clinton deregulated far more than just industries related to the finance sector, again, above, and b.) the fact that he did so is in complete contradiction to your previous claim, that for the past three administrations regulation has run amok. Hell, even Carter deregulated the airline and trucking industries; deregulation is a movement that has appealed to both parties since the 70s.

Since Bush took office in 2001, there has been a 13 percent decrease in the annual number of new rules. But the new regulations' cost to the economy will be much higher than it was before 2001. Of the new rules, 159 are "economically significant," meaning they will cost at least $100 million a year. That's a 10 percent increase in the number of high-cost rules since 2006, and a 70 percent increase since 2001. And at the end of 2007, another 3,882 rules were already at different stages of implementation, 757 of them targeting small businesses. [...] Overall, the final outcome of this Republican regulation has been a significant increase in regulatory activity and cost since 2001. The number of pages added to the Federal Register, which lists all new regulations, reached an all-time high of 78,090 in 2007, up from 64,438 in 2001.

The number of pages added to the Federal Register canard, often shallowly used as a proxy for regulatory activity. Even rescinding a regulation previously passed requires another regulation; the "length" of the rules passed has exactly nothing to do with the regulatory burden they may either be imposing or taking away; at the beginning of a term (i.e. 2001) it's difficult to pass regulations because it takes time to draft and process them; at the end of the term (i.e. 2007) the number of regulations always go up because the administration is in a particular hurry to pass all the ones that have been sitting.

In short, federal activity measured by number of pages without context, especially parsed by year, is simply not reflective of the overall political movement from both parties toward deregulation.

[hubcap]

In short, federal activity measured by number of pages without context, especially parsed by year, is simply not reflective of the overall political movement from both parties toward deregulation.
I'm sorry you feel that way.

On the other hand, based on the facts, I draw a different conclusion.

[LaoTzu]

Famous socialists:

1) Adolph Hitler

2) Joseph Stalin

3) Fidel Castro


Seriously?...
Please turn off Hannity and come back to Earth.

The first two were Fascists, and Castro... well you could argue as a soft-fascist.

Communism and Socialism are not the same thing.

[themuzicman]

Thanks, nice article. It was simply about financial deregulation.

Here, try this one on for size. It points out the size of the increase in total regulation during the GWB years.

To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.

Since Bush took office in 2001, there has been a 13 percent decrease in the annual number of new rules. But the new regulations' cost to the economy will be much higher than it was before 2001. Of the new rules, 159 are "economically significant," meaning they will cost at least $100 million a year. That's a 10 percent increase in the number of high-cost rules since 2006, and a 70 percent increase since 2001. And at the end of 2007, another 3,882 rules were already at different stages of implementation, 757 of them targeting small businesses.

Overall, the final outcome of this Republican regulation has been a significant increase in regulatory activity and cost since 2001. The number of pages added to the Federal Register, which lists all new regulations, reached an all-time high of 78,090 in 2007, up from 64,438 in 2001.

(I think what you'll find is that regulation is more a function of who controls congress, rather than the WH.)

[larkin]

(I think what you'll find is that regulation is more a function of who controls congress, rather than the WH.)

Nope - regulation (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.), by the definition hubcap is using, is exclusively a process of the executive/administrative branch.

[Undead Bonzi]

Famous capitalists:

1) Thomas Edison

2) Henry Ford

3) Bill Gates


Famous socialists:

1) Adolph Hitler

2) Joseph Stalin

3) Fidel Castro


Capitalist: His business is to give you a job.


Socialist: His job is to give you the business.

Who would you want living across the street from you?

An eloquent rebuttal of Ray9's post brought to you by the multi-quote feature.

All "isms" are about who gets to be in charge of the resources. Advocates of the various "isms" will all use some emotional plea in order to advocate why their views are correct, but the bottom line is it IS about control.

In the U.S., saying someone is a communist is a slur on par with being a nazi. But while calling someone that today is just a little too McCarthy-like for the public debate (still, there's been a truly appalling resurgence of Joe McCarthy sycophants on the far right), calling someone a socialist has become the next best thing. It's the new communist!

And most of the people who toss it around casually have no idea what the distinction between communism, socialism, and what basic regulation actually is. Nor do they care.

Yeah American jingoism is getting a bit less difficult to stomach with each passing year

Capitalism as a religion? Shove it. It's bullshit.

[Ray9]

The first two were Fascists, and Castro... well you could argue as a soft-fascist.

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Socialism can create no wealth. What is does create is an equality of misery that provides fertile soil for the destruction of personal freedom and individual liberty. This is what leads to war because all socialism eventually identifies other forms successful of governance as the oppressor of socialsm and the culprits responsible for socialism's miseries.

[Causa Mortis]

To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.



Socialism can create no wealth. What is does create is an equality of misery that provides fertile soil for the destruction of personal freedom and individual liberty. This is what leads to war because all socialism eventually identifies other forms successful of governance as the oppressor of socialsm and the culprits responsible for socialism's miseries.

The economic systems under Stalin, Mao, and Hitler were almost totally disparate in terms of their practices on private property (Stalin - none, Mao - very little, Hitler - private property rights not generally usurped for ethnic Germans), the degree of truly centralized control (Stalin - total, Mao - some, Hitler - some from 1939-1943 near total from 1943-1945), and the role of prices (Stalin - prices did not distribute resources in any meaningful sense, Mao - they weren't centralized enough to truly control prices, Hitler - prices largely distributed resources for non-military goods). I would even assert that the US and the UK each intervened more heavily in their markets until Speer took over the Nazi economy.

You're just lumping everyone unpopular together under "socialist" to try and make a political point.

Secondly, socialism can actually create wealth insofar as it creates a stable political environment and leans against the wind in terms of business cycles. See the work of John Maynard Keynes and the attitude of many business leaders of the 1950s and 1960s on the role of the basic social welfare state.

In short, too many platitudes, not enough consideration of the actual issues at hand.

[Ray9]

Today our lives are easier, safer and healthier due to capitalism. The world has benefited greatly from advancements brought forth by capitalist investors and bankers. Electricity, the automobile, the computer. Can anyone name anything comparable that has come from socialism or socialist thinking? Massive beaurocracies to keep tabs on people doesn't count. Does anyone deny that millions who are alive today would not exist if socialism had held sway in the west? You know very well that their grandparents and great grandparents would have succumbed long ago to small pox, polio and pneumonia if they had relied on socialism to save them.

[hubcap]

Secondly, socialism can actually create wealth insofar as it creates a stable political environment and leans against the wind in terms of business cycles. See the work of John Maynard Keynes and the attitude of many business leaders of the 1950s and 1960s on the role of the basic social welfare state.

In short, too many platitudes, not enough consideration of the actual issues at hand.
Socialism creates no wealth.

Only people can create wealth. More wealth is created in a capitalistic enviornment than any other yet devised. The only problem with capitalism is that some people don't approve of the way the wealth is distributed.

Redistribution of wealth never eradicates poverty. Look at how much money has been spent just in this country since FDR's "New Deal" and combine that with the increase in spending via LBJ's "Great Society". If money could eliminate poverty it would have been done already.

People need go back to what works................and abandon that which just sounds good.

[Tristan]

Famous capitalists:

1) Thomas Edison

2) Henry Ford

3) Bill Gates


Famous socialists:

1) Adolph Hitler

2) Joseph Stalin

3) Fidel Castro

This is a totally unfair and vacuous comparison. Mark one more point for Godwin's Law as well *ding*

[rickster]

People need go back to what works................and abandon that which just sounds good.

And exactly what works? In your opinion, of course...:rolleyes:

[Ool]

The problem about socialism is that it’s a centralized system that lets institutions take care of logistical problems who are not necessarily vested in implementing the most efficient solutions, leading to bottlenecks, waste, etc.

Streamlining economic distribution should take advantage of people’s self-interest in making a profit from finding pockets of demand in their environment that they can service with supply themselves. It’s a time-honored, well-proven method at this point in time.

But that only works where fulfilling such demand is actually profitable for a private party. In instances where it isn’t you still need non-profit institutions filling the gap, and often the only party that can guarantee the existence of such an institution is the government.

This is what is usually done best in a social market economy, as practiced in western Europe, as opposed to socialism, which is what they had behind the Iron Curtain before the Cold War ended.


The main misconception Americans seem to have is that they think what western European countries have been practicing since the end of World War II is actually socialism, which it isn’t. The right characterizes it that way, but so does the left, which is quite disconcerting. It makes you wonder whether they think they’ve lost the Cold War when the Wall fell in ’89 and it’s actually Soviet Russia’s system (the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) that’s taken over the West, rather than the other way around…

[LaoTzu]

The main misconception Americans seem to have is that they think what western European countries have been practicing since the end of World War II is actually socialism, which it isn’t. The right characterizes it that way, but so does the left, which is quite disconcerting. It makes you wonder whether they think they’ve lost the Cold War when the Wall fell in ’89 and it’s actually Soviet Russia’s system (the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics) that’s taken over the West, rather than the other way around…

So true. Good post.
I was about to say something similar, but I'll just stick to my other point...

The US economy has done very well under capitalism, no doubt. But there's another factor that pro-capitalist folks seem to miss.
Namely, having the largest military in the world actively projecting power and protecting the interests of US corporations has (IMHO) had more of an impact on US economic growth than simply having a 'capitalist' economy.

[rickster]

The US economy has done very well under capitalism, no doubt. But there's another factor that pro-capitalist folks seem to miss.
Namely, having the largest military in the world actively projecting power and protecting the interests of US corporations has (IMHO) had more of an impact on US economic growth than simply having a 'capitalist' economy.

a.k.a the reason the rest of the world has come to despise the US, and sadly Americans as well. And nobody is currently feeling any jealousy as hundreds of thousands of Americans lose their jobs every month. If the US continues in this direction it will come to exactly the same end that befalls all empires: the "largest military in the world" is already stretched beyond its capabilities, and scoring no successes whatsoever.

[Autoptic]

While I'm not supporting the military-industrial complex, do remember that the US forces are acting as highest level defense of most of the other more socialized nations.

[rickster]

While I'm not supporting the military-industrial complex, do remember that the US forces are acting as highest level defense of most of the other more socialized nations.

Yes indeed, and it's a real concern since the US' allies can't necessarily be consistently depended upon for backup military support.

A few generations of Americans have grown up convinced that anything that even smells of isolationism is to be scorned, but it's still within the American psyche and may end up back on the political agenda sooner or later.

[Ool]

The US economy has done very well under capitalism, no doubt. But there's another factor that pro-capitalist folks seem to miss.
Namely, having the largest military in the world actively projecting power and protecting the interests of US corporations has (IMHO) had more of an impact on US economic growth than simply having a 'capitalist' economy.

A military force is also a piece of socialism right in the middle of a capitalist country. It’s run in a centralized fashion, it lets the government take care of its members’ healthcare and pensions, it subsidizes industries at home through gigantic, billion dollar contracts from taxes and not even the right or the libertarians rise up in protest against those.

So aside from being a defensive force it’s also an instrument for taking care of a part of the population that might otherwise be left out in the cold by the free market economy and it offers Keynesian stimuli to the economy.

The only problem with that is that it needs tensions and enemies to justify its existence, so whenever there’s peace in the world and its influence wanes, the lack of a social network begins to grate on the system, whereas if there is an enemy to fortify against the country is doing well.

The Cold War was the ideal situation for inserting just enough socialism into the American system to keep it running smoothly. The War on Angst, on the other hand, didn’t quite deliver—mostly for two reasons: a) Bush decided to make it a prolonged hot war rather than a cold one, and those involve death and destruction rather than merely an insane build-up of arms that are never used and b) he tried to privatize the army and make it into a capitalist venture full of mercenaries, who sucked the government coffers dry while torching their new trucks by the side of the road…

[Causa Mortis]

Today our lives are easier, safer and healthier due to capitalism. The world has benefited greatly from advancements brought forth by capitalist investors and bankers. Electricity, the automobile, the computer. Can anyone name anything comparable that has come from socialism or socialist thinking? Massive beaurocracies to keep tabs on people doesn't count. Does anyone deny that millions who are alive today would not exist if socialism had held sway in the west? You know very well that their grandparents and great grandparents would have succumbed long ago to small pox, polio and pneumonia if they had relied on socialism to save them.

Yawn...remember my statement about platitudes? I guess since I've shown your earlier ones were completely baseless you're going to bring a new round.

Forgive me if I don't think a line by line refutation is in order.




Socialism creates no wealth.

Only people can create wealth. More wealth is created in a capitalistic enviornment than any other yet devised.

People create wealth in part by interacting through social systems. Socialism as practiced in Norway, Sweden, and Finalnd does at least a good a job in generating wealth as our mixed system does, and they have no meaningful social inequality.

Redistribution of wealth never eradicates poverty. Look at how much money has been spent just in this country since FDR's "New Deal" and combine that with the increase in spending via LBJ's "Great Society". If money could eliminate poverty it would have been done already.

Our attempts at more progressive forms of government have failed in large part because of an emphasis on corporate welfare that runs through both parties.

Additionally - and I have no issue in debating the infinite number of points on either topic - the New Deal was a bit of a mixed bag from an economic perspective, and the structure of Great Society reforms was and is flatly asinine in light of shifting demographic trends. Both were in large part designed to appease varioius political and economic interests, not the general welfare of the people.

People need go back to what works................and abandon that which just sounds good.

I'd agree, and "what works" is largely a matter of social choice. Conservatives like to set up a strong efficiency or equity dichotomy when really there isn't one - you can have both, it just takes capable government.

I know the old argument - conservatives say government can't work because government is an inherently corrupt social institution. I also know they then go out and get elected to prove their own point.

[Ham]

Socialism creates no wealth.

Only people can create wealth. More wealth is created in a capitalistic enviornment than any other yet devised. The only problem with capitalism is that some people don't approve of the way the wealth is distributed.Socialism and capitalism are not mutually exclusive. You can make the pie bigger and spread it around at the same time. Have you ever considered that you might have been taken in by the anti-communist propaganda which seems to have a hold on a lot of people, even today.

Redistribution of wealth never eradicates poverty. Look at how much money has been spent just in this country since FDR's "New Deal" and combine that with the increase in spending via LBJ's "Great Society". If money could eliminate poverty it would have been done already. Of course not, but you compare what constitutes poverty in the UK (which is still in many ways a welfare state) and Somalia you'll find that the poorest in Britain are very much better off than the poor in Somalia. So if I am to be destitute and homeless, I'd rather have a small dole payment to feed me and access to help to get me off the streets (even if it is inadequate) than have none at all. Paying taxes to know that at the very least I won't starve to death (and have healthcare when I need it) seems quite reasonable to me.

[Urbicande]

Socialism is not bad per se. Same for capitalism and other systems.

Ideology is one thing, implementation another.

Mainly, between socialism and capitalism, there is a difference in the values they advocate.

Socialism is based on community, common need, etc, and individual private needs come after, once the common need is fulfilled.

Capitalism is more based on individuals, that's why people think first about their own needs. That's private property, and so on.

If I remenber right, Marx can also be considered as rather liberal, and he also analysed the needs of each individual over his entire life (one's work must be paid enough to cover his retirement ... e.g. and so on), and analysed the way to fulfill these vital needs as an economist considering what the chosen system must provide.

Socialism and capitalism are political system ... each tied to and economical system, but not to be confused with them.

All the ranges can be covered.

If I remember right again, Communism is the absolute "common" system and Liberalism the absolute "individual" system. Those two for me exclude each other.

In between you have socialism (initially as a temporary system before reaching communism) and capitalism (the other direction). And as said above they do not necessarily exclude each other, the aim of politics being to find the proper equilibrium between "socialist" policies and "capitalist" policies since one must work best on an aspect and the other one work best on antoher aspect.

It is difficult to compare systems and judge them as good or bad per se, because they are not and such a judgement has a lot to do with the way it is run.

As I read above, efficiency is not a good criteria or must be precise, because generally, private more efficient services are more expensive and only the people who can afford it have access to these services.

So it depends a lot on the criteria we apply :-) and the result we are looking for. It also depends on the population of the analysis. And applying one criterium, you should know what you are leaving out.

But I consider that Communism can be compared to Liberalism only to the scale of the Planet (since if we reduce the scale, the number of persons tend to 1 and so you approch liberalism (individuality), so it naturally tends to close up)

Moreover, the people being the same, there is no reason that an administration be run the way a private service is.

I personnaly think that best system is a kind of Mix and Match making distinction between the Regalian Functions (which must be run by the State), Public services (mixed structures) and so on ...

In Europe we often have such mixed systems, especially for Health, Retirement ... for example

[zibber]

The two main points made "against" socialism, as far as I know, unfortunately have nothing to do with socialism.

First, it is said that "free market capitalism" will ultimately benefit "the consumer" ideally. What kind of fantastic, never-before-seen system this is, I do not know. The "free market capitalism" seen all over the world today benefits a small financial elite and leaves every single other person involved in a fight over their scraps. The three richest people in the world (who would not be very rich in socialist system, at least financially (I don't dare bring up spiritual fulfillment)) own more than the 48 poorest countries. Three dudes. Three dudes who are extremely happy with your "free market capitalism".

Second, those opposed to socialism love to bring up the well known socialist projects that were doomed from the start, omitting successful examples of capitalism. China and Russia are not exactly modestly sized countries. "Socialism" there had to be enforced from the start, which means it was absolutely not socialism.

WHY socialism "fails" is because of the easy appeal of mindless consumption. It takes time and effort successfully to establish and sustain a socialist state. People are apparently not willing to co-operate and share. People would rather do the dog-eat-dog thing, attempt constantly to exploit one another and dream of once entering the millionaire club and finally get that long needed golden jacuzzi.

Socialism has been shown, repeatedly throughout history, to not work very well. For a much better argument than I can ever present of *why* it fails, I refer you to F. A. Hayek's "The Fatal Conceit: The Errors of Socialism."

The same goes for capitalism, except there it is the result of exorbitant intentional exploitation and money stockpiling (hedge funds etc). When "socialism" fails, it is a problem of misunderstanding and lingering individualism.

Technically, socialism is government control of the means of production and distribution. Thus, something becomes increasingly socialized when the government begins to take control of it.

For some things, this is good. Roads are an excellent example. There is simply no good market solution to a coherent road system. However, we can observe our government run road system and see more than enough fraud, waste and corruption on a governmental level to make us question whether it really is best. But no one has come up with a coherent solution yet.

This is "capitalist socialism", meaning that it is called socialism while in reality everyone is still competing with each other, antagonizing one another.

This "government" you speak of is a direct representation of "the people", everyone, not some alien organism running things behind closed doors. Well, it shouldn't be. Well, it does seem to be so in capitalism.

While I'm not supporting the military-industrial complex, do remember that the US forces are acting as highest level defense of most of the other more socialized nations.

Oh, do explain.

Hurry.. can't contain myself.. much longer.. such hubris..

[phej]

WHY socialism "fails" is because of the easy appeal of mindless consumption. It takes time and effort successfully to establish and sustain a socialist state. People are apparently not willing to co-operate and share. People would rather do the dog-eat-dog thing, attempt constantly to exploit one another and dream of once entering the millionaire club and finally get that long needed golden jacuzzi.

So, if a given political system can only work if you change human nature, what's the point? (As an aside, people are willing to cooperate and share: we usually share at the tribe-level of things.)

[themuzicman]

This is "capitalist socialism", meaning that it is called socialism while in reality everyone is still competing with each other, antagonizing one another.

Capitalist socialism is impossible. Socialism is government control. There is no competition in government control.

This "government" you speak of is a direct representation of "the people", everyone, not some alien organism running things behind closed doors. Well, it shouldn't be. Well, it does seem to be so in capitalism.


It is eventually so in every government because it is necessary for government to gain power.

[Hamburglar]

So, if a given political system can only work if you change human nature, what's the point?

As a quick response: Politics is human nature, and political systems are only as good as the minds that created them. So if you have brilliant minds who understand the nature of humans within their realm you will have happy people, if you have a bastard developing the system then it will likely be against human nature and strife/violence will reign.

Capitalist socialism is impossible. Socialism is government control. There is no competition in government control.
It is eventually so in every government because it is necessary for government to gain power.

TMM- It is absolutely not impossible. Capitalist economy, Socialist government....you will often hear these referred to as "Social Democracies". Aristotle's truth of the golden mean still applies- usually the middle of two extremes, namely excess and deficiency, you will find the best way to proceed. The challenge is identifying the proper variables to examine on the scale. Arguments like this amplify the need.

There is competition for government control, to think otherwise is foolish. Every year there is an election where billions of dollars are spent to twist politicians to succumb to representing specific interests over the interests of all. You can call liberals socialist, but you neglect that they take in billions of dollars from businesses...how can this be???? Why would businesses pay these politicians to go to the halls of power if they feared a government takeover of their businesses?

[Ool]

Socialism is not bad per se. Same for capitalism and other systems.

Ideology is one thing, implementation another.


Well, I wouldn’t say that. Some ideologies can be labeled evil in that they are unworkable in practice and are bound to lead to something evil and distorted if implemented beyond the abstract visions in the heads of their creators and followers.

