6 ms·

This is the dark side of capitalism. It won't go away. You discover 1000 people, they maybe even lose everything. 2 years later there will be another 1000 peopl

by erikb 9y ago

This is the dark side of capitalism. It won't go away. You discover 1000 people, they maybe even lose everything. 2 years later there will be another 1000 people.

dragandj 9y ago
What does capitalism have to do with that?
- arethuza 9y ago
  The Panama papers were about attempts to hide and obfuscate the control of capital?
  - mjburgess 9y ago
    Yeah, which has nothing to do with capitalism -- right? Unless you're using the humanities definition of capitalism by which it means "everything bad in the world".
    - arethuza 9y ago
      Well, for "capitalism" to function in the way we've come to expect there have to be certain legal frameworks in place (property rights, companies, etc.) which are generally fairly tightly regulated. The Panama Papers described various schemes (often illegal even in Panama) where these legal frameworks were abused to hide ownership and control of large amounts of capital. Were these problems caused directly by capitalism? No. We're the criminal activities described in the Panama Papers facilitated by the structures that have to be in place for capitalism to work. Yes, I think that is arguable. The Panama Papers are an argument for more effective regulation, not against capitalism.
      - mjburgess 9y ago
        > The Panama Papers are an argument for more effective regulation, not against capitalism. So you conclude with agreement despite disagreeing in each premise? As I said. Capitalism =/= the way the world is set up. Capitalism is an economic model. This humanities use of the word obfuscates more than it clarifies. The regulatory environment of the world is not "capitalism". At a guess, I'd say its vaugely semi-feudal. But certainly, there is no transnational court system to make the kinds of rights-based guarantees you'd need.
- erikb 9y ago
  On a more abstract level it is the same in every system. But money, tax, company ownership are the attributes it has in capitalism. And this Malta Papers and Panama Papers topic is about tax, money and company ownership.
hd4 9y ago
Ah, but this is the light side of information. We keep uncovering these 1000 people, and the next 1000, until they realise there is nowhere to hide and their activities will become public knowledge. This is what they're scared of, after all. That they lose the ability to operate normally in public.
- coldtea 9y ago
  >We keep uncovering these 1000 people, and the next 1000, until they realise there is nowhere to hide and their activities will become public knowledge. That's charming.
  - thriftwy 9y ago
    That's doable. Never underestimate the power of metodical work. People have great appreciation of "it was a wonderful little scheme but it doesn't work nowdays". What's really charming to them is your cynicism, it's what they invested in.
    - coldtea 9y ago
      >Never underestimate the power of metodical work. Never underestimate several milenia of human history. >What's really charming to them is your cynicism, it's what they invested in. If only.
      - thriftwy 9y ago
        If anything several millenia of human history has taught us, is that it's possible to enforce laws that govern the society. And that if society is no longer governed by laws, it quickly falls apart. Indeed, societal failure is no stranger in a course of history than beehive colony failure.
        yb7721 9y ago
        Enforce against Joe citizen. The government, the bureaucracy and big money have always been above the law. But of course you are welcome to continue the work of Caruana Galizia.
goatlover 9y ago
This only happens under capitalism?
- erikb 9y ago
  Nope. But the attributes used in this case (money, taxes, company ownership) are core elements of capitalism. Therefore the reference. I'm happy to present this in whatever terms you prefer. In fact it's the core of all systems, but people don't like to talk in abstract terms. Think about how people would react if you tell them feudalism, fascism, communism, capitalism is actually not so different.
  - tertius 9y ago
    Not because of the systems, rather just that people are involved.
    - erikb 9y ago
      In other words you consider a system not to be the sum of what people do but the theoretical definition of how it should be. When I say "system" I mean "all of what the people are doing including which kind of theories they back their actions with".
      - tertius 9y ago
        > When I say "system" I mean "all of what the people are doing including which kind of theories they back their actions with". That's a little opaque. That could include criminal or immoral activity, think money laundering or mass killing of political opposition. Capitalism, for instance, is silent on types of immoral behavior that it could encourage. Thus classifying that behavior as "capitalist", i.e. as a part of the "system" which you reference may be what people are reacting negatively to.
        erikb 9y ago
        Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. Money laundering, mass killing of political opposition or mass killing of workforce are attributes of this system. You understand the way I define it very well. But for some reason you don't accept that yet. Second point: In Feudalism you do immoral things to gain land and title. And communism you do immoral things to gain a higher position in the party hierarchy. In capitalism you do immoral things to gain money. That's what I mean. The terms change but not the morality of actions. You always exploit weaker people to compete with other exploiters, or you choose to be an exploited part of the system. You can choose the moral path, but that automatically means being a loser according to the system. In capitalism the winner is the company owner that makes millions. Think about our celebrities. Steve Jobs is a celebrity, right? And wage slaves, sararimen, are the losers we frown upon and try not be associated with, while actually most people are in fact in this group. This is very capitalism specific. In Feudalism the businessmen also make lots of money, but they are frowned upon, because they don't have inheritable land and title. Same game, different vocabs. What makes it capitalist is not the question of whether or not it's immoral What makes it capitalist is that the always occuring exploitation takes the form of money, tax avoidance, and company ownership. That's my point. You can disagree with it, no problem. Many people do. But please try to understand and accept it as possible point of view first.
valvar 9y ago
Or perhaps we should take a second look at the incentive structures (robbery by license of coercion) which cause the rise of such nasty alternatives?
- erikb 9y ago
  You can apply policy top-down. But actually the higher one rises the ranks the more it is about pure, immoral power play. This again leads to the best psychopaths being at the top, which again means policy won't exclude their main methods of action. So really, what do you want to do about it? You can't enforce policy bottom up. That's why someone is above you in the food chain.

