Capitalism is the dirty secret of many socialists.
Without the former, they can't realize the dream of the latter.
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Nobody Wants to Work
- Thread starter The Hammer
- Start date
Without the former, they can't realize the dream of the latter.
I am not a financial analyst. I just occasionally pay attention to what they are saying on youtube. This guy is saying that the payroll report is a lie or is in some way not correct.
Orbit
I'm a planet
Youtube is the absolute worst for misleading/half-true information. Who are these people who make these videos and what is their agenda? Who is bankrolling them?
This person tends to be on the doom & gloom side, and he sells financial protection. He sells advice about buying bonds. That is his angle. It is in his interest to talk about whatever is scary in the economy, but he doesn't ever paint a rosy picture.
Alien826
No religious beliefs
Here's my take on it.
To use an analogy, capitalism has a very good engine, but poor brakes and steering. So, use it for it's ability to create wealth, but impose strict controls over its side effects.
Socialism? There are some things that capitalism does not do well. Distributing the wealth is one. Another is where you want to support parts of society that don't strictly earn what they get. Health care is an example of things that don't fit well with a profit model. Once we abandon the idea that you should only get healthcare if you can afford it, capitalism fails, not because it is inherently "bad" but because it only deals in exchanging stuff for money. We can add other factors like the absence of a free market. (For example the customer is unable to determine the relative value of the services offered, which is necessary for a free market).
So what am I recommending? A mixed economy, with both capitalist and socialist elements, each applied in its appropriate areas. Don't make it a contest, take the best of both. There are lots of successful examples world wide. You'll disagree here, but I consider the USA to be badly out of balance in favor of capitalism.
Actually the two are not incompatible. Looking solely at the unemployment number and/or a growth in employment can be misleading. The unemployment rate can decrease due to several causes. One is the reduction of frictional unemployment, which is generally a good thing. Other causes include underemployment and structural unemployment. Both of which, while reducing the number of unemployed, would contribute to a recession, not mitigate against one. At this time we are experiencing (in the U.S.) the latter causes, not the former.
Furthermore ignoring employment participation rates also is an error. When large segments of the population drop out of the work force entirely the participation rate and unemployment rate both drop. But the drop in the participation rate drop can have a greater impact on determining whether there is a recession than the unemployment rate drop.
We are entering a new era. Due to demographics the number of people leaving the work force (through retirement of 10,000 Baby Boomers a day) is either greater than the number of people entering the work force or soon will be. This means that we are "running out" of workers. Which means there will be more jobs than available workers as the norm. Which means the unemployment rate will be abnormally lowered, or new normally lowered depending how you look at it, for the foreseeable future.
Basically the unemployment rates will be low for the foreseeable future regardless of who occupies the White House. It will be low for deleterious reasons, not beneficial ones. Yellen and the Administration knows these things and is exploiting the economic ignorance of the masses.
The bottom line is that, unlike in the past, the unemployment rate is not a reliable indicator of economic recession. It should not be used as such.
Wall Street numbers aren't much good too. Can't trust what the corporations are telling us, either. And now we can't trust this financial report. Or the president. Or congress. Or the house.
Is there anyone I should be listening too? Politicians, I'm assuming only the Conservative ones? Or is there something more trustworthy?
Yerda
Veteran Member
This is partly true.
I'm personally quite open about the need for markets and what they can do that states or planned economics can't. This doesn't always go down well among socialists, it is true.
The other part to the truth is that almost all wealth creation, improvements in living standards and growth of prosperity depends directly or indirectly upon the state. More specifically the social democratic organisation of the state carrying out socialist policies and programs. Never goes down well among capitalists, mind.
ImmortalFlame
Woke gremlin
To be fair, this is true. In fact, even Marx and Engels acknowledged the necessity of capitalism for raising the living conditions of the poor all around the world in the Communist Manifesto:
“The bourgeoisie, during its rule of scarce one hundred years, has created more massive and more colossal productive forces than have all preceding generations together. Subjection of Nature’s forces to man, machinery, application of chemistry to industry and agriculture, steam-navigation, railways, electric telegraphs, clearing of whole continents for cultivation, canalisation of rivers, whole populations conjured out of the ground — what earlier century had even a presentiment that such productive forces slumbered in the lap of social labour?
[...]
