Capitalism vs Socialism

Oh, oops, lol.

I wonder which country. Anyway, yeah, there’s government spending and extent of control of the people over its government and maybe a few other ways to quantify socialism. Government spending doesn’t define it wholly, but is one aspect of it.

But if the people were in charge of their own government, would they vote for more or less government spending? Probably more. So although the people aren’t in charge, they’re still getting more or less what they want. But in places like Egypt, they get nothing: no control nor welfare.

And they do it under the banner of socialism. Or we have those like Hillary who are economic conservatives and social liberals: giving people tampons in the mensroom and corporations keep their power. Those are the worst if you ask me.

That Kamala Harris terrifies me. I’ll vote for Trump over her.

Not as long as the people have voting power. Get rid of electoral college and all that delegate crap. And as Bernie says, “If you’re a citizen and you turn 18, you’re registered to vote. Simple as that!” We could even make voting mandatory (like switzerland, I think).

There’s no way a tyrant could take over under those conditions, especially if the people are decently educated.

It says something about me for sure.

There is a Democracy Index.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Democracy … untry_2018

You consider it socialism.

What? Your “consumption as % gdp” number doesn’t take into account where the gov money came from.

I don’t live in your fine republic.

Sigh

We (my parents and I) lived in Czechoslovakia until 1968 when the attempt to get “Socialism with a Human Face” ended with a Russian invasion and a kick in the face.

Then we were in Sweden for a while but eventually moved to Canada.

:laughing:

And the US is ranked #25 and considered a “flawed democracy” lol

At first glance, it appears to correlate tightly with government spending. I’ll work on it later.

If not socialism, then what is it?

Yes, I know. How do I quantify where the money came from?

Still in your best interest to support him lest the US decide one day to send some “US aid” your way :wink:

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Germany had a democracy and a highly educated population. They ended up with Hitler.

So what does that prove? That Russia didn’t want you to have prosperity?

Well hell, you have more socialism and freedom than I do. Heck, you can even daytrade stocks without needing $25k minimum. If not for the cold, I’d move to canada and partake in all the freedom.

I’m dubious that the germans were highly educated. The smart ones were jews.

I’m not sure about the democracy claim either.

And Hitler was more a result of the treaty of versailles and the reparations imposed on the germans.

quora.com/In-1930s-Germany- … racy-ratio

:-k Interesting reaction.

I have difficultly imagining any large body of people could possibly be educated in the 1800s. Sure there were pockets on intelligentsia, but nothing like today where almost everyone can read. But even literacy isn’t enough since Trump supporters can read, but are otherwise dumb as rocks.

And still my point about the jews being the most educated were first to be ostracized, which is common to totalitarian regimes to first persecute the intellectuals:

Totalitarian governments manipulate and apply anti-intellectualism to repress political dissent.[2] During the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939) and the following fascist dictatorship (1939–1975) of General Francisco Franco, the reactionary repression of the White Terror (1936–1945) was notably anti-intellectual, with most of the 200,000 civilians killed being the Spanish intelligentsia, the politically active teachers and academics, artists and writers of the deposed Second Spanish Republic (1931–1939).[3] In the communist state of Democratic Kampuchea (1975–1979), the Khmer Rouge régime of Pol Pot condemned all of the non-communist intelligentsia to death in the Killing Fields.[4]

Lots of examples here: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-intellectualism

Nazi book burners historyplace.com/worldwar2/t … okburn.htm

Now, if everyone were intelligent, then how could one separate the smart from the stupid in order to kill one and enslave the other? The fact that it happened is proof that the people weren’t that smart.

If everyone knew what Chomsky knows, then the only way to kill intellectuals would be to kill 100% of people.

If the germans were as smart as german intelligentsia, there’s no way Hitler could have happened. The fact that he happened proves they were stupid.

“The people get what government it deserves.” - Forgot who said that.

This is going on today in the right wing:

“I realize you’re under a bit of a penalty because all our professors are stupid liberals, but that’s the best we can do.” rushlimbaugh.com/daily/2015 … ain_folks/

So you’re going to hang on to that idea, even though the high level of education in Germany is confirmed by many sources.

Sometimes educated people make bad choices. Stupid people are not the only ones who mess things up.

Your ONE source is “John Gordon, Keen interest in History”. Heck, I have a keen interest in history, why am I not a source? :confusion-shrug:

Further, “high level of education” is relative to the education of the rest of the world, which as I said, is hard to imagine being on par with today.

Germany back then was much like America today: the Jews are smart and the uneducated Christians protested their immorality. Hitler appealed to the stupid Christians to persecute the immoral Jews. Same thing the Right Wing is doing today, only with less focus on the Jews in particular, but liberals, academia, and sometimes Jews too, depending how far Right they are.

