Capitalism Arguments

[Friday]

hi, Friday age 13.7 billion

I know we have a thread for Capitalism, but that's more for news and events about how the rich are ruining the world in their endless quest to measure their money-dicks against other rich people

What I want to discuss here is more abstract: I want to talk about the arguments surrounding Capitalism and hopefully improve my (and maybe your) rhetoric when it comes to that shit. Because I'm always looking to improve my knowledge and rhetoric. So, before we get started, know that I welcome any challenges to my thoughts and ideas here (as long as you remember to also insult me) because that's how I improve them.

Also, this is a general catch all thread for Capitalism abstraction bullshit. I have a topic in mind but I'll probably have more at a later date.

So first up is the classic pro-capitalism argument that it "lifted millions out of poverty." So I want to discuss this, because guess what, I actually agree with that statement in a vacuum.

Lifted.

See, at the dawn of Capitalism/Mercantalism, when monarchies were losing power and the merchant class was gaining power, it kind was an open season. Anyone could make it big. I know that there's never been a truly level playing field and I'm sure nobles and such, anyone with previously accumulated wealth really, had an advantage, but it was still more fair than today.

So a lot of people benefited, and a lot of people who lived in perpetual poverty were lifted out of it. Great! Poverty is bad and kills people/makes people live in horrendous misery.

But then wealth started to accumulate. And I mean really accumulate. I won't quote the stats at you, you know how bad inequality is in the world today. Capitalism no longer uplifts anyone. It grinds the lower classes down, actively.

This isn't a new idea. You hear it all the time, in different words: The economic ladder was lifted up by the Boomers after they finished climbing it, "economic mobility" is down, the middle class is vanishing, etc etc.

But still, people cling to this argument that Capitalism is good because it lifted people out of poverty. Sometimes they'll even say it continues to lift, to this day, but I think we can all agree that at this point that is utter horseshit. Roughly half the world lives in deep poverty. Half. That is insane. And it's not like the upper half are doing much better: most of them live barely above poverty levels, or "working poor". I refuse to believe an economic system is "the best possible" when this is the outcome it achieves.

I'm not a revolution idealist, I know change comes slowly. That doesn't mean we can't move toward socialist, pro-human goals one law at a time until we arrive at a better system 100 or 200 years down the road. Often when I critique Capitalism (or when anyone does) I (they) are asked "well what would you replace it with? Communism? Socialism?" They want you to immediately outline your ideal system so they can pick holes in it or just point to failed communist/socialist states.

Here's my idea: Monarchies didn't die overnight. They were dismantled (or at least defanged and stripped of all legal power) over time. And Capitalism can be destroyed and replaced in the same manner. Do I have some idea of what I'd like to see replace it? Yeah. Safety nets, basic income, automation that spreads wealth instead of concentrating it, etc. These outcomes can be achieved. And they can even be achieved within 100 years.

I agree with Marx: I think Capitalism was a necessary step in human social-economic systems. It was good for the time. It helped people. But it is no longer helping anyone who isn't the top 10%. And that is fucked up, yo.

[Büge]

They want you to immediately outline your ideal system so they can pick holes in it or just point to failed communist/socialist states.

The thing about failed communist/socialist states is that they "failed" because of intervention from America/Britain/Other Colonial Power. Either indirect, through trade embargoes/withholding aid/political pressure, or directly, by funding coups/juntas/etc. or just military actions like blockades/invasions.

[Mongrel]

Ehhhhhhh. Not always. Extremism on any axis will by definition attract immoderate people, and if you have idiots running the show they don't always need outside help. The other side of that is that a robust and moderate civil society will find it easier to resist outside pressure.

It's important to recognize that, because no matter the system, you still need a functioning underlying culture and society. The wealthy have many incentives to destroy societies' capacity to function, but societies can still run into problems the old fashioned way, by bad luck or accumulated incompetence - all that needs to happen for large societies to fall apart is for something to start a trauma cycle.

That's why, historically, the avenue of entry for colonial powers is overwhelmingly not one of direct conquest but that of co-opting a minor faction within an entity (usually one with unsatisfied grievances) and then raising that faction to dominate the former tyrannous majority.

This is also why I don't actually agree with putting all leftists together as a socialist-communist bloc. Socialists are only leftists because they're seeking to moderate a profoundly right-bent world. Doctrinal capitalists and doctrinal communists are both bad news, and I really don't care if one is theoretically objectively worse, because they both represent a critical and above all unsustainable failure state where you just slam up against a wall because the box you're in fell off the damn shelf onto the floor.

