Yeah… and for sure there are gradations which are worse or better than what we have now. Like more tightly managed capitalism is better, but there is no way to actually keep the demon capital from escaping containment forever.
You need to nullify the incentives to accumulate capital.
unfortunately no one cares what anyone believes. especially not the capitalists who own us. the only thing that matters is what we do. which, so far, has been nothing.
You’re wrong. Capitalism is, by definition, a “winner takes it all” system. The logical endpoint of competition between private entities is the consolidation of one of those entities, and once economy of scale plays a role, reversing that is almost impossible. And once a private entity has significantly more economic power than the others, it can manipulate regulations and consequences. Capitalism explicitly rewards by design being greedy
You can’t, because they’re all operated and used by humans. While there may be a logical framework and rules to make a system like capitalism work, it’s the fact that not all humans will respect or follow the rules. Eventually any fairness or equality the rules are supposed to ensure will be worked around by humans that choose not to play fair. Watching the response Mamdami received from the Dems is a perfect example of why our system is broken. He’s got the popular vote of the party, yet they are doing everything in their power to stop him. That’s merely a single recent example though, shit has been broken since the get-go
Well, the other animals have stable systems of rules that have worked fine for millenia. We just gotta find a new social order that scales better than tribes.
Yes, and that’s capitalism. The regulations are antithetical to capitalism, but they’re also the only thing keeping us slightly safe from it. Yes, making capitalism less capitalist makes it a lot better. We can have a better system that’s just better, with the people that exist.
Wrong, a market can only be free if it’s regulated, example: I have a competing factory up river from you and we both need clean water to operate, I output toxic chemicals into the water as a result of my operations making your business impossible.
You have to close your business and I get to set the price however I want without competition, in this example the lack of regulations create a less free market.
The problem with capitalism in a representative democracy is that is almost impossible to maintain a perfectly sized government. If the government asks for too many taxes (on an extreme level) etc the market doesn’t function anymore. The “free market” needs some level of class difference to make profit attractive and keep people committed to their jobs. Because of these differences class conflict is created and through privately owned newspapers, corruption and short term economic gains regulation’s get liberalized. This results in wealth accumulation, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. This then leads to the social and economic conditions that allow for the rise of the populist right.
As a European I can currently see this happening in all countries to which I pay attention (namely Germany, Netherlands and Britain).
almost impossible to maintain a perfectly sized government
yep. while that’s true, i can’t think of a valid argument against some regulating body that protects all the people, which, in america, has been somehow defined as communism by the corrupt upper crust
I was being pithy. I think it’s a bit absurd to say that corruption is impossible under anarchism because no one has power.
Power disparity is an unavoidable fact in every society, no matter the structure (or lack thereof). Some will be popular and some unpopular. Some will be physically strong and others physically weak. Some will seek to build up community and some will seek to tear it down.
And any amount of power disparity is prone to corruption. Surely I don’t need to point out examples of an absolute asshole getting popular and then using that popularity to take advantage of or hurt other people.
Anarchism, if it has one thing going for it, is that these problems tend to stay fairly local. But it also doesn’t give any solutions to these problems other than lynchmobs. So its a bit of a tradeoff. But it absolutely isn’t immune from corruption.
Anarchism is not the lack of government. It’s the lack of hierarchy. There can (and practically must) still be government and cooperation. Anarchism is not chaos, like the media portrays it.
There’s a lot of resources online if you want to learn more.
I didn’t find anarchic rhetoric to be very compelling because it seems like endless layers of “Actually,”, not unlike libertarianism. We wind up reinventing the thing discarded.
I’m a systems guy. When I have conversations with politically idealistic individuals, I ask them questions about their proposed system. Every anarchist I talk to at length about infrastructure and industry either refuses to imagine that people wouldn’t spontaneously cooperate out of the goodness of their hearts, or winds up reinventing hierarchies. But different hierarchies, which aren’t the same things for some reason.
The difficulty isn’t in the cooperation part. It’s with the not having an authority. Some corrupt assholes will always try to take charge and be an authority.