It’s the smarties vs the stupids.

It’s the Dunning-Krugers vs the Freddy Kruegers :smiley:

So it’s better to be stupid than smart?

Just want to point out that “private consumption” isn’t the metric it’s being used as in this thread. Worldbank provides the following clarification:

A few things to note:

  1. This is looking at households, so presumably excludes expenditures by businesses and non-household non-profits. But if healthier societies have a more productive business sector, this will lead to false-negatives for what we’re calling ‘capitalist’ countries.
  2. The inclusion of “payments and fees to governments” complicates things substantially. A more ‘socialist’ country would be expected to have higher fees to government as a percentage of GDP, but as it’s being used those fees would be scored as making it more ‘capitalist’.
  3. Even taken at face value, this seems to elide an important distinction, i.e. countries with large GDPs and small governments and countries with small GDPs and no governments will look the same, even though there is a clear and important distinction between them. I don’t think anyone is claiming that a failed state is a capitalist utopia, so a measure that scores failed states as such is misleading.

I think the discussion here got too heated too fast. It does not seem that ‘capitalism’ and ‘socialism’ have been well-enough defined for a proper disagreement to be found. See e.g. Norway, which is often claimed by both camps as a success story. Similarly, re: Singapore, Georgist libertarians absolutely support government ownership of land (or what is effectively the same thing, a land value tax that captures all rents from land ownership).

Without a clearer definition of terms, it’s all vitriol and no vs.

You wrote that you had "difficulty imagining " it. You didn’t write that you had actually researched it.

The statement was about Germany in the 1930s, not now.

Some sweeping generalities.

Sometimes.

thedailybeast.com/why-smart-people-are-dumb

You appealed to authority, not actual research. I am as authoritative as anyone else having a keen interest in history.

Right, and they were stupid, though less stupid than some other places, but still stupid.

But true nonetheless.

I’ve been writing about the pitfalls of intelligence for a couple years now, and really all you can fallback on is the intelligent person’s inability to jibe with society. And my retort to that is “Being well-adjusted to a sick society is no measure of health”. But falling for scams is actually an instance of stupidity, not intelligence.

That is baloney. I fall for tricks by my friends because I trust them, not because of my ego.

I cut some trees down except for stumps sticking up about 5 ft. A friend said he wanted to put peanut butter on top of one to make the deer stretch out. So I said, “Which one do you want me to save in case I decide to cut them down?” He said, “I’m just fucking with you man LOL!” Yeah, I get fooled easy because I take people at their words. But those guys are programmed not to trust:

Amygdala = fear

But I’ve learned. When discussing whether it was appropriate to taser an 87 yr old woman instead of simply walking up and taking the knife from her, he said “Look into my eyes… I’d shoot the hell outta her!” I said, “You’re full of shit! I don’t believe that for a second!”

Now I know he’s going to be fucking with me all the time and to be on the lookout. Before, I innocently trusted him. It has nothing to do with ego and actually, it’s that magician you quoted who is looking for a way to bolster himself by cutting smart people down: that’s the ego!

If there is one way in which dummies have advantages, it’s finding simple solutions since smart people generally first seek complex answers to complex problems, such as magic tricks; they over-complicate it.

Ego is associated with dummies. Arrogance and ignorance go hand in hand.

Smart people can learn. Dummies cannot because they already know everything (ego).

If you google it, then you get dozens of people writing the same stuff. He had a short post which covered the main points, so I used it.

You have some odd ideas about historical events, which are not confirmed by my research. Therefore, I don’t consider you to be an authority.

Given your binary ideas about smart and stupid, I’m not surprised by this at all.

Sure. You seem to be saying that as soon as an intelligent person makes a mistake, then he is no longer intelligent. That sets an impossible standard. Everybody makes mistakes.

You already had a similar discussion with KT and I don’t want to just repeat what he wrote.

Appeal to popularity.

I have not seen evidence that the non-jewish, christian, regular joes in germany were, by any standard of today, even low ones, could be considered educated. And if you wish to convince me, you have a lot of work ahead of you, which doesn’t include posting opinions, even 1000s of them, of people who are merely interested in history. Show me something from someone with accreditation from a respected university at least. And then show me that the standard of education then was on par with the standard of today.

The question was about how to ensure freedom from potential tyrannical rule and my proposal was to educate the population. Your counterpoint was that the german citizens were smart, yet fooled. I have not seen sufficient evidence to validate your counterpoint. Not least of all, people could not have studied the history of the Nazi regime before it happened, but today such knowledge is common. We have 100 years of empirical evidence to draw upon today in addition to the information they had. That wasn’t the case in the past, among technological challenges for the conveyance of information that existed in that time which draws into question just how educated regular people could have possibly been. And if the education level of today’s christians are any guide, then not much could be said of the education of the same sorts a century ago.

