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Do you think capitalism will continue to work in the future?

2

Comments

  • #32
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 18,046 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Rothmans wrote: »
    Compare communist N Korea to capitalist S Korea. Famine in the North, relative prosperity in the South.

    Can you really say "prosperity" when it's debt though?
    http://en.ce.cn/subject/financialcrisis/financialcrisisln/200903/31/t20090331_18670336.shtml


  • #33
    Ostrom
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,483 ✭✭✭Ostrom


    Rothmans wrote: »
    Capatalism has been around since, well . . . since time began.
    ...no it hasn't....


  • #34
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    Deleted User wrote: »
    Can you really say "prosperity" when it's debt though?
    http://en.ce.cn/subject/financialcrisis/financialcrisisln/200903/31/t20090331_18670336.shtml

    The people are better off. note the term 'relative' in my original post please


  • #35
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    efla wrote: »
    ...no it hasn't....

    . . . . . yes it has . . . .


  • #36
    landsleaving
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,345 ✭✭✭landsleaving


    Rothmans wrote: »
    Its amazing how socialist societies seem to crumble within decades of their establishment whilst capitalist countries last for centuries (if not millenia!) - eg the United Kingdom

    Actually feudalism dominated until fairly recently, historically speaking. Capitalism isn't all that old.


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  • #37
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 18,046 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Rothmans wrote: »
    The people are better off. note the term 'relative' in my original post please

    I know the people are better off.. Note the term "continue to work" in my original title please.


  • #38
    Ostrom
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,483 ✭✭✭Ostrom


    Rothmans wrote: »
    . . . . . yes it has . . . .

    You're missing a few millenia of pastoralism and subsistence agriculture


  • #39
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    Deleted User wrote: »
    Can you really say "prosperity" when it's debt though?
    http://en.ce.cn/subject/financialcrisis/financialcrisisln/200903/31/t20090331_18670336.shtml

    Loans 'which the government aims to gradually reduce'. Seems sensible enough capitalist policy to me. Loans create wealth - that is their purpose.


  • #40
    landsleaving
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,345 ✭✭✭landsleaving


    Rothmans wrote: »
    Loans 'which the government aims to gradually reduce'. Seems sensible enough capitalist policy to me. Loans create wealth - that is their purpose.

    Loans don't create anything other than the false illusion of wealth. Unless you mean for the people who provide them, then they create lots of wealth.

    Their purpose is to allow people to get the things they want before they've earned the money for them, thus creating less wealth in the long run as they are forced to pay interest, which they would have avoided without a loan.

    I'm not arguing that they aren't necessary, one needs a place to live, but they most certainly do not create wealth.


  • #41
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 18,046 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Rothmans wrote: »
    Loans 'which the government aims to gradually reduce'. Seems sensible enough capitalist policy to me. Loans create wealth - that is their purpose.

    So does all this ever return to zero?
    http://www.visualeconomics.com/gdp-vs-national-debt-by-country/

    Is it even possible to reduce it when we look at the P+I basis for it? Once it's lent in the first place, it can't be paid back.. That's the discussion I meant to base this thread on but it got side tracked.


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  • #42
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    Deleted User wrote: »
    I know the people are better off.. Note the term "continue to work" in my original title please.

    LOL - Communism doesn't work and it cannot 'continue to work' if communist governments and societies collapse before before they even get a chance to 'continue to work'.

    In other words, they cannot 'continue to work' if they don't work in the beggining.

    With regard to Captitalist societies ability to continue to work, capitalist countries like S Korea have being 'continuing' to work, so to speak, since capitalism began ( that's a poor way of phrasing btw but im very tired)


  • #43
    [Deleted User]
    Posts: 18,046 ✭✭✭✭ [Deleted User]


    Rothmans wrote: »
    LOL - Communism doesn't work and it cannot 'continue to work' if communist governments and societies collapse before before they even get a chance to 'continue to work'.

    In other words, they cannot 'continue to work' if they don't work in the beggining.

    My original title is called "Do you think capitalism will continue to work in the future?" What are you on about?
    That was my point, at the moment, it's all gravy but in the future, it might not be..


