Lets talk about capitalism

[Overcast]

Well when I say astronomical I more mean the resources needed. Lines and lines of copper wiring, huge capacitance centers to store the surplus at waystations, computer networks for utility control and maintenance oversight. It'd be pretty huge.

[Karrrrrrrrrrrresche]

Originally Posted by Overcast

Well when I say astronomical I more mean the resources needed. Lines and lines of copper wiring, huge capacitance centers to store the surplus at waystations, computer networks for utility control and maintenance oversight. It'd be pretty huge.

Right, and what I am saying to you is we have an astronomical amount of resources. We have more than enough. We're just not putting them to that particular use.

Instead we're making cars.

[Aerozord]

Originally Posted by K-Resh

I'm going to ignore the entire rest of your post to reiterate this:

Russia and China are capitalist nations.

ok, fine, please list the non-capitalist ones then

[Karrrrrrrrrrrresche]

Originally Posted by Aerozord

ok, fine, please list the non-capitalist ones then

I legitimately cannot be assed. At all. I don't believe you actually care one whit.

[Aerozord]

Originally Posted by K-Resh

I legitimately cannot be assed. At all. I don't believe you actually care one whit.

I sincerely do. Its needed for an accurate depiction of alternative economic models in practice and how they hold up. You dismissed two that I name so I take it Cuba and North Korea are not capitalist. Now I know propaganda against both nations is high so hard to take depictions of those nations as accurate. So I am asking you to name some other nations so we can see how their own resources are distributed.

If you give me names I'll happily look for statistic myself, I just want to know which nations I should be looking up

[Osterbaum]

Aero, there is no non-capitalist country currently in existence and there wasn't at the time of the USSR. Even the old "socialist" block countries were only state capitalist.

I can't stress this enough: In today's world of global capitalism, there is no country that isn't capitalist. Dictatorships are capitalists, social democracies are capitalist, monarchies are capitalist etc.

Capitalism is the right for individuals to claim ownership over shared land and resources, it is the logic of wealth-makes-right, it is the system where we use an artificial construct with no real value in itself (money) to measure the worth of everything else. In other words capitalism is a system of private ownership, wealth accumulation, seeking profit and money. If you don't think China has all of those, you're just not looking hard enough. It applies to all countries, because this system has been made (often forcibly) global in the course of contemporary history. Countries can't simply choose to opt out even if they wanted to, they can at most tweak it a little and then spout rhetoric about how non-capitalist they are.

Originally Posted by Aero

If you actually believe those vested in oil have that much power you are naive if you think they wouldn't leverage that influence into any other economical model through non-capitalistic methods like they have been.

The whole point is to replace capitalism with a system that doesn't allow elites to control limited resources, with a system that doesn't allow for the easy exploitation of people and the environment. The so called "big oil" or "big coal" would no longer have the power that they now have to influence politics.

Originally Posted by Kim

Overcast, one of the points Oster makes is that the scarcity is manufactured. It is deliberate scarcity, because capitalism requires it. You can't become post-scarcity when your economic structure forces it. There are farmers who literally get paid not to use some of their farmland because too high of supply would cause price to plummet and fuck up the economy.

Exactly. In short, capitalism requires scarcity because people don't buy anything if they already have an abundance of what they need (or want).

[Aerozord]

I try to remain open minded. So as I said before, what one should do when creating a new model is think of how it can be exploited. I would like to hear what you believe would be an effective solution as well as how it will be corrupted by those who have leverage. Keeping in mind physical resources are not the only things that can be exploited. Skills and social capital (celebrities) also give an edge as well. Including motivating factors that allow for psychological feedback and a sense of agency

[RawBot]

In short, capitalism requires scarcity because people don't buy anything if they already have an abundance of what they need (or want).

That abundance comes from somewhere though, so there is a rather objective need for commerce and money.

The whole point is to replace capitalism with a system that doesn't allow elites to control limited resources, with a system that doesn't allow for the easy exploitation of people and the environment. The so called "big oil" or "big coal" would no longer have the power that they now have to influence politics.

Well, state capitalism in a democratic state has norms and rules that companies must abide to. Such rules are made in the interest of the people or the nation, assuming the democracy is healthy.

A healthy democracy among other things forbids any one individual or company to contribute more than a rather low amount of money to electoral campaigns, in order not to skew the weight of anyone's voice. The rest of the money needed is given back by the State afterwards. The State also ensures that political campaigns aren't excessively skewed between parties by setting an absolute ceiling on spendings.

Private powers must not get as powerful as the State, because they have no legitimacy and no responsibility towards the people or the nation.

So basically, money, commerce and private powers are not a problem if there is a structure strong enough to protect the interests of the people.