If you’re not familiar with the alliance of christianity and Hitler, you can brush-up here viewtopic.php?f=3&t=194717

Why not? Your research is based on opinions of anyone who claims to be a history buff.

I can’t tell if that’s a statement about you or a statement about me.

Well, would you categorize a mistake as a smart decision? You’re saying smart people generally have a proclivity for making mistakes that stupid people generally do not make, and if such is the case, then the smart people you’re referencing obviously are not smart, but have some sort of neurological handicap.

Forget smart and stupid and just tell me what is lost upon going to college and learning? Why do people get dumber after they get smarter? This is what you’re alluding to right? That education makes people so stupid that they fall for bullshit? Alright, propose a mechanism to explain the correlation you think you’ve noticed.

Maybe you want to opine in this thread viewtopic.php?f=3&t=194611

What is the virtue of ignorance that everyone is on about? :confusion-scratchheadyellow:

Countries with greater government spending tend to have inflows of people while countries with less government spending tend to have outflows of people.

The black line is a 15 period moving average.

The x-axis is the countries arranged from most-negative to most-positive migration.

The following chart is the % population of the specified country:

The x-axis on the following chart is the countries arranged from least private consumption as % of GDP to most.

The y-axis represents the inflow and outflow.

Government spending is a people-magnet.

I wasn’t there so I have to use resources collected by others.

Their system of schools is well documented. Their universities produced a number of important philosophers, scientists, playwrights, composers and engineers. They valued education. It all points to high level of education.

I’m not here to lead you into the promised land of knowledge. It doesn’t matter to me what you believe about it.

Ironically, you just wanted me to accept you as an authority. What are your credentials?

Your point was that everyone was stupid until … When? 10 years ago? #-o

Now you know how much research I have done? #-o

I understand your position : A smart person who makes a mistake is not a smart person.

Pretty much means that there are no smart people in existence.

KT covered this with you already.

If it’s documented so well, it would be no trouble for you to display the documentation.

Yes and they were ostracized, demonized, and finally driven to other countries. I said that earlier. How do you think the US got Einstein?

Look at the polarization of the US now. It’s really the ignorant vs the academics. I’ve gone to great length in trying to illustrate this. Look at Pedro viewtopic.php?f=3&t=194702#p2720668

This is real shit! People think smart people are stupid. What people most love about Trump is he is as dumb as they are.

Philosophers, scientists, playwrights, composers (aka jews) and engineers (slavs) are not everyday joes. Show me evidence that these people had a decent education such that they could be somewhat qualified to make a political decision:

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Then why do you keep replying? You’re obviously trying to accomplish something.

The same as John Gordon: a keen interest in history. If that’s acceptable for John to be an authority, then it’s acceptable for me. Your standards are not high.

And your point is everyone was smart since when? 100,000 years ago? When did smartness really take off?

I know what you exhibited. You claim a person with keen interest in history is a good source. And then you back that up with an appeal to popularity. Hopefully you don’t practice the rest of your research in similar fashion.

No, not a single person. You said smart people are prone to falling for scams. People = plural = groups. So, groups of people who make the same mistake obviously are not smart. Either you labeled the group wrong or you populated it with the wrong people. It’s like saying groups of strong people can’t lift the weight groups of weak people can.

I said smart people tend to over-complicate problems. That isn’t a mistake or a deficiency, but a preference to embrace challenges which has the side-effect of not immediately noticing simpler solutions.

I said smart people don’t mesh well in society. That isn’t a mistake of deficiency except to the extent that they’re deficient in patience for dealing with the dumb herd.

You are making the claim that smart people (groups of) are somehow stupid and that there is virtue in not being smart, like not falling for scams. I said it has nothing to do with intelligence, but being trusting, which is an artifact of not over-using one’s amygdala by being raised in the impoverishment of a capitalist society.

People with over-expressed amygdalas do not trust easily while those who are coddled don’t know the fear.

The nurtured coddled intellectual trusts easy (and that trust is easy to exploit).
The impoverished average joe slaving through life trusts no one.

It isn’t a matter of intelligence or ego.

But it is a matter of ego that the dummy remains dumb. The potential is there, but there’s a brick wall preventing learning. Maybe lack of trust (skepticism of smart people) plays into it as well, but mostly it’s ego.

I conceded that capitalists may want government to defend them, but I don’t remember conceding the virtues of ignorance. The only thing I remember is he said academics have egos, but I object to that because if smart people have ego problems, then how did they get smart in the first place?

Snobbery? Yes. Arrogance? No. The difference is here viewtopic.php?f=2&t=193700#p2720432