Yes, the modern lumpenproletariat.  You can find them behind the counter in most retail stores and fast food joints.  They don't amount to very much in the wider scale, beyond an overall lowering of the level of discourse and expectation.  Their greatest power is their ability to screw things up through ignorance, opening up opportunities for the unscrupulous, and leaving the competent to pick up the pieces.  They're not the ones I'm referring to.  I'm talking about the movers and shakers, the idea-makers and wordsmiths.  The people who actually shape public opinion, who tell the plebs what to think - these people have myths of their own, and those are the ones that trickle down and influence policy.

Just as an example - I'm a die-hard capitalist, but whenever I hear or read about a Joe Shmoe claiming to support capitalism, I get angry.  It's a safe bet that person doesn't know anything about economics besides "buy low, sell high".  He's never read Smith, Ricardo, Bastiat, von Mises, Hayek, Keynes, Friedman, etc.  He has no idea what marginal utility is.  He doesn't know how prices help manage scarcity.  His opinion was spoon-fed to him at some point.  It's exactly the same with every other major idea or philosophy in America today - Marxists who haven't read Marx, Christians who haven't read the Bible, etc etc ad nauseam.

These people don't originate the ideas, or pick them up from primary sources - they get them from ideologues, and they change from year to year, maybe even week to week for some especially wishy-washy people.  Lacking the ability to communicate effectively, these people can't pass on their ideas very well.  It's the ideologues and intellectuals, bound by their own myths, that propagate them and ultimately foist them on the rest of the populace.  E.g. Policy-makers in the Department of Education decide on what specific blend of sewage they should pour into the public schools.  In their case, one specific myth is very ego-driven and self-preservationist - the idea that their jobs are necessary and important, so the government should be sacrosanct.

99.9% of people who've gone through the public schools would be aghast at abolishing the Department of Education, jumping to the immediate conclusion it means abolishing public schools.  They don't think about it, because they were taught to have a naïve faith in the state.  This isn't just speculation on my part - I've had more than one person refuse to accept that there were public schools before the federal DoE was created.

Society is always changing and it is only the personal view that make a judgment. Society is a method to cooperate, to pool skills so people can experience more than their personal limits. It also offers a system to procreate and continue the human race.

In over the last 200 years leaders of various political beliefs have worked to have people follow their plans for a perfect society. Marx, Hitler, Thomas Jefferson, and many other's, some with workable ideas and some with huge faults but all with the belief that they had the best one way of making the world a better place. It is more of a philosophic question, "Is there only one best way?"

Posted on: October 02, 2008, 11:40:07 am

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Quote from: tekla on October 01, 2008, 04:05:42 PM
Are you in California?  Most of the people I know here LOVE that system, one of the great and outstanding progressive reforms.  It brought us the Coastal Law, the opt out of the war on drugs medical marijuana law, and Prop 13, an awesome law that increased stability and improved neighborhoods too.  And most of the people I know, know more about the propositions than about national law, if only because its a lot closer to home.

QuoteUnable to get short-term financing, California may have to ask the United States government to lend it $7 billion.

QuoteBut no one wants to pay.

QuoteOf course no one wants to pay, and for good reason too.  I read here about people using student loans to pay for SRS and HRT, and I do not give a damn about what people do, but when your doing it with my money, that sucks.  I am happy to pay some taxes for student loans, because I think education is important.  Paying it for personal improvement.  Screw that.

But any patriot knows, we owe something to the commonwealth. 

Its a fine line between the two.

But now it is my money also.

The people who pay aren't the ones who decide where that line is drawn.

Quote from: tekla on October 01, 2008, 02:23:39 PM
What the 'they' is, is exactly Wall Street and its constant demand that capitalism requires us to give away our best jobs to the third world so that economic standards and environmental issues need never be addressed.  Profits UP, people DOWN. 

I do not think that we as a nation believe in any sort of redistribution of wealth, but we do adhere to a much older notion, that of Commonwealth (matter of fact a couple of our states are even named that) - that all wealth is not private, but for the most part, public.

I hardly worship the state as god, hell, I don't even worship god as god.

I'm with that. It seems to me that if we lived in little tiny villages or tribes, we wouldn't think twice about sharing our tools, our skills, and other necessities. The same should apply to big bad smelly modern civilization. Commonwealth. People who find a way to success should be rewarded, however, people who cannot achieve the same for whatever reason, should be taken into consideration.


Posted on: October 03, 2008, 03:20:39 pm

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I have coined a new phrase to describe the American Economic system.




I'm not joking.   

Except that America isn't very capitalist at all.  Private property and self-ownership are violated as a matter of routine.  Just controlling capital doesn't make you a capitalist.

Also, there's a causal relationship between economic systems based on sharing, and people living in small, primitive villages.  That's not to say sharing is bad, but that it just doesn't work on a larger scale.  It does nothing to solve the calculation problem - how should resources be coordinated among people when they've never met each other and might have conflicting goals and values?

that's what I mean, the capitalism isn't even true capitalism. It's twisted, manipulated, controlled by whackos, and it's full of small people being stepped on and all that. It's just a lie that feeds false hope to people who are gutted by the cruel joke.