Communism was evil in that sense. So is libertarianism. They all sound fairly reasonable on paper, but when put into practice and blended with actual human nature they did or would mutate into something horrible and oppressive: systems like Stalinism or a form of corn-pone Nazism…

[phej]

As a quick response: Politics is human nature, and political systems are only as good as the minds that created them. So if you have brilliant minds who understand the nature of humans within their realm you will have happy people, if you have a bastard developing the system then it will likely be against human nature and strife/violence will reign.

But a political system is composed of two things (1) the people, and (2) it's rules. That's complicating things because people always change the rules, so a political system is just a collection of people. Because it is made up of living people, it is being constantly remade. Some people will have good minds, others won't. If we accept that it is human nature for people to be selfish first, then altruistic; and, that this won't change, how can socialism ever work without some authoritarianism? (We can argue about how much is good or bad, of course)

[Hamburglar]

If we accept that it is human nature for people to be selfish first, then altruistic; and, that this won't change, how can socialism ever work without some authoritarianism? (We can argue about how much is good or bad, of course)

Apply that argument to capitalism and you are on to something.

Socialism is the answer to capitalism's excesses. Conversely, capitalism is the answer to socialism's inefficiencies. Both sides have realized that the two are complimentary forces, and this explains China's rapid movement to adopt what works with capitalism while maintaining many of their socialist policies.

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We, in the US, are in the first quadrant. China would be in the second quadrant. Both should be/are on the march diagonally towards the middle (0,0). Why is (0,0) important? Well my opinion is that each quadrant represents different views of human nature and the only way to achieve political harmony is to govern from the center.

[Ool]

First, it is said that "free market capitalism" will ultimately benefit "the consumer" ideally.

That may actually be true, that if you are a consumer the unregulated capitalist market provides you with more choices of crap to buy. But are there mechanisms in place that ensure that you will be a consumer, rather than a down-and-out bum who can’t afford anything, sleeping in alleyways snaking off between gleaming shopping windows?

What happened in the last few decades in the US was that wages stagnated even though the supply of luxury goods increased while the access to cheap but ultimately deadly loans also increased. That led people to lead their ever more comfortable lives on debt—mostly mortgages—until that bubble burst and it all came crashing down.

And yet while it didn’t crash it was profitable for enough people to keep the system going. This is what you can’t avoid without government regulation and a social safety net taking the edge off raw, laissez-faire capitalism…

[larkin]

Capitalist socialism is impossible.

The term is inexact (as far as I know, but willing to admit I don't know all the ways other countries refer to economic systems), but he's basically referring to the Western European model (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.). Which incorporates elements of both socialism and capitalism - shocking!, I know, but certainly not impossible.

Socialism is government control.

An inaccurate and reductive definition at best; socialism is not uniform, but post- Soviet Union almost all definitions involve a mixture of public and private enterprise (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts._economies_in_theory) .

There is no competition in government control.

While its government is still officially communist, China runs what they refer to as a socialist market economy (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.). So even with widespread government control the possibility for competition exists. (and not that I'm in favor, but indeed, by many standards is kicking our ass. which it owns.)

[themuzicman]

The term is inexact (as far as I know, but willing to admit I don't know all the ways other countries refer to economic systems), but he's basically referring to the Western European model (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.). Which incorporates elements of both socialism and capitalism - shocking!, I know, but certainly not impossible.

And not socialist, at least by the definition. It's heavy government involvement and regulation.

An inaccurate and reductive definition at best; socialism is not uniform, but post- Soviet Union almost all definitions involve a mixture of public and private enterprise (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts._economies_in_theory) .

That's because socialism doesn't work. When it fails, socialists turn to capitalism to cure their ills.

While its government is still officially communist, China runs what they refer to as a socialist market economy (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.). So even with widespread government control the possibility for competition exists. (and not that I'm in favor, but indeed, by many standards is kicking our ass. which it owns.)

Which just means that particular industries are still socialized and some are not.

Obviously on a macro scale any nation will be a mixture of socialism and capitalism, as socialism is simply unsupportable. However, in a given industry, you either have socialism or you do not.

[Ool]

The term is inexact (as far as I know, but willing to admit I don't know all the ways other countries refer to economic systems), but he's basically referring to the Western European model (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.).

Why do we never hear the term “social market economy” in the American discourse? I can understand why a guy like Bernie Sanders would call himself a “socialist” rather than a “social democrat,” which is what he would be over here, because then people would think that he’s with the Democratic Party rather than an independent.

But really, the fact that even the left doesn’t know better than to use a divisive term that’s a bad word even over here, which was used by an evil empire and its minion countries, when there are alternatives—it is so counterproductive, so self-defeating, and so ignorant…

[larkin]

And not socialist, at least by the definition. It's heavy government involvement and regulation. [...] That's because socialism doesn't work. When it fails, socialists turn to capitalism to cure their ills.

So when I link to the actual definition of socialism, which usually involves a mixture of private and public enterprise, your response is clearly, that isn't actually socialism? Your definition is wrong - restating it doesn't make it any more correct.

But yes, I would agree that many economies operate somewhere on a spectrum.

[Lucid]

Capitalist socialism is impossible. Socialism is government control. There is no competition in government control.

Your definition of socialism leaves quite a bit to be desired. It can be government control, but is not so necessarily.

[hubcap]

Your definition of socialism leaves quite a bit to be desired. It can be government control, but is not so necessarily.
Actually, that is THE definition of socialism. Governmental control of the resources of production.

All of these theoretical views about socialism vs. capitalism become moot when applied in the real world for the simple reason that the government is not some neutral benevolent entity. It is a bunch of self-serving politicians and bureaucrats who take a cut of the piece of pie.

If you get the government out of the equation the pie is bigger and it can be divided by the rightful owners.


Ham wrote this:
Of course not, but you compare what constitutes poverty in the UK (which is still in many ways a welfare state) and Somalia you'll find that the poorest in Britain are very much better off than the poor in Somalia. So if I am to be destitute and homeless, I'd rather have a small dole payment to feed me and access to help to get me off the streets (even if it is inadequate) than have none at all. Paying taxes to know that at the very least I won't starve to death (and have healthcare when I need it) seems quite reasonable to me.
That's a huge strawman you set up there. Comparing anarchist Somalia with any nation besides Zimbabwe is absurd.

[Lucid]

Actually, that is THE definition of socialism. Governmental control of the resources of production.

Really? I think you should take a moment to go look it up:

Socialism refers to various theories of economic organization advocating public or direct worker ownership and administration of the means of production and allocation of resources, and a society characterized by equal access to resources for all individuals with an egalitarian method of compensation.[1][2][3] Contrary to popular belief, socialism is not a political system; it is an economic system distinct from capitalism.

All of these theoretical views about socialism vs. capitalism become moot when applied in the real world for the simple reason that the government is not some neutral benevolent entity. It is a bunch of self-serving politicians and bureaucrats who take a cut of the piece of pie.

So is private industry.

If you get the government out of the equation the pie is bigger and it can be divided by the rightful owners.

Government provides a service. We pay it to do that. You are operating under a number of assumptions about government. You think that everyone else is operating under those assumptions as well. We are not. That's why your posts have so much hand waving. You're just not bothering to question the axioms on which you are basing your argument.

[Causa Mortis]

Actually, that is THE definition of socialism. Governmental control of the resources of production.

All of these theoretical views about socialism vs. capitalism become moot when applied in the real world for the simple reason that the government is not some neutral benevolent entity. It is a bunch of self-serving politicians and bureaucrats who take a cut of the piece of pie.

If you get the government out of the equation the pie is bigger and it can be divided by the rightful owners.


Stalinism is the state having exclusive ownership, including labor, of all means of production. Virtually all production is determined by a central planner. Prices are largely meaningless except in black markets.

Maoism is a weaker form of communism wherein some private property and some labor rights are maintained by individuals. Prices play a moderately more meaningful role in the economy than under Stalinism, but central planning of production is still an integral feature.

Socialist-market economies allow private property rights and labor rights. They allow prices to distribute resources. They utilizes taxes and spending to promote what they feel are deisreable social outcomes. Prices remain the key distributor of resources.

Strictly market economies don't exist. The closest you come is Hong Kong and, to a lesser extent, the United States, both of which also rate very high on corruption and social inequality relative to many European states. They still tax and spend, they just do it on a smaller scale. Prices are the key distributor of resrouces.

[hubcap]

Really? I think you should take a moment to go look it up:
The definition you use is no difference in substance than the one I use.

So is private industry.
The difference is that private industry is the legitimate owners of the resources.


Government provides a service. We pay it to do that. You are operating under a number of assumptions about government. You think that everyone else is operating under those assumptions as well. We are not. That's why your posts have so much hand waving. You're just not bothering to question the axioms on which you are basing your argument.
Please stop with the handwaving comments. Unlike you I simply haven't bought into the notion that we owe the government. The only legitimate function of government is to protect individual liberty. That is the basis upon which the government of the United States was founded.

The government is not some benevolent big brother that looks after us, it is more like the mafia that we must pay protection money or they come take away our stuff. The government is staffed for the most part by self-serving politicians and bureaucrats who don't really give a rats behind about the underprivileged kids down in the hood, and you argueing from the perspective that government is benevolent simply makes you appear to be guilty of "hand waving".

Regardless of which "ism" you want to discuss the bottom line is they are all about "who" gets to be in charge of the resources. You can take your idealistic egalitarianism views and put them away because in the real world they are simply platitudes used to pander to voting blocks. The arguements used here sound great in a college classroom, but the real world is different.

[Causa Mortis]

The difference is that private industry is the legitimate owners of the resources.


Do explain how private industry is the "legitimate owners" of anything. It seems to me that "legitimate owner" is a social construction.

[Lucid]

The definition you use is no difference in substance than the one I use.

No, the definition you use seems to be something akin to totalitarianism. Socialism does not necessarily involve the government at all.


The difference is that private industry is the legitimate owners of the resources.

No, this is what I mean when I say that you are not questioning your axioms. Why are they the legitimate owners of the resources? Who the legitimate owner of something is depends largely on the society one is operating in. Ownership is a human invention, not an objective natural law. It's a subjective thing at best.


Please stop with the handwaving comments. Unlike you I simply haven't bought into the notion that we owe the government.

No, you're misunderstanding my argument. Or you're straw manning. Or you don't know what socialism is and how broad a definition that word actually has. Either way, I'll stop telling you when you're hand waving when you stop hand waving. (Incidentally, Unlike you I simply haven't bought into the notion that we owe the government is more handwaving.)

The only legitimate function of government is to protect individual liberty. That is the basis upon which the government of the United States was founded.

Positive liberties or negative liberties? Also, back up your statement.

The government is not some benevolent big brother that looks after us, it is more like the mafia that we must pay protection money or they come take away our stuff.

This is a subjective opinion. It is hand waving. Additionally, socialism does not necessarily have anything to do with the government. Or with a large centralized government.

The government is staffed for the most part by self-serving politicians and bureaucrats who don't really give a rats behind about the underprivileged kids down in the hood, and you argueing from the perspective that government is benevolent simply makes you appear to be guilty of "hand waving".

But I'm not arguing that the government is benevolent. I'm arguing that it's no worse (and no better) than private industry. And I'm arguing that your definition of socialism is incorrectly narrow.

You can take your idealistic egalitarianism views and put them away because in the real world they are simply platitudes used to pander to voting blocks.

Why are you upset? If you want people who disagree with you to take their views and "put them away" I would renew my suggestion that you find a forum where everyone agrees with you. Especially if the best responses you can come up with are opinions you don't bother to back up with anything but more opinions, incorrect definitions, and accusations of idealism.

Also, unless you'd care to back this statement up, because in the real world they are simply platitudes used to pander to voting blocks is more handwaving. You seem to be under the mistaken impression that your subjective opinions are objective facts. Repeating your opinions numerous times is not the same thing as backing them up.

[hubcap]

Do explain how private industry is the "legitimate owners" of anything. It seems to me that "legitimate owner" is a social construction.

Ok - Answer me one question.

Who owns your car?

[nacht]

Ok - Answer me one question.

Who owns your car?

This is a clear example of you not questioning your own axioms. Ownership in this context is a clear social construction which we have a commonly agreed upon meaning for, but that doesn't mean that a different model of ownership is objectively wrong, which is what you are repeatedly claiming.

Now, let's add to this further, and say that even if we can agree on a definition of personal ownership, such doesn't necessarily extend in any natural way to corporations.

Incidentally: I don't own a car.

[Ham]

Please stop with the handwaving comments. Unlike you I simply haven't bought into the notion that we owe the government. The only legitimate function of government is to protect individual liberty. That is the basis upon which the government of the United States was founded.Says who?

[hubcap]

Declaration of Independence

[nacht]

Declaration of Independence

The declaration says no such thing.


We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness.


Now, where on earth do you see "The only legitimate function of government is to protect individual liberty" in that?

[hubcap]

This is a clear example of you not questioning your own axioms. Ownership in this context is a clear social construction which we have a commonly agreed upon meaning for, but that doesn't mean that a different model of ownership is objectively wrong, which is what you are repeatedly claiming.

Now, let's add to this further, and say that even if we can agree on a definition of personal ownership, such doesn't necessarily extend in any natural way to corporations.
I use the commonly accepted definition of ownership. Call it a social construction if you will, a rose by any other name is still a rose.

If you want to use a different definition of ownership you should contact Webster et al.

By the way, corporations are owned by private individuals.

[Ham]

I use the commonly accepted definition of ownership. Call it a social construction if you will, a rose by any other name is still a rose.I haven't seen a definition of this yet. Just what is the "commonly accepted definition of ownership". If you can't define it, you can't argue it.

[hubcap]

ownership - 1. the state or fact of being an owner.
2. legal right of possession; proprietorship.

own - 1. of, pertaining to, or belonging to oneself or itself (usually used after a possessive to emphasize the idea of ownership, interest, or relation conveyed by the possessive): He spent only his own money.
2. (used as an intensifier to indicate oneself as the sole agent of some activity or action, prec. by a possessive): He insists on being his own doctor.

[nacht]

I use the commonly accepted definition of ownership. Call it a social construction if you will, a rose by any other name is still a rose.


That it is commonly accepted (in the United States and in English, but I digress) isn't the point and amounts to no more than a bandwagon appeal. As near as I can tell you are assuming that it is objectively correct and inherent from Natural Law, and claiming that anything that uses a different definition of ownership is inherently--and objectively--wrong, no matter if that definition is only slightly different.

Norway uses a somewhat different definition of "ownership" when it comes to natural resources than, say, Colorado.

Incidentally, so does Alaska, who's model more closely resembles Norway.

Check your axioms and prove--or at least acknowledge--them, rather than just making the same claim over and over again and expecting everyone to agree with you.


If you want to use a different definition of ownership you should contact Webster et al.


Dictionaries are, at best, tertiary sources and exceedingly poor when the terms in question have technical meaning. This goes double for this particular word, since the meaning is extremely terse in said dictionaries and does not imply most of what you seem to be attributing to it.

Besides, Websters? Have at least the decency to use Oxford.


By the way, corporations are owned by private individuals.

Considering that I own a small corporation along with a friend, it might be natural to assume that I know this. Corporations are also considered individuals under law, and those who own the corporation are rarely personally responsible for the acts of that corporation.

[hubcap]

The declaration says no such thing.



Now, where on earth do you see "The only legitimate function of government is to protect individual liberty" in that?

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed

The reason governments are instituted among men is to secure the rights to Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.





hubcap added to this post, 1 minutes and 26 seconds later...

That it is commonly accepted (in the United States and in English, but I digress) isn't the point and amounts to no more than a bandwagon appeal. As near as I can tell you are assuming that it is objectively correct and inherent from Natural Law, and claiming that anything that uses a different definition of ownership is inherently--and objectively--wrong, no matter if that definition is only slightly different.

Norway uses a somewhat different definition of "ownership" when it comes to natural resources than, say, Colorado.

Incidentally, so does Alaska, who's model more closely resembles Norway.

Check your axioms and prove--or at least acknowledge--them, rather than just making the same claim over and over again and expecting everyone to agree with you.
OK - So do we now want to debate the definition of "ownership"?



Dictionaries are, at best, tertiary sources and exceedingly poor when the terms in question have technical meaning. This goes double for this particular word, since the meaning is extremely terse in said dictionaries and does not imply most of what you seem to be attributing to it.

Besides, Websters? Have at least the decency to use Oxford.



Considering that I own a small corporation along with a friend, it might be natural to assume that I know this. Corporations are also considered individuals under law, and those who own the corporation are rarely personally responsible for the acts of that corporation.
OK - so do we now want to debate the definition of "ownership"?

[nacht]

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed

The reason governments are instituted among men is to secure the rights to Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

Your statement:
"The only legitimate function of government is to protect individual liberty."

Key word: "only." It is absolutely a function of government, but "only?" All that I see is something straight out of social contract theory, that governments secure their powers from consent of the governed.

Now, let's look at those specific rights:

"life, liberty, and pursuit of happiness" ("property," which was in the original, was removed in lieu of "pursuit of happiness," but I digress).

Where, in this, do you get that such equals "individual liberty" and that protection of such doesn't allow for what we can loosely define as "socialism?"

[hubcap]

To implement your "socialism" requires the use of force against individuals.

To implement force against an individual is by definition denying them liberty.

[nacht]

To implement your "socialism" requires the use of force against individuals.


My socialism?

When did this become my socialism?


To implement force against an individual is by definition denying them liberty.

How are you defining "liberty?"

You know, if you are going to argue Ayn Rand's points, you might want to at least get as good as she was at not making circular arguments and stating at least the majority of her axioms up front.

Also, you still have yet to indicate how "protection of individual liberties" is the only (your word, not mine) legitimate function of government. This goes double since "life" and the "pursuit of happiness" were also listed along with "liberty."

[hubcap]

My socialism?

When did this become my socialism?
You seem to be the one embracing it.


How are you defining "liberty?"
I roll with the loose definition of "negative" liberty as: An individual can do as he pleases as long as he doesn't intefere with others doing the same.

I deny that positive liberty exists.

[Lucid]

You seem to be the one embracing it.

I don't think anyone here is actually 'embracing' it. I think we're arguing that some elements of it have merit just the same as capitalism does.

Also, socialism does not require government force any more than capitalism.

[firebee]

You seem to be the one embracing it.

Rationality requires an unimpaired ability to gather information. If you cannot explain a thing accurately, independent of your opinion on it, then you are not capable of making rational decisions.


I roll with the loose definition of "negative" liberty as: An individual can do as he pleases as long as he doesn't intefere with others doing the same.

I deny that positive liberty exists.

Both of these are as much abstractions as my bank account, and if zombies invaded the Front Range tomorrow, they would be equally useful.

[Autoptic]

Also, socialism does not require government force any more than capitalism.

Socialism leaves ownership solely, perpetually up to the political blocs authorized by the state in the same manner and by the same blocs as the state itself. What do you call that?

[Causa Mortis]

Ok - Answer me one question.

Who owns your car?

My car is a result of the marginal product of my labor in interaction with the labor of others, the capital of others, the technology of my society, and the social system through which I created it. Isolating just labor - ie putting me on a little island somewhere in the pacific - I would be living a subsistence lifestyle.

The same axiom applies to the role of capital and innovation - yes the marginal product of their labor is high, but its only high because its adding a lot of value to a social system.

Socialism leaves ownership solely, perpetually up to the political blocs authorized by the state in the same manner and by the same blocs as the state itself. What do you call that?

Stalinism and Maoism do this, and to a lesser extent, Chavezism does this as well. That said, I actually think property rights in much of northern Europe are more secure than they are in the States, as eminent domain is rarely an issue there but frequently has been here.

[nacht]

I don't think anyone here is actually 'embracing' it. I think we're arguing that some elements of it have merit just the same as capitalism does.


More precisely as to what I am arguing, I'm not even going as far as to say some elements of it have merit: rather I am claiming that hubcap has failed to prove that no elements of it have merit. Equivalently, that some elements of socialism may, but do not necessarily, have merit.

[Mader]

Socialism, on a large scale, is contrary to human nature.

My simple explanation, stately personally, meant as a statement of human nature.

I will care and share with my family.
I will care and share with my neighbors and friends.

I am not wanting to care and share with strangers as I do family and neighbors. Not trying to be hateful, just human nature.

In an ideal world, communism would rule. We all work, put all of our eggs in one basket and distribute according to needs - sorta' like early Christianity. We are, unfortunately, humans - selfish, greedy, jealous, envious.

Capitalism seems to work best - giving as much power and control to the individual as possible. Not simply for the sake of power, but for the sake of freedom from oppression and persecution, freedom to be as fully human as possible. A good balance between these human freedoms and our responsibility to others.

[Autoptic]

In an ideal world, communism would rule. We all work, put all of our eggs in one basket and distribute according to needs - sorta' like early Christianity.

Need is subjective and personal as are ideals.

