That is a wholly unsatisfactory response
I don’t owe you a “satisfactory” response. I have been trying to explain what system I favour and why given you hadn’t heard of it before. This isn’t a debate and I can’t debate someone who didn’t even know the thing I am talking about even existed before we had this conversation, so stop treating it like one. I am not an expert in any economic system, nor are most people and I doubt you are either. What I do know is that the current one definitely isn’t good for many reasons. I also know that economics is largely pseudoscience and should be treated as such.
Firstly capitalism does work, it is extremely efficient at what it does which is allocating capital, which I’ve never heard of a good alternative. Central planning seems pretty trash as an alternative example But where “capitalism” falls over isn’t to do with it at all. Capitalism is an economic system, it doesn’t dictate anything about how we setup things like welfare or even ubi if you want. Look at Europe, seems pretty chill to me in a lot of countries that are capitalist
I actually live in Europe. That argument won’t work on me. It’s actually so absurd that Americans think Europe is this perfect place just because we aren’t a third world country. There is a cost of living crisis ongoing where I live. I can’t even find a job in my field despite having a masters degree (computer science), and had to move back in with my parents. There are homeless people on the streets. People regularly can’t afford to heat their homes. There are loads more issues if you care to look for them too. Many of these are caused by capitalism.
I can’t say anything about allocating capital because I am not an economist. I can say though the damage that has been caused to people and the environment. There is also no reason why something like market socialism would be less efficient to my knowledge as it uses many of the same ideas that capitalism does including the profit motive. I don’t think it’s a perfect solution by any means, and I am not confident a perfect solution is even possible. I do think it’s something that’s worth a shot.
Right so you would make any other structure of company illegal. I don’t like that particularly, but from your moral system I get it. But then we probably have a fundamental disagreement there that can’t be resolved easily
What moral system do you think I follow exactly? All I want is a world where we don’t have to exploit each other to survive, where everyone is looked after and the planet isn’t dying. To be given the opportunity to improve yourself. Being rewarded for working hard or gaining skills would be good too, but not as important as the rest. Currently I am not getting any of these things and I am rightfully angry about that.
If you actually have a solution that would work better than I am all ears. I don’t think social democracy and welfare can fix all that though, because I have lived in countries with those things and seen them fail. Even the ones that appear to do it well are normally exploiting the planet or other countries to do so.
If we humans can’t work out how to make a system that works for everyone and for the planet then we don’t deserve to be alive frankly. We deserve to go extinct and be replaced by something else.
What really annoys me about socialists/communists is you always want to handwave your bullshit system.
That’s actually one of the main issues I had with marxists funnily enough. That and some authoritarian tendencies. Though there are definitely some who have ideas on how to run an economy, and you might find some of these of interest.
Man I just find it frustrating that not a single socialist I’ve met or talked to can accurately explain their system given any amount of pushback
I can understand wanting to restructure your entire economy because you’re currently facing issues with your current system. But in my opinion the failing isn’t of the economic system but the system built around it. I truly believe with a well implemented tax system and regulations we could keep everyone’s needs met Meaning potentially negative taxation for those of low income and higher taxation as you move upwards
I don’t feel we can blame our economy for the way we’re currently fucking over the plant it terms of climate. Many socialist projects were massively damaging to the environment as well, in both systems the only real fix is regulation. Which I wish we could pass but unfortunately the reality is that in a lot of places voters simply don’t want it (which is dumb)
If you truly want to critique capitalism I think it would be beneficial to understand how it works and some level of the economics Which by the way if you can come up with a cohesive plan for socialism I’d love to see it. As I think fundamentally we want the same things, and I don’t mind which way we go, it’s just thus far socialism doesn’t seem to be very practical
I dunno man, billionaires are a big failure of this economic system. So is alienation of labour. No one should profit from someone else’s work. Even so I could forgive all that of it meant everyone had enough money from working say 20 or 30 hours a week, but that isn’t the case.
I know capitalism isn’t purely to blame for the environmental problems we have, but it is a major component. You can see this with oil companies and their owners lobbying governments not to pass legislation, producing propaganda, and funding bad science.
I actually understand some level of how capitalism works already. Maybe I could learn more, but honestly what I have learned already I find disgusting. How anyone who actually understands it doesn’t find it irredeemable I struggle to understand. That being said it’s certainly a complex system, that certainly seems efficient if you don’t actually look too hard. I think that’s what stops people seeing the very obvious flaws.
I don’t consider it bad for people to make a profit off my work though. They’re always risking something in order for me to be in a position to make profits to begin with. If they weren’t I wouldn’t need the employer, I’d just have a risk free business that I’d run myself
I don’t think the oil companies are a failure of capitalism either. I understand how it looks that way, as they do some real sketchy stuff in the name of profit. But at the end of the day our governments should be regulating them to death, but they aren’t and the reason sadly enough is likely that the average citizen simply doesn’t care. In countries where an actual majority of the population care you see much better results Even under full on communism you could still run in to this issue anyway. Oil is a big industry for a reason, it’s really useful and relatively cheap you could easily see a communist society choosing to use it ignoring the downsides
I think capitalism’s flaws are obvious, which I like. Because we can easily rectify them with government regulation Do you have an example of a flaw of capitalism that can’t be solved? Other than just the idea that profiting off someone else’s labour is wrong, as I think that’s really more of a philosophical question that I don’t think 90% of people would agree with