Which brings me to this model:



Now, 1) okay, in a decorative wave machine the little machine is there to create motion, not arrest it, and 2) this is a bad container because it's long, thin, and squared off because it's designed to make the waves into a nicer visual display. But this is the concept. Waves in a box.

The box is the structure, society, the contents build for itself, people and their energy, desires, needs, actions, etc., which will constantly be in churn, and the box needs to be built to arrest the waves without leaking or tipping the box. You will never find a perfect design which costs zero energy because there isn't actually a tabletop or shelf for this to sit on, so no, there's no perpetual motion machine. But we can still shoot for some best-practices like a balanced shape (in 3 dimensions, so a sphere, except maybe we don't know how to make spheres, uh), with as few sharp edges as possible, using lower amounts of energy to be kept righted.

This is probably getting weird because I've been semi-delirious for a week, but like, maybe the idea I'm trying to communicate is coming through anyway? Like you have this container trying to hold something in motion which is being built by and maintained by the thing in motion and this is obviously a fucking mess and a nightmare, so the tendency to make a really simple box and slap it together with whatever you got is very strong, but your wave motion, which can't ever be stopped because that's asking literal entropy to stop, is far more prone to destroying such slipshod containers with harmful resonance problems that end up accelerating your waveform.

It's hard to even observe this from one point in the wave at one point in time or over a short period of time, so on top of everything else you need accurate information which means both cross-wave transmission (media) and detailed and accurate record-keeping (historical records).

So anyway a land of contrasts is bad, because you're probably looking at a liquid fuel booster whose capsules' dividing seal just broke, and also you're inside that booster, and the warhead is poop. Nuclear poop. And any good nuclear reaction is only as good as its moderator - see I coulda gone for a nuclear power analogy instead, which might've been a better idea, but I did the wave box. This is why I'm not a moderator anymore.

[sei]

it is no longer helping anyone who isn't the top 10%. And that is fucked up, yo.

Quick question. We talking 10% of the world or 10% within a given country?

Stuff that springs to mind:

• Socialized systems scale may very differently depending on things like degrees of cultural homogeneity and contribution rates. People are tribal and when their work goes to a "them" instead of an "us," things get rocky. See the stuff in Canada with the influx of south Asian "students," or more broadly free rider problems.
• If it's global, do certain types of system socialization lead to a competitive disadvantage? Taking care of your poor is great, but if some foreign dick overthrows your country, you're defaulting to their ability or inability (or most likely indifference) to attend your disadvantaged population.
• If the idea is global, what is the shape of the target system and what is the theoretical bootstrapping sequence for migrating from the current systems distributed everywhere? E.g. which places socialize (or do your other thing) and in what order, for it to spread and stick? And does the spread of this system also require or entail certain forms of cultural genocide or oppression, because the system may fall apart without compliance? Or are you designating certain people as acceptable free riders for X time or in perpetuity?

[Friday]

Alright, I'm gonna do my best to respond to every interrogative in the above post. I will state in advance the following: I do not have all the answers. Or even most of the answers. Or even a good amount of the answers. I do not in any way have a "roadmap" from where we are to Fully Automated Space Luxury Communism, with each step bulletpointed. That being said, I will do my best to respond to your points as best I am able. Apologies in advance if I misinterpret anything, I'm terrible when it comes to that, as I mentioned before in the other thread about how I find myself replying to/arguing against ghosts a good amount of the time.

Strap in, people, we're effortposting. Or Quote-ziggurat-shitposting, whichever you want to call it.

Quick question. We talking 10% of the world or 10% within a given country?

I made a mistake here by using an actual number. To answer your question, I don't know, and also don't know where to find those stats. I'm sure certain countries have worse wealth inequality rates compared to others, but I don't know what those percentages are of people who control the majority of the wealth. I suppose you could draw a line, say, 50% of the wealth, and look at the size of the population that controls it.

Here's a result for the USA on a quick google search:

99-99.9% 16.6%
90-99% 36.1%
50-90% 30.8%
Bottom 50% 2.6%

So this shows that the top 10% controls 36.1+16.6% of the wealth, which is 52.7%. That's not the worst thing ever (I'm absolutely sure you could find countries where the top 10% controls more) but it's still a problem. The bottom 90% controls only 33.4%, with the bottom 50% only controlling 2.6%. Also, I googled again and found contradictory(?) data.

