Alternatives to capitalism?

[Deleted]

Dunno. Too busy being a communist.

[Halicia]

The original statement was that capitalism is fair and honest when government doesn't interfere.

Isn't it inevitable that corporations (like any human entity) eventually try to subvert the government into legislating in their favor, both collectively as big business and individually as market leaders ?

[Defengar]

That's speculative. Private companies are slower to adapt to green standards on their own in many cases, but they don't avoid it altogether.

No its not. Without the EPA the coal companies would still be letting as much mercury out into the atmosphere as they were in the 50's. The government has had to poke and prod companies down the road of environmental and public safety EVEY STEP OF THE WAY.

[Catta]

That's speculative. Private companies are slower to adapt to green standards on their own in many cases, but they don't avoid it altogether.

Its not speculative... Freon gasses were a nice cheap propulsion gas - and its effect is first seen much much later. If it had not been banned how long do you think it would have taken before the companies abandoned it? Before or after we wouldnt be able to live outside?

[Laize]

Its not speculative... Freon gasses were a nice cheap propulsion gas - and its effect is first seen much much later. If it had not been banned how long do you think it would have taken before the companies abandoned it? Before or after we wouldnt be able to live outside?

I conceded they do environmental things slower. They do things when their customers demand it. Not before.

[Deleted]

I conceded they do environmental things slower. They do things when their customers demand it. Not before.

No, they don't really do that.

You need to think of environmental damage just like any other doing of damage, except that it's much harder to identify the victims and the perpetrators.

The right solution, theoretically, would be that every polluter asked all of the victims if they consent to it and offered to pay a certain fee to pollute their bodies/property. This ofcourse isn't workable in practice (except for some pollution), so you need to apply some other method.

What government does today is to say to corporations that they can damage our property and our bodies to a certain extent, but not more than that. And if they exceed this limit, they pay the government, not us. Not really a neat solution either.

[Catta]

I conceded they do environmental things slower. They do things when their customers demand it. Not before.

which is horrible when it comes to the environment - the companies will choose the cheap way and the customers wont care as long as its not affecting them in the immediate future or even present...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Midgley,_Jr.
This man was a walking disaster - he was one of the men who created the CFC gasses and also came up with the idea to put lead into gasoline - another thing which was horrible for the environment - especially humans.

Fact of the matter is that governments are needed to stop harmful things created by companies quickly before it becomes too bad - I mean, what do you expect would happen if you took the government out of drug approval? Had the US not had a government official saying no to Thalidomide before more tests had been done then an awful lot of cripples would be jumping around your streets...

[Izin]

The imperative for profit at all costs is the cause of unemployment. Let me explain:
It is in absolutely every possible employer/s interest to minimise expense and increase profit. What kind of insanity will stop him from erasing all the possible costs that come for hiring a human to do something when he can buy a machine once which need no food, no social security, no holidays, it's perfectly precise, never gets tired, and does a superior job to a human in every possible way?

What kind of insanity will stop him from getting that when the rule is simple - you either get profit, or you close down.

As I said, you can cite Economy rules all you want with those fairy tales, but there isn't a single Economy book/professor/professional that found the solution to this problem - the replacing of human labor by machines, which is by default in the employers best interest.

This part of your post is plain stupid. What you are saying is that we shouldn't develop new technologies because some people might run out of a job? Are you kidding me... new technologies will absolutely make some jobs obsolete but it will at the same time create new forms of jobs. If we take a look at history, in the muslim world who where the leaders in science on all frontiers and had the most prosperous society on earth. When they around 1100 century got the idea that technology was a bad thing (in their view: math was something imposed by satan) there prosperous society fell behind and innovation died out. Well just take a look at where they are today compare to back then. I think I don't have to say more than that for you to understand that development and technology is the single most important thing to keep a health and prosperous society.

And btw machines replacing humans is not always bad for workers either. We have fairly strong unions in my country who welcome these machines but at the same time push for higher salaries for workers (taking a part of the extra profit the employers are making from said machine).