It is more difficult to make it work internationally. Globalization can easily turn into colonialism, with all its up and downsides. It's a difficult issue but I doubt the current Free Trade shit is good in any way except for the strongest private powers.

Btw, is there any discussion in the US over TAFTA (TTIP) ? If so, what's the dominant opinion about it ? Because this is the very embodiment of what modern capitalism has become.

[Osterbaum]

Originally Posted by RawBot

That abundance comes from somewhere though, so there is a rather objective need for commerce and money.

There certainly is no 'objective need' for these things. They are necessary, or in the case of money at least helpful, in the current economic system. But there is no objective natural law that says trade must be based on a system of 'commerce'; that is private ownership of natural resources and land, accumulation of wealth in the hands of the few, manufactured scarcity, poor co-ordination of large scale production and behind it all the need of a capitalist system to generate ever more profit (for the few).

As a preliminary response to all that, here's a short text titled The Economic Organism as Panopticon. It's written as an anarchist critique of right-libertarian ideas, but it functions perfectly well to shed some (philosophical) light on how our current system functions to keep us all dependent (materially and psychologically).

A few more specific comments:

The State also ensures that political campaigns aren't excessively skewed between parties by setting an absolute ceiling on spendings.

The main thing the state ensures is always it's own survival and that of capitalism. Everything else is ultimately secondary, as evidenced for example by the response of the state to any protest movement seeking to challenge the state or capitalism or other existing power structures that benefit someone (hint, it's police repression; look up Spain, Turkey, Greece, the US just everywhere basically).

Private powers must not get as powerful as the State, because they have no legitimacy and no responsibility towards the people or the nation.

Private powers are already as or more powerful than a bunch of states. The function of any existing state is very much tied to the logic of capitalism, and private capitalists have much more power at their disposal than one measly vote. Again, as evidenced by how 'austerity' means boons for the rich and business and cuts for the poor and working people.

So basically, money, commerce and private powers are not a problem if there is a structure strong enough to protect the interests of the people.

But the state exists primarily to protect private property and the existing status quo.

It's a difficult issue but I doubt the current Free Trade shit is good in any way except for the strongest private powers.

I agree. And the TTIP is a good example. It has been negotiated in secret with representatives of the US and EU as well as the business world (but no other groups or citizens). It's proponents claim it will bring a bunch of jobs, 160 000 for all of Europe! Which sounds great, but it's apparently only a tiny rise in the time frame it is supposed to happen, and on top this is the most optimistic estimate (by those with the most interest to see it happen). The EU Commission leaked PR strategy stated to "focus on the positive" effects, completely ignoring any and all criticism. Things such as "invester protection" undermine the ability of countries to implement legislation restricting business efforts in any way (including environmental regulations, labour laws etc.). It's an elite project, for elites by elites to put it simply.

I try to remain open minded. So as I said before, what one should do when creating a new model is think of how it can be exploited. I would like to hear what you believe would be an effective solution as well as how it will be corrupted by those who have leverage. Keeping in mind physical resources are not the only things that can be exploited. Skills and social capital (celebrities) also give an edge as well. Including motivating factors that allow for psychological feedback and a sense of agency.

Response forthcoming, I'll edit it in later. Just too busy right now to write more, sorry!

[Red Mage Black]

Honestly? I'm perfectly A-okay with barter system. I use it all the time, since I have no cash to spend and it works for me. I do a service for someone or trade them something I think is of equal value and we both get what we want, pretty simple stuff. I completely agree it's a fair system practiced with the right oversight.

When I first read about Anarchism and how it functions, I thought it was a pretty neat idea. Everybody works, no leaders and everybody contributes their fair share to the well being of the community. This doesn't just mean food, but defense and education as well. That sounds like a pretty self sufficient society to me.

However, maybe I have the wrong idea? Its been a while since I read up on Anarchism, but I do remember it sounded fantastic at the time. What's 'too bad' about it is changing everything to fit what needs to be done(Communist-Anarchism), as you'd need to convince people it's a better alternative to what we have now. That means taking on not only the media, but political pundits and politicians alike. People I'm sure who would rather keep their cushy jobs that Capitalism afforded them.

I've yet to see an idea that wasn't shot down due to Communism's previous incarnations and the people that headed them, but I'd be interested to see it in its purest form. As for Anarchy, people seem to visualize mass riots and burning buildings. I'm not sure I agree with letting people police themselves either. Since all laws are made by people, they're not perfect. If we're going to use an example, the United States is a big one. It goes for quite a few countries, but it's the one everyone seems to use as a measuring stick. So, how do you enforce law without placing anyone a station above their fellows?