At 3:34 PM +0200 on 7/11/99, M. Uli Kusterer wrote:
>>Free? There is no free lunch. At whose expense?
>
>Anthony,
>
> in *capitalism* there is no free lunch. You must learn to think in
>different dimensions: As money has no worth in capitalism,
^^^^^^^^^^
I'll assume that you meant communism.
>since everything
>you do is for the community, and everything the community does is in the
>end for your benefit, it is not needed anymore in communism.
"When you accept money in payment for your effort, you do so only on the
conviction that you will exchange it for the product of the effort of
others. It is not the moochers or the looters who give value to money. Not
an ocean of tears nor all the guns in the world can transform those pieces
of paper in your wallet into the bread you will need to survive tomorrow.
Those pieces of paper, which should have been gold, are a token of
honor--your claim upon the energy of the men who produce. Your wallet is
your statement of hope that somewhere in the world around you there are men
who will not default on that moral principle which is the root of money."
(Atlas Shrugged)
Money get's it's only value from the fact that people will accept it in
exchange for goods. If you abandon money, well, to quote Atlas Shrugged
(again):
"Run for your life from any man who tells you that money is evil. That
sentence is the leper's bell of an approaching looter. So long as men live
together on earth and need means to deal with one another--their only
substitute, if they abandon money, is the muzzle of a gun."
>
>>Simulary, if a person who does a lions share seems himself getting as much
>>as someone who does a rats share -- even if both are working to the best of
>>their ability -- he will become unmotivated. How is it fair that he does
>>more and recieves the same in return?
>
> How is it fair that the other person isn't able to work as much as he
>does?
I never said it was. However, different people have different abilities,
and such is life. The only way to have a genius and an idiot produce as
much is to make the genius produce at the level of the idiot. But I do say
it is fair to have a person who produces 3 sprokets per hour paid less than
a person who produces 5 sprockets per hour. I alos think the other way
around is fair, though dumb, so long as it was by mutual consent of the
employee and the employer.
>Your reasoning assumes people only work to receive money out of it.
My reasoning assumes people work to recieve something of value out of it --
it need not be money. It can be food. It can be shelter. It can be clothes.
>What if the people did their jobs because they like their work?
Then you'd have no one doing the jobs no one likes. And if you are being
paid _and_ like you're job, you'll do even better.
But with altruism, it should not matter if you like the job: You are doing
it wholy for your neighbor, and you must do the just your neighbor needs
most, not what you feel like doing.
>
>>Good. But there are some people who are not, and that will serve to bring
>>down any society based on altruism.
>
> Anthony, after reading this statement I began yelling loud (thus waking up
>my mother, sorry) and had to run a few times through the house before I was
>calm enough to answer again.
>
> What you are saying here reminds me of Nazi argumentation: Arians are
>good, the others are bad. It also reminds me of statements like "a rock is
>a cow." and "a rock is not a cow". What you are saying is, to write it in a
>way similar to what you used so often sourself:
>
>class Human
>{
> Boolean good = true;
>};
>
>That is what Alain agrees with.
No, that's a syntax error <g>.
>And then you say:
>
>void main(void)
>{
> Human one;
> Human two;
>
> if( one.good == true
> && two.good == false )
> ThisIsAnthonysOpinion();
> else
> ThisIsWrong();
>}
>
>You say that *all humans* are good by nature, and then claim that some are
>not. This is logically wrong. Either all humans are good, as Alain said, or
>humans are both good and bad at the same time, as I said. But these two
>don't mix.
I claim that a human's basic nature is good. I however note that there are
exceptions to this generalization. As evidence, I site that most people are
not crooks (thus, the good, in general) yet some are people who are (and
thus the exceptions). To put that in source form:
class Human {
public:
Human() {}
virtual ~Human() {}
public:
virtual IsGood() {return true;}
};
class Crook : public Human {
public:
Crook() {}
virtual ~Crook() {}
public:
virtual IsGood() {return false;}
};
>
>>The law of the jungle is force. Is mob rule. Capitalism expressly forbids
>>it. Capitalism can only work when the rights of individuals are repsected;
>>it is based on those rights.
