Mog,
A few things to think about. Using your best gut instinct, how many people or what percentage do you think meet your criteria currently? How many people or what percentage met your criteria a century ago? Two centuries ago? If you are honest, I think you will have to concede that more people live in luxury today than were alive 1000 years ago. Do you think they had less concern about ready access to resources than you do? I think more, not less.
We live with more food security, better water, better shelter, better entertainment, and personal belongings that royalty would not have dreamt of in centuries past. The capitalist system has provided this ready access to daily miracles of transportation, communication, entertainment, food, drink, etc to the masses (you, me, and likely everyone we know). It provides these things abundantly and on demand. It is not a coincidence that the countries that have had the most freedom and the most capitalism and the rule of law are the ones that have the majority of these blessings and distribute them to the largest portion of their citizens. Our farmers grow more food, our factories produce more goods, and our scientists find answers to shortages of any resources. This is how they make money, become famous, and contribute to society.
Examples are all around you...you are reading this probably within hours of me typing it from across the country, others are reading it around the world...you could not do this when you were a child. You can order clothing, electronics, or a pizza online. There are thriving countries that now have sustainable drinking water supplies from the oceans and seas...this was not possible when we were children. There are fish farms that provide sustainable supplies of seafood...also not possible when we were children. There are so many axamples it is ridiculous. The world reserves of oil are actually growing...and we are harvesting oil we could not have dreamed of touching in previous decades. Define a problem and capitalists will find a solution...if the government doesn't get in the way.
Cheers,
H.

You are wrong.

The development of industry, research and machines are the reason we live in abundance here in the west. Capitalism never developed anything but greed. The way to make wealth by selling things for more than they are worth. Why should someone put in 1 hr of work and demand 2hrs work back from someone else? Why is it allowed to hire people to work for you and pay them less than you yourself earn for the same input of work?
Oil reserves are growing? That was the most preposterous statement I ever have heard. The oil that is there has been there since millions of years and will only decrease over time. A one way road to catastrophy.
Like a train running towards a cliff wall. As long as it runs even faster all aboard are happy and praise the way the train transport them fast and convinient. But the day the wall is in clear view to all you will have no way to stop the train if you don't take meassures in time. Sure the ones who sold the tickets will find someone else to blame like immigrants or terrorists?

Capitalism builds on that some people starve in order to make a few live in abundance. It is a system based on that a few with power (money) see themselves fit to decide for others what is best for them. Sure they will find a solution. Kill the ones who starve and the problem is gone, for a while at least.


Capitalism has nothing to do with democracy. As shown in China, capitalism works best along with a one party government.

Nice comeback Mog! Thanks.

LOD,
Taking your points in order.
People have always developed industry, conducted research, and built machines. Capitalism is what drove the industrial revolution that made the fruits of these developments available to the most people instead of isolated communities and the very rich. Capitalism doesn't sell things for more than they are worth...it sells them for exactly what people are willing to pay (i.e., what they are worth). The socialist system does exactly what you state next...it pays people to not work...work for 30 years, collect a pension at a growing rate for 40-50 years from someone else (current workers). Oil reserves are growing...it is a fact. Here is a link to a chart showing global proved reserves from 1980-2011 from the Poost Carbon Institute (Energy Bulletin is a program of Post Carbon Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to helping the world transition away from fossil fuels and build sustainable, resilient communities.)
www.energybulletin.net/stories/2012-06-21/how-much-oil-left-world
I am not claiming that there is more oil and yes, the total amount will decrease over time...that is not what oil reserves are. Oil reserves are the oil resources that countries are confident they can recover, refine, and deliver to consumers and that is increasing. Example: "In 1980, U.S. proved reserves were 36.5 billion barrels. In 2011, U.S. proved reserves were 30.9 billion barrels. Over the course of 31 years, the U.S. produced 103 billion barrels of oil, but U.S. reserves only fell by 5.7 billion barrels. This is a result of continued improvements in oil extraction technology (e.g., hydraulic fracturing) as well as from new discoveries (especially offshore)." In other words, if we had listened to you and Mog, the US would have run out of oil in the mid-80s once we used up our 36.5 billion barrels of oil...instead, we have already pumped 103 billion and still have 30.9 billion left.
Nest issue, capitalism builds on self-interest and fair trade. Don't confuse someone selling things for what someone is "willing" to pay with those forcing people to pay more than something is worth. There are people who exploit others under capitalism...even moreso under communism, and everyone under socialism. Capitalism doesn't starve anyone...that would eliminate markets and be counterproductive.
China does not have capitalism. It has a communist system that enforces slave labor, child labor, fails to enforce environmental standards, and artificially sets the value of its currency to maintain trade advantage at the expense of its workers for the benefit of the ruling party to maintain control. In short, China has everything you and Mog claim to be the problem with capitalism, but without the capitalism. China does have a one party government, so we do agree on something.
Regards,
H.

