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Capitalism is Opposed to Human Happiness Debate, Volume 2
Posts #006-#010
Post #006
Quote: That's a clear Appeal To Authority. The argument fails. Quote: Not according to differing economic theories. See Austrian Theory and possibly Monetarism. Quote: The key word is depression, as in: a state whereby the previous mode of production is too vast for current levels of consumption through compensation, leading to overproduction until the correct amount is produced. Keeping the food is just wasting storehouse resources that can be spent on more useful things. Quote: Slaves are not paid wages and the fields were vast, and keeping them working means less time for them to work against their slave masters, so working them all day was beneficial and that required some reduction of product. I'm not sure about the Dutch case, but you've got to provide an elaboration that is not simply, "They were going to lose profits." Tell me WHY and HOW. Quote: The first is written to confusingly and vaguely, and the second one seems to be a matter of choosing the lesser of two evils. Quote: Natural monopolies don't exist (Oligopoly is a better word) and collisions between businesses are inherently built to eventually cause members to leave. Quote: First of all, the displacement is temporary. If it wasn't, we'd be living with 80 percent unemployment right now. There is also no reason for why new employment is deterred by new technologies, superstructure, and infrastructure. Next, the new production modes allow for cheaper goods to be produced, both directly and holistically. Next, specialization often requires a loss of wage rates when the job becomes obsolete, but that does not disqualify new specialization, the arrival of new generations as customers and workers, and the idea that a few get a small beating for the good of the many from the advancement. Quote: Blah your evidence, and modern recessions occur because of financial control through valuable mineral price control and interest rate manipulation, as noted by Austrian Economics theorists. Quote: No, I said, "Basically", because the rate differs based on productivity and usefulness and because I was referring purely to how individuals can't consume more than they make. If I make 10 dollars worth of stuff and get paid 9 dollars, then I can't consume more resources than I've produced without having to become in debt, thus giving me an incentive to allow for resources to not be frittered away to a point where anyone can get SUVs and mansions. Thus, the funds can be concentrated, reducing the percentage of consumption from them, thus increasing investment. I take food from my own plate, and the cook gets the biggest share. Quote: I'm smelling conspiracy theories. You are also avoiding the basic facts in this conclusion: that production leads to the benefits of material wealth, and the capitalist mode has a propensity for production. Post #007 Hello, lucky... Quote: The problem of Capitalism is the inequality of bargaining power between any two members of a market that necessarily leads towards significantly unequal shares of existence. The solution of Socialism is to balance this inequality, which, however, I did not state how it ought to be done. What gives excessive bargaining power to the Capitalist? It is the possession of the productive forces of society. How do we resolve this? Make it so that everyone is in possession of the productive forces of society. Even this is vague, and can take such conservative forms as labor unions to more radical forms like revolutionary expropriation. Anyhow, this seemed to create its own objection... Quote: It is possession of society's productive capacities that necessarily leads towards exploitation: a situation where a few live well off of the labors of the many in poverty. Naturally, with society compensating members according to their contribution, those who create society's productive forces will be compensated with an exchange value. This can't be too objectional, since this is the exact situation in Capitalism. (Otherwise, show me one Capitalist that laid a brick in their own foundry or dug a hole in their own mine.) Anyhow, the idea of collective ownership of productive forces is so that nobody can live off of the work of others; so that nobody can be a force that taxes the work of others. It does serve the purpose of maximizing the happiness of everyone, since there are no longer any artificial obstacles to working or claiming the fruits of your labor. Besides, what are you going to do with a factory, a manufacturing plant, or a mine? You can't work more than 1% of it on your own. Hence, economists typically make distinctions between consumption goods and capital goods. Thanks, Andy Carloff Post #008 Hello, Michaeluj, Quote: And then your proof... Quote: Hhmmmmm.... Perhaps you do not understand "Appeal to Authority." That is "a statement is correct because the statement is made by a person or source that is commonly regarded as authoritative." I am not quoting these people as "authorities," because some of them certainly are not recognized as such (Kropotkin, for instance). However, I am not quoting them because it is something a person said who is an authority. I am quoting it for the observations, the statistical data, etc.. You have read The Wealth of Nations, right? It relies on historical, commercial, etc., data in deducing its formulations. Say, if I quote the census bureau or I quote the Gross-Domestic Product, is that an appeal to authority? No. It's not. An appeal to authority would be an explanation that looked like this... "See Austrian Theory and possibly Monetarism." In case you are unfamiliar with the books I quoted, allowed me to quote the selected data used in just one of the books by Kropotkin... Quote: "Results of the Census of the French Industries in 1896"!?!? That's obviously an appeal to authority. Also, are you aware of the contradiction of using your own authority to dispell the authority of someone else? If it is a failed