[Ray9]

Socialism in all its forms has clearly been proved to be inferior to all unrestrained free market concepts. History has demonstrated this over and over again. This is because the market determines what works and what fails. A tiny nucleus of empowered individuals who sit at the helm of socialism simply cannot fathom all of the intricacies that occurr in the mechanics of the marketplace. In a free market system the system is self-correcting. If something is successful it continues and thrives. If something is unsuccessful it is removed by the forces of the marketplace. Socialism is born of arrogance and greed for power. Socialism functions to impose an ideology of absolute fairness by force and against the will of human nature which favors private ownership and self-determination. The fatal flaw in socialism is that it has no faith in the citizen to determine his own fate. It is founded on the premise that the state must enforce its will over the will of the citizen for the citizen's own good.

Again it is stated that history is the best witness. Had socialism held sway none of these debates would take place. The human race would still be squinting by gas light. Horse drawn carriages would still be the main form of transportation. The printing press would never have been invented. And of course there would be no computers or an internet. You see, under socialism there is no more reward for a job well done than for a job not done at all. It's impossible to make a weak man strong by making a strong man weak. Without individual incentive a man's reach can never exceed his grasp.

Socialism is the business of intellectual snobs who veiw the comman man as inferior and incapable of self-determination. Only those with a dumb unawareness of history can argue for socialism.

[firebee]

Stuff

Capitalism, on a large scale, is contrary to human nature.

I will care and share with my family.
I will care and share with my neighbors and friends.

I am not wanting to care and share with strangers as I do family and neighbors. Not trying to be hateful, just human nature. Because of this tendency, it is fantastical to assume that I will spontaneously act in a manner that will aid the interests of strangers who are not of immediate use to me.

Socialism seems to work best - giving as much power and control to the individual as possible in a framework that ensures the basic maintenance of people outside the monkeyspheres of those with sufficient resources to aid them. Not simply for the sake of power, but for the sake of recognizing that our natures, on average, do not lend themselves well to long-term thinking outside of our immediate social sphere. A good balance between these human freedoms and our responsibility to others.

[rickster]

Socialism is the business of intellectual snobs who veiw the comman man as inferior and incapable of self-determination. Only those with a dumb unawareness of history can argue for socialism.

One could also argue that capitalism is the business of the greedy and ethically bankrupt. A socialist at least has enough core ethical values to clearly see that poverty creates unnecessary hardship and death, while affluence actually creates nothing of any fundamental worth whatsoever.

Similarly, it's quite reasonable to state that only those with a dumb unawareness of life can dismiss socialism.

[firebee]

Socialism in all its forms has clearly been proved to be inferior to all unrestrained free market concepts.

Name one place where the latter has been put to the test.

Socialism is born of arrogance and greed for power.

And what is capitalism born of, then?

Had socialism held sway none of these debates would take place. The human race would still be squinting by gas light.

Prove it.

Horse drawn carriages would still be the main form of transportation.

Prove it.

The printing press would never have been invented.

Jeez, it would have been really unfortunate if Germany was ruled by the Holy Roman Empire in Gutenberg's time, as opposed as to being run in accordance with a political philosophy that didn't even exist yet.

And of course there would be no computers or an internet.

Yeah, imagine what would have happened if a powerful central government had thrown tons of resources into a silly technological competition with another country, rather than leaving that money in the hands of the private companies that singlehandedly created the Internet?

Also: Prove it. Of course.


Socialism is the business of intellectual snobs who veiw the comman man as inferior and incapable of self-determination. Only those with a dumb unawareness of history can argue for socialism.

Evidently it's completely impossible to make an argument in favor of capitalism without resorting to handwaving. And I'd tread lightly on the matter of "dumb unawareness of history", if I wuz you...

[hubcap]

My car is a result of the marginal product of my labor in interaction with the labor of others, the capital of others, the technology of my society, and the social system through which I created it. Isolating just labor - ie putting me on a little island somewhere in the pacific - I would be living a subsistence lifestyle.

OK - Having said that - WHO owns YOUR car?

[Synamon]

Technically the bank or financing company owns most people's cars. Yay, capitalism?

[hubcap]

More precisely as to what I am arguing, I'm not even going as far as to say some elements of it have merit: rather I am claiming that hubcap has failed to prove that no elements of it have merit. Equivalently, that some elements of socialism may, but do not necessarily, have merit.

Actually, I'm not sure I have claimed that none of socialisms elements have merit. If so, that was not my intent.

I actually do claim there is no legitimate authority for the collective to usurp the legitimate property rights of the individual. The only possible exception being eminent domain; which has been horribly corrupted from its original purpose in the United States.

[firebee]

OK - Having said that - WHO owns YOUR car?

That's a difficult question to answer without a definition of "owns" and, for that matter, "car".

What is your point in asking?

[Autoptic]

My car is a result of the marginal product of my labor in interaction with the labor of others, the capital of others, the technology of my society, and the social system through which I created it. Isolating just labor - ie putting me on a little island somewhere in the pacific - I would be living a subsistence lifestyle.

Barring fraud or coercion, everyone involved was payed as per their agreements. Anyone involved making a claim beyond this is violating their part in their particular agreement.

[hubcap]

That's a difficult question to answer without a definition of "owns" and, for that matter, "car".

What is your point in asking?

I've already offered a definition of "own" and "ownership". Shall we debate the definition?

Would you like for me to give a definition for "car"?

[firebee]

I've already offered a definition of "own" and "ownership". Shall we debate the definition?

Would you like for me to give a definition for "car"?

I'm actually more interested in your point in asking. What possible relevance is the question of who holds title to a particular set of motor vehicles, to a debate about socialism and capitalism?

[Causa Mortis]

OK - Having said that - WHO owns YOUR car?

I hold the title. What's your point?

[hubcap]

I'm actually more interested in your point in asking. What possible relevance is the question of who holds title to a particular set of motor vehicles, to a debate about socialism and capitalism?
It's quite simple actually.

socialism-
1 : any of various economic and political theories advocating collective or governmental ownership and administration of the means of production and distribution of goods
2 a : a system of society or group living in which there is no private property b : a system or condition of society in which the means of production are owned and controlled by the state
3 : a stage of society in Marxist theory transitional between capitalism and communism and distinguished by unequal distribution of goods and pay according to work done


In a socialistic system the means of production are owned by "all the people". So let's say that for the sake of this discussion Causa Mortis is a pizza delivery driver. Philosophically Causa Mortis has no personal property rights to say that he "owns" his car.

The entire debate hinges upon "personal property rights".

[Causa Mortis]

The entire debate hinges upon "personal property rights".

No, it doesn't, for just the reason's we've discussed:

A. Ownership is a social construct.
B. There is no equity/efficiency tradeoff. This is a false dichotomy created by conservatives and conservative economists. Northern Europe enjoys roughly the same standard of living that we do, and they have no meaningful social inequality.
C. I "own" my car because I paid for it with labor. The value-added associated with participating in society versus not participating in society is gargantuan - the value added of my labor on an island in the Pacific would probably be somewhere in the neighborhood of $1 per hour; its only by interacting with the other factors of production that I'm able to specialize and boost my earnings by more than 20 fold.
D. Some scholars would probably argue that property rights are better protected in so-called socialist Norway than in the United States. Its labor and returns to various forms of capital that are taxed, and these don't have value in isolation - only through social system interaction.

[firebee]

In a socialistic system the means of production are owned by "all the people". So let's say that for the sake of this discussion Causa Mortis is a pizza delivery driver. Philosophically Causa Mortis has no personal property rights to say that he "owns" his car.

And aside from the amusing mental image of Causa Mortis being the People's non-car-owning pizza delivery person, walking around holding a stack of pizzas and making putt-putt noises with his lips, where does this get us?

[hubcap]

No, it doesn't, for just the reason's we've discussed:

A. Ownership is a social construct.
I've offered a definition of ownership. If you'd like to debate the definition please offer your definition and prove to me yours is correct and mine is wrong.

B. There is no equity/efficiency tradeoff. This is a false dichotomy created by conservatives and conservative economists. Northern Europe enjoys roughly the same standard of living that we do, and they have no meaningful social inequality.
How on earth is this relevant?

C. I "own" my car because I paid for it with labor. The value-added associated with participating in society versus not participating in society is gargantuan - the value added of my labor on an island in the Pacific would probably be somewhere in the neighborhood of $1 per hour; its only by interacting with the other factors of production that I'm able to specialize and boost my earnings by more than 20 fold.
OK - So what about the people who own billions of dollars worth of property by using a combination of labor and intellectual capital? Do they not have an equal claim of ownership?

D. Some scholars would probably argue that property rights are better protected in so-called socialist Norway than in the United States. Its labor and returns to various forms of capital that are taxed, and these don't have value in isolation - only through social system interaction.
Some scholars would argue that Karl Marx's theory of social change is superior to every other. What's the point?

[Lucid]

You appear to be confusing socialism with communism.

[jcb]

as with everything in life, theory is very different to practise. almost any philosophical, political or otherwise ideology could be made worthwhile and full of promise.

somewhat reiterating what a few others have said, the one thing you can absolutely count on with systems is that the human interactors will provide the flaws.

the ideologies you adhere to will all too often be a product of the cultural paradigm you live within.

no extreme of a social structure/system is healthy. again, balance.

[Autoptic]

no extreme of a social structure/system is healthy. again, balance.

Extremism isn't automatically wrong. Should we balance our defensive violence with offensive violence?

[Zombicide]

Seriously?...
Please turn off Hannity and come back to Earth.

The first two were Fascists, and Castro... well you could argue as a soft-fascist.

Communism and Socialism are not the same thing.

" Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei " I'm sure everyone knows enough German or can interpret from what's close enough to english in that quote that that means

National Socialist German Workers' Party aka NAZI

that's what that acronym stands for. It's kind of in their name.

But I guess you're going by the claim that they were socialists in name alone, to which I can understand why someone would see it that way.

[pip]

Wow. Just wow.

As our more rational and objective fellows have pointed out throughout this little circus there are poitives and negatives to any form of organisation.
To call any system 'evil' regardless of your views however is at best disingenuous, and belies an innate lack of understanding.

That being said, one must look to the future.
Not just a few years, but toward the future of our species.
Capitalism for all its ability to generate wealth has a flaw that the vast majority of people are not aware of, or just dismiss as irrelevant: It requires constant growth and expansion to feed its ever-growing rates of consumption.
Now it may (or may not) be apparent to you that we currently occupy the modest quantity of 1 planet, which may also be noted is becoming increasingly crowded and has somewhat less abundant resources due to said consumption.
At some point there will be NO more room to expand into, NO more resources to be aquired, and everyone will be hungry for more.
When this happens, one of two things will occur:

1. Everyone gets thier act together, co-operates and gets out into space.
2. Everyone goes batshit and starts fighting over the last scraps.

I don't know about you, but judging by the political history of the current governments, I'm not what you'd call entirely confident 1. will even get a look in. :(

Another way of looking at the way these two forms of government operate is this...

Capitalism and its associated Free Market are based on the method of trying a little bit of everything and seeing what works, then running with it.
This is inefficient and wasteful but very effective when you have an abundance of resources to divert into scores upon scores of potential dead-ends, as the few positive 'hits' will make up for any loss.
So it could be said, Capitalism shines.
But it is very difficult to focus significant effort on a specific task as it requires constant material input (money), and if there is a shortage of this the entire economy stalls.

Socialism runs on a more-or-less steady state just ticking over arrangement, with the odd bit of carefully considered growth.
Compared to the Free Market it is slow and potentailly unweildy, but capable of far greater efficiency (if people co-operate) and is far less wasteful due to how it focuses on specific concerns as opposed to throwing resources at various potential solutions.
When a problem is encountered a Socialist society can focus all its available energy upon it, as people are motivated by the 'good of society' as opposed to their own pocket and can still contribute thier skills regardless of resource availability.
While Capitalism shines, Socialism lases.

Plus, in a purely Socialist society you wouldn't have all these 'stars' getting more money in a week than most people do in 2 years for doing what amounts to almost nothing to contribute to society.
Just IMAGINE what could be achieved with all that wealth worldwide....
Make a start on eliminating poverty and hunger.
Start seriously working to get off this fecking rock and out into space where we belong.
Get the entire world to adopt a sensible means of providing healthcare for everyone :p

Oh, and the business with Hitler.
Hitler was a political genius, he turned a broken and beaten country into a leading world power poised to conquer Europe AND took control of said country all inside of a decade.
That sounds like a pretty good turnround, for a Socialist eh? :p
Now if only he hadn't been so obsessed with the Jewboys for not liking his paintings, things might have had a far more civilised outcome...

[Urbicande]

The difference is that private industry is the legitimate owners of the resources.

Please stop with the handwaving comments. Unlike you I simply haven't bought into the notion that we owe the government. The only legitimate function of government is to protect individual liberty. That is the basis upon which the government of the United States was founded.


You are right in saying that the government is to protect individuals, and not just their liberty by the way, which also means that it must prevent private companies from alienating individuals or making them dependant.

Being a work slave of a private company or a work slave of the state is pretty much the same to me ...

So, I hop, that my goverment tries to protect me from private companies at least for my vital needs such as health, water, ...


And Causa mortis is right ...

Do explain how private industry is the "legitimate owners" of anything. It seems to me that "legitimate owner" is a social construction.

Private property is a social construction ... so is the Money.

It is not a Natural right, and by adding "legitimate" is shows that this is a legal construction :-)

And, although it is high on the scale of social rights, luckily, it is not an absolute right. In a lot of countries, it still comes after "public need".


Ok - Answer me one question.

Who owns your car?

Actually, not you ... even if you pay it cash, you pay your car with money that do not belong to you. The money you own is just a credit to your Bank of State ...

[jcb]

Extremism isn't automatically wrong. Should we balance our defensive violence with offensive violence?

i didn't say it was wrong, just unhealthy. just like eating glass isn't wrong.

[hubcap]

You appear to be confusing socialism with communism.
Please elaborate.

Which definition of socialism would you prefer to use today?

[Autoptic]

And, although it is high on the scale of social rights, luckily, it is not an absolute right. In a lot of countries, it still comes after "public need".

So no matter what deals you and any of "the people" made beforehand, you can be overruled and thrown to the bottom of the heap under the cute and pitiful thanks to the idiot masses or their representatives "voting you off the island" instead of their favorites or even just some random larger mass. The genuinely parasitic over-breeders may have their way paid by your life's effort, if not your life itself, and owe you nothing previously agreed upon, because the likes of them outnumber you solely because of their own selfishness, which is all "the people" means here.

Actually, not you ... even if you pay it cash, you pay your car with money that do not belong to you. The money you own is just a credit to your Bank of State ...

Thus why fiat currency is a racket. If it's not a loan though, you don't owe it to them; they owe it you.

[saberu]

this thread is getting huge, but there is a lot of controversy when dealing with a soft science.

socialism will always be on the verge of failure because of the inherant design of the social system

in a capitalist system private orgainzations will provide services through fair trade, if the product is poor people will stop trading with a company. The feedback mechanism is very short and effective. bad product = bad sales= out of business

in a socialist government similiar services are provided by coercion, if the product isn't any good there is nothing you can do about it until the situation gets really, really bad and the cost of overhauling the entire system is outweighted by the cost of maintining it...by cost i mean human lives and quality of such.

having socialism is like having a giant corporation run things and allowing them to use violence to force people to trade with them. the socialist system's feedback mechanisms mostly reward price increases/taxes and hiring.

now to answer some of the replys...

Socialism in all its forms has clearly been proved to be inferior to all unrestrained free market concepts.


Name one place where the latter has been put to the test.



how about earth? do you think its a coincidence that after 200 years the u.s.a. is the most powerful country in the world?

Socialism is born of arrogance and greed for power.


And what is capitalism born of, then?



the realisation that a captitalist social contract is better for the avergae person, so I guess greed coupled with education.

Had socialism held sway none of these debates would take place. The human race would still be squinting by gas light.


Prove it.



Electricity was discovered several times throughout history. It was mastered in the u.s.a.
Go fact check it yourself you lazy commie bastard...j/k, i enjoy the debate


Horse drawn carriages would still be the main form of transportation.


Prove it.



why have all the best scientist immigrated to the u.s.a.? einstein, tesla, ect.
because they had a system that rewarded their work and valued them! in fact the entire world is built on the hard work of scientists in a capitalist enviroment, its called technology diffusion.


sorry but the evidence is all around you. capitalism may not be perfect but it works much better. one system offers rewards for progress and one system only punisjes failure

[nacht]

I should note that libertarians in the 19th century viewed the threat as large corporations. We also need to note that what most people call "capitalism" should better be referred to as corporatism (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.).

[Hamburglar]

This thread makes me sad. Not to cast too much hate on the 'realists' in here, but really? It is disappointing, to say the least, to hear people legitimately argue that we have no responsibility for our actions, less the exception/expectation of backing up our lifestyle by the threat of violence/force. The so called "put up or shut up" mentality. I realize that their is not much incentive for cooperation in the world, but this should not deter us from having the debate without name calling and hand waving. Just because something "is" working does not mean that we ought not be looking for a better way!

I would remind people that Athens fell precisely because it failed to believe that it could do wrong. (I know some of the members prefer looking at things in historical context.)

[Ray9]

Corporatism as I understand the article is big business benefiting from government interference in the free market. This would make sense because once an enterprise grows to a large enough extent it becomes an entity that functions in its own best interest and not necessarily in the best interest of the free market. There's nothing new about this. It has a long history in all the economies of the free world and it's not going away anytime soon. Probably the best way to describe corporatism would be as a wayward child of capitalism that has forgotten its roots. Or maybe a better description would be as a bastard child of capitalism and socialism. Because corporatism seeks to secure advantages by using the government to block competitors it is probably more closely related to socialism than many would care to admit. It often does an excellent job of cloaking itself in the red, white and blue rhetoric of the free market however.

If you build a better mousetrap the world will beat a path to your door. You will then grow large and employ many people. Then if someone builds a more inexpensive mousetrap you can run to the government and put them out of business by promising the government that you will do good things for the people. Neither the capitalist nor the socialist can plead not guilty in the case of corporatism.





Ray9 added to this post, 5 minutes and 38 seconds later...

Just because something "is" working does not mean that we ought not be looking for a better way!


How bout if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

[Hamburglar]

How bout if it ain't broke, don't fix it.

I'd call that arrogant. Are you such an expert to say that it "ain't broke"? :huh:

[hubcap]

I'd call that arrogant. Are you such an expert to say that it "ain't broke"? :huh:

I'd consider it arrogant for someone think they had all the answers when all they have are theories.

[Lucid]

Please elaborate.

Which definition of socialism would you prefer to use today?

You said:


OK - So what about the people who own billions of dollars worth of property by using a combination of labor and intellectual capital? Do they not have an equal claim of ownership?


Some scholars would argue that Karl Marx's theory of social change is superior to every other. What's the point?

Karl Marx is the father of Communism, not Socialism. Additionally, socialism recognizes private property, communism (in most forms) does not.

I'd consider it arrogant for someone think they had all the answers when all they have are theories.

But you and those arguing against socialism are doing this too.

[hubcap]

Karl Marx is the father of Communism, not Socialism. Additionally, socialism recognizes private property, communism (in most forms) does not.
I was not argueing that Marx was the father of socialism. I was simply responding the the Hamburglars post with a point that was equally as irrelevant as the one he made.

But you and those arguing against socialism are doing this too.
That is patently untrue. All we have to do is look at history and we can see that capitalism creates more wealth and increases the standard of living for more people in a given system than any other.

We can also look at the history of socialistic countries and see the results.

It's not about theory, its about results.

Go with what works................not what sounds good.

[Ray9]

Karl Marx is the father of Communism, not Socialism. Additionally, socialism recognizes private property, communism (in most forms) does not.


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[Synamon]

Karl Marx is the father of Communism, not Socialism. Additionally, socialism recognizes private property, communism (in most forms) does not.


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I assume you posted that to agree with Lucid. From that link:
Instead of wanting to take away people’s private property, socialists want more people to have more private property than ever before.

[Ray9]

Socialism is the first step in the process of developing the productive forces to achieve abundance and changing the mental and spiritual outlook of the people. It is the necessary transition stage from capitalism to communism.

[Lucid]

That is patently untrue. All we have to do is look at history and we can see that capitalism creates more wealth and increases the standard of living for more people in a given system than any other.

We can also look at the history of socialistic countries and see the results.

It's not about theory, its about results.

Go with what works................not what sounds good.

Ok, what socialistic countries would you like to look at to support your statement? Lets do that. List some. Briefly describe their histories.

However, what I think you'll find is that there are some socialistic societies where socialism has worked very well. In others it has worked very poorly.

Unfortunately for your point, the same is true of capitalism.

No political system is inherently good or evil. And no political ideology is inherently better or worse. What makes the difference is how a particular ideology is implemented.

[hubcap]

However, what I think you'll find is that there are some socialistic societies where socialism has worked very well.
I dispute that simply because I believe it is immoral to pilfer the wealth of some to give it to others using the guise of "fairness".

No political system is inherently good or evil. And no political ideology is inherently better or worse. What makes the difference is how a particular ideology is implemented.
So you would advance the idea that communism and fascism or despotism is inherently no worse than republicanism?

Please elaborate.

[Lucid]

I dispute that simply because I believe it is immoral to pilfer the wealth of some to give it to others using the guise of "fairness".

But that's not the only interpretation. All members of a society benefit from certain social programs. Therefore, all members pay into those programs. The amount each person pays is determined using a sliding scale based on what each can afford to pay.

