Capitalist ideals hold that we all live separately and independently, securing our own lives and lifestyles by the work that we do for ourselves alone. Capitalism pursues some idea of fairness by letting everyone gain only what they earn and take for themselves.
At the same time, with our democratic and varied governments and interconnected and co-dependent economies, we rely on the success each other for our own success. Where one person or group fails due to ineptitude, we lose sane control over our government, which affects everyone (so much for independence and self reliance and security). As well when a person or group fails economically we all suffer as a result. We get laid off workers, who no matter how clever or hard working will not be able to survive while there is no opportunity (resulting directly from our co-dependence).
At the same time we try to work together, we watch our own struggle and fail, and we even hamstring our own if there is opportunity and benefit.
Common goals unite us, yet competitively they drive us apart.
This is an oversimplification. No one lives in a bubble or vacuum. Capitalism does not say that we do. Capitalism is merely a loose system of economic rules establishing the private ownership and control of one’s wealth, the right to keep and dispose of what you earn and what is yours. In its basic, naked essence, capitalism is nothing more than the right to property. Of course this implies many other things, such as civil and political rights and a society with fair law and order. But essentially capitalism has nothing to do with saying that “we all live separately and independently”. That might be how you interpret the end result of capitalism or maybe the implied conditions for its existence, but they are not necessary conditions. In fact as you say, such independence is impossible.
Yep. We live in a world with cause and effect. The actions of other people affect us, just as our actions affect others. For good or ill. That is reality.
Capitalism is an economic system that exists within this reality of cause and effect. As does every economic system we might adopt. As such, the existence of any economic system will never undo the fact that people affect each other, positively and negatively. Economic systems merely end up dealing with this fact in different ways.
Not all of us do this. But granted, many do.
Competition need not be divisive nor destructive. When the brighest and strongest, the most able and intelligent people are the ones who “call the shots” economically speaking, we tend to get better products and services; more innovation, higher standards of living. Fair competition which is merit-based ensures at minimum that the conditions exist for these individuals to succeed, on their own merit. Innovation and productivity benefit everyone in a free society. Even the poor in America get good donated food and free shelter, charity or gratis medical care, free money for college, etc. It is the collective wealth of the nation, built upon the idea of a merit-based system, that allowes everyone, even those who do not produce on their own, to receive rewards.
Sure, it isnt perfect in practice. There will always be corruption, lying, fraud, theft . . . but these are not a fault of any economic system; they are part of human nature.
I said people live seperately and independently, not that they live in a vacuum. what i mean is that we earn our wages and receive the rewards separately; we live separately. You say we own our own property, and this is what i was implying.
When i say we live independently, i don’t mean that we live alone or in a bubble. One of the ideals of capitalism is that we get to choose our own work and fend for ourselves. Now by this i don’t mean we all travel in opposite directions into a forest and gather berries with the help of no one else. what i mean is that it is left to us to make our own decisions concerning where why and how we work. We have the freedom to be independent in terms of choosing or constructing our livelihood, so says capitalist ideals.
When i say we live independently, i don’t mean we do it alone, i mean that responsibility falls on the individual.
What independence do you refer to? which type is impossible?
living alone in a mountain shack?
Whether you like it or not, capitalist ideals hold an idea of fairness by letting everyone reap the rewards they sow. It lets is be independent by allowing us to provide our own survival and to live separately by giving us the choice.
This is how the simple “right to private property” implies things about how the society in question will function. I mean, we look at the economic system hopefully for the good things which it does, otherwise why do we employ it?
“the freedom to fail” is a good way to describe the independence i was referring to, which is not “bubble” or “vacuum” like. It is a very real situation in our societies, this independence…
this is why the independence capitalism promotes (the happiness you gain from cutting out your own piece of pie) in the end runs amok on the larger part of society, making capitalist independence hollow and useless for most.
now this is an over simplification. It almost sounds like you reduce these differences between economic systems and the various means to direct the effect people have on themselves and each other to a mere triviality.
Allow me to expound on the pie metaphor.
In a capitalist competitive world we compete to get in line for pie, the further ahead in line you are, the more pie there will be available for you to cut your piece from.
When the most intelligent and hardworking get to the front of the line, they gain the ability to take as big a slice as they possible can. Though we all worked together to create this pie that nobody could have created alone, the most intelligent will get the biggest portions, making them more well nourished than the rest, and more apt to win again, and get an even bigger piece.
Meanwhile while the heads of the line direct the line and those behind them, the people in the middle and end of the line are forced to do all the work. We make pies we never see for those more clever than us.
We watch others butt in line and gird our own spots in defense. We butt in line because we are greedy.
But as is easily imagined, these changes involve marginal increases in lifestyle.
When someone comes up with a way to improve life they charge money for it. We keep what we earn, so these better products simply cost more money.