“Modern industry has established the world market, for which the discovery of America paved the way. This market has given an immense development to commerce, to navigation, to communication by land. The bourgeoisie, by the rapid improvement of all instruments of production, by the immensely facilitated means of communication, draws all, even the most barbarian, nations into civilisation.”
The Communist Manifesto
A huge part of his argument in Capital is that we have now become SO productive, in fact, that there is no longer any necessary fear of starvation, cold or homelessness.
Twilight Hue
Twilight, not bright nor dark, good nor bad.
I always look at the GDP stats.
Where socialism fails is in generating wealth
to distribute. Without capitalism, we observe
that countries are economically weak.
Capitalism has the advantage that if the country
chooses to, it can distribute the greater wealth
it generates.
Socialism is about the "people" owning the means
of production. Health care isn't guaranteed in it.
Capitalism is an economic system. If government
wants to provide health care thru taxation, it can.
It seems that you confuse the dream of what can
be provided under socialism, with the worst aspects
you can find in capitalist systems. This is a false
comparison designed to praise socialism.
Consider capitalist countries wherein the people
do decide to have government provide health
care, eg, Canuckistan.
You don't need socialism to accomplish your
social goals....you need capitalism & the will
of the populace to provide social services.
I don't think you understand what capitalists actually
are. We don't oppose social assistance programs.
Those aren't socialism at all because they're not
the people (ie, government) controlling the means
of production
That isn't so in countries where government is either
unable to prevent starvation (eg, N Korea, Afghanistan)
or unwilling to prevent homelessness (eg, USA).
Moreover, USA (both Dems & Pubs) actually foment
homelessness, eg, making encampments, tiny houses,
& other alternative homes illegal.
Neither disappears entirely, though there have been instances of businesses having to close due to not having any staff. I've seen recent stories where places had to shut down when everyone, including the manager, just decided to quit. And then, if a company loses customers, then they go belly up, too.
Yerda
Veteran Member
The point I was making was that the state underlies and underwrites pretty much all of what we call capitalism - as a mirror to your point that what socialists want rests upon the success of capitalism.
Also, the central proposition of the socialist movement isn't that governments own the means of production - it is that the workers control the means of production. A sizeable number of socialists want to eridicate the state entirely.
Alien826
No religious beliefs
I thought that was implied when I suggested that we need the best of both systems.
These days I tend use "socialism" to refer to all the things libertarians don't like 'cos that's how it is used now. Yes I know that's not the strict definition of the word.
I said that too. Best of both?
Are you saying there's something wrong with Canadian health care?
And I was so careful to present capitalism in a favorable light. It's great at creating wealth!
It's not hard to find countries where a mixed economy provides both wealth and things like universal health care. But of course the "greatest country in the world" doesn't need to consult any other countries, as it is the ultimate best thing that has ever been.
Not totally on topic, but this happened when I first moved over here. I was waiting in line for something and the guy in front of me heard my accent. This followed.
Guy: Where are you from?
Me: England.
Guy: Isn't it (dramatic pause) socialist over there?
Me: (A little irritated) Yes we do try to look after people that need help.
Guy: People should work! (With heavy emphasis) It says so in the Bible!
He then turned his back and ignored me.
So you're not making a general claim.
OK.
The state uses taxes that we pay for infrastructure,
defense, & the machinery of government. So you
could say that capitalism "underlies & underwrites
pretty much all of what we call" the state.
It's not quite what some wag once said to dismiss
the entrepreneurs, owners, & managers of business....
"You didn't build that.
Somebody else made that happen."
In all applications of socialism, it's always been
government that does the controlling of the
means of production. After all, a crowd can't
do that job, so it's up to their representatives,
ie, government to represent the workers / people.
Under capitalism, workers have the right & ability
to start or buy companies that they can run. They
do this as much as they want to & are able to
compete with other companies.
We don't need socialism at all.
Just use tax money generated by
capitalism to fund social goals.
You use "socialism" to refer to authoritarianism,
economic lethargy, foreign military adventurism,
& government controlling the means of production?
That's an inaccurate definition, & even more severe
that the ordinary dictionary definition that I favor.
You read my post, right?
Did I say that?
I don't know what problems it has these days.
My last experience with it was about 1978.
It was minimal then.
Universal health care isn't in the definition of
either capitalism or socialism. Government
can provide it (or not) in either economic
system. Canuckistan, as I said, is a capitalist
country that provides it.
No, I just asked a question, and I still haven't got an answer yet. I've noticed that capitalists never answer questions directly. I wonder why.