So you would advance the idea that communism and fascism or despotism is inherently no worse than republicanism?

Please elaborate.

I personally would advance the idea that republicanism is a synonym of despotism and fascism, but joking aside:

How are any of these ideas inherently evil? Communism is just the idea that everyone in a society should share stuff and trade goods and services and do things for the common good. Despotism is just absolute rule by an individual. If you have the right individual that's not a bad thing.

Fascism:
Fascism, pronounced /ˈfæʃɪzəm/, comprises a radical and authoritarian nationalist political ideology[1][2][3][4] and a corporatist economic ideology developed in Italy.[5] Fascists believe that nations and/or races are in perpetual conflict whereby only the strong can survive by being healthy, vital, and by asserting themselves in conflict against the weak.[6]Fascism, pronounced /ˈfæʃɪzəm/, comprises a radical and authoritarian nationalist political ideology[1][2][3][4] and a corporatist economic ideology developed in Italy.[5] Fascists believe that nations and/or races are in perpetual conflict whereby only the strong can survive by being healthy, vital, and by asserting themselves in conflict against the weak.[6]

Isn't that what republicans believe? Isn't it almost what libertarians believe? Isn't that Social Darwinism?

[Autoptic]

All members of a society benefit from certain social programs.

No, they don't, don't bother naming government monopolies on services allowing no other options financed at the expense of the very types of people you'd be claiming owed "society" for such.

Therefore, all members pay into those programs. The amount each person pays is determined using a sliding scale based on what each can afford to pay.

What one can afford and what one owes aren't the same thing. You're forcing one to pay the debt of another for financing their own robbery, harassment, and coercion. You don't get to decide what someone else needs. They do. It's called freedom.

[Lucid]

Uhm, no, they don't.

You benefit from living in a society with a very high rate of literacy. You also benefit from social programs that, for example, help drug addicts get clean and find jobs. If you wish to see what living in a society without these things is like, look to the third world.

[Autoptic]

You benefit from living in a society with a very high rate of literacy. You also benefit from social programs that, for example, help drug addicts get clean and find jobs. If you wish to see what living in a society without these things is like, look to the third world.

Who pays me for what I suffer under in this society reification of yours? I don't owe people for seeking their own ends if it happens to benefit me. You have no more concept of debt or contract than you do theft it seems.

[Lucid]

Who pays me for what I suffer under in this "society" of yours? I don't owe people for seeking their own ends if it happens to benefit me.

Please refer to the social contract. Nobody gets paid for what they suffer. And putting the word society in superfluous quotation marks and calling it my society only makes it appear that you don't understand the society in which you live.
Stop being such a victim. Paying you to suffer does no one any good, but you seem to feel pretty entitled to your status as a victim.

You have no more concept of debt or contract than you do theft it seems.

No. It appears that you don't understand the concept of theft.

Theft:

In criminal law, theft is the illegal taking of another person's property without that person's freely-given consent.

As with murder, the operative word is 'illegal.'

[Autoptic]

Please refer to the social contract. Nobody gets paid for what they suffer. And putting the word society in superfluous quotation marks and calling it my society only makes it appear that you don't understand the society in which you live.
Stop being such a victim. Paying you to suffer does no one any good, but you seem to feel pretty entitled to your status as a victim.

There is no such thing. Contracts require the agreement of all involved individuals. The society reification isn't an individual and can't agree to anything.

What's your point? They aren't responsible for me, and I am not responsible for them. I knew that. You apparently don't.

Both murder and theft were around before laws. The concepts were the reason for the laws and the legal terms not the other way around.

[Profit]

I don’t think that there is much debate concerning a capitalistic socioeconomic system’s ability in developing natural resources and material production. Yes up to this point human history ‘capitalism’ has proven itself to be without equal in turning out tremendous amounts of goods. Those who argue in favor of such a system over socialism point to its ability to increase the material well being of individuals regardless of their class, a rising tide lifts all boats. ‘Capitalism’ however, is quickly showing itself to be unsustainable. In order to survive and increase capital, companies/industries have to continuously invent new wants within the consumer marketplace. Consumers have to keep consuming in order for the system to continue to function. Not only does overall consumption have to keep increasing but population levels must rise accordingly. You have to have a steadily expanding supply of workers to produce and provide increasing levels of goods and services. Thus you have the average consumption per person increasing at the same time that you have the total number of consumers increasing as well. The problem with such a system is that resources are finite. Already humans consume more natural resources annually than the earth can replace in one year.

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Essentially we are eating into our natural resource ‘savings’. (This is not just energy resources mind you so please do not yell ‘but what about tar sands and coal!’ We are talking about soil, water, fisheries etc) This is simply not sustainable.

The United States, the poster boy of 'capitalism' for many of you, makes up about 4.5% of the world’s population yet consumes nearly 30% of the world’s annual output of natural resources. In the last two decades we have witnessed the economic rise of China and India (historically the two dominant economies in the world). If they continue to develop along capitalistic lines we will simply eat through our ‘savings’ at and even quicker rate. 'Capitalism', in the long run, is not a sustainable socioeconomic system....but hey in the long run we are all dead.

[Autoptic]

Earth isn't a sustainable system or the solar system or the galaxy or the galactic cluster or the universe, etc.

[Lucid]

There is no such thing. Contracts require the agreement of all involved individuals. The society reification isn't an individual and can't agree to anything.

What's your point? They aren't responsible for me, and I am not responsible for them. I knew that. You apparently don't.

Both murder and theft were around before laws. The concepts were the reason for the laws and the legal terms not the other way around.

Ok. All I can say is that you should educate yourself about the social contract before you continue posting.

[Autoptic]

Ok. All I can say is that you should educate yourself about the social contract before you continue posting.

It's not a contract. It's that simple. (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)

[Lucid]

Social contract describes a broad class of theories that try to explain the ways in which people form states and/or maintain social order. The notion of the social contract implies that the people give up some rights to a government or other authority in order to receive or maintain social order through the rule of law.

Social contract theory formed a central pillar in the historically important notion that legitimate state authority must be derived from the consent of the governed. The starting point for most of these theories is a heuristic examination of the human condition absent from any structured social order, usually termed the “state of nature”. In this condition, an individual’s actions are bound only by his or her personal power, constrained by conscience. From this common starting point, the various proponents of social contract theory attempt to explain, in different ways, why it is in an individual’s rational self-interest to voluntarily give up the freedom one has in the state of nature in order to obtain the benefits of political order.

Thomas Hobbes (1651), John Locke (1689) and Jean-Jacques Rousseau (1762) are the most famous philosophers of contractarianism, which formed the theoretical groundwork of democracy and republicanism.

[Autoptic]

You're implying subjectivity and opinion when your opposition says anything you don't like but assume objectivity and self-evidence about things on the same level or even on a sub-level.

You're saying property is relative, yet your claims of public property curiously aren't. Murder and theft are just re-definable legal terms, yet agreement and worth, positive and negative, are all yours to define.

And you might want to read that consent line again.

[Profit]

Earth isn't a sustainable system or the solar system or the galaxy or the galactic cluster or the universe, etc.

ET phone home, I'd like to discuss the underlying problems of the present capitalistic socioeconomic system.

[Autoptic]

ET phone home, I'd like to discuss the underlying problems of the present capitalistic socioeconomic system.

The US isn't a capitalistic socioeconomic system nor anywhere else that I know of. Besides, you explicitly weren't discussing the present.

[Profit]

The US isn't a capitalistic socioeconomic system nor anywhere else that I know of. Besides, you explicitly weren't discussing the present.

Capitalism typically refers to an economic and social system in which the means of production (also known as capital) are privately controlled; labor, goods and capital are traded in a market; profits are distributed to owners or invested in new technologies and industries; and wages are paid to labor.

[rickster]

By far and away the most obscene aspect of socialism vs capitalism is that the most rabid supporters of capitalism are the new middle class i.e. those who lack the means for self-support, independent industrial autonomy and are actually in service to those who posess and control capital. The new middle-class is actually in a worse situation than the (former) bourgeois class who at least had some autonomy. And I assume that most here who are rah-rah'ing for the political superiority of capitalism are in fact the disenfranchised middle-class who are foolishly hoping for a better deal themselves from capitalism, and imagine that political support will make their dream come true.

Middle class denigration of workers (and anything that remotely suggests "socialism") is foolishness personified because it's simply pandering to capitalist fears that the workers will "rise up" and seize the means of production. Whatever skills the middle class may think they have don't outweigh the fact that they're highly expendable - more so than the former bourgeoisie who at least owned limited means of production and real property.

The middle class has more in common with the worker than with the capitalist inasmuch as they're both just wage earners. If you are at a management level you can be worse off in practice because you are prevented from joining organized labor unions and may go years without work with the capitalists you so rabidly support.

Go ahead and debate the rhetoric of the politics till the cows come home, but it would behoove you to have a good look at how your politics relate to your actual situation, and what you are likely to ever actually own. Perhaps you are headed the same way as your forbears - the petty bourgeois. Perhaps you will limp through to death without falling through the cracks, but that's not even assured.

Capitalism may indeed work for some, and may not work for too many fewer if it's ass-kissing supporters just joined a trade union and made their own lives a bit more secure and dignified.

[Blse]

The middle class has more in common with the worker than with the capitalist inasmuch as they're both just wage earners.

There's some truth to this: you can be an MBA pulling down $150k a year and fit the Marxist description of a member of the proleteriat. You must sell your labor to survive and maintain the lifestyle you desire.

Yes, in a post-industrial economy, Marxism becomes difficult. Yes, even the upper middle class manager must sell his/her labor to maintain his/her lifestyle. Yet, (s)he also owns the means of production, for the means of production in a post-industrial society are brains not machines. Those who think for a living (analysts, professionals, managers) are both: a) proleterian in the sense that they must continously provide their labor and b) capitalist in the sense that they own one of the most vital means of production: creative energy and brains.

Capitalism typically refers to an economic and social system in which the means of production (also known as capital) are privately controlled; labor, goods and capital are traded in a market; profits are distributed to owners or invested in new technologies and industries; and wages are paid to labor.

Yes, but "pure" capitalism cannot exist. The limitations inherent in the market system do not allow for an economy functioning without considerable govt. oversight and control. The extent to which govt. and market need to mix and balance each other might be disputed, but pure capitalism can never work and centrally planned economies are equally doomed to failure (as evident from history).

What we call capitalism in the U.S. is a mixed economic system where the market is generally given as much reign as we deem possible/desirable and most price signals (though definitely not all) are set, to some extent or another, by the market system.

All we have to do is look at history and we can see that capitalism creates more wealth and increases the standard of living for more people in a given system than any other.

We can also look at the history of socialistic countries and see the results.

It's not about theory, its about results.

Go with what works................not what sounds good.

Again, there is no such thing as pure capitalism. Market-based mixed economies, if you want to be specific, have shown themselves the only economic model capable of guiding and maintaining a complex post-industrial society where millions of price signals needs to be constantly reset. Centrally planned economies (CPEs) have failed and only two remain: N. Korea and Cuba. Socialism can, however, be found in various forms across market-based mixed economies to some extent or another (mostly in Western Europe, though none of these nations can be properly called "socialist"). Socialism today is mostly about re-shaping and adjusting capitalism, as is conservatism, libertarianism and modern liberalism. Socialism in its modern forms, seeking only to tweak capitalism, has had various effects, good and bad. Socialism as in CPE is dead for a reason.

That said, if socialism is to denote any form of collective action, or state ownership and control over some of the means of production, then all developed countries are part socialist and so is Adam Smith (1776):

[The duties of the state are]... first... that of protecting the society from the violence and invasion of other independent societies... second... that of protecting, as far as possible, every member of society from the unjustice of oppression of every other member of it... third... that of erecting and maintaining those publick institutions and those publick works which, though they may be in the highest degree advantageous to a great society, are of such a nature, that the profit could never repay the expence to any individual or small number of individuals.

I think we need to settle on a working definition of socialism. I provided the traditional and technical definition in the my first response to the OP. We can use a different definition - but without a clear definition strawmen fallacies are sure to follow... just my 2 cents...

[rickster]

There's some truth to this: you can be an MBA pulling down $150k a year and fit the Marxist description of a member of the proleteriat. You must sell your labor to survive and maintain the lifestyle you desire.

Yes, in a post-industrial economy, Marxism becomes difficult. Yes, even the upper middle class manager must sell his/her labor to maintain his/her lifestyle. Yet, (s)he also owns the means of production, for the means of production in a post-industrial society are brains not machines. Those who think for a living (analysts, professionals, managers) are both: a) proleterian in the sense that they must continously provide their labor and b) capitalist in the sense that they own one of the most vital means of production: creative energy and brains.

The main problem with the intellectual middle-class is that while they're multi-strata'd they differ from the working class inasmuch as they lack unity: capitalism teaches them to slit the competition's throats while guaranteeing nothing. The creative energy and brains they use only exist as real property according to supply and demand, and since their output becomes the intellectual property of capitalism their ideas are not their own property in perpetuity. They may come to find that by virtue of the fact they are employed by capitalists they have to prove in a court of law their ideas are their own. We know how ferociously capitalist laws around intellectual property rights are prosecuted.

[pip]

Ladies and Gentlemen - we have a winner (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)!

Ser Profit hits the nail of life sqaurely upon its head, but oddly no-one cares to comment.

As has been stated many (times many) times previously, there is nothing about any system which is inherantly good or bad.
But there is most definately a difference between how they operate and what kind of effect they have on thier surrounding environment.

Capitalism/Corporatism undoubtably is the premier (so far) means of generating wealth, but its absolutely horrible at distributing that wealth - just look at the MASSIVE difference between the poorest and the richest in any overtly consumerist nation.
It promotes growth in leaps and bounds, but consumes resources at a prodigious rate.

Socialism is the opposite insomuch as its pretty awful at generating wealth, but very good at distributing what it has.
It's also doesn't promote rapid growth as under this scheme it simply isn't nescessary to expand all the time.
This has the net effect of vastly reducing the resource demands of a Socialist society when compared to its Capitalist cousin.

Both systems work.
The fact we exist at all suggests that co-operation in the face of scarcity won out over competition for its own sake in our distant ancestors, thus allowing us to come to the position we currently occupy.
Also the fact that the US - the 'Poster Boy' of Capitalism has risen to its prominence in the short space of 2 centuries is testament to how well that system can work.

The problem we face is convincing our Capitalist kinsmen that although thier system works, it can not work forever.
Just as the dominant social model changed before, it will change again.
We are fast approaching a new age of scarcity, and our rate of resource consumption is only increasing - surely no-one can think this is a good thing....

[phej]

...Capitalism/Corporatism undoubtably is the premier (so far) means of generating wealth, but its absolutely horrible at distributing that wealth - just look at the MASSIVE difference between the poorest and the richest in any overtly consumerist nation.
It promotes growth in leaps and bounds, but consumes resources at a prodigious rate...

Stupid, off-topic question: why is the wealth distribution that capitalism intrinsically bad? Is it not fair to say that there is a maximum level of wealth and income where poverty lies? Assuming this, shouldn't the goal be lift everybody above poverty and not care if everybody has the same or different outcome in wealth and income?

[hubcap]

By far and away the most obscene aspect of socialism vs capitalism is that the most rabid supporters of capitalism are the new middle class i.e. those who lack the means for self-support, independent industrial autonomy and are actually in service to those who posess and control capital. The new middle-class is actually in a worse situation than the (former) bourgeois class who at least had some autonomy. And I assume that most here who are rah-rah'ing for the political superiority of capitalism are in fact the disenfranchised middle-class who are foolishly hoping for a better deal themselves from capitalism, and imagine that political support will make their dream come true.
You know some of us just find the idea of pilfering our neighbors bank account so we can improve our quality of life appalling. Apparently other folks have no problem with that concept.

[firebee]

You know some of us just find the idea of pilfering our neighbors bank account so we can improve our quality of life appalling. Apparently other folks have no problem with that concept.

Is this the point where you give up entirely the concept of making a coherent argument, and attempt rather to use perjorative language and transparent social pressure to make your case?

Just so you know, that's not going to work.

What I gather from you is that capitalism is the only system that you think is ethically sound (and/or the only one that you feel emotionally comfortable with) and that therefore it is the only system that should be used, regardless of what the practical effects of using it are on various groups of people. And possibly that the reason why it is ethical is because it works, and the reason why it works is because it is ethical.

From a sheerly practical point of view (although, admittedly, you may have absolutely no concern that people listen to you and support your ideas so long as your ideas are properly constructed), you are not going to convince anyone of the validity of your statements so long as you resort to "but but picking my pocket!" the minute you're challenged in a debate.

[Profit]

Stupid, off-topic question: why is the wealth distribution that capitalism intrinsically bad? Is it not fair to say that there is a maximum level of wealth and income where poverty lies? Assuming this, shouldn't the goal be lift everybody above poverty and not care if everybody has the same or different outcome in wealth and income?

What pip and I are trying to point out and have a rational discussion about is how inefficient capitalism is. I stressed its unsustainable consumption of resources and pip added to this by saying that it is also not very efficient when it comes to distributing wealth among individuals.

[Autoptic]

What pip and I are trying to point out and have a rational discussion about is how inefficient capitalism is. I stressed its unsustainable consumption of resources and pip added to this by saying that it is also not very efficient when it comes to distributing wealth among individuals.

You're assuming wealth should be coercively redistributed. Efficiency exists only in regards to a given purpose. Our purposes differ.

[Profit]

Yes, but "pure" capitalism cannot exist. The limitations inherent in the market system do not allow for an economy functioning without considerable govt. oversight and control. The extent to which govt. and market need to mix and balance each other might be disputed, but pure capitalism can never work and centrally planned economies are equally doomed to failure (as evident from history).

What we call capitalism in the U.S. is a mixed economic system where the market is generally given as much reign as we deem possible/desirable and most price signals (though definitely not all) are set, to some extent or another, by the market system.

I agree, that is why I called the present socioeconomic system in the US capitalistic in my earlier post. Some others on this thread seem to want to rip up socialism but when it comes to addressing the problems of capitalism, ahem I mean capitalistic socioeconomic systems, they say well the present systems aren’t really examples of capitalism...end of discussion.

[Hamburglar]

I'd consider it arrogant for someone think they had all the answers when all they have are theories.

You'd be wrong. I didn't presume to have answers, only theories. You live every day of your life based on theories my friend. You have theorized that your neighbors are always out to rob you of your money, your property, etc. You have also determined that the Governments only design is to protect your theory of Freedom. Your theories are likely not facts, although some may be based on subjective facts (that is not substantiated by your peers but experienced by you). Some theories you have will be based on more objective facts, that have been repeatedly observed, tested, and repeated; this is generally what one would call science. So to reiterate my original point, it is arrogant to assume that a system is not broken unless you have some omniscient ability. I would be skeptical of anyone who states that the current system is, "the best there is" unless they can substantiate that argument against the mountain of evidence that suggests otherwise. For every instance of success you can raise, I can probably find 3-4 instances of failure that deserve attention before one can arrogantly proclaim that, "the system ain't broke, don't fix it!".

[hubcap]

Is this the point where you give up entirely the concept of making a coherent argument, and attempt rather to use perjorative language and transparent social pressure to make your case?
I actually have no trouble debating the issue of why socialism is a bad thing. Unfortunately a number of people do not see picking their neighbor's pocket as a bad thing. "Perjorative language"? What label would you rather I assign to the coercive confiscation of someone's money?

What I gather from you is that capitalism is the only system that you think is ethically sound (and/or the only one that you feel emotionally comfortable with) and that therefore it is the only system that should be used, regardless of what the practical effects of using it are on various groups of people. And possibly that the reason why it is ethical is because it works, and the reason why it works is because it is ethical.
I am perfectly happy with any system that doesn't infringe upon my liberty. At this point capitalism is the least offensive in that respect. You insist on viewing people as "groups" rather than individuals. Isn't that what the debate should be about? Groups don't work, think, or make decisions -- individuals do. Individuals co-exist with other individuals. Individuals have different goals, ideas, wants and needs, yet socialism wants to use "someone's" value system to determine what is best for the "group". What moral authority is there for you or I to decide what is "best" for someone else?

From a sheerly practical point of view (although, admittedly, you may have absolutely no concern that people listen to you and support your ideas so long as your ideas are properly constructed), you are not going to convince anyone of the validity of your statements so long as you resort to "but but picking my pocket!" the minute you're challenged in a debate.
You seem unwillingly to acknowledge that philosophically picking someone's pocket is immoral and unethical. That is a slippery slope you are standing on, which is exactly why Marx recognized that socialism was simply the intermediate step between capitalism and communism.

[nacht]

You know some of us just find the idea of pilfering our neighbors bank account so we can improve our quality of life appalling. Apparently other folks have no problem with that concept.

Resorting to emotional language (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) such as this as your primary mode of debate is only marginally better than if you had said "won't somebody think of the children!"

[hubcap]

Resorting to emotional language (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) such as this as your primary mode of debate is only marginally better than if you had said "won't somebody think of the children!"
What terminology would you prefer be used to convey the concept?