The top 1% holds $38.7 trillion (26.5%) in wealth. That’s more than the combined wealth of America’s middle class, a group many economists define as the middle 60% of households by income. Those households hold about 26% of all wealth.

All of that being said, I did make a mistake. I used a number (10%) when I should have just said "it isn't helping anyone who isn't at the top or near the top." That's a more general statement and one I think holds true no matter where you go in the world. I don't think we need more data to assert that.

Socialized systems scale may very differently depending on things like degrees of cultural homogeneity and contribution rates. People are tribal and when their work goes to a "them" instead of an "us," things get rocky. See the stuff in Canada with the influx of south Asian "students," or more broadly free rider problems.

I have no real response to this, other than to acknowledge that racism/otherism is a problem. "Socialized systems are going to be different from nation to nation" is a given. Socialized countries with safety nets attracting people from less socialized countries with less (or no) safety nets is going to happen, yes. Unless you are on the "immigration = bad" boat, though, I don't see a problem. I mean, I see a problem because of racism, but not like, an economic one. Immigrants do not make the economies of the places they go worse. If you're asking me how we can overcome racism, well, first I'd ask that we all stop making fun of Death Knights. (and switch back to hunters)

If it's global, do certain types of system socialization lead to a competitive disadvantage? Taking care of your poor is great, but if some foreign dick overthrows your country, you're defaulting to their ability or inability (or most likely indifference) to attend your disadvantaged population.

As I stated previously, my idea to head towards socialistic laws and policies is not global. I do not think you could do it that way. Instead, countries will have to individually pass laws that help their own people. As far as "foreign dicks" goes, I think a system where the UN is around and collectively protects its member countries can work to curtail that particular threat. Putin can invade Ukraine but he cannot invade a UN country because he would get obliterated.

Yes, this will leave some countries "out in the cold" but again, I do not assert that I have a no rocks, smooth sailing way forward. People are going to die and horror will continue. While that is happening, I think pushing socialist policies wherever they can be pushed is a good thing. If you're asking me "do you think the UN should just invade countries that are controlled by horrible dictators and are suffering immensely in order to liberate them" that is a whole other discussion and not one I am interested in having at the present time.

If the idea is global, what is the shape of the target system and what is the theoretical bootstrapping sequence for migrating from the current systems distributed everywhere?

Again, I don't think of my plan as global. I don't even think of it as a "plan", beyond "we as a people should support, as best we can, socialist policies that will help the disadvantaged whenever we can." Marx believed that capitalism would inevitably destroy itself by revealing its own flaws in time, I do not agree with that assessment. I don't think anything is inevitable. I think things happen because people try very hard and sacrifice, or they don't because they don't. The universe doesn't bend toward justice, sorry Dr. King. It bends the way we bend it.

E.g. which places socialize (or do your other thing) and in what order, for it to spread and stick?

Everywhere that feasibly can. It's piecemeal. I do not have a sweeping solution to all economic ills beyond "the system we use, which was at one time beneficial overall despite the problems, is now no longer beneficial and should be changed. As change cannot happen instantly, this change must be done slowly, but also incrementalism is stupid and you can actually make pretty big changes to law: see the New Deal, what Reagan did to tax rates, etc."

As far as "sticking" goes, people usually like things that work and help them. You could in theory remove social security, for example, but I think people wouldn't tolerate it. Once good things have been given to someone, they will want to hold on to them naturally. Not that taking good things away is impossible, of course. But it is almost always resisted.

And does the spread of this system also require or entail certain forms of cultural genocide or oppression, because the system may fall apart without compliance?

I reject the premise of your question here. I do not think any form of genocide (actual or cultural) is required to improve the laws and policies that rule our lives. I also do not agree that you need global compliance in order for a socialist system to work. "Rogue nations" (222223), or "nation states ruled by shitfucks" will probably always exist. Even if not, I'm sure some nation states will be around that just do not want to opt in to any socialist systems. That's not ideal but I do not believe socialism requires mass compliance.

Or are you designating certain people as acceptable free riders for X time or in perpetuity?

Are you talking about UBI here? Because I do believe that every human being should just be handed enough money every month to live comfortably. In perpetuity, yes. No questions asked. I do not believe it is "more moral" to have a class of people that we just let rot on the streets because they were unlucky, or made bad choices, or have mental illness. Homelessness is only one thing that UBI could help address.

