"It is always darkest before the dawn" -- Thomas Fuller "Don't worry, be happy." -- Bob Marley "The future will be better tomorrow." -- Dan Quayle " The future ain't what it used to be " -- Yogi Berra
To understand why and whether capitalism is failing, we have to look and see if it was based on true principles and whether it is meeting our goals. I've defined the goal of mankind to produce useful technology at the maximum rate possible and to achieve greater consciousness, in essence to create and to be conscious. On true principles: capitalism is based on an idea of unlimited resources and unlimited growth, neither of which appear to be possible on a limited resource planet. We have very high unemployment in the US. This is a serious problem because it means that man is not able to create at his maximum rate possible therefore capitalism has failed. But, capitalism was flawed to begin with because it has in-built a desire to keep unemployment at a relatively high level. I don't think that man has to be employed to create useful technology but then we have that other problem which is that capitalism doesn't offer a way not to work while working on ones technology. In fact, some of the best creations are probably not in the "capital-creation" system but rather by individuals pursuing own goals. Again, Capitalism promotes that people have Jobs but a Job is for work that we don't want to do -- it is work for others and not for ourselves. So, a job is a bad thing. We don't need more jobs: we need more services. That's what everyone really wants right? Less work and more money. But you see our system has embedded into the people the wrong ideas, that one is worth more when one works. At any rate, we also have to ask exactly what is this capitalism and what are taxes and why does regulation even exist? Capitalism is just an algorithm. It is just an algorithm that attempts to optimize the distribution of wealth in a given way. There are infinite number of algorithms for distributing wealth and organizing labor. Capitalism optimizes toward net profit for the owners but that is the wrong goal! The proper goal should be to optimize toward net value. Capitalism doesn't factor into the creation of products all costs, such as pollution. A good example of this would Foxconn in China where Apple employees have been killing themselves due to poor work conditions. Many companies have went to produce in China because they can pollute (transfer a cost to society) and acquire labor (transfer a cost on society) at a better rate then elsewhere. Capitalism says it is right to create a working condition where your employees are miserable even if it makes you a dollar more. Yet the proper system is to organize toward optimal value for all stake holders: employees, owners, and customers. Regulation is an attempt to fix the wrong motives of capitalism but it is just a patchwork because the algorithm itself isn't the proper one. Getting back to mankind's goal and working from that principles allows us to look at laws and regulations to see if they accord with the first principles. A good example would be software patents. Are they, in practice, allowing man to develop at this ultimate rate or are they slowing down progress? In fact, they appear to be slowing down technological advance and therefore software patents are wrong. Let me get back to capitalism, I do believe strongly in the right of people to own property. I don't see that changing but I'm speaking in broader terms about the free market, how companies are valued, and how people are organized. One might refer to what I refer to as "creditism". "Creditism"/Capitalism/Democracy as it now exist Technology is used to enrich those with access to credit and understand how to get that credit, i.e Solyndra Total costs of production are not factored into the equation (i.e environmental damage) Optimizes toward maximum profit for owners at expense of all others Laws are promoted that protect capital interests and net profits (Copyright, software patents) Producers try to maintain asymmetrical control over production (i.e fighting technology like CD's, mp3s)/ Workers unions try to create artificial work Some unemployment is desired/ Limited ability to produce technology when unemployed (must pay to live in a house/shelter) Political candidates are elected based on values and are in-office for short periods of time -- real controllers maintain power over long periods of time -- limited participation of people in the government Open Technological Society Technology is used to enrich all equally. Technology is respected as the proper creator of wealth. Total costs of production are factored into the equation Optimizes toward maximum value for all stakeholders. Laws are created that promote most rapid technological advancement and evaluated to see determine if they are working. A good example would be copying a copyrighted technology -- if that unregulated copying has a higher net technological benefit to society (getting that work into more peoples hands) then it would be the right thing. No drive for artificial scarcity or made up work. All non essential work is automated. 100% employment is the stated goal. It could be in any of the 3 spheres: private, public, or open society. Obviously a large chunk of that would be researching new drugs and computers or "high research" but open society is not totalitarian. Arts and other technology are seen as valuable. The open sector acts as a "sink" to maintain full production. Political candidates are elected based on engineering, scientific, and conceptual grounds. Politics is more over transformed by the use of open source and peer-to-peer technologies which allow people direct access to the democracy via technology. It might be where your elected official can vote for you or you can vote on a matter yourself if you so choose too by using a digital input system -- direct democracy mitigated, as always, by the constitution.