Those countries are headed towards that circus at varying paces, so that argument doesn’t work anymore. I mean Germany? France? Sweden? Britain? Italy?
Capitalism is the accumulation and hoarding of wealth at all costs. Exploitation and abuse are foundational concepts. There is no ethical or moral version of such a system, and so no version of it that “wouldn’t be so bad.” It is immorality and evil distilled into a code of conduct.
There’s a reason capitalism is essentially counter to the teachings of all major world religions, many of which are extremely authoritarian in their own way.
One aspect of modern capitalism is predatory loans, which every Abrahamic religion has writings against.
It’s pretty telling most religions would not go as far as “poor people can go fuck themselves” despite being used to control people through fear over millenia but the end game of unchecked capitalism is truly as simple as “poor people can go fuck themselves”
I mean, this feels semantic. The word capitalism is obviously of the modern era, but there are governments and economic systems going back to antiquity that I think meet all of the definitional requirements of “capitalistic.”
Really, I just lack a vision of what “free trade but not capitalism” could possibly mean. Could you describe that system for me?
When I try to do so, the result always meets the literal, dictionary definition of capitalism, as listed above.
It’s definitely semantic, but semantics is the reason we use different words for different things.
Anyway, “free trade but not capitalism” would just be anything where you can buy and sell stuff, but without the individual owner class. It can be part of anything. Let’s say workers own their workplace. They still get paid, and they can use that money to buy what they want. That isn’t capitalism, but it still has free trade. Free trade is one component that is required in capitalism, but it isn’t exclusive to it.
Edit: Also, something can be capitalistic without being capitalism. It can have characters related to capitalism, but not meet all the requirements.
So, it isn’t the ownership and trade of capital that makes something capitalism, it’s when someone is allowed to accumulate too much capital?
What constitutes “enough” capital to push it over the edge into capitalism?
Or is it that you cannot have non-owner workers? That you can’t employ additional help without those people buying into the business?
Not trying to be an ass. Just trying to understand the distinction. I genuinely don’t know what “all the requirements” necessary to make it capitalism are, and try as I might I am not finding any beyond the literal definition in the dictionary, which doesn’t have any.
What is the source for this definition of capitalism? Just trying to figure out if this is, like, the “academic definition” or something. Cause, as you say, what words mean does mean something, which is why we have different words for different things.
I do think it’s really easy to redefine words in a “no true Scotsman”-y way, where you redefine a general word to mean “just the versions of that thing I don’t like,” in order to tribalise it. Which doesn’t mean that’s what you’re doing here. I’m just trying to understand, and I think if we can’t agree on what the word capitalism even means, we aren’t exactly going to get anywhere. So I’m just trying to figure out what definition of the term you are using and why.
The definition above, that you’re referring to, is clear enough. Ownership of trade and industry by private owners for profit.
If industry isn’t privately owned it isn’t capitalist. If it isn’t for profit it isn’t capitalist.
If the state, workers, or other non-private groups own the means of production, it isn’t capitalist. If they’re not operating the industry in a manner to make profit, and instead are doing good (for example), it isn’t capitalist.
People can still be paid and they can still spend their money on goods and services. That is not necessarily capitalist behavior. It’s just a method of distributing value.
This is the huge problem with the wider debate; hardcore leftists have a very specific well-defined meaning in mind when they use the word “Capitalism”, whereas the majority of the general public think “Capitalism” just means “you can start a business if you want”.
“Neoliberalism” doesn’t work in most rhetoric either because it’s got the word “liberal” in it. We need a new word that’s unambiguously understood to refer to the specific components of capitalism that are objectionable.
Which “specific components of capitalism” would you say are not objectionable? It’s essence is the private ownership of the productive forces of society and the derivation of profit by selling the product. The core of it is objectionable from the view of democracy or egalitarianism.
You’re exemplifying my point quite well there, in terms of debating from the perspective of your own very precise no-true-Scotsman definition.
