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Which is the correct answer. When you spend money, it doesn't disappear. It's just moved.
by PaulRobinson 11y ago
Which is the correct answer.
When you spend money, it doesn't disappear. It's just moved.
- lr4444lr 11y agoYes, but the goods it can buy on the next round of division still don't come from the spendthrift vagabond, and if his way of life is incentivized while the producers' is disincentivized by this redistribution, then that circulation won't continue so innocuously.
- jjoonathan 11y ago> spendthrift vagabond An obtuse mischaracterization of the poor; a more typical "sin" would be failure to hop over the ever-rising bar that denotes the ability to secure money by threatening to withhold labor. Circulation goes both ways and it isn't the ability of producers to secure profits that seems to be most endangered at the moment.
- icebraining 11y agoAn obtuse mischaracterization of the poor Why do you think it's a characterization of the poor at all? Circulation goes both ways and it isn't the ability of producers to secure profits that seems to be most endangered at the moment. The working poor are themselves producers.
- jjoonathan 11y ago> Why do you think it's a characterization of the poor at all? Because they're the ones who the type of policy we are discussing would actually be intended to benefit. Voicing that side of the argument through a "spendthrift vagabond" is disingenuous at best. > The working poor are themselves producers. I was using the term with my tongue firmly planted in my cheek, I thought it would be clear enough from context that I was referring to capital-holders.
- kamaal 11y ago>>Because they're the ones who the type of policy we are discussing would actually be intended to benefit. No. To be a spendthrift is a symptom of many problems. One of which means lack of respect for money or the effort required to earn it. Other wise one wouldn't be throwing it away.
- audi100quattro 11y ago...and if you incentivized the producers (which is also redistribution) while disincentivized the spendthrift you will not be left with much of a population to keep redistributing from. Ultimately this is bad for the producers, I am not sure why they don't realize it. Short-term thinking and greed, maybe? Increasing inequality does in fact encourage deflation. Redistribution in forms of common services and education (for um.. jobs) is very necessary.
- lr4444lr 11y agoI wouldn't disagree with you, but I think you're reading something into the quote which isn't there. The moral is that redistribution won't bring prosperity - not that it's good in some cases and bad in others. At the risk of adding more complexity to the parable than its pithiness merits for the sake of explanation (as I understand it): the spendthrift wholly consumes whatever he produces, and wants more. The producer generates a surplus. He may well consume an overall greater amount than the spendthrift, but he's still net positive. The "division" however, will only benefit the spendthrift, because producing is chosen for the sake of consumption, but consumption for its own sake. I know it's still a gross oversimplification, but I think the general truth encoded in the parable should be appreciated for its own sake in general terms.
- marcosdumay 11y ago> The moral is that redistribution won't bring prosperity Except that it does - up to a certain point. That's one of the few repeatable, tested, and validated economical principle from the XX century. Counter intuitive as it is, there's just no point denying it.
- pessimizer 11y agoYou assume that the rich man was a producer. He actually just plays video games most days, and takes a trip to skydive in Bali twice a year.
- edanm 11y agoAs most rich men do? Quite a statement if so.
- naasking 11y ago> and if his way of life is incentivized while the producers' is disincentivized by this redistribution The idea that producers are only incentivized monetarily is false.
- trophycase 11y agoValue and efficiency can disappear though. I could spend 100 dollars on something that falls apart in a month, or spend 1000 for a functionally equivalently something that will last 3 generations. One of these choices is wasteful and hurts economic efficiency, one isn't.
- alanwatts 11y agoOne is based on the broken window fallacy assumption, one isn't.
- themartorana 11y agoWell, if the money was to be spent. Half our problem is the extra cash moving towards the 1% is held, not spent, not circulated.
- alanwatts 11y agoWhat is the other half?
- themartorana 11y agoSpeculative (and unregulated) financial dealings by banks with your cash, leading to ruinous effects on the global economy, ruining much of the middle class in the process?
- alanwatts 11y agoSo it would seem. But I see a root cause for both of these: the centralized pyramid user hierarchy which is inherent in any paper based information system. "It is part of the age-old habit of using new means for old purposes instead of discovering what are the new goals contained in the new means."
- lottin 11y agoWhat disappear is the goods the money was spent on, and money is only worth something as long as there are goods that can be bought with it.