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Which society has collapsed because of this? I minored in history, and I can’t think of a single one. Even modern America was largely born out of giants of ind

by jaabe 7y ago

Which society has collapsed because of this? I minored in history, and I can’t think of a single one. Even modern America was largely born out of giants of industry serving their own self interest and fucking everyone else including the climate over. Governments are build by people who serve a greater good, and they typically get replaced once they become too corrupt, but they become corrupt exactly because society as a whole is typically very self-serving.

barry-cotter 7y ago
> Even modern America was largely born out of giants of industry serving their own self interest and fucking everyone else including the climate over. Modern America, and the prosperous parts of the world more generally was built by people coming together in sweet commerce to come to a mutually beneficial exchange of goods and services, made easier by the medium of money. The giants of industry that you denigrate made things people wanted more than the money they paid to get them and the engines of capitalism made whole societies richer than the kings of a century ago in comfort, leisure, health and material goods. This is not to deny the part government and labour movements played in that miracle but if you took the wealth of Britain in 1900 and distributed it perfectly equally among the people we would still consider them wretchedly poor. Hand washing clothes, minimal indoor heating, medical care that’s on average worse than nothing, travel for leisure being a once in a lifetime experience if that, the improvements that we take for granted come from the work those captains of industry did and the work they made possible.
- pjc50 7y ago
  Modern America was built on inter alia the acquisition of huge areas of land for nothing, the business practices of companies like Standard Oil, and the exploitation of immigrant workers in conditions only slighly above slavery. > wealth of Britain in 1900 Similarly this was at peak Empire time period, when a vast British Army was marching across South Africa herding colonists into concentration camps. What part of the wealth of the Empire was really freely acquired in a mutually beneficial way?
  - barry-cotter 7y ago
    America was indeed unusual among first world nations in the relative positions of labour and capital, but not much out of the ordinary in its growth rates. There were many other New World nations with similarly devastated native populations and land for the taking. The US has grown faster than any comparable country, not because of the abundance of natural resources but because of its political, legal and economic systems. Canada, Argentina and Chile all had similar benefits and none are as rich. I’m going to pass on the labour practices of Standard Oil just because living standards in the US were on an unbroken upward trend during the entire period between its establishment and break up. This, combined with the US tradition of labour unrest make the idea that working conditions were slightly above slavery ridiculous. In a tight labour market you can’t treat free labour like slaves. They’ll leave. People who are willing to cross an ocean are not going to hesitate to move states for work, especially in an era of unprecedentedly cheap transport due to the railways. This is a myth, like the myth that the trusts gained their market shares corruptly. They gained it by increasing production and quality and driving down prices. > University of Chicago economics professor Lester Telser, in his 1987 book, A Theory of Efficient Cooperation and Competition,4 points out that between 1880 and 1890, the output of petroleum products rose 393 percent, while the price fell 61 percent. Telser writes: “The oil trust did not charge high prices because it had 90 percent of the market. It got 90 percent of the refined oil market by charging low prices.” Some monopoly! https://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2013/Hendersonbarons.html#note_3 https://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2013/Hendersonbaron... Lester Telser, A Theory of Efficient Cooperation and Competition. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987. Regarding Britain power was partially built on its colonies but its prosperity was not. If it had been we should be able to see it clearly in the growth rate of its economy after the conquest of Bengal or after the loss of India. Invisible in both cases. Economic progress in Western Europe was built on trade and industry, not plunder. If it hadn’t been the U.K. would have been vastly richer than Sweden and France richer than Germany. Despite the enormous disparity in colonial holdings they were roughly as rich. Colonies were everywhere a boon to the scions of the ruling classes, providing military and civil service posts but the economic impacts were nugatory. British wealth was as much a product of its empire as Italy’s, somewhere between trivial and non-existent.
    - 7y ago
imtringued 7y ago
The Roman Empire with it's hundreds of self proclaimed emperors fighting each other for the throne.
- Balgair 7y ago
  The fall/decline of Rome is an incredibly complicated, long, and confusing event. Though the many instances of Imperial infighting is one answer, there are many others. If anything, the 'take-away' idea from Rome and her history is that you can 'take away' anything you want. Rome was many things at many times. The thesis is that there is no thesis.
- jaabe 7y ago
  Are you saying that the Roman Empire, was at any point, lead by someone self-sacrificing and honest who was focusing on the greater good? Because that’s really not what I took away from classical history.
lotsofpulp 7y ago
A society doesn’t have to be perfectly honest, but being able to trust one another, especially in minor interactions, is a massive economic benefit. Societies with lower levels of trust waste significant resources compared to those with higher levels of trust, and it shows in the product. Unfortunately, once the trust starts to decrease, it can be almost impossible to reverse course again.