It's Terror-Capitalism!   

I sort of see what you mean, but where does the "capitalism" part come in?  Doesn't that just perpetuate the misconception that we have actual capitalism in America, and make it that much harder to be talk about the real thing and not be misunderstood?

That's not to say sharing is bad, but that it just doesn't work on a larger scale.

True 'nuff.  But....... What exactly does work on the kind of scale we're talking about here?  Capitalism is swell, don't get me wrong, I'm all for people working hard to make money, and when they make it, they get to keep it.  (Hookers"N Blow, or tax free bonds, YOU MAKE THE CALL!)  Some amount has to be ponied up to the 'common welfare' and all.  However, I'm not thrilled with social adjustment programs.  Though I am in favor of things that would seem to address a long-held really, stupid belief.  So, while I'm against anysort of income redistribution deal (largely I will add because they don't work, the rich get richer and the poor get ... anyway) but I do love Title IX that forced colleges to spend as much on womens' sports as they did on the guys.  That's peachy keen to me.

But, what I wanted to say, was that the scale of things were trying to work things out on now, it may, just maybe, a scale too far.  Too big to be stable.  For sure on too big to be sustainable.  So, I'm not sure what works, and neither is anyone else in leadership role, which is very scary.

That's the beauty of an actual market system - it's highly dynamic and decentralized, and adjusts to changes in scarcity and preference much more readily than what we have now.  It's the prices that do it, and it's no wonder that things get worse in proportion to the degree of price control (wages, salaries, compensation, interest, floors, ceilings, supports, etc.), since it defeats the entire organizational purpose of the market.  Our system is only "big" because we chose "businessmen" and "leaders" who believe in top-down command, for their own benefit - it's not some iron law of market economics.

Quote from: Nephie on October 03, 2008, 10:16:21 PM
I sort of see what you mean, but where does the "capitalism" part come in?  Doesn't that just perpetuate the misconception that we have actual capitalism in America, and make it that much harder to be talk about the real thing and not be misunderstood?

Yes it does exactly what you said because it's Terror-Capitalism!

(sorry. I am required to use the term as often as possible in order to get it picked up by others)

I'm not feeling the meme...

QuoteTerror-Capitalism

More like Terror-Consumerism!

Well the basic system that has evolved over the past 100 or so years (everything that came before industrialism was a very different world) is one of mass production and mass consumption.  Both are equally required, its the formula, the basic equation of capitalism as we know it. 

That cycle of production and consumption has grown to vast and sweeping levels.  Just think, every day, EVERY DAY, the US has to somehow get about 19 million barrels of oil a day, and that's not even our total energy usage.  Along with just getting all that oil out of the ground, and shipped half way around the world there are the sums of money - now grown to astronomical proportions - that fuels all that.  At some point, all of that becomes too big to manage, or at least too big for humans to manage. 

Just think of how much money is flowing around the world just in the next few minutes, and who is really controlling all that?  Can it be controlled?  And in the end its just a system, and all systems hit the wall running from time to time, nothing's perfect.

And, once you have all that going, the huge amounts of everything, all in motion from here to there, how long can you keep that act up?  How long can it survive?  Is is sustainable?

And, the short answer is, nope.  It's not sustainable.  Its based on several things, like cheap oil and cheap energy and cheap natural materials, and none of that is sustainable, and all three parts of it are running out.

A lot of what's going on is that people who know and who pay attention are seeing some very real problems ahead and trying to cut themselves a winning deal now.

Quote from: lisagurl on October 05, 2008, 10:09:39 AM

QuoteTerror-Capitalism

More like Terror-Consumerism!

That works too.

Sure, there's no more cheap petroleum is over, but neither is there cheap land, or cheap slaves, or cheap waste disposal, or even cheap whale blubber or ivory.  And yet, important as these things were to previous generations, we're not up in arms over them.  Who uses whale oil for lighting nowadays?  We've moved on to more efficient things.  The same thing will happen with petroleum as scarcity increases, driving up prices and opening up alternate areas of development.

And as for management, it's been a long time since any one individual, or even an organization, was able to comprehend the scope of economic production.  We don't need to worry about "managing" it, since there's no room for a manager.  It's the most decentralized thing on Earth.  Leonard Reed described it best in I, Pencil - human creativity and productivity can't be masterminded.

scope of economic production.  We don't need to worry about "managing" it, since there's no room for a manager.  It's the most decentralized thing on Earth.

I doubt that.  Manufacturing and production are site specific for the most part.  If it was not, then Mississippi would be making as many computer parts as California, or both would have equal agricultural basis. That's not true.  Financial markets are located too, access may be available, but your playing in New York and London.  Matter of fact, its a rather odd patchwork, highly centralized according to sector.

Manufacturing and production are actually highly decentralized.  Pick any product, and try to tell me that it's all made in one place.  What about the tools, the machinery, the raw materials, and the knowledge?  Even at the most basic level, those come from elsewhere.  What about everything that goes into each of those?

Did you read the link in my post?  The gist of it is that for even something as simple as a wood pencil, there isn't one person on this planet who can tell you everything that goes into making it.