If you're not talking about UBI here, then I assume you're talking about colonized people that are owed reparations? And if so, then yes, I support giving support and money to minority power holders, especially those who suffered colonization. This is a complicated subject, I fully realize, but saying "well, we can't pay anyone anything because it's just too complex" is stupid and serves nobody but the colonizer's descendants.

If you're talking about people with disabilities, then also yes I believe they should 100% get support and money. I do not believe there is "not enough" to go around, that's an actually absurd statement. The ultra rich have more than enough money for all peoples to receive a reasonable stipend every month. Automation has magnified the amount of goods we can create. Instead of concentrating all of the wealth generated from those goods at the top, they should be redistributed to everyone. If the factory owner gets to keep a somewhat larger share, as long as that share is reasonable, I'm okay with that. I do not think fully, perfectly equalized wealth distribution is required to improve the lives of the lower classes immensely.

tl;dr: Tax the rich at a high rate and give their money back to the poor through UBI. The rich can afford it.

[sei]

(Wealth inequality in the US is looking worse over time and I don't think anyone will argue with that.)

Most of my Qs were about figuring out the scale of what you were talking about and what sort of path or trajectory you would have in mind for transitioning from where we are to whatever your goal state looks like in context.

The cultural genocide thing I was referring to was in reference to groups whose culture may impede or forbid participation in what's necessary to keep the system functional--or worse, who might actively undermine their host system / governing body. So the question is whether or how that participation is compelled and how that may interact with subcultural values and backgrounds. Basically, think of how Europe's stuff with the Romani went or how fundamentalists and aspiring fascist sub-populations interact with your system.

Some of the free riders issues may dissolve as green energy and automation improve. Some services seem harder to automate, though. With some health services, people enter because they're motivated to help others. Trying to figure out how we get people to do necessary, automation-resistant scutwork without market incentives.


All of my questions in the earlier post and in this one are more broad strokes questions. I didn't have disabled people in mind. It's more an abstract question of what bootstrapping a socialist system would look like and which categories of problems necessitate which trade offs to solve. I don't have a ton of specific groups in mind; it's more examination systemic principles.

[Mongrel]

I think most of us would probably be on board with a simplistic temporary hack in the short term, which is to drastically increase all higher-end tax brackets for redistributive purposes, with possibly additional steps in the form of breaking the power of corporations with stringent rights-restrictions on them (in the long run I believe non co-op corporations should be outlawed, but you have to address capital-raising necessities before you can resolve that problem), and transitioning to fines scaled to income as an intermediate legal reform.

If you can get some sort of UBI as part of the redistribution, that's maybe 60%-70% of what needs to be done, and would yield significant human benefits.

[sei]

The below is US specific.

Andrew Yang's talk about programs like UBI just giving people money with less strings and much less wasted money going into admin overhead sounded pretty good when I heard it forever ago. Even without UBI, I think the disability system we currently have has something baked in where you can permanently lose your benefits on the back of a temporary window of functionality (9 months over 5 years or something?). This is terrible for the disabled and functionally incentivizes non-participation, leaving people stuck. I am sure there are other provisional forms of help (not sure how e.g. Welfare works) that one can lose, and reforming some of those seems like a pretty straightforward way to help people who actively want to contribute and participate in society do so without risk of being completely fucked by their problems flaring or worsening over time.

[Caithness]

Doctrinal capitalists and doctrinal communists are both bad news, and I really don't care if one is theoretically objectively worse, because they both represent a critical and above all unsustainable failure state

I disagree. More equality is more sustainable.

[Mongrel]

Well, let's get some of that equality going and then we can argue about whether or not perfect equilibrium is possible if and when we get far enough for that argument to matter.

[Friday]

"If you're so smart, why aren't you rich?"

Batman quotes aside, I want to address this belief as it exists in our capitalist society, because I believe it is:

1. Persuasive, and nearly ubiquitous in our society
2. Wrong

You see evidence for this in multiple areas:

1. Trump must be smart, because he is rich
2. Elon Musk must be smart, because he is rich
3. therefore, poor people must not be smart, else they would be rich

Now, if this sounds dumb as fuck to you, don't worry, that is merely a sign that you are able to think critically.

So, then, let's examine this belief. Surely being smart must at least be helpful to becoming (or staying) rich, yes? It's hard to imagine a complete idiot becoming rich, much less staying so. They would make bad investments, create bad businesses, drive existing good businesses into the ground, etc.

