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Is that why hunter gatherer societies didn't have poverty? Is that why communist countries weren't poor? How is that working out for Venezuela? Capitalism is li
by darawk 8y ago
Is that why hunter gatherer societies didn't have poverty? Is that why communist countries weren't poor? How is that working out for Venezuela? Capitalism is literally the only thing in human history that has ever lifted large numbers of people out of poverty.
- whatever1 8y agoHi. China is calling.
- darawk 8y agoChina is successful now entirely as a result of their conversion to capitalism. This is an extremely well known fact about China. China tried communism, it went absolutely terribly. They changed to capitalism, and things got good. I can't imagine an example that more perfectly agrees with my point.
- whatever1 8y agoHow is Facebook doing in capitalist China?
- whatever1 8y agoAlso, in which textbook is it stated that capitalism requires joint ventures of the government with every multinational company that tries to operate whithin its borders?
- darawk 8y agoThey're not fully capitalist. Their economic success began when they started their slow conversion to capitalism, and has proceeded in lockstep with their loosening of economic regulation. This is not a co-incidence.
- acchow 8y agoFacebook is banned behind the Great Firewall. Regardless, what does this have to do with the discussion?
- whatever1 8y agoThe People do not have stake at company A. Company A does not share the true values of the People. Company A is now banned. Repeat until all companies comply.
- viraptor 8y agoTrue. But what does this have to do with poverty levels discussed here?
- whatever1 8y agoThat you cannot call capitalism any successful economic system. China proved that a protectionist model with colossal government intervention can successfully reduce poverty.
- darawk 8y agoChina proved that you can reduce poverty in spite of those things. There is precisely zero evidence that those policies have done anything to reduce poverty, and a mountain of evidence that those policies, in general, exacerbate poverty.
- Apocryphon 8y agoWhat do you think China did to reduce poverty?
- acchow 8y agoI believe we mean "capitalism" as in capital is held by private owners in search of profit instead of owned by the state. Not necessarily free trade with other countries. China has a sort of partial capitalism in that some big companies are 50% owned by the state.
- zaarn 8y agoWell, there was America's gilden age, which was also present in wide areas of Europe; Factory Owners would get all of the money and the workers got almost nothing. In Germany this was so bad that children over the age of about 12 generally worked in the factory along with the entire family to be able to affort a 10sqm single room housing in the city with 2 meals a day. The factory owners largely didn't care and caused quite a few large scale accidents facing little to no consequence for it. That only changed in Europe after strikes, unions and socialist programs got punched through (also stuff like the 48 hour work week, 2 days of rest a week, sickdays, social welfare and healthcare and a lot of other stuff that was largely not capitalistic in nature), in the US only after anti-monopoly rulings where deployed en masse (while still paying out the factory owners shitloads of money).
- darawk 8y agoYep, that's true. Unfettered capitalism is not without its flaws. But it's still the only thing that has ever lifted large numbers of people from poverty in the entirety of human history.
- zaarn 8y agoIt also kept large numbers of people on the verge of starving while working themselves to death.
- darawk 8y agoIt didn't keep those people anywhere. They were free to go live as hunter-gatherers whensoever they chose. They chose not to do that, because they believed that working was a better life.
- zaarn 8y agoIn later stages it actually did keep those people there because they either couldn't afford to leave the city without half the family starving and/or militia hired by the factory owner enforcing people stayed there.