But to answer you at face value, let’s have a look in wikipedia’s opening paragraph on Capitalism:
This socioeconomic system has developed historically through several stages and is defined by a number of basic constituent elements: private property, profit motive, capital accumulation, competitive markets, commodification, wage labor, and an emphasis on innovation and economic growth.
It’s going to be a struggle convincing the developed world, or even the majority of left-leaning voters, that owning your own home, earning a company salary, paying people for services rendered, or market competition all need abolishing. Most people just want to see a bit more market regulation, monopoly busting, worker protections, social welfare, money removed from politics, and the rich paying their share of tax.
How is the definition I posted any different from what you quoted? I said the essence, the core required part that defines it as capitalism, there are other historic aspects but I was saying what the most basic elements of it are. And those are what I believe we should have an issue with, and if you remove that essence, it’s not capitalism.
You can own your own stuff with socialism, even a home, that is one of the common misunderstandings of socialism. People want to see a lot of things but dreams cannot always become reality. The fact of the matter is that the state will be co-opted by capitalists and they will remove protections, it’s a natural cause and effect of the capitalist system. It might be possible to manage this tendency but requires so many controls that it gets further from the definition of capitalism and may as well begin to be called market socialism or another term.
I’m not trying to convice the average westerner who has essentially zero history and political education. Not everyone needs to be convinced anyway, most people right now have little agency in politics and don’t care to.
Well you have mercantilism, which was the predecessor of capitalism
Basically, the difference is the role of government. Think of it in feudal terms - a noble owns a mine, owns an expedition, uses their soldiers for both security of their land and their monetary interests. As far as raw resources/resource producing land, you couldn’t buy that without buying a title first
But it’s a line that blurred as time went on. If you’re a leather worker, that leather came from an animal owned by the king or by livestock owned by a noble. So you’re paying taxes on the inputs, but you can probably sell stuff freely - although imports and exports might be taxed. And if you’re a merchant, you might buy spices from one noble and sell it to others
But the means of production were owned by a noble - they owned the land and the serfs that work it, they own the animals and the mines.
As time went on, it kinda faded… Maybe you sell the rights to mine a site, maybe you partner with a merchant to go on an expedition for spices, maybe you just require a permit to hunt on the land, and so on
But then as supply chains gets more complicated, you kind of naturally evolve into capitalism
See, the trick there is in your first paragraph I feel like. Under mercantilism, trade is under the almost exclusive purview of the government. So I would argue this doesn’t really meet the definition of “free trade.”
But, to steel man a bit, when “the government” is fairly unstructured, like in a feudal system, the line between government control of trade and “private citizen” control of trade can be a bit blurry. And over time I’m sure it gets messy whether a person is a “government entity” or not.
I do also feel like there’s a “difference of scale is difference of kind” problem here. Obviously if you own a copper mine and employ hundreds of people to go down and mine it for you, you own the means of production. But also, if you run a small restaurant in a strip mall and hire a half dozen servers to wait tables, you also own the means of production.
And, to your point, there probably were private innkeepers under mercantilism that took coin in exchange for goods and services. They probably employed people to help work the place. Does that make it capitalism? What if the owner used the money from that inn to build another, then another and another, and eventually had the money to buy a title and become part of the “noble class”? Is it capitalism then? Does a system that allows for that count as a capitalism, or does it need to actively encourage it?
Idk. I think my big issue, at the end of the day, is that the word capitalism doesn’t really mean anything. Or, rather, no one can really agree on what it means, and it just turns into a tribalism stand in word for “anyone who disagrees with me on economic policy.” But that’s so unspecific as to be totally useless. What parts of “capitalism” are you decrying? What would you replace it with? But I feel like any questions are met with anger that you’re not bought into the anti-capitalist agenda, even though no two people seem to agree on what that actually means.
