Case for bigger Gov.

[StevieC]

Originally Posted By: rshaw125
No they're not most Canadians are pretty nice. But a few have a big jealousy problem.But I can understand how they feel.Always on the side lines while the US does the heavy lifting.


You create your own heavy lifting... AKA: IRAQ! So why shouldn't we sit on the sidelines and watch?

 

[Gary Allan]

Quote:
So far, nobody seems to have pinned down why competitive free market systems are better.


They function better ..but that has no assurance that there is more benefit realized. You can have competitive markets reduce the distribution of supply side resources ..to their own (future) destruction.

One example would be WallMart ..where it actually undercuts its own customer base for employment.

 

[sciphi]

Kinda twisted logic (please rip apart): Since the XYZ Corp. has been so successful and paid their employees a lot to produce a product using processes harmful to the population around their sites, their employees and the surrounding population are slowly getting sicker every year. The employees pay into their health insurance which covers them, but nobody's covering the daycare worker who watches their kids or the people working at stores who can't afford health care coverage but are just as affected by XYZ Corp's practices as the employees of XYZ. And without those people in place, XYZ employees can't bring home the bacon.

Now who is going to look after those people when they get sick? XYZ? I don't think so as they're not XYZ employees. So they go to the ER when they're sick as it's their only form of health care. That costs us a lot more than providing appointments and treatment for minor stuff before it blows up into something major.

And XYZ will not voluntarily clean up their act even though it's more beneficial to the long-term health of their workers because it costs more in the short term.

 

[Gary Allan]

The bottom line is that the self interest of capitalism is devoid of benefits to the society that hosts it. IT IS the fairest distribution system that I can think of (in a vacuum of concept). Each member effectively is a shareholder in the collective (meaning total composite of enterprises - not commie collective, Tempest

) enterprise system. Each nets benefits commensurate with their worth to the enterprise. Those of no tangible worth ..get no tangible benefits. Very simple ..and totally fair. Just what are you bringing to the table??

 

[Tempest]

Quote:
Each nets benefits commensurate with their worth to the enterprise. Those of no tangible worth ..get no tangible benefits. Very simple ..and totally fair. Just what are you bringing to the table??

Exactly correct. In capitalism, society truly makes the determination as to who and what is important by spending their dollar votes. It's self regulating.

With a centralized system a few select people make the decision based on what is best for them. Our Founding Fathers understood this.

 

[Gary Allan]

Well, capitalism, outside of a vacuum of conceptual view, won't stop monopolies and/or cartels from forming. Those trumping paying "fair value" or charging "fair value". Now I'll admit that juggling the corrupt corruption with legislated corruption can be a debatable exercise in futility ..but..

The concept of capitalism works best with perpetually expanding potential. An ever advancing flame front, if you will. It never EVER had to face a lack of new frontiers.

I think that capitalism is going to fall short of providing the needs of the population when there is little need for more and more of them. To avoid this, capitalism would have to assure that all members DO have a share in the collective pie ..and opportunity to compete for larger slices of it. This it cannot do if reality refuses to cooperate. That is, capitalism will write conceptual checks that it will not be able to cash. We've had plagues and wars and famines and major events that have reset many clocks ..and have, up until now, relatively unlimited developed resources to provide the go juice for making it pay. When those inhibitors or enhancers are no longer there ..then you'll see, as we do now, the darker side of capitalism showing itself.

You cannot lay off people from life.

 

[oilyriser]

Where did the superbug, MRSA, come from?

 

[Gary Allan]

Too slow and way too expensive. Poor product release. We need near 100% fatality within weeks of infection ..days preferably. Let the strong survive (strong may be defined as "economically viable").

 

[oilyriser]

By what process did the bug come into being?

 

[VeeDubb]

Originally Posted By: Gary Allan

The concept of capitalism works best with perpetually expanding potential. An ever advancing flame front, if you will. It never EVER had to face a lack of new frontiers.

I think that capitalism is going to fall short of providing the needs of the population when there is little need for more and more of them. To avoid this, capitalism would have to assure that all members DO have a share in the collective pie ..and opportunity to compete for larger slices of it. This it cannot do if reality refuses to cooperate. That is, capitalism will write conceptual checks that it will not be able to cash. We've had plagues and wars and famines and major events that have reset many clocks ..and have, up until now, relatively unlimited developed resources to provide the go juice for making it pay. When those inhibitors or enhancers are no longer there ..then you'll see, as we do now, the darker side of capitalism showing itself.