by jaabe 7y ago

barry-cotter 7y ago

> Even modern America was largely born out of giants of industry serving their own self interest and fucking everyone else including the climate over. Modern America, and the prosperous parts of the world more generally was built by people coming together in sweet commerce to come to a mutually beneficial exchange of goods and services, made easier by the medium of money. The giants of industry that you denigrate made things people wanted more than the money they paid to get them and the engines of capitalism made whole societies richer than the kings of a century ago in comfort, leisure, health and material goods. This is not to deny the part government and labour movements played in that miracle but if you took the wealth of Britain in 1900 and distributed it perfectly equally among the people we would still consider them wretchedly poor. Hand washing clothes, minimal indoor heating, medical care that’s on average worse than nothing, travel for leisure being a once in a lifetime experience if that, the improvements that we take for granted come from the work those captains of industry did and the work they made possible.

pjc50 7y ago
Modern America was built on inter alia the acquisition of huge areas of land for nothing, the business practices of companies like Standard Oil, and the exploitation of immigrant workers in conditions only slighly above slavery. > wealth of Britain in 1900 Similarly this was at peak Empire time period, when a vast British Army was marching across South Africa herding colonists into concentration camps. What part of the wealth of the Empire was really freely acquired in a mutually beneficial way?
- barry-cotter 7y ago
  America was indeed unusual among first world nations in the relative positions of labour and capital, but not much out of the ordinary in its growth rates. There were many other New World nations with similarly devastated native populations and land for the taking. The US has grown faster than any comparable country, not because of the abundance of natural resources but because of its political, legal and economic systems. Canada, Argentina and Chile all had similar benefits and none are as rich. I’m going to pass on the labour practices of Standard Oil just because living standards in the US were on an unbroken upward trend during the entire period between its establishment and break up. This, combined with the US tradition of labour unrest make the idea that working conditions were slightly above slavery ridiculous. In a tight labour market you can’t treat free labour like slaves. They’ll leave. People who are willing to cross an ocean are not going to hesitate to move states for work, especially in an era of unprecedentedly cheap transport due to the railways. This is a myth, like the myth that the trusts gained their market shares corruptly. They gained it by increasing production and quality and driving down prices. > University of Chicago economics professor Lester Telser, in his 1987 book, A Theory of Efficient Cooperation and Competition,4 points out that between 1880 and 1890, the output of petroleum products rose 393 percent, while the price fell 61 percent. Telser writes: “The oil trust did not charge high prices because it had 90 percent of the market. It got 90 percent of the refined oil market by charging low prices.” Some monopoly! https://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2013/Hendersonbarons.html#note_3 https://www.econlib.org/library/Columns/y2013/Hendersonbaron... Lester Telser, A Theory of Efficient Cooperation and Competition. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987. Regarding Britain power was partially built on its colonies but its prosperity was not. If it had been we should be able to see it clearly in the growth rate of its economy after the conquest of Bengal or after the loss of India. Invisible in both cases. Economic progress in Western Europe was built on trade and industry, not plunder. If it hadn’t been the U.K. would have been vastly richer than Sweden and France richer than Germany. Despite the enormous disparity in colonial holdings they were roughly as rich. Colonies were everywhere a boon to the scions of the ruling classes, providing military and civil service posts but the economic impacts were nugatory. British wealth was as much a product of its empire as Italy’s, somewhere between trivial and non-existent.
  - 7y ago

imtringued 7y ago

The Roman Empire with it's hundreds of self proclaimed emperors fighting each other for the throne.

Balgair 7y ago
The fall/decline of Rome is an incredibly complicated, long, and confusing event. Though the many instances of Imperial infighting is one answer, there are many others. If anything, the 'take-away' idea from Rome and her history is that you can 'take away' anything you want. Rome was many things at many times. The thesis is that there is no thesis.
jaabe 7y ago
Are you saying that the Roman Empire, was at any point, lead by someone self-sacrificing and honest who was focusing on the greater good? Because that’s really not what I took away from classical history.

lotsofpulp 7y ago

A society doesn’t have to be perfectly honest, but being able to trust one another, especially in minor interactions, is a massive economic benefit. Societies with lower levels of trust waste significant resources compared to those with higher levels of trust, and it shows in the product. Unfortunately, once the trust starts to decrease, it can be almost impossible to reverse course again.