To address your first point, you go into the bazaar, and you buy a shirt vs another shirt. The lord owns the cotton fields, they both come from the same place but have different prices and different quality/traits - that’s a free market. The raw materials belong to the lord, but what you do with it is up to the artisan
You’re trying to cut the difference between raw materials and value added - that’s the murky difference between mercantilism and capitalism
Remember, there was an age where shipping iron to a town was how farmers got tools - mercantilism is about raw materials in and out, once things get complicated it doesn’t make sense
That’s saying a grilled cheese wouldn’t be so bad if it didn’t have cheese. At that point it ain’t a grilled cheese anymore so why even try to defend it in the first place? Just eat some god damn bread
That regulation is antithetical to capitalism. Yes, it’s the only thing that keeps it functioning in a reasonable manner, but that’s just an indication capitalism is bad.
Yes, less capitalist capitalism is better than more capitalist capitalism. Maybe we should just have none.
It’s the basic idea behind ordoliberalism – companies get free reign until their actions start harming the common good, at which point the government imposes fair rules to even the playing field. It’s… reasonably functional as far as political theories go. Still wildly suboptimal, though, and not long-term stable against the influence of hyper-wealthy entities.
That’s the problem. The system prioritizes wealth accumulation above all else. When you build a society that views wealth as the highest state of being then those regulatory systems will eventually be bought out.
There may well be no such thing as a sustainable regulated capitalism, especially when we’ve normalized the monetization of everything.
capitalism is amazing as long as it not allowed to run rampant. stricter regulations and safety nets (usa) would make the whole risk/reward game of capitalism more palatable imo
Yup. Most things go bad if not fixed and out of control. Moderation is key. The problem is the people in charge don’t want a good system. They want a system they can control.
They will do anything but a fair system because then they would lose control.
Yes let’s set strict global rules on pricing of goods and a living standard of wage as well as rent capped at 10-20% income based(not real estate). Then companies can be taxed to provide health insurance and housing for everyone. Finally we can ensure 97+% employment by setting full time to 20hr a week with 3mo vacation mandatory minimum. I suppose in that world Capitalism sounds A-OK to me.
Honestly, I think it’s a bad idea for a democratic politicians to say capitalism is bad as a blanket statement. Capitalism with controls is great. Unchecked capitalism is bad.
Also, capitalism and social safety nets are not mutually exclusive. We can have capitalism as our economic core while still providing universal healthcare.
Any democrat that just comes out and says “capitalism bad” as a blanket statement is going to have a much harder time in the general election.
Any democrat that just comes out and says “capitalism bad” as a blanket statement is going to have a much harder time in the general election.
This is because the entire political establishment is aligned with capitalists, not because there isn’t popular agreement with that statement. But I’m not sure if that’s true anymore for a Dem politician.
capitalism wouldn’t be so bad without the corrupt bloated shitheel scumbag fucking christofascligarchs
Gee I wonder why a system that rewards people for being corrupt … oligarchs keeps producing corrupt … oligarchs?
I used to believe this…
Yeah… and for sure there are gradations which are worse or better than what we have now. Like more tightly managed capitalism is better, but there is no way to actually keep the demon capital from escaping containment forever.
You need to nullify the incentives to accumulate capital.
unfortunately no one cares what anyone believes. especially not the capitalists who own us. the only thing that matters is what we do. which, so far, has been nothing.
What I was trying to say is that I’m no longer naive enough to think that’s true. This is capitalism working as intended.
congrats, i guess?
Capitalism grantees they rise to power.
systematic removal of regulations and consequences has enabled greedy corporate dickbacks to sieze power.
systems are made of people. To make a better system, you need better people.
You’re wrong. Capitalism is, by definition, a “winner takes it all” system. The logical endpoint of competition between private entities is the consolidation of one of those entities, and once economy of scale plays a role, reversing that is almost impossible. And once a private entity has significantly more economic power than the others, it can manipulate regulations and consequences. Capitalism explicitly rewards by design being greedy
You’re talking about unregulated capitalism…
Give me a historical example of properly functioning, regulated capitalism
You can’t, because they’re all operated and used by humans. While there may be a logical framework and rules to make a system like capitalism work, it’s the fact that not all humans will respect or follow the rules. Eventually any fairness or equality the rules are supposed to ensure will be worked around by humans that choose not to play fair. Watching the response Mamdami received from the Dems is a perfect example of why our system is broken. He’s got the popular vote of the party, yet they are doing everything in their power to stop him. That’s merely a single recent example though, shit has been broken since the get-go
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Well, the other animals have stable systems of rules that have worked fine for millenia. We just gotta find a new social order that scales better than tribes.