[phej]

What pip and I are trying to point out and have a rational discussion about is how inefficient capitalism is. I stressed its unsustainable consumption of resources and pip added to this by saying that it is also not very efficient when it comes to distributing wealth among individuals.

Why does capitalism need to end in either (a) a Marxian social revolution; or (b) an exhaustion of natural resources? Seems to me if we let pricing signals work, we can avoid either end-game.

[firebee]

You insist on viewing people as "groups" rather than individuals. Isn't that what the debate should be about?

I don't know about you, but I am not capable of simultaneously considering the individual characteristics of every unique snowflake on this entire planet. And even if I could, my suspicion is that the difference between myself, "graduate student in electrical engineering wearing humorous T-shirt" and the person sitting in front of me, "graduate student in electrical engineering wearing fedora" is not significant enough to warrant the increased complexity.


You seem unwillingly to acknowledge that philosophically picking someone's pocket is immoral and unethical.

You are correct -- regardless of whether you want to label the principle at hand "not picking someone else's pocket", "not picking someone else's nose", "not violating someone else's goat", or "not doing what hubcap says", I see no reason to acknowledge it. Are you going to present any reasons?


That is a slippery slope you are standing on, which is exactly why Marx recognized that socialism was simply the intermediate step between capitalism and communism.

This is starting to be like the Spam skit. "We have logical fallacy, logical fallacy, eggs, and logical fallacy." -- "But I don't want any logical fallacy!"

I'm sitting at a desk. The coefficient of friction of all the surfaces that I seem to be in contact with are all acceptably high, although my mouse is suspiciously sticky. The evidence at hand would seem to indicate a lack of slippery slopeness or for that matter standing, and you have certainly not helped me out in discerning any reason why I might think otherwise. Absent proof, I am forced to conclude that you are delusional.

Possibly you want to support your statements before the nice men with nets come?

[hubcap]

I don't know about you, but I am not capable of simultaneously considering the individual characteristics of every unique snowflake on this entire planet. And even if I could, my suspicion is that the difference between myself, "graduate student in electrical engineering wearing humorous T-shirt" and the person sitting in front of me, "graduate student in electrical engineering wearing fedora" is not significant enough to warrant the increased complexity.
You do not have to consider all the individual characteristics, just acknowledge they exist. You as "graduate student in electrical engineering wearing humorous T-Shirt" may want to go to the beach on summer vacation, while the "graduate student in electrical engineering wearing fedora" may choose to go to Europe on summer vacation. You may choose to spend your money on illegal drugs while the fedora wearing grad student may choose to invest his or her money in stocks and bonds. After 20 years of you buying illegal drugs and your fedora wearing friend buying stocks and bonds you end up penniless and dependent on illegal drugs while your friend has a comfortable nest egg. Now you want to lay claim to his nest egg........what gives you the right?

I'm sitting at a desk. The coefficient of friction of all the surfaces that I seem to be in contact with are all acceptably high, although my mouse is suspiciously sticky. The evidence at hand would seem to indicate a lack of slippery slopeness or for that matter standing, and you have certainly not helped me out in discerning any reason why I might think otherwise. Absent proof, I am forced to conclude that you are delusional.

Possibly you want to support your statements before the nice men with nets come?
I have to admit this statement gave me a laugh. :-)

[firebee]

Now you want to lay claim to his nest egg........what gives you the right?

Because we live in a society in which that is the system by which resources are distributed. It's not my fault that he decided to spend his drug money on stocks.

Because beer and whores are intrinsically more worthy expenditures than stocks and bonds.

Because I am the only person in the universe, and the rest of you are all automatons created to serve me.

And because you seem to like constructing just-so stories involving the use of intoxicants, here's one for you: A young man possessed of considerable intellectual gifts elects to be homeless and strung out on heroin. Because he is a convincing panhandler and because he is a member of a middle-class family, he is able to convince a great many people to give him money that amounts to an income in the high five figures. Regardless of whether these people have good sense or not, they freely elected to give him money that they earned; hence, it is his legitimate possession.

Meanwhile, in the same city, there is an addictions counselor who is working on a master's degree that would increase his utility for the purpose of getting people off heroin by a considerable margin. He is not a convincing panhandler (among other things, because he spends his time counseling addicts rather than begging) and not a member of a middle-class family -- hence, the amount of money that he can freely convince other people to give him is considerably smaller.

Enough money passes through the addict's hands per year to finance the education of two or three addictions counselors -- indeed, to finance his own education in something that would cause him to be a doer of valuable things. Yet he is going to spend this money on substances that are ultimately useless and will indeed eventually kill him. What gives him the right?

[hubcap]

What gives him the right?
Free will. We all have it, and as long as we don't interfere with others' right to do the same its all good.

Ultimately it boils down to some people wantinig to tell other people what is best for them. In your story you would advocate that it is "wrong" for the social worker to be paid less than the panhandler because his endeavor is more honorable. You would also advocate that it is wrong to let the intellectual heroin addict have access to heroin. You would claim the moral high ground by telling people what is "best" for them.

I take the position that it is "best" for the individual to decide what is "best" for themselves. Just because you like vanilla better than chocolate does that make vanilla best? Because you are an engineer instead of a door greeter at Wal-Mart does that make engineering better? For you perhaps, but what about the guy who is happy being a door greeter at Wal-Mart.

Better or best is a matter of perspective. My view is that it is simply better to let the individual make those decisions. You say vanilla is better, I say chocolate. Who is right? Should we vote on it? If 63% say vanilla is better does that make it so? If 63% say we should raise taxes and give the money to the poor does that make it moral?

[nacht]

What terminology would you prefer be used to convey the concept?

I would prefer you use considered reasons rather than emotional language to convey the concept. Calling something "theft" as your sole basis of argument only convinces those who already agree with you.

Others clearly do not think that it is theft, and rather as part of the social contract or a "necessary" or "lesser" evil of some form. Repeating over and over again that it is "theft" accomplishes nothing, because they have already decided either that it isn't or, at the least, is an acceptable price to pay for whatever benefits society grants.

In essence, I want a rational argument, not an emotional plea.

[hubcap]

I would prefer you use considered reasons rather than emotional language to convey the concept. Calling something "theft" as your sole basis of argument only convinces those who already agree with you.

Others clearly do not think that it is theft, and rather as part of the social contract or a "necessary" or "lesser" evil of some form. Repeating over and over again that it is "theft" accomplishes nothing, because they have already decided either that it isn't or, at the least, is an acceptable price to pay for whatever benefits society grants.

In essence, I want a rational argument, not an emotional plea.
nacht - I understand your view and will attempt forthwith to respect it.

However, I do not believe that "political correctness" is anything other than pandering, nor do I believe it accomplishes anything positive.

[firebee]

In your story you would advocate that it is "wrong" for the social worker to be paid less than the panhandler because his endeavor is more honorable. You would also advocate that it is wrong to let the intellectual heroin addict have access to heroin. You would claim the moral high ground by telling people what is "best" for them.

Gosh, all of this stuff that I "would" claim. Do I own socialism too? Wouldn't that be similar to picking nacht's pocket (a thing that I do not want to do since he would snap my hand off at the wrist long before I succeeded at getting it into his pants)?

I could make that claim, if I cared to. Other claims that I can make include:

The addictions counselor causes an increase in functional behavior among his clients, which causes them to spend more time 'keeping the lights on' and less time fucking stuff up. This is a useful function that we want more of; therefore we should endeavor to direct resources toward it.
The drug addict achieves chemical stimulation of his pleasure centers to a much higher degree than the addictions counselor -- therefore his efficiency at converting money to brain reward is considerably higher, and he is therefore a better user of resources than the addictions counselor.
The addictions counselor is a moral degenerate who is going to Hell for a number of reasons -- hence, he lacks financial resources in accordance with the Prosperity Doctrine. Attempting to reverse this state of affairs would be a crime against God.
The drug addict, being as he is most likely contaminated by bloodborne pathogens and appears to have certain distinctly maladaptive neurological traits, is less useful for mating purposes. Therefore, the money at issue would be better used at ensuring that he kills himself sooner rather than later, as opposed to getting clean and potentially reproducing.
While it is amusing that the drug addict spends more money on drugs than the addictions counselor would spend on his education, there is no practical means of getting ahold of said money because it is being spent piecemeal on heroin and the addict would not be able to continue to panhandle without heroin. Therefore, the resources required to educate the counselor should be acquired by some more feasible means than "turn the addict upside down and shake him".


But what actually happened is this: You told a story in which the non-addict had money and the addict did not, and I told a story in which the addict had money and the anti-addict did not. The rest is interpretation.


If 63% say we should raise taxes and give the money to the poor does that make it moral?

Perhaps it does and perhaps it doesn't. Why is morality relevant as far as operating a government, and why should a government be operating according to your system of morality as opposed to someone else's?

[nacht]

nacht - I understand your view and will attempt forthwith to respect it.

However, I do not believe that "political correctness" is anything other than pandering, nor do I believe it accomplishes anything positive.

If you think that this has anything to do--at all--with "political correctness" or, as you put it in a comment to me, "A fart does not smell like roses no matter what we call it" then no, you did not "understand my view."

I am not talking about your terminology being negative, I am saying that the structure of your debate is flawed, only marginally better than repeating "think of the children" over and over again when someone makes a point.

What you "call" it is completely and totally irrelevant to me. Call it "theft" if you like, but don't expect anyone else to take that seriously or to accept your argument simply because you call it "theft."

My problem isn't that you are using emotive terms, it is that you are using emotive terms in place of a rational argument.

[firebee]

But what actually happened is this: You told a story in which the non-addict had money and the addict did not, and I told a story in which the addict had money and the anti-addict did not. The rest is interpretation.

Oh, and incidentally -- unless I misconstrue your statements, the story you told and the story I told both fall into the same category according to your system: "Person A has money, person B does not have money and wants it. Regardless of the virtue of A and B calculated on any system, and regardless of what A and B would spend the money on, A should continue to have the money." Given this, what purpose was there in you telling a tale of chemical dependency?

[hubcap]

Gosh, all of this stuff that I "would" claim. Do I own socialism too?
No.

Why is morality relevant as far as operating a government, and why should a government be operating according to your system of morality as opposed to someone else's?
Morality is only relevant if you want a moral system of laws. What system would you prefer? Moral or immoral?

Actually "my" system of morals is irrelevant. The system of morals the government of the United States should be operating under is the system of morals of the Founding Fathers..............unless we should choose to amend the Constitution via the mechanism provided.





hubcap added to this post, 8 minutes and 29 seconds later...

Given this, what purpose was there in you telling a tale of chemical dependency?
The only purpose is to illustrate that individuals make choices that others may not agree with. I do not believe we should presume to make choices for other individuals even though those choices may ultimately result in a lower level of income or lifestyle.

I don't presume to think I know what is best for "you".





hubcap added to this post, 10 minutes and 43 seconds later...

My problem isn't that you are using emotive terms, it is that you are using emotive terms in place of a rational argument.
I don't want to pay higher taxes because I want to keep my money.

Is that rational enough?

[Hamburglar]

I don't presume to think I know what is best for "you".


Yes you do. You believe the COTUS is the best way for us. What if it is not? that is the OP of this thread!!!!!!!

[firebee]

Morality is only relevant if you want a moral system of laws. What system would you prefer? Moral or immoral?

Immoral.

Ask a silly question, get a silly answer.


Actually "my" system of morals is irrelevant. The system of morals the government of the United States should be operating under is the system of morals of the Founding Fathers..............unless we should choose to amend the Constitution via the mechanism provided.

In which case I have to ask the same question you asked me:

If 63% say we should raise taxes and give the money to the poor does that make it moral?


And how does the Constitution of the United States apply to a general discussion of how governments, not all of which are the United States or have a Constitution, are best run?


The only purpose is to illustrate that individuals make choices that others may not agree with. I do not believe we should presume to make choices for other individuals even though those choices may ultimately result in a lower level of income or lifestyle.


Given the well-known effects of chemical dependence, and the somewhat less well-known effects of the mental illnesses that cause and are caused by said dependence, do you think it is reasonable to attribute the actions of the addicts to a truly free choice?


I don't want to pay higher taxes because I want to keep my money.

Is that rational enough?

Actually, that is about as definitive an example of "irrational" as anything that I could come up with.

[xkas4165]

BECAUSE IT DOESN'T WORK!!!!

I didn't like when my parents told me what to do and I don't like it when the government does either. I think we should be able to excercise the free will God gave us. It's interesting how the left wants "diversity", but then wants us to be the same and control everything we do. I remember in grammar school (4th grade?) they eliminated the advanced, regular, and basic reading groups. You know what happened? The slower children were so lost in the regular class, they didn't learn anything. the advance children were so bored we did our work in about 3 minutes and started to talk. We definitely didn't learn anything b/c we already knew the subject matter. The average, mid-level students were so distracted by our talking, they didn't learn anything either. So no one learned a thing. In a socialist society, there is no reason to work or have hope about anything b/c it doesn't matter what you do, the outcome is the same and nothing gets accomplished.

Love this quotation: The difference between a contemporary liberal and a socialist is that to a liberal the most beautiful word in the English language is 'forbidden', whereas to a socialist the most beautiful word is 'compulsory'. John McCarthy

[Ham]

Morality is only relevant if you want a moral system of laws. What system would you prefer? Moral or immoral?What about an amoral system of laws. The world does not have absolutes or dichotomies, only degrees and relatives.

[hubcap]

Ask a silly question, get a silly answer.
You are the one who asked why morality was relevant.

And how does the Constitution of the United States apply to a general discussion of how governments, not all of which are the United States or have a Constitution, are best run?
At the very least it can be used as an example of a constitutional republic and evaluations can be made of its' development. Let us compare it to the socialism of Cuba for instance. Or Chavez's socialism. At least then we have an objective frame of reference.

Given the well-known effects of chemical dependence, and the somewhat less well-known effects of the mental illnesses that cause and are caused by said dependence, do you think it is reasonable to attribute the actions of the addicts to a truly free choice?
I would be just as comfortable making a comparison with a non-drug using individual who spent his income on expensive vacations and material items such as 52" widescreen TV's. The result is the same. One individual ends up with no savings after 20 years while the other has a nice fat nest egg as a result of careful saving, investing, and doing without widescreen TV.
The point is made either way.


Actually, that is about as definitive an example of "irrational" as anything that I could come up with.
So it is irrational to want to keep one's earnings? In that case please turn all yours over to me.





hubcap added to this post, 2 minutes and 27 seconds later...

What about an amoral system of laws. The world does not have absolutes or dichotomies, only degrees and relatives.
Interesting concept, but any system would have to be based on values of some kind. If there were no morals or values it would certainly be difficult to make the case that murder or theft should be illegal. Everything would be arbitrary would it not?

[Ray9]

Now that we know socialism and communism are just different aspects of the same thing why don't we explore how they have worked in say, the last hundred years? No one can argue that communism is an advanced form of socialism and all forms of socialism have as their logical outcome the establishment of the communist state, so how has socialism/communism worked to improve the conditions of its subordinates? In order for socialism to work everyone must be on the same page, that is they must all be in total agreement as to the mission of socialism which is to make all things as equal and fair as possible. Of course equality and fairness are subjective things, so the definitions of equality and fairness must come from some ruling elite that has the power to impose them on the masses. What of those who aren't on the same page and don't understand the mission or don't care? Well, this is why socialism has no choice but to evolve into communism because the human being is an autonomous creature that values individuality and self-determination. The "great Thought" that provides the elegant theory of socialism may be lost on the simple folk who would benefit from it most so inevitably, force must be applied to bring them to their senses. This is why all socialism must evolve into communism at some point because the mission is more important than the individual and the individual must be submitted to the mission. In other words an individual's freedom to choose must be removed from the equation in order for socialism to realize its mission of total equality and fairness.

Predictably some here will argue vehemently that socialism is not the same as communism but clearly they differ only in a matter of stage. Socialism exists to set the stage for communism because without it socialism would be rejected as inferior by its disgruntled charges. Communism is the tool socialists need to police the mission. Now which form of socialist utopia has worked the best? Cuba? The former Soviet Union? North Korea? East Germany?

[Profit]

I would be just as comfortable making a comparison with a non-drug using individual who spent his income on expensive vacations and material items such as 52" widescreen TV's. The result is the same. One individual ends up with no savings after 20 years while the other has a nice fat nest egg as a result of careful saving, investing, and doing without widescreen TV.
The point is made either way.


But if enough individuals don't spend their money on new beach towels for their vacation and don't buy the latest and biggest gadgets that they don't really need then the companies that make these goods do not see their sales increase meaning that value of their stocks go down and the individuals that invested in those stocks see the value of their investments decrease. Capitalistic systems need their lower and middle classes to spend their income - not invest it. If everyone saves their money the system starts to break down.

[Tristan]

In order for socialism to work everyone must be on the same page, that is they must all be in total agreement as to the mission of socialism which is to make all things as equal and fair as possible. Of course equality and fairness are subjective things, so the definitions of equality and fairness must come from some ruling elite that has the power to impose them on the masses.
...
...
...
Now which form of socialist utopia has worked the best? Cuba? The former Soviet Union? North Korea? East Germany?

The 10-15 small countries whose GDP/capita exceeds the US are far more socialized than we are. Luxembourg, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland, and the like. These are upheld as shining examples of the efficacy of socialism. The failures get disregarded by advocates, but still: you can't argue with success.

My answer would be that what works in Luxembourg works in Luxembourg, but I doubt China or the US would get very far on their model. Or vice-versa. Success is not entirely linked to the economic system. It also relies on the solidarity, optimism, and commitment of the people who live under that system. Size matters, as well as a million other factors. Success can rely on existing wealth. And the culture. A few nations are "sustainable," able to get by without growing much, while others, used to growing, have come to rely upon it.

Our view on the difference between Swiss and North Koreans is tunneled into these crude, useless delineations of ideologies. Whereas, the plain fact of the matter is that the Swiss are bankers, and the Norks are rice farmers.

[firebee]

At the very least it can be used as an example of a constitutional republic and evaluations can be made of its' development. Let us compare it to the socialism of Cuba for instance. Or Chavez's socialism. At least then we have an objective frame of reference.

Or we could compare it to the social democracies of Western Europe as well as the current state of affairs in the US. All of these represent some degree of socialist influence.


I would be just as comfortable making a comparison with a non-drug using individual who spent his income on expensive vacations and material items such as 52" widescreen TV's. The result is the same. One individual ends up with no savings after 20 years while the other has a nice fat nest egg as a result of careful saving, investing, and doing without widescreen TV.
The point is made either way.


Yes, but would you be just as comfortable making a comparison with an intoxicant-free individual who spent his income on food, rent, and treatments for Crohn's Disease? One individual ends up with no savings after 20 years, while the other has a nice fat nest egg as a result of careful saving, investing, and having not yet contracted a catastrophic illness.

Your examples of how a person might come by poverty are suspiciously skewed to the side of reckless indulgence, but your actual philosophy is neutral as to the cause. Both cases exist -- unless you care to argue otherwise? -- but one is clearly more palatable to mention to most people than the other.


So it is irrational to want to keep one's earnings? In that case please turn all yours over to me.

:laugh:

Trouble is that I share that irrational (or maybe best said nonrational) desire among others that cannot be satisfied simultaneously.


Interesting concept, but any system would have to be based on values of some kind. If there were no morals or values it would certainly be difficult to make the case that murder or theft should be illegal. Everything would be arbitrary would it not?

See, now this is an interesting thing. I'd argue that any state can be viewed amorally as a system that provides certain affordances -- whether that be "if I save enough money then I can buy a car" or "if my cousin has a friend who works in the Ministry of Pizza Delivery, then I can have Comrade Mortis deliver me a pizza".

Obviously, there are certain regimes that most people find preferable, and other regimes that most people want blown up. That's a matter of "morals and values", and I do not think the varying standards in existence can be fully reconciled.

[Causa Mortis]

Success is not entirely linked to the economic system. It also relies on the solidarity, optimism, and commitment of the people who live under that system. Size matters, as well as a million other factors.

Labor quality is one of the big reasons that Norway, Luxemborg, Switzerland, etc have higher per capita incomes. And I'd speculate that the reasons labor quality is so much higher in those countries is because investment in human capital (ie education, health care, and reasonable time off) increase MPL.


So it is irrational to want to keep one's earnings? In that case please turn all yours over to me.

This line of reasoning is tiresome. If you find participation in a complex modern economy cumbersome and overly taxing, I'd advocate that you withdraw from the system and move somewhere high in the rocky mountains and in the pacific where the value of your labor will be 100% yours to keep.

The difference between how you'd live in this environment and how you live in our complex modern environment is the benefit of interacting with others' labor, capital, technology, and social system. I know its terrible that buying public goods and ensuring the general welfare takes about a third of it back (but would your income be higher if government expenditure were lower? I doubt it), but you do have the opportunity to withdraw at any time.

[Profit]

I remember in grammar school (4th grade?) they eliminated the advanced, regular, and basic reading groups. You know what happened? The slower children were so lost in the regular class, they didn't learn anything. the advance children were so bored we did our work in about 3 minutes and started to talk. We definitely didn't learn anything b/c we already knew the subject matter. The average, mid-level students were so distracted by our talking, they didn't learn anything either. So no one learned a thing. In a socialist society, there is no reason to work or have hope about anything b/c it doesn't matter what you do, the outcome is the same and nothing gets accomplished.