Our current society forces both parents to work full time usually monotonous jobs to pay for a lower middle class existence. They have to work from an early age and into old age.
50 years ago you could raise a family by working at a gas station. We are simply so addicted to these needles amenities and life improvements sold to us that we have to make our lives comparatively shittier to pay for them.
our lives have not improved, the clever are taking all the god damn profit.
And the thing is, competition does not need to be destructive…
In a world where nobody could lie, i think capitalism would be great…
otherwise failures small and large are inevitable.
it ensures nothing. Competition is never fair, and the merit based system has many flaws. Our own merit is a commodity traded by people worth millions of times what we are worth.
this is what we call run of the mill success.
Does capitalism pit us against each other in order to motivate us to succeed?
The irony of success within capitalism is it is seldom shared.
This sadly is not the case. Children go mal-nourished in America, Canada, Mexico, and plenty other merit based systems. Bumbs freeze during the winter.
The third world is currently under the rug. (not to mention the fact we rape them all for resources to provide our current lifestyles)
The fact is that charity is more often used for personal gain than selfless desire to assist. Publicity and image for sales is all i see. Even scholarships. How can you possibly see scholarships as charitable or rewards for the inept?
It is when a university or organization says to themselves “Hmm, this person is intelligent and can be successful, let’s sponsor them to give them an extra boost above everyone else”, for whatever reason.
Everyone i have ever debated politics or economics with inevitably makes anappeal to human nature.
At one point you say competition does not neccessarily divide us and can make things efficient, and at this point you admit corruption, fraud, theft and deciet, the other side of “competition”, are an intrinsic part of humanity.
You assert that human beings must be corrupt and deceitful.
I disagree with this assertion, i believe that the individual merit based competition system creates greed. I believe that this greed is a result of our society, not the cause of our society.
I believe that the only advantage to competition is motivating people to work harder for themselves (which is paradoxically good for us as a whole, but bad for it as well), and i believe that this advantage us outweighed by the disadvantages it brings.
Competition doesn’t necessarily divide, but it does. Charity provides rewards, but it doesn’t.
The cream rises to the top, and we destroy ourselves by fighting each other to get there.
I guess my point is that the problems you see within capitalism are not unique to capitalism. They exist in every economic configuration. People lie or cheat, they steal from each other, the commit fraud, the hurt or abuse each other for personal gain. These types of behaviors will continue in any and every possible economic system. So I was trying to point out that capitalism does not CREATE these types of unfortunate behaviors, they are just a part of reality, of what it is to be alive and to be human in a world with limites resources, where individual and group desires will always be greater than the actual rewards gained by those individuals or groups.
In otherwords, no one is ever satisfied completely, or for very long. This is also a part of what it is to be human.
You argue that capitalism increases these behaviors, I assume as opposed to alternative systems. You seem to center your argument around the competitive nature of capitalism. But “competition” is not a dogma or essence of capitalism; you might think that the disadvantages of competition outweigh the advantages, but I would ask what the alternative is? Without competition (i.e. without the possibility to create a product or service and set the price you wish to sell it for), would an economy really be able to function? Would there be any incentives AT ALL to take risks and invest money and time to research and innovate? And who would determine what the “right” price of a product or service is? It seems like the best person to determine this is the person who had to pay his own money and time to create that product or service itself, as he personally knows what it is “worth”.
And is it possible that you do not realise all the advantages of competition that you enjoy, even now? Someone had to invent, produce, test, retest, manufacture, distrubute and sell the computer, foods, house, books, car, heating, air conditioning, TV, internet, etc etc etc etc, for every single thing that is a part of your life. It is a very long and complex process from start to finish to create a product or service, and employs the help of countless hundreds or thousands of people in most cases. Everything you own that you have not explicitly made on your own is the result of competition. So how can you claim that the advantages are outweighed by the disadvantages? How do you even weigh the advantages that we take for granted every single moment of our life?
I would also add, too, that capitalism tends to spur the growth of cooperation. Businesses and corporations spring up everywhere, all the time. These are cooperative groups of people working TOGETHER toward a common goal of creating a product or providing a service. These groups then compete with other such groups, true, but ultimately if you say that capitalism is only about competition, this misses the point. It is not about competition OR cooperation; it is simply about the idea that you control your life, your decisions, and you deserve the rewards or lack thereof of your choices. In otherwords, private property rights, which includes both your right to keep what is yours as well as the other guy’s right to keep what is his (i.e. he does not have the right to take what is yours, and you do not have the right to take what is his).
How can you say that this basic right to respect what others have, and not steal it, is bad?
This basic right does not mean competition or cooperation. In reality, both competition and cooperation will exist out of a necessity, because there are advantages and efficiencies in both of them in different situations.