[Laize]

What the hell are you talking about...? Emotional problems? Look, you can cite Economy textbooks all you want, but I assure you it's got nothing to do with reality. That ''profession'' that they teach you is a load of fiction, but I still haven't met a single ''economist'' that wasn't too proud to admit that.

Lemme ask you - why the hell do people get employed? why would they want that? what the hell drives them to go through this or that education so that they can get a job? Because they just like busting their assess off all day doing meaningless work? Nope, it's because of one simple reason:

If you don't get money in this society you can either start robbing the stores or starve to death.

That's the only reason people go to work. Without food, your lifespan is one week. In one week you have to eat something. Your whole life looks like that - each time you eat, you replenish your life for another few days. If you don't have that ability to feed yourself, you're done. If you steal, you get punished. If you ''work'' you get payed.

That's the sole imperative of why ''jobs'' exist in the first place, not because we simply need to have 160 million people sitting at desks answering phones all day long. You have voicemail for that. This also applies to every job that can be replaced by a computer. There is no need for a cashier at a shop if you can have it work like a vending machine.

And long story short - that's the reason why we have unemployment.

Technology advances, human labor becomes redundant, people are fired and stop getting money to eat, debts can't be payed by the individual or the state so the state can't hand out millions of free money to people and those whole system goes to hell. As I said, I will repeat:

The imperative for profit at all costs is the cause of unemployment. Let me explain:
It is in absolutely every possible employer/s interest to minimise expense and increase profit. What kind of insanity will stop him from erasing all the possible costs that come for hiring a human to do something when he can buy a machine once which need no food, no social security, no holidays, it's perfectly precise, never gets tired, and does a superior job to a human in every possible way?

What kind of insanity will stop him from getting that when the rule is simple - you either get profit, or you close down.

As I said, you can cite Economy rules all you want with those fairy tales, but there isn't a single Economy book/professor/professional that found the solution to this problem - the replacing of human labor by machines, which is by default in the employers best interest.

Why is this a problem? The consumer gets higher quality goods for less money. The huge bulk of ANY company's expenses is labor. Why shouldn't they be allowed to trim it or even eliminate it if possible?

[Deleted]

Capitalism but without compound interest.
People can't think exponentially, so they make mistakes (dept).
The linear interest by itself is controllable, but not the exponential one.
Until the middle ages there was no compound interest. We should return to that.

[Laize]

Capitalism but without compound interest.
People can't think exponentially, so they make mistakes (dept).
The linear interest by itself is controllable, but not the exponential one.
Until the middle ages there was no compound interest. We should return to that.

You mean like the coupon structure bonds use?

[Deleted]

Michael Hudson: The mathematical economics of compound interest: a 4,000-year overview:
"Economic writers in earlier times were more ready than their modern counterparts to confront the problem of debts growing so large as to be unpayable. In The Wealth of Nations (V, iii), Adam Smith observed that “Bankruptcy is always the end of great accumulation of debt. The liberation of the public revenue, if it has ever been brought about at all, has always been brought about by a bankruptcy; sometimes by an avowed one, but always by a real one, though frequently by a pretended payment.”
The tendency of debts to accumulate at compound rates of interest explains why Smith’s axiom applies so universally. The principle was described graphically by one of Smith’s contemporaries, the dissenting Anglican minister and actuarial mathematician Richard Price. It was Price who first popularized the distinction between compound and simple interest that later came to be associated mainly with Malthusian population theory.
Money bearing compound interest increases at first slowly. But, the rate of increase being continually accelerated, it becomes in some time so rapid, as to mock all the powers of the imagination. One penny, put out at our Saviour’s birth at 5% compound interest, would, before this time, have increased to a greater sum than would be obtained in a 150 millions of Earths, all solid gold. But if put out to simple interest, it would, in the same time, have amounted to no more than 7 shillings 4½d."

And so on.

Of course, the other thing that would really help is that money should only represent real value (which it once did) like gold, silver and so on. Now it is basically just worth the paper and the "believe" put into it. If that "believe" goes down, the currency devalues and the other way round.