Why is corn used to make ethanol when soybeans and algae are many, many times more efficiently productive;
while the frozen corn we now get to eat is fit for horses ...
went back to canned corn because of it?

It's all part of the big business juggling act imho.

rex

Oil takes millions of years of fermentation of plants and dead animals to create. How can yo uinsist on the reserves are growing ? Maybe you mean we find new ways to locate and extract what is already there since the days of the dinosauers, but there is no NEW oil. It is a limited resource that one day will run out.
If you work 1 hr to make something and then sell it for more than 1 hrs worth of work, then you are selling it for a higher price than the amount of work you invested in it. That is the whole idea of capitalism, to make a profit.
Capitalism does not at all build on fair trade. If so a worker in for example Haiti, would recieve the same pay as one in the US. Our wealth is built on the backs of those in the third world. Read up on your history...Basically all of the bankers wealth origins from pillaging and slave trading.

Is there really another diffrence between communism and capitalism than the semantic one? Both systems build on that a small self appointed elite says what goes. The US also in reality have a one party system. The bankers party. Without money you go nowhere in US politics and money comes from the bankers who back both sides of the houses, a houses consisting of the two fractions of the same old party and a few independents. The bankers are the ones ruling the lot of them.

The pension system is an insurance just like any other insurance you can buy. You pay in to it all your working days in order to be able to recieve an income as you no longer are able to work. Do you have something against insurances?

"China does not have capitalism. It has a communist system that enforces slave labor, child labor, fails to enforce environmental standards, and artificially sets the value of its currency to maintain trade advantage at the expense of its workers for the benefit of the ruling party to maintain control. In short,"

Is it your meaning the US companies do not do exactly the same thing, if not so much in the US so at least abroad.

Another note here: If you buy things comming from China it means you say ok to whatever they do.

ps
A lesson in what capitalism is about for those who need education
www.youtube.com/watch?v=YS88F7Bw2AQ
www.youtube.com/watch?v=lsmbWBpnCNk
www.youtube.com/watch?v=cOZ2l6UNY34

ds

Last Edited : Thursday, 3 January 2013 - 11:21

Hwatta, I was tired yesterday and had been in multiple angry altercations with people who want to make my life tougher than it already is. I just couldn't muster the energy to refute your bogus claims, but when I get time, I'll go through each one and explain to your uncomprehending stare why you are so very, very wrong about your worldview. Neither of us will change a bit, so I will wait until I feel like using up my valuable time on a wasteful thing such as trying to counter your "truths".

OK Mog...I'll wait to see what you come up with on your point by point refutation. Since it is based on your gut instinct, you can just stick with the "you are wrong" answer and that is perfectly fine.

Just one example of what you are stating by that: 1000 years ago, the population of the world was 400 million people. So, to say my point was wrong is to say your gut instinct is that there are not 400 million inhabitants on earth living at first world standards today. You can believe this if you want, but it is a hard sell to most people I think. In 1000 years from now, I would guess we will have the same or an analogous situation, where over 7 billion people will be living at first world standards. There will still be poverty (many more people than now), but people will continue to solve problems in the future just as they have in the past and are doing now.
I do hope you feel better and don't consider this an angry altercation.
Regards,
H.

Why must you look at it as if there was only the one option, some people living well and a lot not living well? I would like to see a lot less folks living really well with no poverty, hunger or war in a clean environment. We can't possibly get there the way we are going..

I expect that soon enough the bird flu (or another) will mutate and be contagious between humans and will wipe out approximately half the human race. Then, chaos for centuries, possibly a return to an industrial society sometime later. We just can't go on the way we are going without disaster, no matter how rosy you want to paint the picture, with capitalists doing good for everybody and so on. It doesn't work thaqt way. Capitalism needs regulation to keep the greed from overwhelming everything else as happens so often, look at the stock market.

Capital itself is neutral. It can be used for good or ill. Big projects are very difficult to achieve without a store of capital, witness dams, railroads and the space program for instance. Left to themselves, capitalists merely move numbers around to make themselves richer. Without strong regulation, greedy people will destroy a society as is happening here now with nearly all the available capital going to a tiny, tiny minority of the population. They get it, they hide it in overseas banks and it isn't put into local circulation anymore. That is criminal theft to me. It's just "business" to them. Business allows people to do anything they want, morality be damned. Corporations are not allowed to be good, their stockholder just won't allow it!