Anyways, I guess I do not really understand your points, if that does not address them. For one thing, I do not know what you mean by “fair”. You say that competition is not fair, but what could be more fair than allowing people the freedom to do what they want, provided it does not hurt others? If everyone has the EQUAL freedom to do what they want with what is theirs, provided that others whom they interact with do so of their own free choice, how could it be any more fair than this? Are you talking about FORCING everyone to occupy the same material level? But as everyone has different intelligences, motivations, desires, abilities, etc, this would be fundamentally UNFAIR because it would involve a skewing of natural rewards and merits and personal desires, in favor of some and at the expense of others.
Surely the flaw of capitalism is the one-way flow of wealth - the need for perpetual wealth creation (‘promissary’ notes from central banks) in order to stave off the ever-accumulating debt created out of the exchange of action (or production-product) for ‘promissary notes’ which have no value until exchanged; the burden of banks that create a simulacrum between the resource (the necessary ‘valued’ production-product) and the individual.
Specialisation only compounds the situation with ‘distinct channels’ or ‘paths’ that the individual must fit down in order to be valued and gain some form of wealth.
The disintegration of monetary ‘debt’ but the retention of the competitive need to survive (there are limited resources, not scarce, but limited) seems to be the obvious answer to the problem of capitalism - get rid of the one-way street, and have a plaza…
There is room for competition & cooperation without the need for capital (or at least, the simulacrum of ‘money’); and there is room for social and individual growth and prosperity without the need for debt accumulation - the system in place only seeks to establish the class system that we are constantly seemingly overcoming as something fundamental; we seem to be over that hurdle, only to find that it is posited right in front of us once again, it is posited as the fertile ground upon which ‘growth’ departs - without the ‘goal’ or projection of a superior place to be, the production would stop. At least, this is what we are told.
The wall, the blocking of the production-product that the individual would be capable of producing is unnecessary, it only serves as a shield, as a limiting factor that establishes a social heirachy where those with the means of producing the simulacrum (money in this case) gain the upperhand over all others.
The corporations are not a ‘good thing’, they are a ‘necessary’ thing as resources are limited and assumed scarce; the individual must band together with other such individuals in order to keep their head above the debt line…
There is no irony of capitalism… It is built upon some major contradicitons…Morally, it expects a virtue to grow out of a vice… Greed is a vice, and no good comes of it… While capitalism pushes the idea of the individual it treats all as a herd… We all buy off the rack, and all our cars are the same… We are all the same… and considered as free individuals we can make our own deal with the boss…And no consideration can be made as to whether one person having more resources than another should undercut everyone and lower all wages, and generally hurt many…We are seen as free to dispose of our time, our labor and selves as we see fit…Yet; the rich do not hold to such stupid ideas as individualism…They combine into super individuals called corporations at every chance…The corporation not only has more resources than any individuals, but it is immortaly…In spite of this I would never encourage anyone to organize…All organizations fall apart, and they sap the good people of effort… No effective tactic of organized labor has ever been accepted by the courts of this land; but why bother… We have the government which was formed to achieve everything a labor union might, but it will not do what it was organized for…If one organization will not do it; what hope has a second organization of working…It is better, if we are individuals to do as much good as possible as individuals… Breathe meaning into the word…Generally, individualism is an intelligence test…Most people fail…
I don’t think capitalism is the issue. It is the free market. I don’t want capitalism, I want the free market. If the market is not free, then it becomes a question of who controls it. Corporations should only be chartered for public interest. This is the thing that most people miss. In order for a public corporation to be chartered, they must petition the government. We need to have more stringent regulations for chartering corporations. In addition, moral guidelines should be built right into the charters themselves which prevent corporations from taking certain actions such as outsourcing or other unscrupulous business practices. The problem with modern day capitalism is the allowance of corporations chartered for private interests. This should be expressly forbidden. Public corporation, public interests. Simple as that. If you want to represent your own interests, that is what an LLC is for.
The system that I advocate uses the free market which is only regulated in ways to keep the market itself free. It is a truly free market, free from monopolies and cartels which are the #1 problem with modern day capitalism
Wonderer, which economic system are you suggesting using as an alternative to capitalism? Are you aware that our market is anything but free? There are a whole slew of cartels, a few monopolies, and a private central bank which controls all interest rates, monetary production, and liquidity thereby effectively controlling the market. If you are against the free market then you should be happy with the system we have now. I call it fascism. That is debatable, but it is at very least corporatism, and I don’t think anyone can deny that. I personally find it obvious that the corporations fund and control a strong national authority.