appeal to authority, then you're only proving it by relying on your own authority. I didn't see much else along the terms of evidence or reasoning. If you should still doubt the above observations and data, I am ready to provide far more firm, physical and historical examples support the theory of exploitation. Quote: Yes, I understand your explanation -- I pointed it out earlier where I said "to destroy food where selling it wouldn't be as profitable." But, that's quite a turn-around. Before you said "First of all, this is a conspiracy..." when I said that Capitalists are destroying food. And now you explain it for me economically? Thank you. Quote: That is interesting. Masters work slaves arbitrarily, doing non-productive work, so that they wouldn't rebel. Do you have any reference for proving this? Consider the largest slave-empire in the history of the world: the United Kingdom. We know from the domination styles of Canada, India, and Australia, that the sovereign chose a path of leniency and liberty, keeping these colonies for the longest. In contrast, we see the exact same opposite in the Chinese and American colonies, the two colonies that were lost after excruciating violence and brutality. (See "Canada: A Modern History," by J. Bartlet Brebner, in comparing the style of rule between the colonies.) In fact, overwork is almost never attributed to "keeping slaves down." The most noteworthy attribute of the French and Revolution revolutions was the absolute, widespread poverty throughout society that accelerated society in that direction. Quote: SUPPLY and DEMAND. When supply goes down, demand goes up, and when supply goes up, demand goes down. Hence, if you can artificially keep supply down, the excess of demand be able to allow you to maximize profits. President Gowen, of the Reading Railroad, was prosecuted by the US under anti-trust laws. This well-connected industrialist told the court... "Every pound of rope we buy for our vessels or for our mines is bought at a price fixed by a committee of the rope manufacturers of the United States. Every keg of nails, every paper of tacks, all our screws and wrenches and hinges, the boiler flues for our locomotives, are never bought except at the price fixed by the representatives of the mills that manufacture them. Iron beams for your houses or your bridges can be had only at the prices agreed upon by a combination of those who produce them. Firebrick, gaspipe, terracotta pipe for drainage, every keg of powder we buy to blast coal, are purchased under the same arrangement. Every pane of window glass in this house was bought at a scale of prices established exactly in the same manner. White lead, galvanized sheet iron, hose and belting and files are bought and sold at a rate determined in the same way." ("The Lords of Industry," by Henry Demarest Lloyd, North American Review 331 (June 1884).) Quote: Standard oil "through its pipe line, had refused to run oil, unless sold to them, and then declared it could not buy, because the railroads could furnish it no cars in which to move away the oil." Of course, I probably should have quoted the whole thing for you... "Mr. Campbell.... convinced the railroad men they had gone too far, and in a few hours afterwards hundreds of empty cars suddenly appeared ot Parker, and for a week the railroad, which had sait it could furnish no cars, took away from Parker fifty thousands barrels of oil a day!" (Note: Google any of the quoted phrases to find the original article if you're still interested.) Quote: Really? The last time I looked up "Natural Monopoly" in the dictionary, it gave me the example of power lines. Because it would be cheaper for any single company to provide all lines and have all customers, than for any single company to provide its own lines and have its own customers. You'd probably read the same thing in the book "MicroEconomics" by Stephen Slavin -- a fairly typical book for introductory economics. As noted above, the railroad was also another natural monopoly. Quote: I was quoting a study conducted with thousands of workers. I didn't say "they found no employment afterward." I said that almost always they had significantly greater difficulty finding work and never earned the amount they had at their first employment. Quote: This did not happen with the textile industry, which until 1850 was competing with hand-sewn industries and sometimes losing. (See "Political Economy," by Simonde de Sismondi.) Quote: Yes, it does, the vast, significant majority, according to studies. Quote: Now who's using an argument to authority? You don't even quote them -- you interpret them, the way you interpreted Thoreau. Anyhow, there is plenty that can be gleaned from Austrian economics, though Monetarism is probably less valuable. Hey, I have an idea. How about instead of just saying "ah, your theory, which was long ago disproven by the Austrians," why don't you say, "Hey, this is my idea, and why I don't think your idea is right." I'm here for a discussion, not a confession. Quote: "Basically"? If you were to say that one's productive ability were directly proportional to their wage, you would only be looking at a very few situations. Very large, booming economies -- Russia, Brazil, China -- simply by their average earnings compared to gross domestic product per capita, will produce wildly different results. So, when your "basic argument" fails for more than half of the planet, it ceases to be compelling. Quote: Hundreds of years ago, all of our ancestors were either slaves, serfs, or a few privileged who controlled them. They slept on hard floors, ate rotten food, and suffered excruciating, dangerous labor. Since then, the average person now earns more, significantly more -- but Americans, for all that they earn more, cannot save any money. In 2009, the average annual savings of the American citizen was -0.5%. (See "Can Americans save money – and the economy?," by Christian Science Monitor.) Quote: Slavery has a propensity for production. My question, rather, is to understand why a few can live off of the labors of the many; why fields and factories are kept dormant when people "will work for food;" and, more importantly, how to fix it. It is inequality of bargaining power that leads to inequality of outcomes; this isn't doubted in any single act, but now it is doubted when expressed over an entire society. Since society should be formed around maximizing the happiness of all, shouldn't we ask what system best serves this purpose? Also, it is very helpful if you tell me where you received certain facts from (books, etc.). Somehow, I cited studies and economic observations, including GDP and census-growth, but this is "an appeal to authority." Instead, you counter my argument with "See Austrian Theory." Do you understand the problem with this picture? Thank you, Andy Carloff Post #009