[Zecora]

Of course, the other thing that would really help is that money should only represent real value (which it once did) like gold, silver and so on. Now it is basically just worth the paper and the "believe" put into it. If that "believe" goes down, the currency devalues and the other way round.

Mmm, as you say, money has no value these days, except what value society agrees that it has. If people lose faith in their currency, there will be chaos as a result.

[Catta]

Mmm, as you say, money has no value these days, except what value society agrees that it has. If people lose faith in their currency, there will be chaos as a result.

Gold and silver has little to no inherent value either - if you want inherent value then its gonna be food stuff

[Deleted]

Mmm, as you say, money has no value these days, except what value society agrees that it has. If people lose faith in their currency, there will be chaos as a result.

Well, yes, but normally the country with a currency that is no longer believed in goes bankrupt and gets a monetery reform (interesting wikipedia article). Happened before. Just today a lot of countries don't want that to happen.

Gold and silver has little to no inherent value either - if you want inherent value then its gonna be food stuff

Ehm, no. Gold and silver do have inherent value as they are limited. And with food - there is too much speculation going on with it and speculation with food prices is really no alternative to capitalism.

[Catta]

Well, yes, but normally the country with a currency that is no longer believed in goes bankrupt and gets a monetery reform (interesting wikipedia article). Happened before. Just today a lot of countries don't want that to happen.



Ehm, no. Gold and silver do have inherent value as they are limited. And with food - there is too much speculation going on with it and speculation with food prices is really no alternative to capitalism.

Gold and silver has no inherent value because they are not necessary for survival - there are plenty of things that are limited but what gives it value is the fact that people want it. Not everyone want gold and silver - everyone wants food.

If gold and silver has inherent value then why not paper money? The value it has is what we give it.

[Laize]

Well, yes, but normally the country with a currency that is no longer believed in goes bankrupt and gets a monetery reform (interesting wikipedia article). Happened before. Just today a lot of countries don't want that to happen.



Ehm, no. Gold and silver do have inherent value as they are limited. And with food - there is too much speculation going on with it and speculation with food prices is really no alternative to capitalism.

The idea of a gold backed currency is about as dumb as it gets. You lose the ability to make monetary policy when you force an exchange rate.

Gold is only worth what we say it's worth... Just like a fiat currency.

Gold actually costs money to hold... It's stupid as hell to hang onto... Not to mention industrially useless.

Silver at least is a strong electrical conductor and has real uses.

[Deleted]

An example:
A poor fisherman at the coast of africa enjoys life x10000 times better then any big corporation leader as long as the fisherman have enough food AND friends.
My point is that we need to get back to our roots and stop the consumtion lifestyles we have in west. You want to hear more about my ideas? Go to your local library and borrow any major writings on philosophy, look up and read about different writings done by Sokrates and Epikuros.Now you will get the idea on how people should live to be truely happy with their lifes.Thanks for reading!

[Catta]

The idea of a gold backed currency is about as dumb as it gets. You lose the ability to make monetary policy when you force an exchange rate.

Gold is only worth what we say it's worth... Just like a fiat currency.

Gold actually costs money to hold... It's stupid as hell to hang onto... Not to mention industrially useless.

Silver at least is a strong electrical conductor and has real uses.

Well gold is quite rare and has several real uses which would make it even more insane to use it as a currency as while there are uses they are quite limited - IE spacecrafts and the likes

[Laize]

An example:
A poor fisherman at the coast of africa enjoys life x10000 times better then any big corporation leader as long as the fisherman have enough food AND friends.
My point is that we need to get back to our roots and stop the consumtion lifestyles we have in west. You want to hear more about my ideas? Go to your local library and borrow any major writings on philosophy, look up and read about different writings done by Sokrates and Epikuros.Now you will get the idea on how people should live to be truely happy with their lifes.Thanks for reading!

Sokrates and Epikuros? Are these new age hip hop artists?