321–330 of 368 posts
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> I want an economy where we can celebrate automation and distribute the profits evenly. Distribution of profits evenly: This is called "company stocks".
"Let them eat cake" Equal distribution is called taxes and social programs.
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> Texans know that Whataburger is infamous for being slow since everything is made to order. In-n-Out has figured it out but Whataburger is still so slow for some reason. The analysis is obviously incomplete. Making your order to order, in a timely fashion, was the point that distinguished Burger King from McDonald's.
Un-lucky for you, I am uniquely qualified to rebuttal this with evidence from my time working at Burger King. Very rarely was the burger cooked to order. Assembled, yes, but the cooking was done in a giant broiler machine with a conveyer belt and the patties were stored in heated containers for up to 2-3 hours until you ordered it.
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"You are not your job" is one thing I keep teaching all my junior colleagues. Your work is not your identity, and should not be seriously attached to your ego. This helps very much at code review and performance review times.
I spend more time doing my job than almost anything else. Sleeping is the only thing I spend more time doing. It might be healthier if I can avoid attaching so much importance and part of my identity to it, but I don't know how that's possible for me. Not only does it dominate my time, but it determines how much money I have for what I need and want and therefor what class of society I fit into and how difficult my l…
I envy your work-life balance %)
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It really makes me sad that jobs are seen as inherently valuable. The way you phrase it, 'provide jobs', feels like jobs are something needed. Of course, in the current setup, this is true, but there are so many boring and hard jobs (worked by people who are yet poor) that we shouldn't mourn once we manage to get rid of them. I want an economy where we can celebrate automation and distribute the profits evenly.
> It really makes me sad that jobs are seen as inherently valuable. The way you phrase it, 'provide jobs', feels like jobs are something needed. If I had to guess, you have a job, so it's fun for you to sit here and make these comments from your high horse.
If I had a job I might not want to continue if it was undesirable, if it was desirable I would continue anyway.
If I didn't have a job I would still like my basic needs covered (living in a country with good social security means that that would actually be so), and if nobody else had to pick up my slack I'd want more than the basics.
And then I want that for everyone. Any of the situations given above is true for someone in my surroundings, colleagues, friends, neighbors.
My perspective is coloured by the country I live in of course. Nobody will be on the street, hungry or without healthcare if they lose their job here, there is plenty of annual leave by law. And it's great, I gladly pay taxes for that. But imagine, it could be even better!
Why do you think the question matters?
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Capitalism is the default system that evolves organically when free men and women create things of value and voluntarily exchange them with others. That's not to say it's perfect or 100% fair. That's why you always hear communists and socialists talk about the need for a "revolution". No one ever talks about a capitalist revolution because people don't need to be coerced into voluntarily exchanging goods and services…
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That being said, I don't think we're disagreeing here or at least not entirely. I'm saying that the state can't be trusted to manage the economy and distribution of wealth because it is prone to corruption and favoritism leading to bad outcomes. You seem to be arguing a similar point.
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If that's the magic line, then it's a thousand miles away. I can't find a single country (maybe North Korea?) still in existence, that has outlawed private business. We aren't just talking social democracy, even Cuba and Venesuela allow private business.
> that has outlawed private business. From my original comment: "the majority". The examples you have given, have indeed outlawed many private businesses, in the past. Although, I agree that those countries have become significantly more capitalistic over the years. You also skipped the most famous example of socialism, which was the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union absolutely banned almost all forms of private enterpr…
Before Stalin forced the kulaks out of their farms Lenin allowed private farming as a means to an end. Stalin lost patience and forced it.
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> Or, as the socialists would call it, when they take control of "the means of production". > Which is just another way of saying that private businesses are illegal. No, it's not. Private businesses executed through private labor applied to public capital which the business rents from the state are perfectly compatible with socialism in which private ownership of the means of production is prohibited. It's true that…
> private ownership of the means of production is prohibited. This is a borderline semantic argument. There is very little difference between banning almost all private businesses, and banning all owenership of private capital. Everything that everyone does, relates to capital. If I write code, I just produced capital. And now the socialists are saying that I won't own that. Yes, code is capital. The value of almost…
Dude, the cold war is over, the communists are gone, noone is coming for your code. Every half-sensible discussion of modern socialism is not about taking away all of your stuff. I am really tired of this bait and switch social democracy for communism.
Einstein, Heinzenberg and many other scientists have advanced the whole human race, but you can't have IP on ideas and on laws of nature, and on scientific theories. So have they produced capital?
The discussion of IP is very nuanced, and raises question for why code is covered by overlapping patents and copyright, how long it should last, what rights does end user have and how right to repair is affected, etc.
Anyway, this thread has been massively derailed. It started with a bizzare slippery slope argument of "for every Finland there is a North Korea" as if social democracies are in danger of turning totalitarian any day.
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So tired of this old chestnut. Do yoy think the fact that Cuba and North Korea is a dictatorship maybe has some relevance to the fact that they are not nice places to live? There are plenty of capitalist dictatorships, are they great? Maybe thats the key differentiator?
Has communism been able to exist outside dictatorships? Or has it been unlucky in that regard and always attracted authoritarianism. I guess the question would be, if given a chance to choose would people living in those regimes keep the economic system and reform government or would they vote for a different kind of system altogether?
Whether the dictators where honestly trying to create communism, or they were using it to fool the populace much the same as monarchs used religion, is debatable.
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> private ownership of the means of production is prohibited. This is a borderline semantic argument. There is very little difference between banning almost all private businesses, and banning all owenership of private capital. Everything that everyone does, relates to capital. If I write code, I just produced capital. And now the socialists are saying that I won't own that. Yes, code is capital. The value of almost…
> And now the socialists are saying that I won't own that. Dude, the cold war is over, the communists are gone, noone is coming for your code. Every half-sensible discussion of modern socialism is not about taking away all of your stuff. I am really tired of this bait and switch social democracy for communism. Einstein, Heinzenberg and many other scientists have advanced the whole human race, but you can't have IP on…
Correct, that is kind of my point. Socialists and communists are becoming more and more irrelevant in the modern era. That does not change the definition of what "The means of production" are though.
I am not too worried about socialists taking over. They lost, and aren't going to take back the means of production from anyone.
> is not about taking away all of your stuff
Well yeah. That is because they are no longer relevant, because of how significantly they lost, and because of how much capitalism has become the defacto government system, all around the world, even in many places that used to call themselves socialist.
If socialists want to redefine socialism to be actually be just capitalism, but with a slightly more expansive social safety net, with more free healthcare and government programs, I guess that is fine by me.
But I am not going to call that socialism.
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Has communism been able to exist outside dictatorships? Or has it been unlucky in that regard and always attracted authoritarianism. I guess the question would be, if given a chance to choose would people living in those regimes keep the economic system and reform government or would they vote for a different kind of system altogether?
Communism has never existed at all, lets start there. Whether the dictators where honestly trying to create communism, or they were using it to fool the populace much the same as monarchs used religion, is debatable.