This is off topic and I don't know the details of your grammar school/school system but....
Was the rational for doing away with the three different reading groups due to a funding issue? Sounds like three different groups requires three different teachers. Or perhaps an increase in enrollment meant that they no longer had the space, or the money to add on to the building, to divide your grade up. I can't see how you could blame this on liberals seeing how they are usually the ones advocating for more education funding.
Also your story has nothing to do with a socialist society. In a socialist society those students that were more advanced would be given the opportunity to develop their academic abilities to their fullest potential.

[firebee]

Also your story has nothing to do with a socialist society. In a socialist society those students that were more advanced would be given the opportunity to develop their academic abilities to their fullest potential.

Why would this necessarily follow? Real socialist societies are just as constrained by the availability of resources as any other system. Presumably, a sensible socialist society would allocate resources towards the development of exceptional talents because it is useful, but this does not necessarily guarantee the maximum development of potential.

[Profit]

Why would this necessarily follow? Real socialist societies are just as constrained by the availability of resources as any other system. Presumably, a sensible socialist society would allocate resources towards the development of exceptional talents because it is useful, but this does not necessarily guarantee the maximum development of potential.

This is why I said the more advanced students would be given the opportunity to develop their skills to the fullest. As in they would be given the choice to pursue an advanced education based on their academic ability and not their ability to pay for said education.

[Ray9]

The 10-15 small countries whose GDP/capita exceeds the US are far more socialized than we are. Luxembourg, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Switzerland, and the like. These are upheld as shining examples of the efficacy of socialism. The failures get disregarded by advocates, but still: you can't argue with success.


Agreed. Socialism can work relatively well on a small scale with a homogenous population and a prevailing philosophy of cooperation and mutual aid. The problems arise with the vastness of countries like the United States and China. There's just too much real estate seperating different cultural and ethnic populations. Trying to administer socialistic policies under these conditions is next to impossible. This is where capitalism shines. Everyone understands the basic rules of capitalism. If I work hard I will be rewarded and can take an active roll in improving my condition.

[firebee]

If you find participation in a complex modern economy cumbersome and overly taxing, I'd advocate that you withdraw from the system and move somewhere high in the rocky mountains and in the pacific where the value of your labor will be 100% yours to keep.

I'm not exactly satisfied with the "if you don't like it, leave" argument, but I'll add a bit more support to it:

Let's say that we're in the state of nature and hence apt to be eaten by a bear. Now two of us make some sort of agreement in accordance with proper principles of ownership that we will trade 30% of our shoots and leaves which we eat in exchange for some beneficial situation such as that we will alternate standing watch for bears which would otherwise eat us. So now we only have 70% of our shoots and leaves but are less likely to be eaten by bears.

Then a third person decides they like the bargain, and now we have an even better system of bear watches, and more people join and we develop agriculture, and then even more people join and we have banks and roads... and you still don't much like the bargain, but you like even less the concept of being eaten by a bear (which is still on the table, y'know). Why is it that we cannot effectively decide, now as an entire nation, that the price of interacting with us is one thing rather than another?

[nacht]

I don't want to pay higher taxes because I want to keep my money.

Is that rational enough?

Even if that is a rational position (I won't comment on this one way or the other), it is not really a useful statement in a debate. It is simply a statement of personal opinion: you, personally, don't want to pay higher taxes because you, personally, want to keep your money. This--as one might expect--has exactly zero bearing on anyone else's position and isn't going to sway anyone.

Further, it is exceptionally simplistic and presents--at best--a specious case for not having higher taxes. I want a pony, but I don't want to go through the trouble of feeding it. I just want it to be happy and healthy and require no upkeep whatsoever. Telling someone this, their proper response might be to pat me on the head and say "good for you?"

Your statement--note that I do not use the word "argument"--certainly doesn't establish that taxes are "theft" nor, even if they are, that such is wrong or that--even if it is wrong--those concerns are not outweighed by other concerns.

[hubcap]

Yes, but would you be just as comfortable making a comparison with an intoxicant-free individual who spent his income on food, rent, and treatments for Crohn's Disease? One individual ends up with no savings after 20 years, while the other has a nice fat nest egg as a result of careful saving, investing, and having not yet contracted a catastrophic illness.

Your examples of how a person might come by poverty are suspiciously skewed to the side of reckless indulgence, but your actual philosophy is neutral as to the cause. Both cases exist -- unless you care to argue otherwise? -- but one is clearly more palatable to mention to most people than the other.
Actually this is where you have discovered the fact that I am not opposed to all public assistance. You see, you never asked the question in that manner. I am suspicious of the government administering public assistance in a philanthropic way due to the fact that all things government are political, and fundamentally I think politicians are contemptable, but under the proper oversight and circumstances I would not be opposed to helping other citizens of this nation who are unable to provide for themselves. I question whether it could be done properly, but in concept I would be agreeable.

Do you know how many people without health insurance make over $50k / year ??

[lurk]

a sensible socialist society

I suspect that finding this is about a likely as finding a benevolent dictator. And I expect it would probably work as well.

I nominate myself...

[firebee]

Actually this is where you have discovered the fact that I am not opposed to all public assistance. You see, you never asked the question in that manner. I am suspicious of the government administering public assistance in a philanthropic way due to the fact that all things government are political, and fundamentally I think politicians are contemptable, but under the proper oversight and circumstances I would not be opposed to helping other citizens of this nation who are unable to provide for themselves. I question whether it could be done properly, but in concept I would be agreeable.

And actually, this is where you have discovered the fact that I am not opposed to "proper oversight and circumstances". Group hug! Although I would point out that you still have the problem that some of the set of people taxed are invariably going to object to at least some of the uses to which their money is put, at which point you are again contaminated by lack of consent.

To my mind, the entire point of anything one might do on a government-scale level is to preserve the functioning of meat-units and/or increase their utility -- that is to say, for instance, to convert the above mentioned addict from a meat-unit not even suitable for use as a doorstop, to one that is capable of moving boxes from places that we do not want boxes to places where we do want boxes (or even one that is capable of pushing buttons that make a set of robots conduct the box-lifting activity). Obviously, this requires a certain degree of planning. policy, and metrics to ensure that the ratio of money spent on beer vs. textbooks remains within acceptable limits.

Overall, I would like the machinery of society (of which government is only a part) to operate such that we have a minimum of time spent re-solving fundamentally uninteresting problems such as "How shall I pay for the food that I need to eat in order to function tomorrow?" or "Where do I find the bear that I want to be eaten by?" (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)

And as a side note, one of the odd consequences of this debate is that I have been thinking about how I want to construct my life with respect to my immediate social sphere: I implied above that one potential purpose of redistributive taxation was to provide an approximation of the social support that humans are cognitively equipped to manage only on the tribal level. When combined with some events that have occurred in my monkeysphere lately, it occurs to me that I need to do some further thinking on how to systematically address the problem of "members of the tribe in need of assistance" and to structure my system of living in such a manner that I might have resources available for such use.


Do you know how many people without health insurance make over $50k / year ??

Do you know how much it costs to manage a Chronic Ugly Condition such as MS, narcolepsy, or the aforementioned Crohn's? Or to purchase insurance for someone having those conditions? (Mind that I don't actually have a figure myself, but the ones I've heard in the course of discussion have been stored in my brain as $omglots and $hahahahaha, respectively.)

We may want to play with this issue in the sadly-neglected health care thread, but in short I think that the practical disadvantages of the current scheme include but are not limited to:

People who cannot reasonably afford the insurance that is offered to them.
People who could afford the insurance that is offered to them, elect to gamble on their good health vs. the significant impact of the premium involved on their daily life, and who then lose the gamble by developing an absurdly expensive acute or chronic condition. We could potentially declare that the prize for this particular lottery is death or unrelieved inability to perform useful social functions, but this seems to be a consequence that few are comfortable accepting.
People who can afford and did purchase insurance, but who then encountered an unforeseen event that left them unprotected; disability leading to loss of the income that pays premiums, for instance, or the company discovering occult reasons to deny coverage when called upon for a major need.


How we might deal with these issues (and the discrepancies between a more-ideal solution and the proposals currently on the table) is probably a question for the other thread, but I do think it is necessary to be clear-eyed about what we are supporting and not supporting with any given plan.





firebee added to this post, 20 minutes and 28 seconds later...

I suspect that finding this is about a likely as finding a benevolent dictator. And I expect it would probably work as well.

It depends on the sense of the word "socialist" -- arguably, the western Europeans have introduced a degree of ambiguity to the term.


I nominate myself...

No no no, you've got it all wrong. The ENTJ is the benevolent dictator, the INTJ manipulates the dictator among others in accordance with the Grand Master Plan, and the INTP performs the scientific experiments (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.) necessary for realizing certain aspects of the Plan. And occasionally flings a trout at the INTJ to see what happens (so far data indicates: trout returns at high velocity, subject produces facial configuration earlier found to correlate with 'irk').

But anyway. It seems reasonable to guess that it is difficult to find a real-world example of a successfully benevolent dictator, but we are not necessarily -- especially in the case where we are examining impractically extreme social systems -- concerning ourselves with petty things like "reality". I suppose next you're going to tell me that I shouldn't assume that the chicken in every pot is spherical (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)?

[nacht]

Do you know how many people without health insurance make over $50k / year ??

< 11 million nonelderly people, including children, have a family income over $40k and are uninsured (7.2% of nonelderly couples making over $40k, source (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)).

Of that, 4.7 million are adults without dependent children.

I imagine the numbers are somewhat smaller for individuals making $50k+ as opposed to members of families making $40k plus.

But, where does this magic $50k number come from and why do you think it matters?

Incidentally, your average employer-based plan costs over $13k/year for a family of four, of which about 30% is generally covered by the employee (source (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)). Assuming employment, that leads to around $4k per year.

[hubcap]

Who said there was anything magic about $50k

It is generally accepted that anyone making $50k is living above the poverty line and it just could be that they've chosen not to purchase healthcare. Since we're discussion socialism it seems reasonable to ask why should I be concerned about someone else's decision to NOT purchase health insurance.

[nacht]

Who said there was anything magic about $50k


You did when you used that as a constant without any particular footnote on to where that number comes from.


It is generally accepted that anyone making $50k is living above the poverty line and it just could be that they've chosen not to purchase healthcare. Since we're discussion socialism it seems reasonable to ask why should I be concerned about someone else's decision to NOT purchase health insurance.

We're talking about around 8 million non-child, non-elderly individuals who exist in families (not as individuals) who make over $40k/year and do not have health insurance. That's for whatever reason: some of those are going to be that they can't get it or can't get it at a reasonable rate due to preexisting conditions. Given the curve tends to closely follow income, we can guess that the number is going to be substantially lower for 50k. Especially once we remove the issues with preexisting conditions.

You care about it because it increases the cost of health care for everyone if and when these people end up in the ER.

[hubcap]

So are you advocating that the taxpayers should pay for health insurance for those who simply refuse to purchase it?

[nacht]

So are you advocating that the taxpayers shoot pay for health insurance for those who simply refuse to purchase it?


They will be required to purchase it, and the barrier to entry (preexisting conditions) will be lifted, which will allow many of them to do so. That isn't us "paying for their health insurance." Some may qualify for subsidies, but if so it would be a function that they couldn't buy it without those subsidies and it would be a portion of the cost, not the entirety.

Now, that said, this is a relatively small number of people to start with, meanwhile, their lack of health insurance is costing everyone else more in their overall health care.

[Autoptic]

Some may qualify for subsidies, but if so it would be a function that they couldn't buy it without those subsidies and it would be a portion of the cost, not the entirety.

Subsidies certainly aren't equality. "From each according to ability, to each according to his effort" doesn't cover subsidies. You're talking about some communism. Of course, socialism purposely hides its intrinsic inequalities between effort and payment under it's forced "benefits" and their actual hidden costs as you mentioned.

[nacht]

Subsidies certainly aren't equality. "From each according to ability, to each according to his effort" doesn't cover subsidies. You're talking about some communism.

Using labels to smear concepts is not exactly productive, but even so, we aren't talking communism we are talking socialism, and we are talking socialism in a much lesser degree than already existing programs in other areas (see also, medicaid, medicare, EITC, social security, welfare, and even Stafford Loans). Switzerland isn't exactly a bastion of communist thinking, and that is similar to the system we are looking at.

[Autoptic]

Using labels to smear concepts is not exactly productive, but even so, we aren't talking communism we are talking socialism, and we are talking socialism in a much lesser degree than already existing programs in other areas (see also, medicaid, medicare, EITC, social security, welfare, and even Stafford Loans). Switzerland isn't exactly a bastion of communist thinking, and that is similar to the system we are looking at.

Actually, I was saying socialism's claims contradict it's actions. The concept violates itself quite nicely.

The subsidizing you were referring to would only occur on the books since everyone would be officially considered equal and forced to comply. It's intrinsically and purposely deceptive.

[firebee]

Actually, I was saying socialism's claims contradict it's actions. The concept violates itself quite nicely.

How is it that you propose that socialism violates itself?

Note that if the answer involves five clothes pins, a toilet plunger, a case of motor oil, and a herring, then I do not want to know.

[themuzicman]

The core difference between socialism/communism and capitalism/free but regulated markets, is the view of human nature.

Socialism has to believe that people will work hard and be productive and creative, plus be willing to sacrifice and look to cut costs for the good of the collective. It assumes human beings naturally work for the good of others, and that people in groups will naturally raise themselves up without any concern for personal gain.

Capitalism assumes that people are fundamentally self-interested, and that the best work comes out when people are challenged to achieve for their own benefit. Thus, creativity and hard work and sacrifice and productivity create the expectation of personal reward.

This isn't to say that socialism doesn't acknowledge some selfish elements to human nature, nor does capitalism say that people cannot work for the good of others.

But the fundamental question is whether any given person will naturally be self-interested or others-focused.

While the idyllic youth may want to believe the latter, both history and experience will tell us that humans are naturally self-interested, and must be repeatedly motivated to rise to the level of helping others.

Thus, at a foundational level, capitalism is the better system, hands down, because it correctly understands human nature.

[Autoptic]

How is it that you propose that socialism violates itself?

Note that if the answer involves five clothes pins, a toilet plunger, a case of motor oil, and a herring, then I do not want to know.

It's supposedly "equal pay for equal work"; then, we add "except when otherwise", and quite obviously most things will end up "otherwise".

[firebee]

The core difference between socialism/communism and capitalism/free but regulated markets, is the view of human nature.

One of the problems with a solely free-market system is that it assumes that human beings are rational actors. This is not necessarily the case. We have well-known cognitive issues with, among other things, understanding risk and acting in a mutually-supporting fashion outside of a fairly limited sphere.

While in many cases the price of knowledge is pain, there are cases where people are almost guaranteed to make decisions that when spread out among the population as a whole will have catastrophic effects for some individuals, their families, and probably the community around them (at least to some degree). The very case that we are discussing right now is a potential example of this: There may exist people who are currently experiencing good health and who consequently elect to forego health insurance for some short-term benefit. They have not experienced sudden and expensive illness before, so they do not have a clear picture of the disastrous event that they are gambling on. Some of them lose. These people will end up unnecessarily dead or disabled, thusly removing their ability to contribute to a prosperous society, or they will end up receiving services that they (unlike others) did not pay for.

What we choose to do about this is another question, but it is astoundingly naive to discount the effects of imperfect information and decisionmaking on a system that assumes perfect knowledge.


While the idyllic youth may want to believe the latter, both history and experience will tell us that humans are naturally self-interested, and must be repeatedly motivated to rise to the level of helping others.

You seem to be enamored of late of mistaking "you'll understand when you're older" for a valid argument. As I become older, I become increasingly unimpressed with such assertions.

Also, 'idyllic' does not mean what you think it means.

[nacht]

It's supposedly "equal pay for equal work"; then, we add "except when otherwise", and quite obviously most things will end up "otherwise".

That is Marx's interpretation of the lower stages of communism and the final stages of socialism. That is not, to be blunt, what any of this about and the quote is pretty much entirely irrelevant to the question of subsidies.

[themuzicman]

One of the problems with a solely free-market system is that it assumes that human beings are rational actors. This is not necessarily the case. We have well-known cognitive issues with, among other things, understanding risk and acting in a mutually-supporting fashion outside of a fairly limited sphere.

This is libertarianism, not all free market theorists. That's why I said "regulated free markets."

While in many cases the price of knowledge is pain, there are cases where people are almost guaranteed to make decisions that when spread out among the population as a whole will have catastrophic effects for some individuals, their families, and probably the community around them (at least to some degree). The very case that we are discussing right now is a potential example of this: There may exist people who are currently experiencing good health and who consequently elect to forego health insurance for some short-term benefit. They have not experienced sudden and expensive illness before, so they do not have a clear picture of the disastrous event that they are gambling on. Some of them lose. These people will end up unnecessarily dead or disabled, thusly removing their ability to contribute to a prosperous society, or they will end up receiving services that they (unlike others) did not pay for.

1) You've just confirmed that free markets have the correct view of human nature, thus putting socialism on the wrong side.

2) Socialism doesn't fix this problem. It only makes the care you want people to get cost less, which isn't even an issue for most (possibly all) who forgo basic health care, and you have the same problem. You assume that this is a cost problem, when in fact it is simply a youth problem.

What we choose to do about this is another question, but it is astoundingly naive to discount the effects of imperfect information and decisionmaking on a system that assumes perfect knowledge.

Free market philosophy assumes people will make poor decisions. In fact, the free market system limits the effects of poor decisions by localizing them to the individual. In socialism, power is held by the few in the government, and bad decisions (which governments are renowned for) are catastrophic.

You seem to be enamored of late of mistaking "you'll understand when you're older" for a valid argument. As I become older, I become increasingly unimpressed with such assertions.


That's because you're young. All the intellect and philosophy in the world won't change reality. Ivory tower professors everywhere think that just adopting a philosophy will somehow change the world, when in fact they're just pouring ideas that have already failed into young minds who think they're going to be different, somehow.

*sigh nostalgically*

Also, 'idyllic' does not mean what you think it means.

I'm using it in the sense of an unspoiled, idealistic and naive view of life. (Idyllic -> unspoiled.)

[firebee]

That is Marx's interpretation of the lower stages of communism and the final stages of socialism. That is not, to be blunt, what any of this about and the quote is pretty much entirely irrelevant to the question of subsidies.

Incidentally, if I understand Marx correctly (and given the amount of study I have dedicated to such topics, it is entirely possible I do not), the communist society looks very much like the ideal society proposed by right-libertarians -- one in which individuals interact in a mutually-supporting manner in small groups, with a minimum of large concentrations of power (financial in the case of the corporatist->capitalist end, political in the case of the socialist->communist end).

[Autoptic]

That is Marx's interpretation of the lower stages of communism and the final stages of socialism. That is not, to be blunt, what any of this about and the quote is pretty much entirely irrelevant to the question of subsidies.

If the State is the employer, subsidies are payment...unless the citizen is regarded a means of production belonging to the State.

[jndiii]

One of the problems with a solely free-market system is that it assumes that human beings are rational actors. This is not necessarily the case. We have well-known cognitive issues with, among other things, understanding risk and acting in a mutually-supporting fashion outside of a fairly limited sphere.


No, a free market system does not assume that human beings are rational actors. Interestingly, a system more oriented toward public-sector entities does rely on the assumption that the public sector entities are rational actors.

Private sector entities (organizations or individuals) can act "rationally" or "irrationally" and in the end it really doesn't matter: they attain various degrees of success, or failure, based upon privately made decisions. In the case of organizations, a poorly managed private sector organization will just disappear or disintegrate and be reabsorbed elsewhere. Perhaps there are drastic implications when this happens to larger organizations, but the failure of large or small organizations allows new organizations to fill in the gaps and potentially do better.

Public sector entities have a different problem. First, they are charged with managing public affairs in a rational and responsive manner. Being complex systems themselves, every bit as complex as private organizations, they are prone to the same kinds of mismanagement and irrationality as private organizations, with one key difference: public sector entities are almost never allowed to disappear. This is the phenomenon that ended the Soviet Union, and turned China more towards "capitalism".

Eventually, most complex systems fail: living organisms die, computers crash, civilizations vanish. In an economic context, both private and public organizations fail. When that failure happens to a private organization, it is handled with bankruptcy laws, perhaps, and ceases to exist. When that failure happens to a public organization (and some private organizations with far too much political clout) the public organization continues to operate by continuing to draw from public funds. The public entities are supposed to somehow rationally fix things, but of course, they usually don't without a strong political carrot or stick to reform them.

I believe that unless it is absolutely necessary for an organization to be public (e.g., the military), it is best for it to be private, so that when bad decisions are eventually made, the system cleans up its own mess, by letting the poorly managed organizations disappear and allowing new ones to replace them. Hence I lean more towards a private enterprise economy (often called a free market) rather than a public enterprise economy (often called socialism).

[Note: for now, I really do not care to discuss the degree of public vs private that would be ideal. I'm just pointing out distinctions between the approaches, and a general degree of personal preference.]