>
>Capitalism is an economic system. It has nothing to do with human rights.
I'll get to that when you pull out your definition.
>Actually, most of the time capitalism and human rights are on opposite
>sides of the battlefield.
Are they? I guess it depends on what you call "human rights." Notice I said
individual rights.
>Do me a favor, before you start talking about
>thinks like Marxism, Capitalism and Democracy, look up the words in the
>dictionary. Here's what my dictionary says on Capitalism:
>
> (...) the economic system in which all or most of the means of production
>and distribution, as land, factories, railroads etc., are privately owned
>and operated for profit, originally under fully competitive conditions; it
>has been generally characterized by a tendency toward concentration of
>wealth, and in its later phase, by the growth of great corporations (...)
>
> There's no mention of human rights in the entire entry.
I said _individual rights_, namely, the rights to life, liberty, and property.
It says "owned." That requires the right of property. If you are to have
the right of property, you must have (in order to do anything with it, so
it's not fascism) the right to liberty -- to do with your property as you
please. In order to even worry about property or liberty, you must have the
right to life.
You can not have capitalism if you do not have respect for individual
rights. (And notice I advocate _pure_ laissez-faire capitalism, not a mixed
economy.)
>
>>Communism rejects those rights. Communism forces you to work for your
>>neighbor -- even if you don't want to. Communism is the law of the jungle:
>>brute force.
>
> Communism doesn't force you. That's socialism or leninism maybe, but not
>communism.
So, if I want, in a communistic society, I can say: "I work for myself. Get
your rotten hands off my property."? [No, I don't have any property] I can
say: "I'll say whatever the hell I please. If you don't like it, that's too
bad!"? [No, I must work for my neighbor at gunpointI can say: "I'll do with
my property as I please. If you don't like it, too bad!"? [No, I don't have
any property]
That's not any form of communism I know of. I don't know of any form of
communism that respects my right to property (and without that right, there
can be no others)
Now, if a group of people want to voluntarily practice communism, I don't
have a problem with that. (In fact, it would fit in fine with laissez-faire
capitalism) But the second they demand anything of anyone who does not want
to be a part of their expirement, that's wrong.
>
>>No. If I am working for myself, I keep what I earn.
>
> That means you refuse to pay taxes?
In principle, I should refuse to pay taxes. But morality and logic end
where force begin: If I don't pay taxes, the Gov. comes out with the guns.
>
>>The only proper distribution is one which respects that my labor is mine to
>>do with and sell to whomever I please (within reason -- I can't go out and
>>murder someone).
>
> Why? Capitalism only concerns itself with capital. If you can gain money
>by murdering someone, capitalism lets you.
No it does not. That's the most perverted definition of capitalism I've yet
heard! That's mob rule, that's war, not capitlism.
Maybe I'd best define what I mean by capitalism. I mean:
A political-economic system in which:
1) All valuables are in private ownership
2) All people have the inalienable right to
and property (including that of their own life) and
of liberty over that property (including their own life)
and including the right to direct its disposal
a. This does mean that all relationships are
voluntary (that is, without physical force)
because anything else would violate one of those
rights
I think I've covered it all. People may trade because they have the right
to the disposal of their property. No one may initiate physical force
because if it was done against property, it would violate the right of
property. If it were done against them, it would violate the right of life.
If it were done against their liberty (which is really just the right of
deciding what to do with your property) it would violate that.
I can derive all of this from your definition above (again). Laissez-faire
capitalism, I'm sure we can agree, in it's pure form has only private
ownership.
If a person is to own something, he must have the right to own it. That is,
he must have the right to property. The right to property does not make
much sence without the right to use it; in other words, liberty. And
lastly, the rights to property and liberty are moot if you are dead, so you
need the right to life to protect your ability to excercise the other
rights.
Capitalism includes the individual rights. So, no, capitalism (by your own
definition!) does not permit murder.
>
>>Capitalism allows you to try and become self employed. It allows you to go
>>seek a job. It is about your choice.