Yes, and that’s capitalism. The regulations are antithetical to capitalism, but they’re also the only thing keeping us slightly safe from it. Yes, making capitalism less capitalist makes it a lot better. We can have a better system that’s just better, with the people that exist.
I think a lot of people misunderstand capitalism in the same way other people misunderstand communism.
What you said is absolutely wrong, regulations are not antiethical in capitalism, they are necessary for the free market to remain free.
The system we see today is a corruption of capitalism the same way Stalinism is a corruption of Communism
A regulated market is by definition not a free market.
Wrong, a market can only be free if it’s regulated, example: I have a competing factory up river from you and we both need clean water to operate, I output toxic chemicals into the water as a result of my operations making your business impossible.
You have to close your business and I get to set the price however I want without competition, in this example the lack of regulations create a less free market.
Here’s the definition
The Supreme Court specifically, they gave US citizens united, and then unlimited executive power. Now we’re fucked being most hope.
They always do, regardless of the economic system.
I would not describe any communist or socialist leader as a Christian Fascist Oligarch.
Usually they’re just regular old Fascist Oligarchs
Exactly
it sure does with small government.
remember there are countries that enjoy capitalism without the 5 ring circus shitshow we have going on in the states
The problem with capitalism in a representative democracy is that is almost impossible to maintain a perfectly sized government. If the government asks for too many taxes (on an extreme level) etc the market doesn’t function anymore. The “free market” needs some level of class difference to make profit attractive and keep people committed to their jobs. Because of these differences class conflict is created and through privately owned newspapers, corruption and short term economic gains regulation’s get liberalized. This results in wealth accumulation, the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. This then leads to the social and economic conditions that allow for the rise of the populist right.
As a European I can currently see this happening in all countries to which I pay attention (namely Germany, Netherlands and Britain).
yep. while that’s true, i can’t think of a valid argument against some regulating body that protects all the people, which, in america, has been somehow defined as communism by the corrupt upper crust
if there is hope, it lies in the proles
So far, but corruption is always the end result.
i’m not trying to simp for capitalism, but corruption can and does happen under any system
Anarchy. Can’t be corrupt if nobody has power. 😤
unironically this
mitual aid for the win
Roving bands of bandits would disagree.
Sir this is not a video game.
I was being pithy. I think it’s a bit absurd to say that corruption is impossible under anarchism because no one has power.
Power disparity is an unavoidable fact in every society, no matter the structure (or lack thereof). Some will be popular and some unpopular. Some will be physically strong and others physically weak. Some will seek to build up community and some will seek to tear it down.
And any amount of power disparity is prone to corruption. Surely I don’t need to point out examples of an absolute asshole getting popular and then using that popularity to take advantage of or hurt other people.
Anarchism, if it has one thing going for it, is that these problems tend to stay fairly local. But it also doesn’t give any solutions to these problems other than lynchmobs. So its a bit of a tradeoff. But it absolutely isn’t immune from corruption.
But I like roads and hospitals and fire stations and no purge.
Anarchism is not the lack of government. It’s the lack of hierarchy. There can (and practically must) still be government and cooperation. Anarchism is not chaos, like the media portrays it.
There’s a lot of resources online if you want to learn more.
I didn’t find anarchic rhetoric to be very compelling because it seems like endless layers of “Actually,”, not unlike libertarianism. We wind up reinventing the thing discarded.
