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> the ideological lens is very, very foggy. It distorts our view of the world with easy-to-digest narratives and categories Right. All of this talk about capit

> the ideological lens is very, very foggy. It distorts our view of the world with easy-to-digest narratives and categories Right. All of this talk about capitalism, communism, etc is intellectually nonsense. The whole world is actually moving towards the Chinese model with highly interventionist monetary policy, the majority of GDP allocated by the government, etc. That is the case in every major country now. No serious policy makers believe in free markets any more. They believe in democracy to the extent that they see it as a mechanism for social control, but that is it. That might be shocking to some people but the other thing to take into account is that all of these smart people have come to this conclusion so maybe they are right and free markets and real democracy are just dumb ideas.

dalbasal 9y ago
Well... The Chinese are "moving to the Chinese model" too, so idk if it's right to call it chinese. I think the model is the same, and all major economies are going that way. The cultural & legal differences make for different ways of describing and justifying things but.., they don't seem to amount to a huge difference. Baidu was essentially picked by the CCP, as the Chinese Google. Google was produced by the "free market." The end result is the same. Similar privacy/surveillance implications, similar business models. Similar market share (monopoly). I bet the offices look pretty similar too. Generally speaking, I am very skeptical of free market ideas applied at the >$1bn level. Corporations that size have political power, inevitably. They also tend to operate in less dynamic & competitive environments. The power differential between them and the employees they are "freely transacting" with are huge. Mostly though, it's the political thing. A mayor of a city is not going to ignore a $5bn going under, or moving away. They have influence on the rules that get made.

dalbasal 9y ago

Well... The Chinese are "moving to the Chinese model" too, so idk if it's right to call it chinese. I think the model is the same, and all major economies are going that way. The cultural & legal differences make for different ways of describing and justifying things but.., they don't seem to amount to a huge difference. Baidu was essentially picked by the CCP, as the Chinese Google. Google was produced by the "free market." The end result is the same. Similar privacy/surveillance implications, similar business models. Similar market share (monopoly). I bet the offices look pretty similar too. Generally speaking, I am very skeptical of free market ideas applied at the >$1bn level. Corporations that size have political power, inevitably. They also tend to operate in less dynamic & competitive environments. The power differential between them and the employees they are "freely transacting" with are huge. Mostly though, it's the political thing. A mayor of a city is not going to ignore a $5bn going under, or moving away. They have influence on the rules that get made.