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Adam Smith, father of free market economics, pointed out already 300 years ago the fallacy of this argument. He has a passage about how an Englishman was expect

Adam Smith, father of free market economics, pointed out already 300 years ago the fallacy of this argument. He has a passage about how an Englishman was expected to wear leather shoes while a frenchman could walk barefoot without being ashamed. Further he talks about how in his day a linen shirt if considered a necessity even for the poor while the ancient greeks and romans could do well without it. So the point is that following your reasoning there is really no end to the depravity you can reach and somebody would still be able to claim that is all fine, because only rich people in the stone age could afford such luxury. The point Smith made was that poverty is always a relative phenomenon. What is a necessity is always defined in terms of the society you live in. There is no such thing as a universal definition of necessity. I had an interesting conversation about this with my wife's American parents. Despite the fact that her parents were noticeably better off economically in their childhood than my parents, they felt a severe stigma of poverty my parents never felt. My parent grew up in a country where they were much the same as everybody else. In fact a little better off. They did not feel poor at all. They had a happy childhood both of them. But one of my wife's American parents had a bad childhood, plagued by a strong feeling of being lesser than everybody else. Never having people over on visit out of shame over their own poverty. She was used to seeing everybody else being better off and internet the idea they they were somehow lesser people. Today my home country is richer than America by GDP per capita but comparisons of wealth and of people's feeling of wealth or poverty is difficult. Many of my american relatives enjoy bigger houses and cars than I do, but one always gets the feeling that their life is much more of a struggle than mine. I live in a smaller house and have no car. But I have no financial worries like them. I have long vacations, I am not constantly overworked. I don't worry about health care insurance, saving for college education to my kids, getting fired. So I think one should have some respect for the desperation and despair the poor in America feel. Knowing that a surprising car repair or medical bill could send you onto the street in no time. Even poor in much less wealth western countries have to deal with quite that level of insecurity.

webXL 11y ago
Poverty may always be a relative phenomenon (even in Cuba) but there has been no better system to lift people out of the life-threatening effects of abject poverty than capitalism. In fact, you cannot have a success with socialism without a large number of wealthy (or well-off) people to tax, and a society cannot tax itself to prosperity. > I live in a smaller house and have no car. But I have no financial worries like them. I have long vacations, I am not constantly overworked. I don't worry about health care insurance, saving for college education to my kids, getting fired. In America, we trade stability for social mobility (probably truer before the WWII), and our government promotes car and home ownership, but I doubt those were tradeoffs you made for longer vacations and "free" health care and education. We became more socialist and fascist after WWII and during the Cold War, but we've still managed to maintain steady income growth for average Americans, despite what the media would have you believe with "household income": http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-discovery-of-unseen.html#.VwvIxxMrIQ8 http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-discov... Poverty will always be with us, but there are plenty of things our bureaucrats can give up to fight it better. Our federal government has more or less the same number (very few added in the last 100 years) of representatives despite our population tripling. This system has become more susceptible and beholden to corporate interests, including media corporations that promote stories like this one and the problems and divisions in our society without any context of our achievements and commonality. This promotes bandaid and politically expedient half-measures that only make the problem worse in the long-run.
- mahranch 11y ago
  > In fact, you cannot have a success with socialism without a large number of wealthy (or well-off) people to tax, and a society cannot tax itself to prosperity. And you can't have success with capitalism without a healthy and prosperous working/poor middle class to be your consumers. I'm thinking of democratic socialism. It's capitalism with a heavy emphasis on welfare and super strong social safety nets. If you look at the quality of life index (the "where-to-be-born" index), you'll see that the top 10 countries all employ a form of democratic socialism. That's saying something right there.

webXL 11y ago

Poverty may always be a relative phenomenon (even in Cuba) but there has been no better system to lift people out of the life-threatening effects of abject poverty than capitalism. In fact, you cannot have a success with socialism without a large number of wealthy (or well-off) people to tax, and a society cannot tax itself to prosperity. > I live in a smaller house and have no car. But I have no financial worries like them. I have long vacations, I am not constantly overworked. I don't worry about health care insurance, saving for college education to my kids, getting fired. In America, we trade stability for social mobility (probably truer before the WWII), and our government promotes car and home ownership, but I doubt those were tradeoffs you made for longer vacations and "free" health care and education. We became more socialist and fascist after WWII and during the Cold War, but we've still managed to maintain steady income growth for average Americans, despite what the media would have you believe with "household income": http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-discovery-of-unseen.html#.VwvIxxMrIQ8 http://politicalcalculations.blogspot.com/2012/12/the-discov... Poverty will always be with us, but there are plenty of things our bureaucrats can give up to fight it better. Our federal government has more or less the same number (very few added in the last 100 years) of representatives despite our population tripling. This system has become more susceptible and beholden to corporate interests, including media corporations that promote stories like this one and the problems and divisions in our society without any context of our achievements and commonality. This promotes bandaid and politically expedient half-measures that only make the problem worse in the long-run.

mahranch 11y ago
> In fact, you cannot have a success with socialism without a large number of wealthy (or well-off) people to tax, and a society cannot tax itself to prosperity. And you can't have success with capitalism without a healthy and prosperous working/poor middle class to be your consumers. I'm thinking of democratic socialism. It's capitalism with a heavy emphasis on welfare and super strong social safety nets. If you look at the quality of life index (the "where-to-be-born" index), you'll see that the top 10 countries all employ a form of democratic socialism. That's saying something right there.