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David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

theguardian.com

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Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#301

Post by steveklabnik »

patrickaljord wrote: post #232
steveklabnik wrote: post #180

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It does sound familiar, I'm (often) an anarchist. You do realize individualist anarchists (like Tucker) are still socialists, yes? And Tucker still subscribes to the labor theory of value? > so much has been proven wrong. Sigh. > The argument that the value of a commodity is only related to the labor needed to produce or obtain that commodity and not to other factors is now well known to be wrong. You're absolutely r…

> It does sound familiar, I'm (often) an anarchist. You do realize individualist anarchists (like Tucker) are still socialists, yes? And Tucker still subscribes to the labor theory of value? Not really, he was an individualist anarchist that supported private property and a free market economy. He wanted some limitations on land property but all considered he was more of a libertarian than anything else. > You're cri…

You are flat out wrong about Tucker. That essay you cite is about how the only thing shared between anarchists and socialists is the labor theory if value...

I have read many (but not all) of the people you cited. I'm also not a Marxist, though I play one often. Since you're French, I'll name drop Deleuze here...

Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#302

Post by fizzbar »

ahomescu1 wrote: post #279
ant512 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Few people are saying saying "let's not do this" for some value of "this", they're saying "let's not force everyone to do this". There are four guys in a crippled spaceship. They have 7 hours of oxygen left if they continue to breathe normally. If they all make a concerted effort to breathe slowly they could extend the oxygen to 8 hours. The rescue ship arrives in 8 hours. They are all in it together. There's nothi…

> No amount of cajoling, threatening or reasoning will get this guy to give up his "one-man island" philosophy. That's an unreasonable assumption. If he doesn't breathe slowly, he dies. As CamperBob2 also points out, it would be completely irrational for the libertarian astronaut to refuse to cooperate, so he'd go along. The problem most libertarians point out is that we're sometimes forced (by society) to contribute…

How do you define what the "return" is? Perhaps it's not an immediate causal relationship, but a much more complicated, interrelated set of returns -- like a more cohesive, inclusive, better functioning society.

Paying more for welfare to others might pay off in being able to walk the streets at night without being mugged, for example.

Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#303

Post by gnaffle »

bmelton wrote: post #268
gnaffle wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As pertaining to capitalism, our stance is that true capitalism hasn't ever really been tried In some sense, when I hear this argument, I'm reminded by the claim of some Marxists, that you shouldn't conclude that communism doesn't work just becuase it failed in so many countries, after all they didn't implement the communist ideal properly! As you say, I think neither extreme will ever work well as long as we human…

> that you shouldn't conclude that communism doesn't work[...] I haven't concluded that, and as I think I conceded in the original post (or at least somewhere anyway), I'm not entirely convinced that we've discovered what the true path forward is. Regardless, I agree that there hasn't been a fair application of communism, where both its recipients and its administrators were all held to equal benefit. > couldn't you…

My implication was that the problem with both communism and capitalism (at their extremes) can only work well under circumstances that aren't met in real life (because humans are what we are). As you say, there are no easy answers, especially so when we face problems that require global cooperation.

Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#304

Post by bmelton »

gnaffle wrote: post #303
bmelton wrote: post #268

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> that you shouldn't conclude that communism doesn't work[...] I haven't concluded that, and as I think I conceded in the original post (or at least somewhere anyway), I'm not entirely convinced that we've discovered what the true path forward is. Regardless, I agree that there hasn't been a fair application of communism, where both its recipients and its administrators were all held to equal benefit. > couldn't you…

My implication was that the problem with both communism and capitalism (at their extremes) can only work well under circumstances that aren't met in real life (because humans are what we are). As you say, there are no easy answers, especially so when we face problems that require global cooperation.

I don't think I stated myself well. I understood your point -- Mine is that I don't think there's any system that's necessarily going to work better than either of those so long as there are irrational actors, so we should pick one (we already have chosen capitalism, within the constraints of a federal republic) and try to enforce fairness at every step.

We aren't doing a good job of that now, but ultimately, I see that unfairness as the graven flaw in any system, and more responsible for fault than the system itself (usually).

Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#305

Post by dllthomas »

majika wrote: post #6

This is a remarkably sensible speech. The idea that the market will solve such things as environmental concerns, as our racial divides, as our class distinctions, our problems with educating and incorporating one generation of workers into the economy after the other when that economy is changing; the idea that the market is going to heed all of the human concerns and still maximise profit is juvenile. It's a juvenil…

Incidentally, I think a lot of those questions are missing the trees for the forest - speaking in broad terms like "more government or less", "more regulation or less" is not terribly useful. There are tremendously bad ways to add more government and more regulation, and tremendously bad ways to remove them. One may have some bias in one direction or the other, but policies and proposals should be considered, and implemented or scrapped, on their merits. If we're going to be speaking in vague platitudes, then it probably makes sense to stick to a high enough level that it's not divisive, but it's not terribly useful for making decisions either way.

Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#306

Post by robomartin »

logfromblammo wrote: post #271
robomartin wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with your views regarding less government being a good thing. Just in case some take pride in the number you provided I want to take a moment to put it into some context. > The 2012 Federal government expenditures were 3.54 trillion. Right off the top, the Federal government accounts for 22.6% We thankfully have a canonical example that exposes just how bad government can be: Obamacare. Government is the only…

I have been working for government contractors / subcontractors / sub-subcontractors / military-industrial complicators for a few years now. For the last year, I have been working with a team of 20+ to accomplish only half of a task that would have been absolutely trivial in comparison with my last job in the fully private sector. It could have been accomplished by one person working for 6 months, or perhaps 2 workin…

Yup. Pretty much my experience working with government agencies. They'll pay two to ten times more for half the product and the ability to shift blame elsewhere in case things go wrong. It's sad that making comments like these --which are factual-- are often met with comments characterizing the poster as a right wing extremist of some sort. Sad. Open your eyes folks. You have been so utterly brainwashed by the liberal machine you'll bend over backwards to justify the most ridiculous things and ignore the damage this ideology is doing our country. I find it really telling that someone, in response to my billion dollar claim regarding the obamacare website, came back with a number in the $150 million range. And that justifies supporting the incompetence, fraud and thievery this represents? In other words, it's OK they spent $150 million for something that should have cost one to five, at most, because these are "your people". Well, you know what, you pay for it with your money. Not my money. Yours. I don't want to pay for the product of incompetence and fraud. That's just me.

Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#307

Post by patrickaljord »

steveklabnik wrote: post #301
patrickaljord wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It does sound familiar, I'm (often) an anarchist. You do realize individualist anarchists (like Tucker) are still socialists, yes? And Tucker still subscribes to the labor theory of value? Not really, he was an individualist anarchist that supported private property and a free market economy. He wanted some limitations on land property but all considered he was more of a libertarian than anything else. > You're cri…

You are flat out wrong about Tucker. That essay you cite is about how the only thing shared between anarchists and socialists is the labor theory if value... I have read many (but not all) of the people you cited. I'm also not a Marxist, though I play one often. Since you're French, I'll name drop Deleuze here...

> You are flat out wrong about Tucker. That essay you cite

I'm not talking about that essay but Tucker in general. He was pro free-market and private property.

> I'll name drop Deleuze here

No way, you name drop the guy all the time on HN and elsewhere (don't remember where right now). Deleuze even in French reads like well written logorrhea, fun but nonsense and mostly anti-capitalist (how original).

Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#308

Post by nickff »

hbags wrote: post #298
nostromo wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Inflation is a way to silently lower wages without pissing off workers. See more: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/10/27/business/economy/in-fed-an... Key quote: "Rising prices allows companies to increase profit margins quietly, by not raising wages"

Your réponse (and dnautic's much longer response) are both based on an unsupported assumption: that employers in a zero inflation environment wouldn't trim wages. The change in inflation would impart no change to the balance of power, so there's zero reason to believe that employers would become more generous in the alternate condition. We already see employers trimming employee wages even today. It would simply be m…

Keynesian stimulus is often justified by 'wage stickiness', which is a theory that nominal wages are very slow and unlikely to adjust down; the stimulus causes inflation and devalues real wages, by increasing the money supply.[1] Please note that this is not my belief, but it is supported by some empirical evidence, and is widely held in some circles.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keynesian_economics#Wages_and_s...

Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#309

Post by mooreds »

yetanotherphd wrote: post #225
mooreds wrote: post #20

"...because you know when people get to the end there's always the brick." Chilling.

I find it chilling that the left still get away with their implicit threats of violence unchallenged. Can you imagine someone saying that about immigration? They would almost certainly be locked up in the UK. There is a double standard where saying "X will lead to violence, but I am just warning you, I don't want to see it happen" is allowed for some, but not others.

Well, it happens on both sides in the USA all the time. Plenty of violence to go around over here.

Re: David Simon: 'There are now two Americas. My country is a horror show'

#310

Post by Mikeb85 »

chongli wrote: post #193
Mikeb85 wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because it's based on the idea of exponential growth. Except it isn't. It's based on the expectation that the market will allocate resources based on factors like supply/demand. We focus on growth because it's a human tendency to always want more. Has nothing to do with capitalism.

No, you've got your definitions mixed up. You're talking about the free market. Capitalism is about capital ; that is, investment with the goal of profit. The only way to sustain continued investment and subsequent profit is to have growth.

Capitalism and the free market are synonymous with each other. In a free market, you sell goods produced with capital (ie. labour, resources, which are purchased with money, or your own time), and you make money (aka. profit).

In the most basic of examples, let's say I'm a farmer. I plant some seeds, take care of them, harvest the grains, and then sell them. My capital is whatever seeds I planted, and the labour I used to raise them, then harvest them. What I get paid is my revenue, and the amount of money that I'm compensated that goes beyond the minimum required to produce my goods is my profit. Heck, even if I didn't sell my grain, you could say whatever I produced is my revenue, and whatever's left in my silo beyond what I will eat before next harvest is my profit...

Capitalism doesn't require endless growth because, strictly speaking, you don't need to constantly increase revenue (grow your business) to have profit. Japan's economy went through decades of no growth, yet companies survived, and Japan is still a bastion of capitalism.

And of course, this is still leaving out a big part of the equation - efficiency. It's possible that in the future we'll still grow economically while not using up any additional resources depending on how technology progresses... Today we certainly are more efficient than 100 years ago, both in terms of resources and labour.

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