I believe the solution is fairly obvious when you examine it: Being smart can be helpful to amassing money, but it is more important (far more important) to have very few (or none) moral limitations.

Are you okay with utilizing slave, or the by far more common near-slave, or slavelike labor? That is going to help you become rich very fast. Are you okay with underpaying your employees and wage theft? That is going to help you become rich very fast. Are you okay with union busting, both preemptively (in the form of intimidation, propaganda, taking people aside and unlawfully telling them that unions "are not allowed", etc) and post strike? That is going to help you become rich very fast. Are you okay with ruining local economies of small towns by undercutting all competition with your vast capital to operate at a loss for a time until you run the totality (or near totality) of the town's economy? That is going to help you become rich very fast. Are you okay with ruining local economies of small towns by undercutting all competition with your utilization of slave labor imported from other countries until you run the totality (or near totality) of the town's economy? That is going to help you become rich very fast. Do you not care that after you have sucked all the money from the local community into your own coffers to the point that the town will simply run out of spendable income and you will then close down your operation and move on, leaving the town a burnt out economic husk that will take years, decades, or even never recover? Leaving people's livelihoods and lives in ruins? That is going to help you become rich very fast.

Are you okay with skimping or outright ignoring safety measures to cut monetary costs at the cost of the actual literal lives of your workers, or even the surrounding population? That is going to help you become rich very fast. Are you okay with reducing a person to a number on a spreadsheet in terms of medical costs, denying them life-saving coverage they have been paying your company for for years and years? That is going to help you become rich very fast. Are you okay with just moving the pedophile rapist priests around like a game of cups and just paying off the families that -- oops, wrong issue.

All of these things do not require any intelligence to implement or be. They can be aided by intellect, but they do not require it.

The number one most relevant thing that helps a person become rich and stay rich is a lack of moral restrictions. When you are not bound by the desire to help other people or make sure they are not harmed, that is a massive boon to your own personal ability to amass wealth. I believe this to be self-evident from human history, and also current events.

[atog]

The below is US specific.

Andrew Yang's talk about programs like UBI just giving people money with less strings and much less wasted money going into admin overhead sounded pretty good when I heard it forever ago. Even without UBI, I think the disability system we currently have has something baked in where you can permanently lose your benefits on the back of a temporary window of functionality (9 months over 5 years or something?). This is terrible for the disabled and functionally incentivizes non-participation, leaving people stuck. I am sure there are other provisional forms of help (not sure how e.g. Welfare works) that one can lose, and reforming some of those seems like a pretty straightforward way to help people who actively want to contribute and participate in society do so without risk of being completely fucked by their problems flaring or worsening over time.

It not only incentivizes non-participation, but also teaches the disabled never to manage their money in any way resembling prudent.

If you're on disability, there's a limit on how much you can make. But that's not all. There's a limit on the total amount of money you can ever own at one time. So you have to turn down gifts, because accepting a one-time gift or windfall means getting your income permanently cut or revoked. You can't invest any of your income, because passive interest is taxable up to a point and having 401K's or RRSP's appear on your taxes will send the state or fed govt after you. You're legit supposed to spend yourself down to less than 5k assets in any account, holding, etc. before you can qualify for some of these benefits.

You can't inherit anything. If you do, say goodbye to your disability pension. Even if your parents had money, it doesn't mean they loved you enough to take care of your needs when your disability might have been what alienated them from you in the first place. And having them put your name in the will for just over 5k in assets could be the worst thing ever, because it's clearly not enough to cover bills or rent, but it's enough to trigger a cut or revocation of your benefits.

You can't invest in anything that pays a taxable dividend, even if deferred. No mortgages, no stocks, just spend it down or stuff it in mattresses. Anything that could pay a passive income to you shows up on paper and you can't leave a paper trail.

The only way out of poverty for many on disability is to accept cash under the table, or some form of barter or black market arbitrage, favours, etc. And because you likely do have a life-limiting disability, whatever you do on the side you are likely doing less of it than a non-disabled person might do.
This is fucked up. It's beyond fucked up. Everything you learn in HS about basic financial survival, savings, investing, building credit. All out the window, because society has decided that if you cannot find someone to employ you doing something of value, and you go on the dole instead of just quietly crawling in a hole and drinking yourself to death, you waive your right to financial survival.

[Mongrel]

(There are some exceptions to the above in Canada, mainly in allowing a modest amount of savings, one vehicle, and one residence even if you own it, though this varies by province, but it's still broadly true)