>
> No. Capitalism is about money. Ask your encyclopedia.
I think I covered that above when speaking about liberty.
>
>>I see no problem with it. It's their money. (And no, it's not comparable to
>>communism because one is done by physical force, and one is done by mutual
>>consent.)
>
> Do you think being bought requires mutual consent? You never concerned
>yourself with the stock market, did you?
The shareholders own the company. And if they decide to sell, well, then,
that's mutual consent.
>
>>The rich person did the intellectual work. The workers do the physical
>>work. Draw your own conclusions.
>
> So, this statement means Bill Gates did all the work on DOS, right? Sadly,
>DOS was created and invented by someone else. Gates bought the sources,
>letting money do his work.
He did the work of figuring out how to make billions off of it. Any idiot,
given funds, can buy something. But it takes for more intellegence to make
billions off of $70,000 (I think that's what it cost).
And besides, Bill Gates did compilers before that -- which he himself
helped write.
>
>>WHy was it not so before the 1930's? There was no Government safety net then.
>
> Let me remind you of black friday. That's where living without a safety
>net and with pure capitalism gets you.
I think I'll bring back my compromise between good and evil idea (borrowed
idea, of course) here. If there is a compromise between good and evil. If
there is a comprimise between good and evil, consider who wins:
Good takes the blame for nothing or for evil's follies.
Evil takes credit for nothing or for good's success.
Good has nothing to gain, but everything to loose. Evil has nothing to
loose, but everything to gain.
The only result can be victory of evil or, possibly, a stalemate. But
eventually, if good takes but one item of shame for evil's follies, or evil
takes one ounce of good's credit, then evil wins. It is quite simular to a
compromise between poison and food. Food certainly ain't winning.
Simularly is a compromise of capitalism and statism.
In capitalism, you can't lend more money than you have. You simply don't
have it. Remember that.
Much of the depression of the 1930's was caused by rampant speculation.
Banks lent money for people to play the stock market. And banks lent more
money than they had. But how? You can't lend more money than you have!
In 1913, the Federal Reserve was established. The Federal Reserve allowed
baks to borrow money from the goverment. It removed the limitation of the
bank's reserves as to what it could lend. Prior to that, gold was the
standard in the United States. And you certainly can't give away more gold
than you have. But when you're backed by a government printing press, you
can.
The Federal Reserve officials decided one a cheap money supply. Their logic
was simple: If there were never a lack of money supply, there would be no
minor recessions. There would be prosperity, in their opinion, forever; the
boom would never end. Throughout the 1920's, banks (compelled by the
Federal Reserve) kept rates artificually and uneconomicly low. Money, as a
result, was speculated everywhere. By 1928, warning signals were everywhere
-- from overvalued stocks to rampant speculation. The government ignored
them. (A free market would of been compelled to do something way before
this, because they would not have the money -- the gold -- to lend like
that!)
You can only make so much money on paper. You can only stretch reality so
far. Whatever events first set off the panic, what happened is clear:
People quickly sold their stocks, bank loans were called in, etc. And
people found that money existing only on paper -- as it was with the
Federal Reserve -- was worthless. Banks failed, savings were wiped out, etc.
Capitalism did not do this; government intervention did. Had the free
market been allowed to handle things, the speculation could of never
occured: There would not of been money to do it with. And the banks that
did make bad investments would of failed -- but it would not of taken the
entire country (world?) with it.
And, the New Deal programs did not help either -- they prolonged the
depression -- if you believe Alan Greenspan.
So, when people blame capitalism instead of stateism for 1929, it is as I
said: In a compromise between good and evil, only evil can win. Evil won.
>
>>Change "without" to "with full" and you'd have a true statement.
>
> This is the kind of reasoning I usually hear from first-graders when I'm
>on that camping trip when I need to tell them to go to bed. ANthony, you
>aren't stupid, so please get back to providing real arguments instead of
>Yes, No, Yes again, no again.
Sorry. Forgot to insert the ";-)" at the end of the statement. How are
these arguments for "real arguments"?