And the basic flaw with much of this seems to me to be that there is the presumption that when oil, coal, whatever is gone, why! like magic a new "unlimited" supply of something will be found to take care of the crisis. All through the agency of human creativity.

That would be fine except there are limits to human creativity and creativity is also located: in the mind and in how that mind is inclined to look at the world. A hammer-maker may be wonderfully creative, but he's most likely to use his creativity to make a revolutionary hammer: not make a fusion reactor that works efficiently and at low cost.

Capitalists create desire. Not all desire, just the ones that can be sold exorbitantly. 

Of course that's just my thought and may not be true at all.

Nikki

Look, its impossible.  Production, markets, industry, and finance are all human activities.  They will be concentrated in places with more humans.  Humans, being social animals, or perhaps for other reasons, tend to cluster in large population areas, cities, metropolitan areas, vast sweeping conglomerations of people like the Boston to Washington area (55million plus) or the Greater Los Angeles Area (about 14 million alone).  Since that's where the people are, that's where those activities will be taking place.  Just like farming and other agricultural stuff will find itself in all the places were people are not.   

Such activity can not be seen to be decentralized in any sense when they are all taking place in pretty much the same time and place.

Quote from: tekla on October 05, 2008, 09:11:22 PM
Look, its impossible.

What's impossible?

Quote from: tekla on October 05, 2008, 09:11:22 PM
Production, markets, industry, and finance are all human activities.  They will be concentrated in places with more humans.

OK, that's logical.

Quote from: tekla on October 05, 2008, 09:11:22 PM
Humans... tend to cluster in large population areas

Tautology.  That defines a high population area.

Quote from: tekla on October 05, 2008, 09:11:22 PM
Since that's where the people are, that's where those activities will be taking place.

OK, also a tautology, but for the purpose of illustration.  I'm not sure why you mention this, though.

Quote from: tekla on October 05, 2008, 09:11:22 PM
Just like farming and other agricultural stuff will find itself in all the places were people are not.

That's a pretty funny statement on the face of it, but I think I see what you mean.

Quote from: tekla on October 05, 2008, 09:11:22 PM
Such activity can not be seen to be decentralized in any sense when they are all taking place in pretty much the same time and place.

Whoa, whoa!  You just finished saying that agriculture takes place in a different location than industry.  For that matter, industry and manufacturing isn't some homogeneous mass concentrated in one location - many products have diffuse, globe-spanning chains of production.  Think about how coffee gets into the pot.

Did you read the link I posted? 

Posted on: October 05, 2008, 10:42:55 pm

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Quote from: Nichole on October 05, 2008, 08:56:36 PM
And the basic flaw with much of this seems to me to be that there is the presumption that when oil, coal, whatever is gone, why! like magic a new "unlimited" supply of something will be found to take care of the crisis. All through the agency of human creativity.

You're thinking in terms of the status quo continuing under another name.  I'm talking about shakeups, paradigm shifts.  There's no magic replacement for resources that have been depleted, but there doesn't have to be.  For example, we don't build with stone nearly as much as we used to.  Instead, more efficient techniques and materials have become available, giving us entirely new forms of architecture.  People found, and will continue to find, new ways to build, to live, to cope.  Change is the only constant.

Oil and coal are used because - aside from atomic, which has image problems - they are the most efficient methods of producing energy today.  Saying that we "should" switch to renewable resources, like solar or wind - that's saying we should ignore a windfall gain in the field of energy.  Fossil fuels are just densely packed solar energy, ready and waiting for us.  Sure, pollution is bad, but the incentives for clean energy production from oil and coal have been wrecked by subsidies and the corporate shield.

Quote from: Nichole on October 05, 2008, 08:56:36 PM
A hammer-maker may be wonderfully creative, but he's most likely to use his creativity to make a revolutionary hammer: not make a fusion reactor that works efficiently and at low cost.

And when we have no more need of hammers, or their price grows too great, our funds flow to someone better able to satisfy our desires.

Quote from: Nichole on May 22, 1970, 08:56:21 AM
Capitalists create desire 

Untrue - human nature creates desire.  We all want something.  No sooner do we satisfy a desire, than a new one moves up to take its place.  It's like a stack, a hierarchy of wants.

If we didn't want anything, we'd have no impetus to act.  We'd all just lay on the ground until we died.  I want for that not to happen.   

Quote from: Nichole on May 22, 1970, 08:56:21 AM
Not all desire, just the ones that can be sold exorbitantly. 

Exorbitantly?  If you want to become rich, you don't sell custom yachts to the upper class - you sell a $1 toothbrush to everyone in China.  Further, I wasn't aware that it was a bad thing to give people choices and options they didn't have before.  I'd never presume to control another's life in such a fashion as to deny them their right to dispense with their wealth as they see fit, provided they respect my rights in return.

Also, don't forget that prices are a signaling mechanism in a market economy.  They reflect relative scarcity of goods, and coordinate investment.  If someone has a very high profit margin, than that's a signal for investment and expansion, thus driving the price down.  If the retail price is high, but the profit margin is slim - that's a signal to find substitutes or improve production processes.  And so on, and so forth.