I’m a systems guy. When I have conversations with politically idealistic individuals, I ask them questions about their proposed system. Every anarchist I talk to at length about infrastructure and industry either refuses to imagine that people wouldn’t spontaneously cooperate out of the goodness of their hearts, or winds up reinventing hierarchies. But different hierarchies, which aren’t the same things for some reason.
Cooperation can still exist without authority.
The difficulty isn’t in the cooperation part. It’s with the not having an authority. Some corrupt assholes will always try to take charge and be an authority.
I feel like the logical endpoint of “corruption in a system of anarchy” then is just bandit gangs.
I have a hard time saying those are worse for society than rich capitalists these days. But they’re not good.
Give Europe a bit more time. They’ll get there.
Those countries are headed towards that circus at varying paces, so that argument doesn’t work anymore. I mean Germany? France? Sweden? Britain? Italy?
Capitalism ultimately rots into authoritarianism through wealth accumulation.
Corruption is an inherent part of capitalism
Capitalism is the accumulation and hoarding of wealth at all costs. Exploitation and abuse are foundational concepts. There is no ethical or moral version of such a system, and so no version of it that “wouldn’t be so bad.” It is immorality and evil distilled into a code of conduct.
There’s a reason capitalism is essentially counter to the teachings of all major world religions, many of which are extremely authoritarian in their own way.
One aspect of modern capitalism is predatory loans, which every Abrahamic religion has writings against.
It’s pretty telling most religions would not go as far as “poor people can go fuck themselves” despite being used to control people through fear over millenia but the end game of unchecked capitalism is truly as simple as “poor people can go fuck themselves”
Capitalism is always bad, because capitalism is where an ownership class who does no work leeches from a working class who owns nothing.
Don’t confuse free markets with capitalism, they’re different.
Genuine question. How do you have free markets without the existence of capital and the pursuit of its accumulation?
The definition of capitalism per the dictionary is:
How do you have free trade without people who own things trading them?
Capital has existed far longer than capitalism has.
I mean, this feels semantic. The word capitalism is obviously of the modern era, but there are governments and economic systems going back to antiquity that I think meet all of the definitional requirements of “capitalistic.”
Really, I just lack a vision of what “free trade but not capitalism” could possibly mean. Could you describe that system for me?
When I try to do so, the result always meets the literal, dictionary definition of capitalism, as listed above.
It’s definitely semantic, but semantics is the reason we use different words for different things.
Anyway, “free trade but not capitalism” would just be anything where you can buy and sell stuff, but without the individual owner class. It can be part of anything. Let’s say workers own their workplace. They still get paid, and they can use that money to buy what they want. That isn’t capitalism, but it still has free trade. Free trade is one component that is required in capitalism, but it isn’t exclusive to it.
Edit: Also, something can be capitalistic without being capitalism. It can have characters related to capitalism, but not meet all the requirements.
So, it isn’t the ownership and trade of capital that makes something capitalism, it’s when someone is allowed to accumulate too much capital?
What constitutes “enough” capital to push it over the edge into capitalism?
Or is it that you cannot have non-owner workers? That you can’t employ additional help without those people buying into the business?
Not trying to be an ass. Just trying to understand the distinction. I genuinely don’t know what “all the requirements” necessary to make it capitalism are, and try as I might I am not finding any beyond the literal definition in the dictionary, which doesn’t have any.
What is the source for this definition of capitalism? Just trying to figure out if this is, like, the “academic definition” or something. Cause, as you say, what words mean does mean something, which is why we have different words for different things.
I do think it’s really easy to redefine words in a “no true Scotsman”-y way, where you redefine a general word to mean “just the versions of that thing I don’t like,” in order to tribalise it. Which doesn’t mean that’s what you’re doing here. I’m just trying to understand, and I think if we can’t agree on what the word capitalism even means, we aren’t exactly going to get anywhere. So I’m just trying to figure out what definition of the term you are using and why.
The definition above, that you’re referring to, is clear enough. Ownership of trade and industry by private owners for profit.
If industry isn’t privately owned it isn’t capitalist. If it isn’t for profit it isn’t capitalist.