"Mankind" doesn't have a goal, individual men and women have goals and they can, if they choose, band together to pursue those goals. The people who have tried to impose a single goal on "mankind" have all ended up killing millions of people in pursuit of that delusion and, to a person, the world would have been better off had those deluded would-be philosopher-kings never existed. The minute you tell me that I must subordinate my goals to "mankind's goal" is the minute you become my mortal enemy.
quite your whining, losers. you didn't complain about capitalism when your house went up 70% in value or your stock portfolio doubled. you didn't complain when the economy was booming or jobs were plentiful, did you? why complain now? because you're losers who didn't realize that good times don't last forever and you should have been socking money away for the bad times. in other words, only financially undisciplined people or those with marginal skills complain about capitalism because they don't know how to ride through the ups and downs. move to North Korea if you don't like how the US is.
There have been repeated attempts to repeal the 22nd Ammendment. God help us when it happens. Imagine having Obama as Pres until he dies. It's just a matter of time. Instead of repealing the 22nd another ammendment should be added limited the number of terms a Congressman or Senator can run for their seat. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twenty-second_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
Greed has to be regulated out of the system. Greenspan actually thought that deregulation was good because "people would self regulate".. I knew a guy once that hated rules. This guy had a College education and he tells me "the rules are what makes people do bad things, get rid of all the rules and we would all be good"... He was a cranky little bastard, I could say that the sky was blue and it could start an argument.. but I think he really believed what he said about the rules making people do evil... I knew another highly educated one. He said "money is the root of all evil" and he believed it. He would not eat food from Whole Foods Market after he learned they were a public corporation. So I posed the question: "if we went to a barter system would evil exist?" He couldn't sort that out on his own so I dropped the discussions..... So anyhow, capitalism has had it's landscape altered in recent decades with all the governments borrowing to try to pay all the promises that have been made to voters. Governments have become such big players in the money scene that they are part of the capitalism. The guys with the money can indeed make the rules; they just need to buy favor from a politician and they can have about anything they want. Read the IRS regs sometime, book after book and nearly every regulation is a tax break for somebody that donated to a politician. That is a whole big step backwards for the US of A relevant to, say, before 1910 maybe... One big step in the right direction would be to go from an income tax to a consumption tax. I like Herman Cain for his 9-9-9 tax plan [which the Left is smearing to no end].. Ron Paul would throw the Federal Reserve out completely and surely get rid of the IRS in the process.. all other candidates are for the "status quo" I'm pretty sure...
It is a shame when folks are not educated on very simple definitions, like capitalism, socialism, etc. The current system of the USA is NOT a capitalist system. It is a mixed economy, you have capitalist tendencies and socialists ones. As people have written over the ages, a mixed economy cannot last. Just read the classic road to serfdom. What generally happens is that the socialist tendencies of the economy collapse and the system moves further and further towards socialism. As an example, the FED and the government create the housing/credit bubble ---that's socialism for you. As a result what happens? Is the FED or government blamed? Do people say that socialism has caused massive disasters, we need to move towards less government and more capitalism? No, the exact opposite occurs and people say you need government bailouts, stimulus, FED stimulus, FED bailouts and more regulation (Dodd Frank, Sarbanes Oxley, etc). So a mixed economy will always collapse into a completely socialist one sooner or later. And a socialist "democracy" will always collapse into a fascist socialist economy/society since socialist democracies are simply not possible. The USA was the closest ever to a purely capitalist society. That's why it becamse the richest and most powerful on the planet. The decay into socialism started in 1913, but it was a slow progression. For the best measure on socialism just look at total government spending vs income. It took off in the 1930's with Roosevelt and Hoover, but still the 1930's would be recognized versus today's America as a capitalist mecca. The great society mess really put the move to socialism in overdrive, the 1980's and 1990's we saw a slower move towards socialism if not a standstill in the progression, and the 2000's until today have again gone into overdrive. It is a shame, but the USA will eventually collapse into more and more socialism. The trick is to get out when you can. http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/d9/Us_gov_spending_history_1902_2010.png
Wrong date to compare against. To your first comment, "gold determines the money supply." If gold deposits truly determined the supply then Nixon should have never been "forced" to take us off the gold standard in '71. To your second point, compare the growth in gold to the dollar's decay since Nixon made the dollar a fiat currency. Oh, yeah, there's that pesky little spike and decade+ trough in gold circa 1980 too. Gold ain't perfect, much less edible or potable...
Capitalism, in the modern sense of the word, was never more than a mirage created by the discovery of cheap energy. As that slowly ebbs away, so do the "inherent" advantages of "capitalism".