[themuzicman]

(Objectivism and libertarianism DO assume rational self-interest, but that isn't what we ahve in the US.)

[Undead Bonzi]

So are you advocating that the taxpayers should pay for health insurance for those who simply refuse to purchase it?

Are you under the impression that you don't pay for them already? Do you understand where the root of healthcare cost spikes in general hospitals lay? The ER...that place you can't be turned away from regardless of insurance.

General hospitals above a certain size and classification are required by law to have ER's. These ER's and their ever increasing flux of patients creates a black hole in a hospitals budget. The government already reimburses hospitals for a portion of the costs associated with an ER (your tax dollars paying for the uninsured). The remainder of the shortfall is covered by increased costs of healthcare passed on to insured patients. These inflated costs lead to greater premiums and inflating costs of healthcare insurance (the remainder of the cost of the uninsured coming out of the pockets of the insured). The increase in costs of healthcare drives more to become uninsured. The cycle repeats at a greater rate.

This is the reason healthcare costs have increased by double digit percentages since roughly the mid 90's. This is the reason why the cost of a General Motors vehicle is impacted more by employee healthcare costs ($1,500.00 per vehicle) vs the costs of labor to build the car (25hrs @ $30.00per hour = $750.00 per car).

So, if you exist under the delusion that you are not currently paying for the uninsured it is time to educate yourself. You already are, the costs are simply indirect. By offering those currently uninsured an affordable option you are making them pay for a portion of their healthcare costs rather than the costly free ride ER visit you are currently giving them. In addition access to preventative healthcare such as regular dentist or eye doctor appointments costs far less than the critical reactive care required when such basic services are put off until they become life threatening.

[firebee]

This is libertarianism, not all free market theorists. That's why I said "regulated free markets."

In that case, we probably need to define the distinction between "regulation" and "elements of socialism".

I'm admittedly contributing to the imprecise use of language in this thread, and when I have time I may do some reading to correct it. Essentially, I am saying that the presence of a free market or one that is regulated in matters not aimed at social welfare is a use of "capitalist" principles, and policies that are redistributive (aimed at providing resources that people did not earn in the free market, to some end deemed beneficial or ethical) are a use of "socialist" principles. The two endpoints of a state using solely one set of principles are largely examined since nobody has managed to pull one off in human memory without botching it somehow. Which should probably be something of a hint about the importance of path-dependence.

You've just confirmed that free markets have the correct view of human nature, thus putting socialism on the wrong side.

Minus the 'wrong side' business, that is essentially my view -- or at least one roughly compatible with it.

Socialism doesn't fix this problem. It only makes the care you want people to get cost less, which isn't even an issue for most (possibly all) who forgo basic health care, and you have the same problem. You assume that this is a cost problem, when in fact it is simply a youth problem.

Would you care to read my post, before you assign me opinions to be shot down by your wise self?


They have not experienced sudden and expensive illness before, so they do not have a clear picture of the disastrous event that they are gambling on.

As it stands, people are allowed to make the choice to forego health insurance that they are capable of paying for, in the service of short-term gains to their lifestyle. It seems likely that they are fooling themselves in some predictable fashion, such as thinking that they are immune to human frailty or that they will have sufficient warning before they become persons of ill health. Some of these people will experience a sudden and life-changing encounter with the nature of their error.

One potential way of dealing with this problem is to mandate that people carry health insurance meeting some minimum standard. This is an imposition against their free will and right to make stupid mistakes, but it also reflects the reality that the decision that they face is clearly one of "make a stupid mistake or do not". Another solution, of course, is to allow people to play that lottery and to pass the expenses they incur and did not pay for onto other citizens and users of health services. Which is the option that we have picked presently.


Free market philosophy assumes people will make poor decisions. In fact, the free market system limits the effects of poor decisions by localizing them to the individual. In socialism, power is held by the few in the government, and bad decisions (which governments are renowned for) are catastrophic.


Of course, there is also option #3 which is roughly speaking "The dumb and/or unlucky die, and the rest of us move on." This does not make for good campaign speeches, though, hence the use of euphemisms such as "localizing poor decisions to the individual".


That's because you're young. All the intellect and philosophy in the world won't change reality.

Do please tell me at what age you will consider my opinions to be worthy of respectful consideration, that I might decline to waste my time talking to you until that time comes. My actual father is a man who in many areas has earned my respect for his wisdom, and I still do not give him free reign to declare that "daddy knows best".


Ivory tower professors everywhere think that just adopting a philosophy will somehow change the world, when in fact they're just pouring ideas that have already failed into young minds who think they're going to be different, somehow.


I wouldn't know; I have not met any ivory tower professors, and what they might or might not be saying to people who are not me is largely irrelevant to my life.

[themuzicman]

I would rather pay for it through the hospital than the government.





themuzicman added to this post, 12 minutes and 12 seconds later...

In that case, we probably need to define the distinction between "regulation" and "elements of socialism".

I'm admittedly contributing to the imprecise use of language in this thread, and when I have time I may do some reading to correct it. Essentially, I am saying that the presence of a free market or one that is regulated in matters not aimed at social welfare is a use of "capitalist" principles, and policies that are redistributive (aimed at providing resources that people did not earn in the free market, to some end deemed beneficial or ethical) are a use of "socialist" principles. The two endpoints of a state using solely one set of principles are largely examined since nobody has managed to pull one off in human memory without botching it somehow. Which should probably be something of a hint about the importance of path-dependence.

Free market regulation would be those regulations designed to sustain a healthy competitive environment and a workforce sufficiently prepared to keep pace with productivity changes as they occur.

Socialist principles would be those that cause government to take control of an industry, stifling competition.

Minus the 'wrong side' business, that is essentially my view -- or at least one roughly compatible with it.

Then you're a capitalist.

Would you care to read my post, before you assign me opinions to be shot down by your wise self?



As it stands, people are allowed to make the choice to forego health insurance that they are capable of paying for, in the service of short-term gains to their lifestyle. It seems likely that they are fooling themselves in some predictable fashion, such as thinking that they are immune to human frailty or that they will have sufficient warning before they become persons of ill health. Some of these people will experience a sudden and life-changing encounter with the nature of their error.

The unspoken assumption here is that if they had paid for health insurance, they'd go to the doctor and all this would be prevented, which is a monumental disconnect in your argument. On the one hand they don't think they have human frailties and don't go to the doctor because of it, and yet on the other hand, if they had health insurance, they'd go to the doctor, in spite of thinking that they don't have human frailties.

Having health insurance doesn't increase or decrease the mentality of not having human frailties.

One potential way of dealing with this problem is to mandate that people carry health insurance meeting some minimum standard. This is an imposition against their free will and right to make stupid mistakes, but it also reflects the reality that the decision that they face is clearly one of "make a stupid mistake or do not". Another solution, of course, is to allow people to play that lottery and to pass the expenses they incur and did not pay for onto other citizens and users of health services. Which is the option that we have picked presently.


Um... you failed to deal with the mentality of not having human frailty. Forcing them to have health insurance won't make them go to the doctor.

Of course, there is also option #3 which is roughly speaking "The dumb and/or unlucky die, and the rest of us move on." This does not make for good campaign speeches, though, hence the use of euphemisms such as "localizing poor decisions to the individual".


This is why we have a social safety net. Granted that it works very poorly now, but that's another story.

Do please tell me at what age you will consider my opinions to be worthy of respectful consideration, that I might decline to waste my time talking to you until that time comes. My actual father is a man who in many areas has earned my respect for his wisdom, and I still do not give him free reign to declare that "daddy knows best".

It's not an age. It's the point at which your philosophy and reasoning is seasoned with some knowledge of history and real world experience. Liberal socialism talks a good game and sounds good in theory, but fails when it comes into contact with reality.

[firebee]

Then you're a capitalist.


Sure, I'll be a capitalist, a pragmatist, or a jelly donut. I won't dress up in a French maid uniform though.


The unspoken assumption here is that if they had paid for health insurance, they'd go to the doctor and all this would be prevented, which is a monumental disconnect in your argument.


No, that would be a monumental assumption on your part. What I am stating is that if they had paid for health insurance, when they go to the doctor and are told "You have MS. You will be taking medications that cost $3000/month for the rest of your life, if you want that life to be particularly long and productive," that they might have something to do about this situation besides say "Well, fuck."


Having health insurance doesn't increase or decrease the mentality of not having human frailties.


The decision to have health insurance is based on the knowledge that at some point bad stuff is going to happen to you. If you do not believe that bad stuff is going to happen to you, then you will not make provisions for the possibility of bad stuff, and you will eventually learn otherwise -- either by the easy way or by the hard way.


This is why we have a social safety net. Granted that it works very poorly now, but that's another story.


How is a social safety net not an element of a Social Democratic state?


It's not an age. It's the point at which your philosophy and reasoning is seasoned with some knowledge of history and real world experience. Liberal socialism talks a good game and sounds good in theory, but fails when it comes into contact with reality.

How do you distinguish between the states of "lacks knowledge of history and real world experience" and "has knowledge of history and real world experience that do not lead to the same conclusions as themuzicman"? Because most of my opinions -- including and especially my lack of respect for the "you'll understand when you're older" argument -- are in fact based on my own real-world experiences and my observations on what others report.

[hubcap]

Are you under the impression that you don't pay for them already?

Not at all. I just don't think that the current approach being taken by the government will solve the problem, nor do I think it the government's position to coerce me to pay for the healthcare of the irresponsible. I am already on record as stating that I have no conceptual problem with public assistance for those unable to provide for themselves so please don't assume I want children dying in the streets.

One of the fundamental problems I see with the current approach being taken by the government is that from an economics standpoint it is fundamentally flawed.

Let's assume for a moment that Obama waves his wand and tomorrow everyone in the United States as health insurance. One fundamental thing that has just happened is that there is now going to be an increased demand for healthcare without a corresponding increase in supply. That is the fundamental problem with EVERY socialized healthcare system ever devised. Nothing is ever done to address the supply side of healthcare. Any Econ 101 class teaches that an increase in demand without a corresponding increase in supply will cause the cost to increase. The counter to that is we will regulate what providers can charge. This now becomes a disincentive because the market is no longer setting the price.

[Merle]

I am perfectly happy with any system that doesn't infringe upon my liberty. At this point capitalism is the least offensive in that respect. You insist on viewing people as "groups" rather than individuals. Isn't that what the debate should be about? Groups don't work, think, or make decisions -- individuals do. Individuals co-exist with other individuals. Individuals have different goals, ideas, wants and needs, yet socialism wants to use "someone's" value system to determine what is best for the "group". What moral authority is there for you or I to decide what is "best" for someone else?




Supply and demand, put forth by some as evidence for Capitalism's ability to provide for the individual what he wants, does exactly what you are accusing Socialism of doing:

Production and markets are not driven by individual need - it takes a great many people wanting something for the demand to be met. As an individual with fairly off-the-beaten track tastes in, for example, film and music - a purely Capitalist system of supply would fail thoroughly to provide for my individual needs. In a market based system the want of the group is always more powerful than the want of the individual because pricing always favours the most populist option.

You are totally kidding yourself if you think Capitalism affords you the greatest individual freedom of choice.

[hubcap]

You are totally kidding yourself if you think Capitalism affords you the greatest individual freedom of choice.

I've never argued that capitalism affords me the greatest individual freedom of choice.

I've argued that it infringes on my liberty the least.

[firebee]

As an individual with fairly off-the-beaten track tastes in, for example, film and music - a purely Capitalist system of supply would fail thoroughly to provide for my individual needs. In a market based system the want of the group is always more powerful than the want of the individual because pricing always favours the most populist option.


As an individual with moderately off-the-beaten-track tastes in film and music, I note that market forces have created a system by which I can satisfy many of my desires for such material instantly or limited only by download speed, and essentially all such desires limited by my ability to understand the language spoken by the people who are selling the stuff.

I seriously doubt that central planning can anticipate that an American engineer would develop a liking for certain Icelandic heavy metal bands, nor consider it beneficial to meet said desire.

[themuzicman]

No, that would be a monumental assumption on your part. What I am stating is that if they had paid for health insurance, when they go to the doctor and are told "You have MS. You will be taking medications that cost $3000/month for the rest of your life, if you want that life to be particularly long and productive," that they might have something to do about this situation besides say "Well, fuck."



The decision to have health insurance is based on the knowledge that at some point bad stuff is going to happen to you. If you do not believe that bad stuff is going to happen to you, then you will not make provisions for the possibility of bad stuff, and you will eventually learn otherwise -- either by the easy way or by the hard way.

Not if they're forced to have it. They'll just complain about the expense, and do nothing different.

How is a social safety net not an element of a Social Democratic state?


Because it doesn't control means of production and distribution.

How do you distinguish between the states of "lacks knowledge of history and real world experience" and "has knowledge of history and real world experience that do not lead to the same conclusions as themuzicman"? Because most of my opinions -- including and especially my lack of respect for the "you'll understand when you're older" argument -- are in fact based on my own real-world experiences and my observations on what others report.

Then you view isn't big enough. Probably the best example of socialism (although I don't think it was quite 100%) was the USSR. State controlled industry. They simply could not put out the work. Political solidarity and the communist vision were insufficient motives for workers to produce.

There are many nations today (and in history) who have a combination of socialism, socialized, subsidized and free market systems, and the free market systems outperform the others in areas where competition is possible.

China is an excellent example. Since allowing free markets in particular sectors and regions, they've seen explosive growth in productivity and wealth. They're trying to make a repressive political climate work with a free market capitalist economy. We'll see how that does.

The fact that there are individuals who didn't go to the doctor until it was too late doesn't imply that they'd have gone if they were forced to pay for health insurance. That's simply a non-sequitor. Individual experiences can be a good place to begin, but until you either learn from failures in the past or observe macro failures as time passes, your perspective will be limited.

[Undead Bonzi]

Not at all. I just don't think that the current approach being taken by the government will solve the problem, nor do I think it the government's position to coerce me to pay for the healthcare of the irresponsible. I am already on record as stating that I have no conceptual problem with public assistance for those unable to provide for themselves so please don't assume I want children dying in the streets

#1. And the point I made is that you already are paying for the 'irresponsible' through taxes and health insurance. If you contest that point then you are simply crying over split milk. The option before us now is to continue paying for the ER visits of the uninsured or offering these individuals healthcare and making them pay for a portion of the service they are already using. One option leaves the spiraling cycle unbroken, the other at least mitigates one of the factors leading to increased costs.

#2. I never said you wanted to see children die in the street...what is the relevance of this statement in the context of the current debate?

One of the fundamental problems I see with the current approach being taken by the government is that from an economics standpoint it is fundamentally flawed.

Let's assume for a moment that Obama waves his wand and tomorrow everyone in the United States as health insurance. One fundamental thing that has just happened is that there is now going to be an increased demand for healthcare without a corresponding increase in supply. That is the fundamental problem with EVERY socialized healthcare system ever devised. Nothing is ever done to address the supply side of healthcare. Any Econ 101 class teaches that an increase in demand without a corresponding increase in supply will cause the cost to increase. The counter to that is we will regulate what providers can charge. This now becomes a disincentive because the market is no longer setting the price.

I'm going to use your own 'free market' capitalism to dispel that theory. You accept that demand is a variable that can fluctuate (and you propose that the new healthcare will increase said demand, a reasonable statement)...yet your equation sets supply as a fixed number (thus costs will increase as a result). What Econ 101 taught me that if you create a demand, smart and savvy businessmen will see opportunity and create supply (i.e. build more hospitals, train more doctors, ect). As demand and supply come into balance competition between the suppliers will drive down costs and improve quality of service. Thus the end result of this could be seen as a short term spike in costs followed by a balancing act where the U.S. sees an increased number of hospitals (more jobs ect) and a decrease in medical cost long term as the utility of preventative care drastically reduces the incidence of high cost critical healthcare coupled with an underprivileged class carrying a portion of their own cost burden rather than none.

(I admit it is something of a lark when you see a person arguing the capitalist side of the equation stating that increased demand is a bad thing.)

Please correct me if I'm not stating the basic precepts of capitalism properly.

[firebee]

Not if they're forced to have it. They'll just complain about the expense, and do nothing different.

You are not reading what I am writing. I suggest you start. The behavior I object to is that of not getting insurance. If a penalty for not having insurance is introduced, then people will either have insurance while complaining about the expense, or pay the penalty while complaining about the expense. In either case, they will be doing something different which reduces the incidence of people spending their insurance premium money on ale and whores and then coming crying to us when their head needs sewing back on.

Perhaps you are a young person who lacks experience in the matter of chronic illness. I am not. I suggest that you listen to mommy firebee when she tells you that visiting the doctor regularly does not necessarily prevent you from being run over by a truck or developing epilepsy, and that both of these conditions are going to be beyond most people's capacity to self-insure.


Because it doesn't control means of production and distribution.


As I mentioned in my earlier posts -- which it might behoove you to read, if you are going to reply to them -- the term "socialism" can refer either to a wholly state-run economy or an economy which involves some elements of state intervention. When used in the US, this term almost invariably refers to a policy aimed at a relative increase in redistributive meddling or a rearrangement of existing redistributive policy.


Then you view isn't big enough.

I'll take that as "I have no such means".

Unfortunately, as I mentioned before, experience has led me to believe that following the advice of the supposedly-experienced over my own internal objections has a way of leading to disastrous results. Hence, our differences in this matter appear to be unreconcilable.

[Merle]

As an individual with moderately off-the-beaten-track tastes in film and music, I note that market forces have created a system by which I can satisfy many of my desires for such material instantly or limited only by download speed, and essentially all such desires limited by my ability to understand the language spoken by the people who are selling the stuff.

I seriously doubt that central planning can anticipate that an American engineer would develop a liking for certain Icelandic heavy metal bands, nor consider it beneficial to meet said desire.

I'm not comparing the Market with central planning - but in a purely Capitalist system there would be no hand outs, no subsidies etc right?... those are the evils of Socialism some people want to ban... but without such support, a great deal of the music I want to hear and buy would never get made - A market system that allows me to purchase whatever I want thanks to advances in technology is just great (I'm not being facetious, I really love it!) but if, because of a lack of government financial support, the music I want is not there for me to purchase - well then, my demand is not being met - and pure Capitalism has failed me.

[themuzicman]

You are not reading what I am writing. I suggest you start. The behavior I object to is that of not getting insurance. If a penalty for not having insurance is introduced, then people will either have insurance while complaining about the expense, or pay the penalty while complaining about the expense. In either case, they will be doing something different which reduces the incidence of people spending their insurance premium money on ale and whores and then coming crying to us when their head needs sewing back on.

Other than complaining that the government is taking their money for something they don't want or (they think) don't need, what will be different? You seem to assume that having health insurance through force will change young folks' attitude towards their own infallibility.

Perhaps you are a young person who lacks experience in the matter of chronic illness. I am not. I suggest that you listen to mommy firebee when she tells you that visiting the doctor regularly does not necessarily prevent you from being run over by a truck or developing epilepsy, and that both of these conditions are going to be beyond most people's capacity to self-insure.

True enough. But that's a decision for an individual to make, rather than one big brother should be forcing upon you.

Furthermore, you ignore the macro effects of socialism in the medical sector, which actually reduce the ability of the chronically sick to get care.

(I have asthma, developed at age 27.)

As I mentioned in my earlier posts -- which it might behoove you to read, if you are going to reply to them -- the term "socialism" can refer either to a wholly state-run economy or an economy which involves some elements of state intervention. When used in the US, this term almost invariably refers to a policy aimed at a relative increase in redistributive meddling or a rearrangement of existing redistributive policy.

In a sense, socializing welfare is socialism, in that it took over the privatized area of helping the poor from churches and other groups, and began using forcible taxation of the rich to give to the poor.

But it's not strictly socialism because it isn't production or distribution

I'll take that as "I have no such means".

Funny how you ignore three paragraphs of explanation, probably because you have no answer for it.

Unfortunately, as I mentioned before, experience has led me to believe that following the advice of the supposedly-experienced over my own internal objections has a way of leading to disastrous results. Hence, our differences in this matter appear to be unreconcilable.

When you can address the history of socialism and can show us successes in these industries, we can talk again.

[firebee]

I'm not comparing the Market with central planning - but in a purely Capitalist system there would be no hand outs, no subsidies etc right?... those are the evils of Socialism some people want to ban... but without such support, a great deal of the music I want to hear and buy would never get made - A market system that allows me to purchase whatever I want thanks to advances in technology is just great (I'm not being facetious, I really love it!) but if, because of a lack of government financial support, the music I want is not there for me to purchase - well then, my demand is not being met - and pure Capitalism has failed me.

First of all, what sort of music is at issue here? Also, do you have a breakdown of the degree of government support provided to obscure artists? My rough impression has been that they are simply small-scale commercial ventures that are initially funded by the income or credit of the artists and are thereafter supported by sales.





firebee added to this post, 28 minutes and 1 seconds later...

Other than complaining that the government is taking their money for something they don't want or (they think) don't need, what will be different? You seem to assume that having health insurance through force will change young folks' attitude towards their own infallibility.