If the state, workers, or other non-private groups own the means of production, it isn’t capitalist. If they’re not operating the industry in a manner to make profit, and instead are doing good (for example), it isn’t capitalist.
People can still be paid and they can still spend their money on goods and services. That is not necessarily capitalist behavior. It’s just a method of distributing value.
This is the huge problem with the wider debate; hardcore leftists have a very specific well-defined meaning in mind when they use the word “Capitalism”, whereas the majority of the general public think “Capitalism” just means “you can start a business if you want”.
“Neoliberalism” doesn’t work in most rhetoric either because it’s got the word “liberal” in it. We need a new word that’s unambiguously understood to refer to the specific components of capitalism that are objectionable.
Which “specific components of capitalism” would you say are not objectionable? It’s essence is the private ownership of the productive forces of society and the derivation of profit by selling the product. The core of it is objectionable from the view of democracy or egalitarianism.
You’re exemplifying my point quite well there, in terms of debating from the perspective of your own very precise no-true-Scotsman definition.
But to answer you at face value, let’s have a look in wikipedia’s opening paragraph on Capitalism:
It’s going to be a struggle convincing the developed world, or even the majority of left-leaning voters, that owning your own home, earning a company salary, paying people for services rendered, or market competition all need abolishing. Most people just want to see a bit more market regulation, monopoly busting, worker protections, social welfare, money removed from politics, and the rich paying their share of tax.
How is the definition I posted any different from what you quoted? I said the essence, the core required part that defines it as capitalism, there are other historic aspects but I was saying what the most basic elements of it are. And those are what I believe we should have an issue with, and if you remove that essence, it’s not capitalism.
You can own your own stuff with socialism, even a home, that is one of the common misunderstandings of socialism. People want to see a lot of things but dreams cannot always become reality. The fact of the matter is that the state will be co-opted by capitalists and they will remove protections, it’s a natural cause and effect of the capitalist system. It might be possible to manage this tendency but requires so many controls that it gets further from the definition of capitalism and may as well begin to be called market socialism or another term.
I’m not trying to convice the average westerner who has essentially zero history and political education. Not everyone needs to be convinced anyway, most people right now have little agency in politics and don’t care to.
https://lemmy.zip/comment/19846863
Well you have mercantilism, which was the predecessor of capitalism
Basically, the difference is the role of government. Think of it in feudal terms - a noble owns a mine, owns an expedition, uses their soldiers for both security of their land and their monetary interests. As far as raw resources/resource producing land, you couldn’t buy that without buying a title first
But it’s a line that blurred as time went on. If you’re a leather worker, that leather came from an animal owned by the king or by livestock owned by a noble. So you’re paying taxes on the inputs, but you can probably sell stuff freely - although imports and exports might be taxed. And if you’re a merchant, you might buy spices from one noble and sell it to others
But the means of production were owned by a noble - they owned the land and the serfs that work it, they own the animals and the mines.
As time went on, it kinda faded… Maybe you sell the rights to mine a site, maybe you partner with a merchant to go on an expedition for spices, maybe you just require a permit to hunt on the land, and so on
But then as supply chains gets more complicated, you kind of naturally evolve into capitalism
See, the trick there is in your first paragraph I feel like. Under mercantilism, trade is under the almost exclusive purview of the government. So I would argue this doesn’t really meet the definition of “free trade.”
But, to steel man a bit, when “the government” is fairly unstructured, like in a feudal system, the line between government control of trade and “private citizen” control of trade can be a bit blurry. And over time I’m sure it gets messy whether a person is a “government entity” or not.
I do also feel like there’s a “difference of scale is difference of kind” problem here. Obviously if you own a copper mine and employ hundreds of people to go down and mine it for you, you own the means of production. But also, if you run a small restaurant in a strip mall and hire a half dozen servers to wait tables, you also own the means of production.
And, to your point, there probably were private innkeepers under mercantilism that took coin in exchange for goods and services. They probably employed people to help work the place. Does that make it capitalism? What if the owner used the money from that inn to build another, then another and another, and eventually had the money to buy a title and become part of the “noble class”? Is it capitalism then? Does a system that allows for that count as a capitalism, or does it need to actively encourage it?