While railing against capitalism, be careful what you wish for. Glass half empty types usually think life can't get worse and they are usually wrong. In capitalist countries, booms and bust usually lead to GDP decreases and layoffs, but in non-capitalist countries, we get famines by the millions, along with purges of "enemies of the state."

Gary, when you can solve the problem of giving everyone an equal share of the pie while making sure the pie is as big as can be in a world of unequal ability/talent and immutable human greed (and yes greed would still persist even in the absence of capitalism), then you should get the Nobel prize. But until then, we'll have to accept a world where there are tradeoffs. Or you can take it up with the Big Guy upstairs for creating a world with unequal ability and greed.


p.s. I can already anticipate your response. And no, I am not saying let people who were born with fewer Gawd given abilities starve. I think it is the responsibility of society to ensure basic necessities and yes that includes health care. I'm just sayin that the pie will never be distributed equally, and in spite of this, capitalism is still the best system we've got.

 

[MarkC]

Originally Posted By: oilyriser
By what process did the bug come into being?


Evolution.

 

[oilyriser]

Finally! We have a winner!

It's a system for solving problems that does not need any central control. People will mistakenly try to apply it to society, but it is most useful when confined to the business world.

 

[Gary Allan]

Well, it's hard to separate humanistic platitudes from our admiration and criticism of a "theory". I too believe that capitalism is the fairest distribution system. Will anything truly be fair about it? Not likely ..but as you said (paraphrased) "We've got the worst system going ..except for what everyone else uses".

I find the distinctions between various economic theories applied over other ideological beliefs to be population management modalities ...at least in the contemporary sense. It may have always been that way.

 

[sciphi]

My point is that capitalism is great at looking after its own, and doesn't give two hoots about others who enable the capitalist system to succeed, ultimately derailing the whole social system that adopted capitalism.

Look at the riots we've had over the years demanding better working conditions. A prime example of short-term profiteering leading to higher long-term costs. Destroyed/blockaded factories are not productive.

Remember, everything is good in moderation. Including moderation.

The corollary to that is that for some things, moderation means zero, for others 100%, and for yet others, somewhere in between. It's up to society to hash out what they consider moderating for a topic.

 

[Gary Allan]

Quote:
My point is that capitalism is great at looking after its own, and doesn't give two hoots about others who enable the capitalist system to succeed, ultimately derailing the whole social system that adopted capitalism.


I've made this point a few times. I consider the move toward our corrupt version of socialized population management as the outright indictment of capitalism for its failure to cash the checks that it rhetorically writes. While it may be the most productive and motivating, it doesn't seem to produce "progress" in society wide benefit ...unless you rationalize "reduced degradation" as an inverted benefit.

Capitalism spans the globe ..while our society spans from the commercially depleted Cod Atlantic ..to the ever threatened eco-diversity in the Pacific.

 

[oilyriser]

Socialism is capitalism, once one person has monopoly. Then evolution stops, and you have a "dinosaur".

 

[Tempest]

Quote:
it doesn't seem to produce "progress" in society wide benefit ...unless you rationalize "reduced degradation" as an inverted benefit.

Yes, because all of those communist/socialist/dictatorial countries are doing SO much better than our capitalist model...

If you want people to do better, implement capitalism. It has worked every time it's tried. The others have failed every time they have been tried.

Capitalism DRIVES growth because there is something to gain from your labor. Other systems strive to keep the status quot in the guise of "fairness". This lack of growth eventually turns to negative growth and the rest is well documented in history.

 

[Shannow]

But where does the infinite growth come from, on a finite planet ?

 

[Tempest]

There is an ultimate limit, regardless of what economic system is used. But who would have thought that we could have 6 billion people living on this planet, with most of them having at least semi-regular meals? Capitalism has driven the technology to allow greater food production and mineral extraction.

The reason people are not fed throughout the world is due to their governments preventing efficient resource distribution. How many people starve in capitalist systems vs. central systems?

 

[MarkC]

So you believe that most of the starving people in the world live in communist countries?
India is the world's largest democracy and has almost half of the world's starving people.