Quote: I've had to explain the Austrian theory so many times, that I am sick of talking about it, especially to people who can't even grasp the basic premises of how consumption affects resources and interest rates. I was hoping that you would do your own research into alternative ideas that you seem so apparently fond of doing. Quote: Most of the claims made by these observers are too broad to have been formed of quantitative analysis. For example: Quote: is not an argument but a statement. I can just simply disagree with it. And any book you quote is based on research that is, in some way, limited, whether by available resources or by the bent perception of a biased author. I like numbers, not perceptions. Quote: If you give raw data from the GDP, then no. If you give a conclusion based on a quote, then it is an appeal. Quote: It's a conspiracy to state that it is done for literally no reason other than the magical word PROFIT$!! Quote: Just reasoning. Quote: Liberty, something that wasn't done to the American Black Slaves, is something that helps docility, for how can you be angry at some halfway decent country, as how you describe it? Also, there is less reason to fear revolt when you're safely far away from the slaves, something that the British were instead of the Americans. Quote: The two sentences don't make sense together. Quote: That example refers to fixed prices, not fixed supply. I don't even see why you bothered to use an entirely different set of circumstances to explain a very specific case of Dutch supply. Quote: That is still a jumbled mess without context. I will read Lords of Industry and get back to this. Quote: That's a geographic monopoly, an oligopoly in a broad sense but the controller of everything in the sense that it occupies a certain area at a cheaper price. A real monopoly would be able to raise prices without backlash due to a complete lack of competition. Quote: "Never" seems too...absolute...but it still does not disprove my point anyway. Quote: New technologies often require increased compensation for starters to make up for the increased construction requirements, so that's not a problem. What happened in 1850? Quote: And yet, life goes on, better for everyone else. Quote: Funnily enough, I did not say anything about proportion. My argument did not depend AT ALL about proportion. Strawman. You should read "Basically" as "Similar to, but never as much as what is produced" if you don't like finding the exact meaning of the words through their use in the arguments. Quote: I know, Americans are stupid, right? Since humans sometimes have crazy desires or bad patience for acquiring new things, we should do everything we can to make sure that this depravity doesn't go even lower! If they can't restrain themselves from buying luxuries with the cost of Interest, how can they be expected to live in a world where they earn more money and can freely take from others? It's a mad idea! It's such a shame that people don't live like the Chinese and have their large savings rate. You can't trust humans to be perfect guinea pigs, for there are so many variables. The only thing to do is apply a priori arguments and say, "If there is an example that faults these, then either find a pattern that makes sense in their context or just accept that people have different standards than they ought to." Quote: That's a bare-ass insult. Are you saying that production isn't relevant or that the social issues that you speak of are a worse punishment than any promotion of production that can be promised? Post #010 I would like to bring to the discussion a matter of the developmental characteristics of unions. My concern is particularly with the American Prison Guard Unions and Teacher's Unions. These are a few of the remaining strong unions in America. My complaint probably can be addressed as a matter of disliking their politics, but if we grant that their brand of conservatism makes any change possible, and also that change is necessary we have two concrete and living examples of the general complaint about unions. And observation which could be expanded to include the Soviet Union. Granting that there are grounds to complain about unions, I have another problem in that "Reaganomics" along with Thatcherite policies were explicit strategies for dealing with such unions and I have as well, grounds to complain about the effects of these. A pop-culture example would be the opinions of Micheal Moore. It seems pretty clear to me that privatization has resulted in greater economic wealth overall, without benefit to the middle class and that it has been disastrous to the lower class. Given that macro-economics is complex and a subject of a great deal of acrimony and disagreement I would say that overall the subject is not really something we can say we understand. On the other hand it yields to some perfectly intuitive analogies, for example; That in the first case if you want to practice capitalism you do some work, and if you want to practice socialism you help your neighbors. I would suggest that there is something altogether other going on. That the truth about macroeconomics is that it is not in fact primarily a matter of economics.
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