Idk. I think my big issue, at the end of the day, is that the word capitalism doesn’t really mean anything. Or, rather, no one can really agree on what it means, and it just turns into a tribalism stand in word for “anyone who disagrees with me on economic policy.” But that’s so unspecific as to be totally useless. What parts of “capitalism” are you decrying? What would you replace it with? But I feel like any questions are met with anger that you’re not bought into the anti-capitalist agenda, even though no two people seem to agree on what that actually means.
To address your first point, you go into the bazaar, and you buy a shirt vs another shirt. The lord owns the cotton fields, they both come from the same place but have different prices and different quality/traits - that’s a free market. The raw materials belong to the lord, but what you do with it is up to the artisan
You’re trying to cut the difference between raw materials and value added - that’s the murky difference between mercantilism and capitalism
Remember, there was an age where shipping iron to a town was how farmers got tools - mercantilism is about raw materials in and out, once things get complicated it doesn’t make sense
That’s what capitalism is.
Anarchists still believe in trade.
That’s saying a grilled cheese wouldn’t be so bad if it didn’t have cheese. At that point it ain’t a grilled cheese anymore so why even try to defend it in the first place? Just eat some god damn bread
AKA the inventors and vanguard of capitalism.
Capitalism only works when heavily regulated, because human greed is a cancer to everything it touches.
That regulation is antithetical to capitalism. Yes, it’s the only thing that keeps it functioning in a reasonable manner, but that’s just an indication capitalism is bad.
Yes, less capitalist capitalism is better than more capitalist capitalism. Maybe we should just have none.
This — if capitalism could be contained by government it would do nicely, but it ends up corrupting government so that it cannot function.
It’s the basic idea behind ordoliberalism – companies get free reign until their actions start harming the common good, at which point the government imposes fair rules to even the playing field. It’s… reasonably functional as far as political theories go. Still wildly suboptimal, though, and not long-term stable against the influence of hyper-wealthy entities.
That’s the problem. The system prioritizes wealth accumulation above all else. When you build a society that views wealth as the highest state of being then those regulatory systems will eventually be bought out.
There may well be no such thing as a sustainable regulated capitalism, especially when we’ve normalized the monetization of everything.
capitalism is amazing as long as it not allowed to run rampant. stricter regulations and safety nets (usa) would make the whole risk/reward game of capitalism more palatable imo
Please tell me, when exactly has capitalism been amazing?
They’re confusing free market with capitalism most likely.
Salt and pepper make dog shit more palatable too. Instead of seeking to make bad things palatable, can we try something different instead?
I’d imagine salt would make it taste worse for the same reasons why salt makes food taste better, but this is just me being facetious
Yup. Most things go bad if not fixed and out of control. Moderation is key. The problem is the people in charge don’t want a good system. They want a system they can control.
They will do anything but a fair system because then they would lose control.
Yes let’s set strict global rules on pricing of goods and a living standard of wage as well as rent capped at 10-20% income based(not real estate). Then companies can be taxed to provide health insurance and housing for everyone. Finally we can ensure 97+% employment by setting full time to 20hr a week with 3mo vacation mandatory minimum. I suppose in that world Capitalism sounds A-OK to me.
Simple small changes no biggie
Uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh
Honestly, I think it’s a bad idea for a democratic politicians to say capitalism is bad as a blanket statement. Capitalism with controls is great. Unchecked capitalism is bad.
Also, capitalism and social safety nets are not mutually exclusive. We can have capitalism as our economic core while still providing universal healthcare.
Any democrat that just comes out and says “capitalism bad” as a blanket statement is going to have a much harder time in the general election.
Please, can you give me the historical example you’re thinking about when you say this?
This is because the entire political establishment is aligned with capitalists, not because there isn’t popular agreement with that statement. But I’m not sure if that’s true anymore for a Dem politician.