I have now explained this to you three or four times, and you continue to make the same irrelevant statement in response. I grow impatient. Or at least impatienter.

It is not my intent, at least in this case, to be the cluestick-wielding fairy of enlightenment regarding the value of sensible behavior. Whether the people in question appreciate the reason for pooling their risk of catastrophic illness or not is immaterial so long as they do it. They do not have to have a bone-deep appreciation for their own mortality. The objective here is that when, appreciative of their own mortality or not, they spend two hours in the hospital over a minor heart rhythm discrepancy, the $10,000 bill is paid by the premiums that they and others in their position have paid rather than discharged in bankruptcy.

There have been any number of times in my life where I have found myself saying "I am so incredibly glad that I took precaution Y even though I thought that in this case it was superfluous."


True enough. But that's a decision for an individual to make, rather than one big brother should be forcing upon you.

That is a debate that could be had among people who are interested in such discussion.


Furthermore, you ignore the macro effects of socialism in the medical sector, which actually reduce the ability of the chronically sick to get care.

Path dependence plays a factor here. We might guess that most conditions could be affordably treated in a freer market, but we do not know this -- and we most certainly know that it is not true under the present system.


Funny how you ignore three paragraphs of explanation, probably because you have no answer for it.

Funny how you seem to think that the particular content as regards socialism has anything at all to do with the gigantic gaping flaw in your process of debate across all topics, which happens to include socialism.

Keep in mind that, given that part of my purpose in participating in this discussion is to unearth data that could be used to support some conclusion, that I am absolutely sure you don't know what my conclusions are.


When you can address the history of socialism and can show us successes in these industries, we can talk again.

Why should I analyze this data with an aim to defending a position that I may not hold, for the benefit of a person who has declared himself to be a nonparticipant in the process of discovery?

[hubcap]

#1. And the point I made is that you already are paying for the 'irresponsible' through taxes and health insurance. If you contest that point then you are simply crying over split milk. The option before us now is to continue paying for the ER visits of the uninsured or offering these individuals healthcare and making them pay for a portion of the service they are already using. One option leaves the spiraling cycle unbroken, the other at least mitigates one of the factors leading to increased costs.
I realize that the cost burden placed on hospitals for providing healthcare to people who don't have insurance or the means to pay must be placed on the people who do have health insurance or the means to pay. I just don't agree that the approach being taken is the appropriate one.

I'm going to use your own 'free market' capitalism to dispel that theory. You accept that demand is a variable that can fluctuate (and you propose that the new healthcare will increase said demand, a reasonable statement)...yet your equation sets supply as a fixed number (thus costs will increase as a result). What Econ 101 taught me that if you create a demand, smart and savvy businessmen will see opportunity and create supply (i.e. build more hospitals, train more doctors, ect). As demand and supply come into balance competition between the suppliers will drive down costs and improve quality of service. Thus the end result of this could be seen as a short term spike in costs followed by a balancing act where the U.S. sees an increased number of hospitals (more jobs ect) and a decrease in medical cost long term as the utility of preventative care drastically reduces the incidence of high cost critical healthcare coupled with an underprivileged class carrying a portion of their own cost burden rather than none.

(I admit it is something of a lark when you see a person arguing the capitalist side of the equation stating that increased demand is a bad thing.)

Please correct me if I'm not stating the basic precepts of capitalism properly.

I think you applying the principles correctly but are omitting some key variables. Namely government price controls. When price controls artificially affect the market price there is in fact a disincentive to create additional supply. Medicare is a perfect example. Let's say you are a doctor who performs procedure (x). The going price for this procedure is $1000, but Medicare will only pay $600 for the procedure. What incentive do you have to do the procedure for $600 if you can do them for $1000? You would have to admit that at least in principle the incentive to increase the supply for $600 is not as great as the incentive to increase the supply for $1000.

That is why governmental interference in the marketplace upsets everyone so much. People cannot make rational decisions about whether to increase supply or not simply because they don't have a clear idea of how governmental interference will affect their cost model.

[Merle]

First of all, what sort of music is at issue here? Also, do you have a breakdown of the degree of government support provided to obscure artists? My rough impression has been that they are simply small-scale commercial ventures that are initially funded by the income or credit of the artists and are thereafter supported by sales.

I don't have a breakdown I'm afraid, and after a quick trawl of the net have been unable to find any data on the topic... but will look into it.

The experiences of many of my friends who are artists or musicians, however, tells me that a lot of them would be unable to devote themselves to their art without both up-front support such as grants etc and "hidden welfare" such as tax breaks for artists etc - taking them as a representative sample of "obscure" artists, which I think would be pretty fair, I would postulate that without such support systems in place a great deal of Art (be it music, Fine Art, film or whatever) would not get made... and therefore that my choices of what to listen to, look at, watch, and then maybe buy, would be limited.

[firebee]

I realize that the cost burden placed on hospitals for providing healthcare to people who don't have insurance or the means to pay must be placed on the people who do have health insurance or the means to pay. I just don't agree that the approach being taken is the appropriate one.

This seems to imply an assumption that some level of service in certain areas (health care being one, food and shelter presumably constituting another) should be provided to those who are unable to pay for it.

About what level of service do you think that is? I think we can clearly conclude that we are not in the business of providing boutique executive physicals to all comers, and that we are probably are in the business of providing prostate exams unkindly performed by Nurse Helga, but how do we make the distinction between something that is a legitimate minimum standard of living and something that is unnecessarily luxurious?

[hubcap]

Originally Posted by themuzicman
True enough. But that's a decision for an individual to make, rather than one big brother should be forcing upon you.

That is a debate that could be had among people who are interested in such discussion.

Actually, this is the entire point of the debate in my opinion.

The instant that you decide you know what is best for me and use the government to force me to do what you think is best you have stripped me of my free will. The exact free will that the Founding Fathers attempted to ensure would never be taken by incorporating the Bill of Rights into the Constitution.

Where does it end? Telling people they can't smoke? Or what they must eat?

This is not a purely theoretical discussion. It is a very real issue.





hubcap added to this post, 4 minutes and 46 seconds later...

This seems to imply an assumption that some level of service in certain areas (health care being one, food and shelter presumably constituting another) should be provided to those who are unable to pay for it.

About what level of service do you think that is? I think we can clearly conclude that we are not in the business of providing boutique executive physicals to all comers, and that we are probably are in the business of providing prostate exams unkindly performed by Nurse Helga, but how do we make the distinction between something that is a legitimate minimum standard of living and something that is unnecessarily luxurious?

I believe a good start would simply be limiting it to "emergency" care and giving the hospitals the protection to turn people away who are using the emergency room for routine healthcare. Granted the guidelines would have to be specific, but if you've ever been to the emergency room in the winter you probably noticed an inordinate amount of kids with runny noses who just needed a trip to a local family doctor.

[firebee]

This is not a purely theoretical discussion. It is a very real issue.


Oh, it is quite the real issue. And, IMHO, not an easy one.

It strikes me that in situations of this form, we have basically three choices:

Permit the behavior in question. People who lose the lottery will incur unrecoverable financial or physical ruin, and we will do nothing about that beyond provide whatever services they can earn (plus, probably, the public service of cleaning up the corpse wherever it lands).
Permit the behavior in question. People who lose the lottery will incur unrecoverable physical or financial ruin, which we will then mitigate. This, however, does not provide a disincentive for doing things that end up imposing on our generosity.
Disallow or provide strong disincentives to engaging in the behavior in question. People are not permitted to play the lottery where the winning ticket is messy death. Their right to freely choose the tradeoffs between fun and messy death, however, is impinged upon and there is always the lurking risk of the People's Anti-Fun Bureaucrat imposing onerous restrictions on lifestyle choices which he disfavors.


Do you see any other options?

[themuzicman]

It is not my intent, at least in this case, to be the cluestick-wielding fairy of enlightenment regarding the value of sensible behavior. Whether the people in question appreciate the reason for pooling their risk of catastrophic illness or not is immaterial so long as they do it. They do not have to have a bone-deep appreciation for their own mortality. The objective here is that when, appreciative of their own mortality or not, they spend two hours in the hospital over a minor heart rhythm discrepancy, the $10,000 bill is paid by the premiums that they and others in their position have paid rather than discharged in bankruptcy.

So what? It is wise to have health insurance. That's about all we can say. Socializing the health insurance industry to deal with a few folks who don't act wisely isn't wise.

There have been any number of times in my life where I have found myself saying "I am so incredibly glad that I took precaution Y even though I thought that in this case it was superfluous."

That's great. Institutional knowledge is a good thing. The real question is whether the government should be using force to make everyone follow it forever.

The problem with governmental force is that it never changes. We may reach a time when health insurance is superfluous, but we won't be able to be without it.

Path dependence plays a factor here. We might guess that most conditions could be affordably treated in a freer market, but we do not know this -- and we most certainly know that it is not true under the present system.

But there are more factors than just cost. If that were the case, we'd go with government rationing, since they are capable of lowering costs by allowing the most sick to die before they could get treatment.

The system we have in the US, when you eliminate cost, is the best in the world. Our current discussions of costs are important, although considering whether government is the problem rather than the solution seems to have gone by the wayside.

Funny how you seem to think that the particular content as regards socialism has anything at all to do with the gigantic gaping flaw in your process of debate across all topics, which happens to include socialism.

Keep in mind that, given that part of my purpose in participating in this discussion is to unearth data that could be used to support some conclusion, that I am absolutely sure you don't know what my conclusions are.


That's because you appear to be unwilling to reveal them.

[hubcap]

Oh, it is quite the real issue. And, IMHO, not an easy one.

It strikes me that in situations of this form, we have basically three choices:

Permit the behavior in question. People who lose the lottery will incur unrecoverable financial or physical ruin, and we will do nothing about that beyond provide whatever services they can earn (plus, probably, the public service of cleaning up the corpse wherever it lands).
Permit the behavior in question. People who lose the lottery will incur unrecoverable physical or financial ruin, which we will then mitigate. This, however, does not provide a disincentive for doing things that end up imposing on our generosity.
Disallow or provide strong disincentives to engaging in the behavior in question. People are not permitted to play the lottery where the winning ticket is messy death. Their right to freely choose the tradeoffs between fun and messy death, however, is impinged upon and there is always the lurking risk of the People's Anti-Fun Bureaucrat imposing onerous restrictions on lifestyle choices which he disfavors.


Do you see any other options?
My concern is letting the camel get his nose under the edge of the tent. If you let him do that the next thing you know the entire camel is in the tent. Personally I prefer scantily clad harem girls in my tent........no camels please. But seriously, I believe it is important to let people have the ability to excercise free will, and I am willing to let them take the chance on financial disaster and ruin should they choose poorly.

I don't think it is fair for my neighbor to have to pay my mortgage payment if I buy a house I can't afford, nor should he have to pay my hospital bill should I choose to forego insurance.

Life isn't fair and bad things happen to folks all the time. Governmental interference in people's lives isn't going to change that fact.

[Undead Bonzi]

I believe a good start would simply be limiting it to "emergency" care and giving the hospitals the protection to turn people away who are using the emergency room for routine healthcare. Granted the guidelines would have to be specific, but if you've ever been to the emergency room in the winter you probably noticed an inordinate amount of kids with runny noses who just needed a trip to a local family doctor.

Yea gods man, you want less government but you want the government to offer protection to hospitals so they can turn away patients? Do you know what a legal grey area it would be to offer that option? No hospital in their right mind would open themselves to that sort of legal or pulic liability. It would only take one misdiagnosed 'turn away' patient sob story before the lawyers would smell blood in the water and start circling. That's just the legal libaility, we will disregard the public backlash. No matter how much a hospital would loose through the ER treating everyone it would be marginal in comparison to money lost in the courts fighting 'turn away' cases.

Then lets suppose you offer hospitals tight immunity from such legal recourse (which would require an extensive legal code readjustment). What is to stop them from looking at an ER patient who needs help but will set the budget in the red and saying 'you don't need help, bye'. If you leave grey area on such a matter the lawyers eat the hospitals, if you don't leave the grey area the hospitals eat the people. The answer: Government oversight. Suddenly your less government control option has increased the govs role in healthcare, simply in a different place. When is the dog chasing its tail and when is the tail chasing its dog?

[Ray9]

[Yawn], This is all getting very boring. Socialism is an old idea that ran its course long ago. It was rather handily pushed aside by Adam Smith's invisible hand and though it still has some appeal to the "unwashed" Woodstock communal set it is really just a bedridden relic of man's attempt to enslave himself. It was rejected by civilized western society because government love is no replacement for the love of man. Men must be free to reach for the stars and when they do all mankind benefits. Socialism is not ony a bad idea it is an evil one. It's bedrock philosophy is to tether man to the state, restricting his movement and preventing him from realizing his dreams. There is no central authority that can match Adam smith's invisible hand.

[Merle]

It was rather handily pushed aside by Adam Smith's invisible hand

I think you may have your time-line somewhat mixed up...

[nacht]

My concern is letting the camel get his nose under the edge of the tent. If you let him do that the next thing you know the entire camel is in the tent.


You are concerned about the camel getting its nose under the edge of the tent when there are a horde of a hundred other camels from the same herd crammed in the tent with you, and there's nothing different about that one camel that's trying to get in.


But seriously, I believe it is important to let people have the ability to excercise free will, and I am willing to let them take the chance on financial disaster and ruin should they choose poorly.


The disaster we tend to talk about isn't purely "financial" in nature, and to the extent that it is the financial its impact is on us as much as them.

That financial impact isn't strictly in ER visits either, but also missed days from work. People who have poorly controlled asthma, for example, can have trouble getting insurance and tend to miss more days of work due to that asthma (source (To view links or images in this forum your post count must be 2 or greater. You currently have 0 posts.)).

You are also neglecting that in many cases the lack of health insurance is not a "choice," but rather a function of preexisting conditions making it either impossible--or too expensive--to get good insurance. Not to mention the issues with "too many days from work = losing job = losing my health insurance" or situations such as the woman's mastectomy for breast cancer being denied because she had an unreported case of acne from five years before.



I don't think it is fair for my neighbor to have to pay my mortgage payment if I buy a house I can't afford, nor should he have to pay my hospital bill should I choose to forego insurance.


Yet, in the case of health insurance, he already is.

Stop pretending that somehow the health care and health insurance industries aren't already heavily regulated. Your idea of abolishing the ER requirements without addressing the other issues would make the situation substantially worse--not better.


Life isn't fair and bad things happen to folks all the time. Governmental interference in people's lives isn't going to change that fact.

It isn't a question of keeping "bad things" from happening. It is a function of damage control.

[nacht]

[Yawn], This is all getting very boring. Socialism is an old idea that ran its course long ago. It was rather handily pushed aside by Adam Smith's invisible hand and though it still has some appeal to the "unwashed" Woodstock communal set it is really just a bedridden relic of man's attempt to enslave himself.

Which is why Norway is collapsing in on itself, right?

[hubcap]

You are concerned about the camel getting its nose under the edge of the tent when there are a horde of a hundred other camels from the same herd crammed in the tent with you, and there's nothing different about that one camel that's trying to get in.

And I would like nothing more than to kill every one of those camels.

[Delarge]

Moral principle: The idea that the state ought to force individuals to surrender all of their produce for the purpose of redistribution, prevent individuals from engaging in autonomous economic activities, and allot individuals to economic tasks through force is appalling.

Pragmatics: A decentralized management system in which strong incentives exist is likelier than socialism to result in higher efficiency in resource management, along with a higher rate of innovation spurred by the desire to reduce input costs (increase profit margin) and/or capture market share (increase profits). More minds focusing on strategies to gain a competitive advantage is almost guaranteed to yield better results than a system dominated by corrupt bureaucrats. In Cuba, for instance, the punishment for killing a cow is more severe than the punishment for killing a fellow human. To say the least, the agricultural sector in that country has been seriously botched.

The lack of a proper pricing system in command and control economies serves to impede the state's ability to respond adequately to increases and decreases in demand.

I'll continue later on.

[Ray9]

Which is why Norway is collapsing in on itself, right?

Socialism can work relatively well on a small scale with a homogenous population and a prevailing philosophy of cooperation and mutual aid.


Norway has a population roughly the same as the state of Colorado.

[nacht]

Norway has a population roughly the same as the state of Colorado.

So your argument is that "small" extends to the size of a moderately sized state. How convenient that it works for:

1) Australia (21,885,016)
2) The Netherlands (16,500,156)
3) Belgium (10,665,867)
4) Sweden (9,263,872)
5) Switzerland (7,739,100)
6) Denmark (5,519,441)
7) Finland (5,342,344)
8) Norway (4,835,685)

How convenient it works for all of them, but wouldn't work for the US. Could we just enforce the 10th amendment more strictly, and have 50 socialist states?

Oh, did I leave out Japan (127,590,000)? Japan has strong public schools which teach proper social behavior. It has a robust health care system that includes preventative care and requires all of its residents to be members of a health insurance plan, which are mostly (but not entirely) run by the state, prenatal care is completely free, and fees are set by the state. It also has a progressive income tax. It has its issues (and I have yet to see economists who can make sense of its habit of having its loans at 0.5% interest), but I don't see it collapsing any time soon, and the yen is incredibly strong against the dollar right now (when I was in Japan last it was 111 yen to the dollar, now it is 90).

I also left out Germany (82,060,000), which has a political structure similar to the US, an income tax and a VAT, has Europe's oldest universal health care system and have 85% of their population covered by what amounts to state-provided health insurance, it also helps cover the cost for low-wage employees, and their public insurance has the premium set by the government.

When most people say that "socialism works for small groups" they generally seem to mean tribal societies, not countries of 127 million people. Even if you claim that they have a "philosophy of cooperation and mutual aid," that is a huge stretch to the point of cherry picking to say that it will apply in countries of 127 million people but not to the US. You start getting enough of these exceptions, and your statement about socialism conveniently only applies to the US.

Given all of this, we see clearly that your statement that:


Socialism is an old idea that ran its course long ago. It was rather handily pushed aside by Adam Smith's invisible hand and though it still has some appeal to the "unwashed" Woodstock communal set it is really just a bedridden relic of man's attempt to enslave himself.


Is patently false to the point of being in denial of reality.

[nacht]

And I would like nothing more than to kill every one of those camels.

..and when you establish your colony on the moon, you can banish them from your sight.

In the meantime, the rest of us have to deal with a world that involves path dependency and irrational actors with imperfect information, which means that if you kill all of the camels you then have to find somewhere to put the bodies, and may have accidentally destroyed your entire economy and society in the process of killing camels.

[hubcap]

..and when you establish your colony on the moon, you can banish them from your sight.

In the meantime, the rest of us have to deal with a world that involves path dependency and irrational actors with imperfect information, which means that if you kill all of the camels you then have to find somewhere to put the bodies, and may have accidentally destroyed your entire economy and society in the process of killing camels.
I understand the difference between idealism and pragmatism. As I have mentioned before -- It's all about "how much". There is never "pure" socialism, capitalism, communism or any other ism. I prefer less socialism as opposed to more. I have already stated that I am not opposed to "some" government support.

Fundamentally I prefer it to come from the states rather than the feds.

[Hamburglar]

I understand the difference between idealism and pragmatism. As I have mentioned before -- It's all about "how much". There is never "pure" socialism, capitalism, communism or any other ism. I prefer less socialism as opposed to more. I have already stated that I am not opposed to "some" government support.

Fundamentally I prefer it to come from the states rather than the feds.

I fully understand your distrust of 'foreign' politicians doling out the pie-it is soooooooooo much easier to buy local politicians than ones who are bought out by large interests. :toff: It is in your interest to have all politics local, it is in everyone's interest for the converse.

[hubcap]

I fully understand your distrust of 'foreign' politicians doling out the pie-it is soooooooooo much easier to buy local politicians than ones who are bought out by large interests. :toff: It is in your interest to have all politics local, it is in everyone's interest for the converse.
Honestly, I don't think you understand anything about my position.

[yoginimama]

1) If our system is the best in the world, why are we #38 in life expectancy?

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2) Re the statement "I am willing to let them take the chance of financial disaster and ruin," I'm sure people really appreciate you making that generous choice for them :) And I'm sure they're quite convinced you have the total and complete right to!

Except you don't. You do not have the moral right to choose someone else's homelessness because they lived in New Orleans or got breast cancer or schizophrenia. If the means exist to rescue people from such calamities--and they do--I fail to see how anyone under any moral system can believe they have the right to stand in the way of such means being implemented. Who cares about abstract ideas of how society should theoretically run when confronted with a sick child? Danger invites rescue. Suffering demands alleviation.

But even if you do believe you have the moral right to consign people to living in a dog-eat-dog manner, who thinks it's a smart idea? Look at how our ongoing experiments in social Darwinism (aka Watts, South Bronx, etc) are turning out. Gee, what a shock--strong young men rule everything by force, and everyone else cowers. You want all of America to be like Cabrini-Green? Because that's what a zero-sum, make-your-own-bed world looks like. Where would you honestly stand in a world like that? Not in your imagination, but in reality.

3) In short--what Nacht and Hamburglar are saying.

[themuzicman]

We're #38 in life expectancy because of cultural issues. If you eliminate accidental and criminal deaths, the US rises to the top.