Really we have two extremes here which are the adopted system worldwide. On one side you have corporatism/fascism, on the other side you have communism/socialism. What I think most people don’t realize is that public corporations are more or less governmental entities. No different then say the courts or the EPA for example. As such, they are vulnerable to corruption. In a communist system you have a strong national authority which controls corporations, in a fascist system you have corporations who control a strong national authority. But it is really just same shit, different toilet. The solution is to abandon them both for the free market and limited government by and for the people, don’t you think? I don’t want illusion of the free market and illusion of freedom of choice via election. I want the real thing. I think people really miss the point with this left/right bullcrap. And indeed it is designed that way. That is the oldest trick in the book for the ruling elites. It’s called divide and conquer. We all want the same thing, but they box us in by making us squabble over the details of how it should be achieved.
Of course their tactics are damned good ones. It seems to me that hardly anyone wants liberty anymore. But people need to wake up and realize what the alternative is. The government isn’t there to protect you, only limit your actions and enslave you. Every time you trade some of your liberty for security you lose both. The people you petition for that security are the very ones who don’t want you to have it and want to increase their own security by taking away your liberty. Don’t do it, it is the most asinine thing you can do. There will always be unscrupulous individuals that will do dishonorable things. By petitioning that others solve your problems for you you create additional problems that are harder to solve then ever before. The people who want the power are the ones who would misuse it. Should we just hold our hands open extending power to anyone who claims to use it properly? Power is attractive only to those who lust after it. There is no glory in power for those who would not abuse it. It is merely a service that they perform for the public. The very few who view it in such a manner almost always lose out to those who would give their left nut for it so that they can reap their own personal benefits. The only real solution to this problem is to severely limit power itself, spread it out far and wide rather then concentrating it, and heavily scrutinize its usage. Every person must do their part in policing the government. In a free society we must all wear the badge of justice. The old adage “who will guard the guards” is answered by those that the guards serve and protect must guard them. If they don’t their guards become their wardens instead.
Every corporation, and every church as a corporation ought to be able to prove, and be forced to prove a pure public purpose… We don’t need unions if the government follows its own goals- clearly stated -in the preamble of the constitution… Why should any government of the whole people allow organizations (corporations) designed to feed on the body politic??? There is nothing free about free enterprise…Those people who can control economic conditions, markets, supplies, money etc have an advantage that allows their ownership and control over the whole society…Neither the government nor economy work becasue neither works for the people…
If somebody is controlling the market, it is not free. Plain and simple. I have a slightly different idea of free market then most people. In order to keep the market free, we need not the government controlling it (that would be disastrous) but the people controlling it. I have an idea of how this might be accomplished. We need an organized effort to get people to realize that buying is voting. We need to incorporate buyer’s unions into local elections. We can vote for the people who organize them. Once elected, they can appoint secret mystery shoppers who evaluate companies and write reviews which would be published in buyers unions newspapers and newscasts. Then the buyer’s union members could vote on which companies they think do the most good. Then once that is done, local taxes could be implemented that would be applied to the corporations which least serve the public interest. Of course corporations don’t really pay taxes. Whatever amount they are taxed is always passed on to the consumer. This will be translated as lower and more competitive prices for companies which have the fairest business practices and best meet the public interests. Thus dollar voting would be implemented as a general practice the way it should be, and the market would be free and fair. Corporations who try to establish monopolies or cartels should also have their charters revoked. I think charters should be reviewed every few years, and if they don’t serve the public interest they should be revoked. But it should be the public itself who makes that decision, not the government.
I think a very ancient principle needs to be towards corporate charters. That principle is “qui bono” or “who benefits?”. If the answer is anything but the public, then the charter should be revoked. Corporations should be rewarded based upon performance, not upon dishonesty and unscrupulous business practices. That is a truly free market. One that is not controlled by any specific interests, government or private alike. And nor should coercion methods be allowed to be used. PR ads should not be allowed to be played for public corporations. Rather they should have to demonstrate their merit through their actions rather then their words. Private corporations would be allowed to run these ads per their freedom of speech, but a public corporation should not be protected under the bill of rights. It is a servant of the people, and any time it becomes any more then that it is overstepping its authority. When we start serving corporations rather then the other way around, that is when we start becoming slaves to financial interest. The right to property should be reserved strictly for the individual, not the organization. Individuals should be allowed to be as greedy and unscrupulous as they like without harming another. But the moment they organize those goals they have overstepped their bounds and have lost that right. We need to make that kind of distinction in order for us to have a market that serves us rather then the other way around. It is a question of who should serve who. Markets should be equally free for every person who wishes to participate in them. In order to make that happen we MUST reform the system. But when I say “we”, I mean the consumers and citizens, NOT the government. The government has no place in a free market.
I also ought to mention that these buyers unions should be LOCAL ONLY. As local as humanly possible. Down to counties and municipalities, and there should be no national ones. It would be as democratic as it gets that way, and MUCH, MUCH harder to corrupt. Could you imagine a corporation trying to buy off every county and municipality in the country? It wouldn’t happen! They’d go broke long before that, and likely hit some walls where some people could not be bought. Yes, I think this system would be fool proof.