by erikb 9y ago

This is the dark side of capitalism. It won't go away. You discover 1000 people, they maybe even lose everything. 2 years later there will be another 1000 people.

dragandj 9y ago

What does capitalism have to do with that?

arethuza 9y ago
The Panama papers were about attempts to hide and obfuscate the control of capital?
- mjburgess 9y ago
  Yeah, which has nothing to do with capitalism -- right? Unless you're using the humanities definition of capitalism by which it means "everything bad in the world".
  - arethuza 9y ago
    Well, for "capitalism" to function in the way we've come to expect there have to be certain legal frameworks in place (property rights, companies, etc.) which are generally fairly tightly regulated. The Panama Papers described various schemes (often illegal even in Panama) where these legal frameworks were abused to hide ownership and control of large amounts of capital. Were these problems caused directly by capitalism? No. We're the criminal activities described in the Panama Papers facilitated by the structures that have to be in place for capitalism to work. Yes, I think that is arguable. The Panama Papers are an argument for more effective regulation, not against capitalism.
    - mjburgess 9y ago
      > The Panama Papers are an argument for more effective regulation, not against capitalism. So you conclude with agreement despite disagreeing in each premise? As I said. Capitalism =/= the way the world is set up. Capitalism is an economic model. This humanities use of the word obfuscates more than it clarifies. The regulatory environment of the world is not "capitalism". At a guess, I'd say its vaugely semi-feudal. But certainly, there is no transnational court system to make the kinds of rights-based guarantees you'd need.
erikb 9y ago
On a more abstract level it is the same in every system. But money, tax, company ownership are the attributes it has in capitalism. And this Malta Papers and Panama Papers topic is about tax, money and company ownership.

hd4 9y ago

Ah, but this is the light side of information. We keep uncovering these 1000 people, and the next 1000, until they realise there is nowhere to hide and their activities will become public knowledge. This is what they're scared of, after all. That they lose the ability to operate normally in public.

coldtea 9y ago
>We keep uncovering these 1000 people, and the next 1000, until they realise there is nowhere to hide and their activities will become public knowledge. That's charming.
- thriftwy 9y ago
  That's doable. Never underestimate the power of metodical work. People have great appreciation of "it was a wonderful little scheme but it doesn't work nowdays". What's really charming to them is your cynicism, it's what they invested in.
  - coldtea 9y ago
    >Never underestimate the power of metodical work. Never underestimate several milenia of human history. >What's really charming to them is your cynicism, it's what they invested in. If only.
    - thriftwy 9y ago
      If anything several millenia of human history has taught us, is that it's possible to enforce laws that govern the society. And that if society is no longer governed by laws, it quickly falls apart. Indeed, societal failure is no stranger in a course of history than beehive colony failure.
      - yb7721 9y ago
        Enforce against Joe citizen. The government, the bureaucracy and big money have always been above the law. But of course you are welcome to continue the work of Caruana Galizia.

goatlover 9y ago

This only happens under capitalism?

erikb 9y ago
Nope. But the attributes used in this case (money, taxes, company ownership) are core elements of capitalism. Therefore the reference. I'm happy to present this in whatever terms you prefer. In fact it's the core of all systems, but people don't like to talk in abstract terms. Think about how people would react if you tell them feudalism, fascism, communism, capitalism is actually not so different.
- tertius 9y ago
  Not because of the systems, rather just that people are involved.
  - erikb 9y ago
    In other words you consider a system not to be the sum of what people do but the theoretical definition of how it should be. When I say "system" I mean "all of what the people are doing including which kind of theories they back their actions with".
    - tertius 9y ago
      > When I say "system" I mean "all of what the people are doing including which kind of theories they back their actions with". That's a little opaque. That could include criminal or immoral activity, think money laundering or mass killing of political opposition. Capitalism, for instance, is silent on types of immoral behavior that it could encourage. Thus classifying that behavior as "capitalist", i.e. as a part of the "system" which you reference may be what people are reacting negatively to.
      - erikb 9y ago
        Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. Money laundering, mass killing of political opposition or mass killing of workforce are attributes of this system. You understand the way I define it very well. But for some reason you don't accept that yet. Second point: In Feudalism you do immoral things to gain land and title. And communism you do immoral things to gain a higher position in the party hierarchy. In capitalism you do immoral things to gain money. That's what I mean. The terms change but not the morality of actions. You always exploit weaker people to compete with other exploiters, or you choose to be an exploited part of the system. You can choose the moral path, but that automatically means being a loser according to the system. In capitalism the winner is the company owner that makes millions. Think about our celebrities. Steve Jobs is a celebrity, right? And wage slaves, sararimen, are the losers we frown upon and try not be associated with, while actually most people are in fact in this group. This is very capitalism specific. In Feudalism the businessmen also make lots of money, but they are frowned upon, because they don't have inheritable land and title. Same game, different vocabs. What makes it capitalist is not the question of whether or not it's immoral What makes it capitalist is that the always occuring exploitation takes the form of money, tax avoidance, and company ownership. That's my point. You can disagree with it, no problem. Many people do. But please try to understand and accept it as possible point of view first.

valvar 9y ago

Or perhaps we should take a second look at the incentive structures (robbery by license of coercion) which cause the rise of such nasty alternatives?

erikb 9y ago
You can apply policy top-down. But actually the higher one rises the ranks the more it is about pure, immoral power play. This again leads to the best psychopaths being at the top, which again means policy won't exclude their main methods of action. So really, what do you want to do about it? You can't enforce policy bottom up. That's why someone is above you in the food chain.