It's not really capitalism anymore when the government keeps bailing out businesses that are supposed to fail.
This happens when capital owners get enough wealth and influence to capture government regulatory agencies. This is what any attempt at capitalism will build to.
At least the no true communism people use the actual definition of the system in their argument. What you’re describing is literally capitalist organizations acting on the incentives inherent to the system.
Yeah it's called corruption. I think no matter how perfect your ideals are in your head, any idea can be ruined with a little corruption.
Which is why every authoritarian system of government leads to disaster. The fewer people are at the top, the easier it is for that corruption to take hold.
Of course it is. Capitalism, especially neoliberal capitalism, needs the state to support it. Without the state, who will arrest people who go against the wishes of capital? If there isn't one already, capital will become the state.
it is when the richest people have already paid off the government to bail them out, when the time comes, with our tax dollars.
Capitalism isn't the "best system we've got", though... it isn't even the system we are all using right now.
We've never operated in anything like a "purely" capitalist economy, and the socialist policies most western countries have put in place are wildly popular and few people would want to live without them.
Countries that intelligently choose when and where and what things should be operated on a capitalist basis, have better outcomes.
Healthcare? Not something anyone should make money off of. Basic housing, food, water, power... these should be immune to market forces.
At the same time, capitalism drives fantastic technological and social innovation within its swimlane. We just have to pre-define what things people should be able to make money doing.
Capitalism =/= markets.
Socialism =/= public services.
Markets are much older than capitalism, and socialism is a very simple economic idea, being the collective ownership of the means of production by the workers.
Capitalism guides innovation towards increasing profits for capitalist, hardly “innovative”. The USSR was the first to the Moon, after being a feudalistic society, thanks to socialism.
Imean, the USSR wasn't even good socialism. They still used money for quite a large set of things, businesses were very much NOT worker owned in many places, people could be killed by the whims of authorities and a dictator... Yep, not even good socialism got to space first.
Child repeating what their parents and society has told them.
Vs.
Adult who has started to live the reality.
In theory, how would a different system really help?
Currently the people in power manipulate and circumvent the system, do they magically disappear?
The move from absolute monarchies ruled by kings and aristocrats to democracies made the power distribution more equal across classes.
What is needed in a new system is another step in this direction.
The biggest problem and driver of inequality in the current system is that while we have democratic control of government, the control of business is still largely autocratic.
Work and business is a huge part of our lives and making sure that the companies work for workers and consumers and not owners and investors is the next major systemic change that should be sought out.
There is this belief by so many that somehow, if you create the perfect system, it will somehow overcome human nature or that humans will somehow starting acting collectively altruistic with the right political model.
In most cases, they also imagine themselves in a position of power in this new government, either up in an upper "leadership" class or somehow silently leading "but I'm not a leader", as if somehow the idea itself is so potent that people will just, you know, execute it flawlessly without intervention.
Capitalism is great for handling things that are relatively unimportant. So you don't want it for medical, education, infrastructure (including utilities), etc. Its fine for things like fashion or the various things might have around the house. Even then it must be highly regulated.
Agreed, although I'd reframe it; capitalism is a solid default, and does a good job of innovating ... but it tends to operate like gravity, the more capital you have the more you get.
So, you need a mechanism to redistribute that capital, and you need to make sure that the things everyone is supposed to have enough of, don't get distributed that way in the first place.
I've never seen an adolescents defend capitalism. They tend to be either apolitical or anarchists.
I've seen a lot of college kids adamant about the invisible hand of the free market solving all problems.
The communists on Lemmy are cringe as fuck and have to make up these situations to justify their positions.
Also they're nearly all born into wealth lol
Just drop by hexbear some time. It's fucking hilarious to read their discussion thread, because they're all children of software engineers and shit.
hexbear
I've heard about them, and have no interest in dealing with them.
It could be a regional thing. capitalism is practically a religion in the US that parents indoctrinate their kids into.
We prime them from young ages to buy what the commercials show them
This has to be a lie. I've never seen a single kid educated enough to even know what anarchy is. But they're definitely dumb enough to parrot their parents.
That’s because those people are always assuming they will be living capitalism from the CEO’S perspective after school. never from the worker’s perspective.
Young workers doing shit work don't like their jobs.
News at 11.
So when do people typically start enjoying their work?
Retirement
According to some research, the switchover is at around $250k a year or thereabouts.
Can you give one example of a long-term, large scale, non-hierarchical system in human society?
In my experience, the people who work retail and food service are more likely to favor socialism and collective action. But not all of them, of course.
The people who justify capitalism tend to work in higher paid office or managerial jobs. Not all of them, of course, as I am an example, and as are the ton of lower paid office workers that hate their jobs.
Turns out, the people for whom capitalism worked out, tend to like it. Those being crushed by the weight of unsustainable consumption tend to hate it. Go figure.
I don't like to think that I or we really can't imagine a better system but I don't think it's completely unrealistic to say something like best we got. I say this only because things like communism and all their promises can only really come about through a revolution and the price in blood is jaw dropping. So much killing. It also almost certainly means people materially worse off for a long time if not the rest of their lives in the wake of this revolution even if over generations it manages to eventually deliver.
I'm all for substantial reform and leftist/liberal politics but it's difficult for me to ignore the great peril and huge gamble of revolution. Some times a society successfully manages to make things so bad that there's so little to lose that it can seem a realistic option but I think everybody considering that option should weigh it very carefully. It's very possible to sacrifice everything including your own life and thousands of others' only for the whole thing to get derailed by opportunists and to make a bad situation so much worse.
I say this only because things like communism and all their promises can only really come about through a revolution and the price in blood is jaw dropping. So much killing. It also almost certainly means people materially worse off for a long time if not the rest of their lives in the wake of this revolution even if over generations it manages to eventually deliver.
These same arguments can be used to ward off a revolution against a dictatorship or absolutist monarchy, though. Or even against slavery.
I've thought about this a lot. I wonder if a good compromise would be a requirement for maybe 10-20% of all issued and outstanding shares of publicly traded companies to be owned by non-officer employees. It doesn't even have to be given away freely. They could be sold to employees and/or given as part of their total comp. Just enough to get a seat on the board elected by them. Seems reasonable.
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