  • #44
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    landsleaving wrote: »
    Actually feudalism dominated until fairly recently, historically speaking. Capitalism isn't all that old.

    Fuedilism is capitalism, only in smaller circles (again, please forgive the poor phrasing-im very tired)


  • #45
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    efla wrote: »
    You're missing a few millenia of pastoralism and subsistence agriculture


    To what exactly are you refering. Basic farming?


  • #46
    Ostrom
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,483 ✭✭✭Ostrom


    Yes


  • #47
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    landsleaving wrote: »
    Loans don't create anything other than the false illusion of wealth. Unless you mean for the people who provide them, then they create lots of wealth.

    Their purpose is to allow people to get the things they want before they've earned the money for them, thus creating less wealth in the long run as they are forced to pay interest, which they would have avoided without a loan.

    I'm not arguing that they aren't necessary, one needs a place to live, but they most certainly do not create wealth.

    That is a fundamental misunderstanding of economics -I'm stating that the primary function of loans is to CREATE wealth and not merely to provide wealth


  • #48
    Liam Byrne
    Closed Accounts Posts: 18,152 ✭✭✭✭Liam Byrne


    I'd hope that people would realise that it won't work, and that they'd also realise the difference between communism and true socialism.

    Unfortunately, I fear that the answer is that it will continue to "work", in the sense that "money talks" so it will work for those with money and lobbying power, while the rest of us get screwed over.

    The worst aspect of the current bastardisation of capitalism is the socialising of the losses while those who siphoned off millions and billions during the boom years get to keep those billions that those paying now never saw, and will never see.


  • #49
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    efla wrote: »
    Yes

    How is that not capitalism - the farmer grows produce and is rewarded for = capitalism, no?


  • #50
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    Deleted User wrote: »
    So does all this ever return to zero?
    http://www.visualeconomics.com/gdp-vs-national-debt-by-country/

    I should hope not. If it did then our banking system, and capitalism could collapse


  • #51
    Ostrom
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,483 ✭✭✭Ostrom


    Rothmans wrote: »
    How is that not capitalism - the farmer grows produce and is rewarded for = capitalism, no?

    No. Farmer consumes his own produce, travels with grazing livestock, labours in kind for his feudal lord, meets his needs by barter many centuries before he trades labour for monied wage


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  • #52
    OxfordComma
    Closed Accounts Posts: 407 ✭✭OxfordComma


    Winston Churchill once said something to the effect of "Democracy is the worst form of government, except all of the other ones" (if my memory serves me correctly) and I think capitalism can be described similarly. I'm no expert in politics or economics, but capitalism has always seemed to me be the only truly viable form of social system (nowadays, in any case), despite its many, many failings.

    I've always thought that there was something very unnatural about the whole idea of communism (although it is a very nice theoretical concept). It's based around the assumption that people are equal in all respects, when in reality the opposite is the case. That's not to say that some people are "better" than others in a general sense, but there is no question that some people are, for example, more hard-working, more innovative, more intelligent or more talented than others. Some people benefit society more than others. People don't all deserve the same (monetary) rewards regardless of what they do - that doesn't make any sense at all, and in a way it's not hard to understand why communism, broadly speaking, has to be enforced by totalitarian regimes. People need incentives, and people who work harder, train/study for longer etc, deserve to be rewarded for it.

    To be honest, I can't see any viable alternative to the capitalist system in operation now, despite its huge flaws.


  • #53
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    Deleted User wrote: »
    My original title is called "Do you think capitalism will continue to work in the future?" What are you on about?
    That was my point, at the moment, it's all gravy but in the future, it might not be..

    The second paragraph is about capitalism continuing to work.
    With regard to the second question, are you familiar with John Maynard Keynes?


  • #54
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    efla wrote: »
    No. Farmer consumes his own produce, travels with grazing livestock, labours in kind for his feudal lord, meets his needs by barter many centuries before he trades labour for monied wage


    Yes. And if he didn't grow crops?


  • #55
    Liam Byrne
    Closed Accounts Posts: 18,152 ✭✭✭✭Liam Byrne


    The issue with capitalism is the greed and profit.

