71–80 of 116 posts
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Can you define "graft", as you use it here? The common definition is "the obtaining of money or advantage through the dishonest use of power and influence" [0], but that doesn't seem like what you mean. [0] http://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/graft
Sorry, I'm a speaker of the Queen's English: British Slang. work; labor. http://www.dictionary.com/browse/graft
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>It really isn't a question of the rentier class vs proletariat. Capitalism solved that problem a long time ago. How exactly did Capitalism solve that problem? We still have stark class divisions between people who make the majority of their money from capital ownership and people who have to work to survive.
>We still have stark class divisions between people who make the majority of their money from capital ownership and people who have to work to survive. It is true that there are divisions, but anyone can now participate in the acquisition of wealth and resources. You can save and reinvest until you attain your goals in life but most people are engaged in the consumption of capital goods such that even if they wanted…
Work may currently be necessary, but it is not "good". For most people it is boring and unpleasant, and a world where they could do something else would be a better world. Telling people who spend the majority of their lives working two jobs and still live in poverty that they "don't HAVE to work, they GET to work" is a hollow joke.
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Sorry, I'm a speaker of the Queen's English: British Slang. work; labor. http://www.dictionary.com/browse/graft
That's not the Queen's English, HRH speaks RP.
Edit:
Tangentially, I happen to speak 3 languages and English is not my native language.
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s/Egalitarianism/Authoritarianism/
No communist societies have ever been able to feed themselves - from the Pilgrims, to the USSR, to Jamestown, to the kibbutzen, to North Korea. Voluntary or coercive, the results are the same.
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>We still have stark class divisions between people who make the majority of their money from capital ownership and people who have to work to survive. It is true that there are divisions, but anyone can now participate in the acquisition of wealth and resources. You can save and reinvest until you attain your goals in life but most people are engaged in the consumption of capital goods such that even if they wanted…
>Work is good. Work allows us to eat, get shelter, clothing and move civilisation forward while at it. Work may currently be necessary, but it is not "good". For most people it is boring and unpleasant, and a world where they could do something else would be a better world. Telling people who spend the majority of their lives working two jobs and still live in poverty that they "don't HAVE to work, they GET to work"…
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This is an experiment that is going to test the idea and effects of basic income. It sounds as though you have a lot of fear with the experiment being successful. Is it from a personal perspective or is it something you have been taught?
This experiment has already been done. It always fails and leaves a devastating trail of destruction every time. People die and those that don't(die) leave their countries on dangerous makeshift rafts in pursuit of capitalist nations. I implore you to look at countries that have tried re-distributing income/sustenance; they always fail. Many of them actually realise that that model is unsustainable and quickly revert…
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Friedman himself would disagree with you. He supported a related idea - a negative income tax. Hear him describe it here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xtpgkX588nM . This is not a capitalism vs socialism or left vs right issue.
True but I did not say I invariably agree with all of Friedman's proposals. I think he was sufficiently correct on many things but he wasn't 'right' enough; so to speak.
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True but I did not say I invariably agree with all of Friedman's proposals. I think he was sufficiently correct on many things but he wasn't 'right' enough; so to speak.
Seeking in advance the idea that is right (or left) on the political spectrum is a bad approach, and anyway gets you nowhere in the face of an issue like basic income where heroes of the right and of the left disagree adamantly amongst themselves. If Friedman isn't "right" enough for you, how's Thomas Paine? See his pamphlet entitled "Agrarian Justice". Point is: there is no correct "right" or "left" or "capitalist"…
Nobody said that this new form of wealth transfer will replace existing forms of wealth transfer. The goal here is that it would run in tandem with existing forms of redistribution. It is a delusion that it will ever be enough. Once UBI is in place, other forms of egalitarianism will soon follow until communism is attained. These initiatives are but like a hammer seeking to equalise all the nails on a given piece of wood.
>America - transfers wealth already in many ways
I'm both well aware and firmly opposed to all forms of wealth transfer (inflation, welfare programs, excessive taxation et al). It is beyond atrocious and I couldn't speak less favourably of it.
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So distorting the market by giving people money and letting them decide what they want is bad, but distorting the market by buying/producing arbitrary food and shelter for people is good?
No its lot less worse than UBI. I should point out that the Govt part would be minimal. Food & Shelter should be provided by multiple private entities under contract from Govt. If you want to eliminate Food & Shelter Welfare as well, you would not hear any objection from me.