Remember the Union Carbide disaster in Bhopal India? Through negligence 20,000 people died. The President of Union Carbide went on TV soon after and said they would make it right and never rest until the survivors were compensated. He was put through the wringer by his board of directors and recanted immediately. They ended up settling for $700 per victim. Criminal behavior. Sanctioned by our government and business leaders, but clearly morally bankrupt behavior. If you kill someone his family deserves jsut compensation, but that would have affected the bottom line and therefore was not going to happen.

Capitalism works like this every single day. Remember the calculation that the car companies went through before installing seat belts in every car? They weighed the cost of lawsuits versus putting a rather inexpensive safety item in their cars. Untikl the lawsuits were going to be larger than the cost of the belts, well, people can just die, profits won't be affected. It's heartless. I have no allegiance to an economic system that demands underemployment and then stigmatizes those very people kept out of work! If everybody is working in a capitalist society then wages will rise, the bosses sure don't want that so they keep an underclass to draw desperate workers from, pay them far less than a living wage and reap all the profits. When the worker can no longer perform, or his salary is getting too high, or his pension might actually have to be paid off, he is fired, often to be offered the same job back at lower wages without benefits. Criminal capitalist behavior.

Remember Enron? While the top bosses sold off their stock knowing it was about to fall they told the longtime employees to keep buying it! Those poor saps ended up broke and without the pensions they had worked for for decades while the rich thieves got to keep their money and not face jail time. Sure, one guy was going to be a scapegoat bbut he died before trial.

My point here is that capitalism is used for a lot of really bad actions, thoughtless actions, destructive actions and it is protected by property laws over human rights nearly every time they clash. It is not the wonderful panacea you claim but a tough economic system that can be used for good or ill, but tending towards ill in my opinion.

One of the main functions of government is to control criminal business behavior like insider trading, racketeering and physical coercion. Without it, it is merely the law of the jungle, each man for himself, devil take the hindmost (the poor in this case are the hindmost). How is that jungle law more moral or even useful than a blend of many systems that work in part? Some aspects of socialism are great, necessary and in use in the USA today, such as libraries, police, public works and schools to name but a few collective actions taken by people. The labels tend to obscure the actions. Some aspects of capitalism are great and necessary too. Some aspects of Libertarianism make sense. Some aspects of hard core communism make sense. It's who gets control and calls the shots that counts.

With wise governance people can move ahead in life, get reasonable goals met and live happy lives. With poor controls as we have now, we are continually plunged into recessions, depressions and wars by the greedy, unregulated forces of capital.

Who profits by war? The arms manufacturers. Who profits from sickness? The HMO's. and insurance companies. Letting the profit motive get between people and live-saving medicines or food or clean water means misery created by greed and shortsighted profit taking.

I suppose you will have a lot of arguments to whitewash what I have just said, even though it is all true and kind of obviously damning of aspects of the system you adore so much. I could go on for hundreds or thousands of such examples but I leave it to you to discover that not all businessmen are saints.

The only reason the USA is still the #1 economy is that we have stolen so much from so many for so long. Check out South American history for few hundred examples. For instance, in the 20th century the Marines were sent into Nicaragua 19 times on orders from the United Fruit Company to quell native opposition to their plantation practices. Capitalism made sure they only made a product for export so that the rich owners could make a fortune while native subsistence farmers were systematically stripped of their land and lives for the banana trade to flourish. They weren't allowed to produce varied crops to eat themselves but had to sell bananas, then buy imported food to survive.... at high prices, of course, gotta make a profit! How is that a great story about the positive benefits of capitalism?

I'll go on at great length as time goes on, but I know you are a hardened rightist, so it will be of no avail with you (especially since you are beholden to the current system for your livelihood) , but perhaps others will get strength from the fact that some are willing to tell the ugly truth instead of cheerlead for the murderers ( I of course mean upper) class. I am not a socialist or communist, I am an American citizen. I desire freedom and liberty. I wish the best for all people who are willing to be friendly. I speak truth to power, lame as that sounds. Viva Mog!

Hell of an argument Mog
and
Hwatta, it seems to me that even though the fault may lie beyond the word,that is on a handfull of the users of the word, the word may be too easy to abuse and so needs regulation imho.

PS:

" www.foxnews.com/us/2013/01/03/snake-hunting-season-for-any-takers-to-begin-this-month-in-florida/ "

rex

Last Edited : Friday, 4 January 2013 - 18:27

That old scifi:
"The Incredible Shrinking Man" was on *"TCM"* past couple of hours ...
the main character continues to shrink due to an odd combination of insecticide and then later radiation exposure down to the size where a common household spider first becomes his adversary and then it can be imagined that later he'd have to fend off ants.

Anyway, oddly that movie has always been the basis of my thoughts of our Earth being able to support hundreds of times our present population;
that is, if our scientists breed us to grow ever smaller until our average height is possibly 6".

rex

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