Aristotle said in any number of ways that people combine for advantage… So; if you give people a chance, the markets will never be free…I worked with a fellow down in Detroit who had no love at all for the Jews…Since one of my kids is Jewish I sort of picked around to find out where the prejudice came from…It may have been long stqanding in his family, which was Polish; but he told me of picking pickles all day once for his father, who had a pickle farm, and bringing a truck load of pickles down to the Eastern Market in Detroit… The farmer had a deal before even picking, and the man he had a deal with knew it had rained the day before; but when they showed up with these pickles with a little dirt splashed on them, he used it as an excuse to cut the price he had offered in half…He knew that there was a limit on the time the pcikles could sit after being picked, and it was not as though he would not was the pickles before selling them… He had the farmer over a barrel, and got him and his kids to work for no gain what ever… Where was the free market???..Did he expect, and this is simply a side issue, that prejudice would not attend his mis-use of the Farmer and his family???
The farmers are in a particularly difficult position in regard to markets and middle men… The reason New York city considered leaving the union with the slave states is the great amount of money made on Cotton… Well; the farmers never made any… Slavery did not support the economy of the South, but it did support financiers… What set the price of Cotton was the price of slaves, because slavery killed slaves… Human life was depreciated just like machinery is today…But the slave owner was in the same position as his slaves, unable to escape credit or preditory middlemen…Every one wants their cut, but those people able to control both the markets and the money supply have the world by the balls…The same thing is happening today…It does not matter how enlightened and humane a boss wants to be, because both he and his employees are working for a bank in New York; and he wants his money… Consider, that those financiers account for 90% of the profits in this country… Do you think they do not control every aspect of the market place??? I do not think it is in the nature of such people to leave any profit to chance…When they say free market, they do not mean free for you, but free for them, so no one questions what they do behind the scenes to ensure their maximum, and the minimum for all others…If you realize it is a farce, then the control of the economy by government does not seem such a bad idea…
I agree the system needs some reworking, but you are throwing the baby out with the bath water. When you talk of people working together for advantage on a free market system, you are describing cartels. Guess who the cartels go to to enforce their cartels? Why the government of course. Government is a cartel’s best friend. So when you say the government should control the economy you are telling me you either want a total state monopoly (Communism) or you want cartels running the country (Fascism/Socialism). Those are the two things I am trying to avoid with my plan. Consumer unions can kill any economic giant pretty easily. Your pickle farmer is presumably selling his pickles to a reseller. He could either find someone else to sell to, or he could complain (or threaten to complain to get a fair price) to the buyers union organizers about it under my plan. Fair trade would be enforced by buyers unions. The only part that the government should have in regulating a market is to ensure competition by either denying or revoking charters for corporations who work for private interests only. But the government cannot be trusted to do that (elected officials can be bought) which is why we need buyers unions. If we had those, corporations who would do such a thing would find a very hard time surviving and likely not have the money any longer to buy off elected officials any longer if they stayed in business at all. It is consumers who have to reign in monopolies and cartels. Nobody else really has the power to do that. People have no idea how much power money has. If we went to a total state monopoly system, undoubtedly the same individuals you are describing would end up running it and things would be even worse then they are now. As it is, buyers COULD organize and get rid of these cartels. They just choose not to out of ignorance and apathy. But at least we still have the power to do so. Under communism that power is entirely revoked.
I would not trust our government with any authority, but if we had true democracy there would be problem with it…Business and commerce should be governed to the point that it is both economical and beneficial to the people, all of whom own this place and the government… Pick up a book of property law…All that mine and yours, and meets and bounds rests upon the ugly fact of gotit hasit… With this government being an extra constitutional government, changed by its own will, -using its power of taxation to make poor and rich alike; it has changed the old balance of power between wealth and worker… This land was made with the rich having power in government and rights for their property at the price of nearly its entire support…They have shifted that weight onto labor, and made their wealth untaxed and protected by rights all but unassailable to the people…Do our states protect us… Today states and localities will take it hard to have businesses and jobs…No federal law prevents this behavior but the injury to people is extensive, the waste is incredible and people are left with infrustructure they cannot support, and their homes blighted by trashed industry…With wealth goes political power…And with political power goes wealth…How do you think this society is going to turn out…If we cannot re-form it, and we cannot; then we must form another to grow, like a shark in a shark…I am all for a free market, and I know there is no such thing in fact…As long as people play to win, and justice is not a consideration we will not have a free market… Are you going to be the one to teach your society morality??? The fact is that what is legal represents the understanding that it is moral for people to prey upon each other, and exploit each other, and profit on a managed market…Every profit taker in this land looks at the people and say: I want my share… Everyone wants just a drop of blood and after a bit the whole society is bled out by a insignificant class of bankers…A country can survive on what it grows, on God’s blessing, sort of… But take more than labor makes or God gives and then the rich are consuming the capital of this land, and of this people…We are being liquidated…The capital of many generations is going to the rich, never to be seen again to pay interest no one can avoid, or afford… As our wages are driven down our expenses are driven up so that no one can get ahead…
So which government would you trust that authority with? Can you name an existing government that you would?