    If someone creates something and charges a fair price to cover costs and some overheads and R&D and a bit extra for a rainy day, then fair enough.

    People suggest that socialism creates laziness, but so does capitalism once you reach a certain income....you don't contribute and you sit back and get "profits" that you don't need, created by charging the end-user and consumer more than they needed to pay, so that you can accumulate more money than you will ever need.


  • #56
    Ostrom
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,483 ✭✭✭Ostrom


    Rothmans wrote: »
    Yes. And if he didn't grow crops?

    He hunted, gathered, foraged or engaged in animal husbandry


  • #57
    landsleaving
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 4,345 ✭✭✭landsleaving


    Rothmans wrote: »
    Fuedilism is capitalism, only in smaller circles (again, please forgive the poor phrasing-im very tired)

    While similarties technically exist, the ideals of coapitalism are not present in pre-capitalist society. The ruling classses could not be challenged, the poor simply 'rented' the land of the Lord, in exchange for their labour. They could not rise above their position and could not own land. The gap between the wealthy aristocracy and the poor serfs was enormous and unquestioned, as the aristocracy were 'chosen by god'

    Capitalism, in its purest form, should allow anyone to become wealthy and own land, through their labour, which was directly remunerated. This is really quite different. Working for a wage, which can be used to improve your position in life, the idea that you can rise to the top of society in monetary terms, these are relatively new concepts and are the foundation of modern capitalism.


  • #58
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    efla wrote: »
    He hunted, gathered, foraged or engaged in animal husbandry

    No thats not what I meant. I meant that by growing crops, hunting etc he was maiking a living for himself which, I'm afeared to inform you my dear, is capitalism.


  • #59
    Ostrom
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,483 ✭✭✭Ostrom


    Rothmans wrote: »
    No thats not what I meant. I meant that by growing crops, hunting etc he was maiking a living for himself which, I'm afeared to inform you my dear, is capitalism.

    No, it isnt. The mode of production is not determined by the mere act of cultivation. Honestly, even wikipedia would clear up the basics.


  • #60
    Rothmans
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 1,806 ✭✭✭Rothmans


    landsleaving wrote: »
    While similarties technically exist, the ideals of coapitalism are not present in pre-capitalist society. The ruling classses could not be challenged, the poor simply 'rented' the land of the Lord, in exchange for their labour. They could not rise above their position and could not own land
    Not necessarrilly- (this is a bit OT but) could they not become a knight?
    landsleaving wrote: »
    The gap between the wealthy aristocracy and the poor serfs was enormous and unquestioned, as the aristocracy were 'chosen by god'

    Capitalism, in its purest form, should allow anyone to become wealthy and own land, through their labour, which was directly remunerated. This is really quite different. Working for a wage, which can be used to improve your position in life, the idea that you can rise to the top of society in monetary terms, these are relatively new concepts and are the foundation of modern capitalism.


    You are talking about what I would refer to as 'pure capitalism'. However, if that was the point of this thread then this thread would be moot as Ireland, the UK, the U.S ( all Eu countries) etc are not technically 'capitalist' in the purest sense. If this was the case would we be providing social welfare, rent allowance etc? Is that not a socialist policy?


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  • #61
    El Siglo
    Registered Users, Registered Users 2 Posts: 3,803 ✭✭✭El Siglo


    Capitalism would work if a government had a transparent operation, if taxes were collected proportionally and spent better on services. Seriously, I don't like capitalism as this monolith juxtaposed to socialism. However, no one would complain if taxes were appropriated and spent properly. If health care was either universal like the NHS or insurance based like Holland. If education was better provided, like that of Finland, if infrastructure like roads and rail etc... was similar to that of Holland etc... The point is capitalism doesn't necessarily have to be about inequality or social darwinism, if the wealth produced by the richest was taxed accordingly and fairly by a state and spent appropriately, then we'd hit the nail on the head. What's mad is, we're talking like its a zero-sum game and that inevitably there's winners and losers. If we developed and implemented an economic and social model like this, I'd be very happy.


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