Democracy has been subverted over and over. It was a good idea, but we need something better. First of all, one problem with democracy is that your rights can be voted away. If 50.1% of the people vote to take away freedom of speech and religion, guess what? No freedom of speech and religion. The other problem is that in a true democracy elected officials are not held accountable to any specific group of people. In a republic each representative represents a specific district of people which can vote him out or call for an impeachment, write letters, etc. In a true democracy, a majority of the whole entire population have to decide to vote the bum out, call for impeachment, write letters, etc before anything is accomplished. If you want to break voting down into district and have guaranteed rights and limitations on government, you don’t want a democracy, you want a constitutional republic with guaranteed rights like I do. Can you imagine if the federal government literally controlled the whole country unchallenged by the states, counties, and cities? That is the system you are advocating. If that is not what you want, I suggest you re-evaluate the use of that term. Democracy is not a good system.
I agree, but then shouldn’t it be governed by the people? You seem to be suggesting that we leave it up to an elected bureaucracy to govern the economy.
In theory they should own this place and their government. But anybody who thinks they actually do is just out of touch with reality. The people own the land and the government until the point where they fall asleep and let tyranny take over their lives again. This is inevitable to happen unless the government and people are organized in such a way to prevent this. I have a plan to do that, but how to implement it is the question.
So then I guess you should just give the clothes off your body to whoever asks for them. If a homeless family wants a place to live, then they can just come kick you out of your house can’t they? I would like to see you live without owning anything. That is not practical. You are getting caught in this hopeless ideal where everything is equal. Equality is not a natural state of being. Inequality is not caused by any mismanagement or the like. It is a natural thing. Some people are smart, others are stupid. Some people are strong, other people are weak. Some people have a lot, others only a little. These are just facts of life and denying them is just completely out of touch with reality. If you want some reality like that, I suggest you invent a virtual reality where everyone is exactly equal and go live in that. But in real life, nobody is equal, nor should they be. Variety is the spice of life.
Property rights as it turns out are what really separate a free man from a slave. A slave has property rights taken from him to such a degree that he no longer even owns his own body. If you are against property rights, you are advocating slavery. And don’t worry, we are well on our way there. They recently just passed that health care bill requiring us to submit to allopathic medical care and keep national medical IDs with RFID to track us. You wanted slavery? There it is, you no longer can choose how to take care of your body. Congratulations! Hey, remember “health care, not warfare”? That was a liberal scam if I ever heard one. There never was anything in the bill ending the war, only just requiring people to submit to the medical industry, and forcing everybody to buy a product. This is a perfect example of how liberals who are fed up with corporate controls willfully give up all of our collective rights to their savior, the state who will of course make everything better. Why would anyone think they wouldn’t? And you want democracy . The irony of this is that you are advocating an antiquated version of the system we already have that was already corrupted beyond imagination, and you think that will work out well for us. The truth is, in order for the system we had to be subverted, states rights had to be destroyed so that we could be taken back to a true democracy, the system YOU want! What you are forgetting about this system is that it is HIGHLY vulnerable to subversion, coercion, and mind control. You don’t want the open, iron fist. You want the hidden hand, the man behind the curtain.
Let me tell you this. The enemy of a tyrant is liberty. By limiting our property rights you are contributing to tyranny, NOT liberty. It is as simple as that.
Let me correct you right there. The land was made before the rich existed. A big burning ball of dirt cooled off, and a land mass cooled, and it became this land. Perhaps are you talking about the infrastructure? Of course the infrastructure was made by rich people. Poor people don’t have any money to build infrastructure. You are asking something that is impossible. Changed by its own will? You just said that the people own the government above. If that is true then it was changed by the will of the people. Which is it?
You seem to think that only the rich should not have property rights. Whatever you take away from them, you take away from yourself. I think you are falling for some communist propaganda. Sorry, but that system has already been tried and proven a failure in its aims. The problem is that when you have given the state an exclusive monopoly over all things, then you have given the state so much power that when they begin subverting the will of the people (and they do, will, and always have) then there is nothing you can do about it because you already gave away all your power to the state. The monopoly of the state in a communist system is so complete, that in all instances of communism the will of the people began being subverted immediately after the inception of the government. Power corrupts, absolute power corrupts absolutely. Our American system worked for about 100 years before it was subverted. That is not too bad of a run really. But that was the beta model. We need to take the good parts of that system and build on them.
Sounds kind of like you want big brother and the nanny state to take care of you. Instead, why don’t you try taking responsibility for your own protection. The people are the ones who made all this money for the wealthy, and also the ones that gave it to them in the form of purchase power. Had they been a little more aware of their actions, the whole thing could have been prevented. We gave them the wealth, and we have the power to take it away from them. It is really interesting how that works. Any time we want to we can stop buying their products and using banks and the whole thing collapses taking all their wealth with it. Unfortunately we are deeply integrated into their system which means a collapse of that scale would result in poverty and misery. Which is why my method needs to be implemented. We need to start one county/city at a time instituting buyer’s unions. We need to integrate them into the local governments. The people can then vote on which corporations are doing the most for the people, and which are doing the least. The corporations who are doing the least good would have heavy taxes laid on them for doing business in that county/city which the buyers unions have jurisdiction. As a result people would choose not to buy the products or use the services of the corporations who they decided are against public interest since they would be more expensive and there would be a moral guilt attached to using those products and services. It is a double edged sword to slay corrupted corporations one district at a time. The result would be the slow but steady recession of corporate controls.
Why, yes. I was planning on it. Not so much teaching as implementing. I live in a city that hates corporate cartels and monopolies. I am considering organizing a team of people to get this buyers union thing set up. I am almost 100% sure that the people of this city would be behind the idea. With massive public support we can begin it right here in my city. When we do it, other cities and counties are going to look at what we have accomplished and other people are going to want to do the same thing. People already know that buying products and services from corrupt corporations who do not serve the public interest is immoral. The problem is that they feel powerless and so they choose to do nothing. They excuse their behaviors by considering that they are too poor or unfortunate to buy the more expensive, more ethical products. It is just an excuse, and most people could in fact afford to do that, but they refuse to make the change in life style. It is a very selfish decision that they make unconsciously. So all I have to do is organize the people together to force themselves to do the right thing collectively. It will not only take away their excuses for doing the wrong thing, it will raise awareness of the issues so that when they do consider using immoral products and services they have the necessary pang of guilt associated with it and realize that they are doing the wrong thing.
Yes, but the main reason for this is that we turned the power of monetary creation over to the state and forgot about it. Central banks monopolize the monetary supply. That whole problem can be fixed by a commodity based monetary system. With such a system it is impossible to expand capital beyond what is produced, since it is based on commodities. What you are complaining about is called inflation. It is the result of a fiat paper based monetary system. Our monetary system is at the very center of our livelihood as a society. The more corrupt the monetary supply, the more corrupt the system. This is again where property rights fit in. In order to take control of a society you must destroy their property rights. Commodity based money is property. Fiat money is a government promise backed by a government legal decree. Debauch the currency and you debauch the whole system of property ownership. All of the sudden nobody really pays for anything. They just discharge debt. Thus a vicious cycle begins that gets worse and worse until finally it collapses altogether. The problem we are having is not one of giving people too much freedom. It is a problem of the people of the land not being as smart or informed as the ones who govern them. We have to be smarter and learn to govern ourselves. Human beings need not be controlled, but simply need to learn to evolve. There is plenty of control and coercion already. People are so well integrated into the system that they don’t realize how effectively they are being coerced. If you step outside of the box for a second and look inside you will realize that anything but a commodity based monetary system is just a system that coerces people to behave in a certain way upon demand. It is trade vs. commerce. With trade, something of value is given for something of value. With commerce something of value is coerced from a party or individual. It is a very thick scheme so most people have trouble seeing through it. But once you do, it is blatantly obvious.
I see that you want the same things I do. I just think you are seeking those things in a fallacious manner. You cannot appeal to the government to regulate itself. As you said, government is most often controlled by rich people. This will not change until we create a system where government is so well controlled that rich people have no interest in it any longer. But that is a long way down the road. Until then, we must assume that the wealthy will always control it and limit their powers as much as humanly possible. Corporations are also part of the government. Keep in mind they are chartered by the government. So they must be regulated too. But only them, NOT the market. The market should remain a free market by and for the people. In order to make this happen we have to appeal to the people not the government or the corporations. The people in fact hold all of the power. They just need to be convinced to use it for their own betterment and resist coercion.
As usual, I agree with the Last Man, but what I think you’re saying here that might not have been addressed, is who’ll take care of the people who fall through the cracks. Libertarians and capitalists point out that private property MUST have government protection, which the Chinese are finally picking up on, learning from the Soviets who didn’t. The exception, of course, is taxes. The government must be funded somehow, but how much if any should be used for charity or for helping those who’ve fallen through the cracks?
I agree with Jefferson and Paine that the government should help the citizens who can’t help themselves, as well as able-bodied citizens who can’t find work. They believed they shouldn’t be just given the means of subsistence, but should do something to earn it. Nobody should receive welfare while sitting on his can, drinking beer and watching TV all day. And I know it happens all the time. I worked in the home healthcare industry. On top of all that, not only is there no appreciation, they have a monster chip on thier shoulder and feel its their due.
The issue is not welfare per se, it’s how it’s abused and used to grow government, expanding its tentacles into all the other avenues that welfare opens the door for.
Big government is the issue, and big government will ALWAYS eventually suppresses freedom and thus individual initiative. Government and capitalism are natural enemies, but if good order and prosperity are the goals, they absolutely must find a way to co-exist. Our Constitution has failed. The next one must take this into account.
You’re referring to what Jefferson et al. referred to as a “tyranny of the majority”. They were accutely aware of the problem and built protections into the Constitution to specifically restrict the ability of a legislature to “vote” away rights. Hence the notion of “inalienable” rights.
It is not a failing of the Constitution - or of the democratic ideal; rather, it is a failing of morality. A failure of the individual’s will to act morally within the spirit of the founding principles of the Constitution - which has translated over time into a sanction of corruption by the statist, collectivist, opportunists. The majority of Americans accepted their new Constitution in form, but not in spirit. In spirit, they held onto the Christian notions of self-sacrifice and subordination to a higher authority.
On another matter…
The OP opined that: “Common goals unite us; competition drives us apart”.
I disagree. Common goals do unite “us” - if by “us” you mean any group of individuals who choose to come together in pursuit of a single objective. However, it is through the competition to complete or achieve the objective from which we each individually derive our unique creativity and tap potential.
We all choose to live a life of interdependency on other individuals because it makes rational sense from a perspective of our individual long term self interests. I have no desire to spend 100 years learning the theory and then the application necessary to produce all of the goods and services me and mine might require. It is infinitely more rewarding to rely on the individual expertise of others - thereby freeing up my time to pursue what I value, what my interests are. It makes rational sense to live this way. The “social organization” is a by-product of our individual reason that directs us to leverage the skills of others to our benefit.
If a right can be voted away either it is not a right, or, you have no democracy…Democracy is self government…Majority rule is not government, and it does not reach the result for which government is formed…
Where is “self” in “demos”? We can retrocon Democracy to mean self-government but I don’t think that is a legitimate representation of the concept to anyone besides some modern idealists. I mean, the whole idea of self-rule is soooo 14th Amendment.
Before societies had enough wealth to divide them they were all democratic, and if it were ideal, no people would have spread out. broken out and taken over the whole habitable earth… Consensus is what separated them from us…Consensus offers protection for the individual… If his wheel isn’t greased, he does not have to come along…Primitives were able to endure life without much of resources or technology… It is because true democracy unites people aand does not divide… We think we are superior, but their societies actually produced aa superior individual, prepared to defend himself, his honor, and his people…He was a microcosm of his culture…It is no wonder that the enlightenment could see such people as noble savages…So long as a society has enough of resources and technology it can hold out against enemies… If it does not need the whole people for its defense why bother asking their opinion???In fact, the minority, and even more, the majority needs protection… We can be ruined by halfs… Look at how many people cannot bear to give any attention to politics because it takes such energy, is frustating and futile, and the stupidity is mind numbing… And those who do participate are at loggerheads with the other half… We never get a vote on any issue of merit with the exception of piddling local stuff… Paine made the argument aginst Burke of future generations being bound by the consent ot today… As he rejected it I reject it… We need consent on all the laws that are passed… We need to re- write the constitution, and give our consent for no longer time than is necessary; and we should demand consensus… Half the people are always wrong…If the bare majority can whittle away at the minority, there will always be a minority and a majority, but no rulling class will ever waste money buying a majority they do not need…This country is not simply divided, but is divided to deny the maximum number fair representation…It is no wa to govern… More countries faail out of division than fall to invaders, but our division is an invitation to attack…
If a right can be voted away, then you have democracy. Democracy is mob rule - rule of the majority - nothing more. America is a republic. The two terms are not interchangeable. America was designed as a republic – constitutionally protecting the rights of the individual to specifically to protect individuals from the tyranny of the majority - or, pure democracy.
. The irony of this is that you are advocating an antiquated version of the system we already have that was already corrupted beyond imagination, and you think that will work out well for us. The truth is, in order for the system we had to be subverted, states rights had to be destroyed so that we could be taken back to a true democracy, the system YOU want! What you are forgetting about this system is that it is HIGHLY vulnerable to subversion, coercion, and mind control. You don’t want the open, iron fist. You want the hidden hand, the man behind the curtain.