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> Capitalism generates a lot of wealth depending on the situation Isn't communism in the same "depending on the situation" boat?

aldoushuxley001 7y ago
sure, but with significantly more deaths associated with it
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- crimsonalucard 7y ago
  The whole death thing really just depends on the situation.
- lotsofpulp 7y ago
  How has this been measured?
  - justinhj 7y ago
    The entirety of recent history?
    - geofft 7y ago
      Have a meme, because we're clearly not citing reliable sources in this thread: https://i.redd.it/usuxsd2ex5cy.png https://i.redd.it/usuxsd2ex5cy.png
      - aldoushuxley001 7y ago
        I must have missed the part where communism saved those people instead... The reality is that Capitalism is the worst type of economy except for all the others, just like Democracy is for governance.
        geofft 7y ago
        OK, but that's changing the goalposts, the claim here is that communism has more deaths. If we're now saying people are going to die under both communism and capitalism, then "people will die under communism" isn't an argument to go with capitalism (nor vice versa) and we should find some other way to save their lives instead of putting our hope in either capitalism or communism.
      - justinhj 7y ago
        In this article are 10 object ways the world is getting better. Your "meme" is not capturing the gradual, and quite amazing, lifting our of poverty of hundreds of millions in the last few decades. The failures of communism in Russia, China, Venezuela are their own meme. https://singularityhub.com/2016/06/27/why-the-world-is-better-than-you-think-in-10-powerful-charts/ https://singularityhub.com/2016/06/27/why-the-world-is-bette...
        geofft 7y ago
        1. Can you link the world getting better with capitalism specifically? (Are we more able to feed and heal the world because the discoverers of new techniques were motivated by profit and capitalism enabled them to do their work? Norman Borlaug and Alexander Fleming would probably disagree with that.) 2. How would Russia, China, and Venezuela have fared if it weren't for US sanctions and military threat? We don't see communism in a vacuum, we see communism spending all its resources defending itself from existential threats from "capitalist" countries with significant (taxpayer-funded) militaries. 3. Hasn't poverty gotten worse in Russia after the transition to capitalism?
        justinhj 7y ago
        1. Capitalism does not succeed on its own. The success of the west is combining free markets, capitalism and shared values about individual rights and freedoms. 2. Sure blame America. Wait didn’t America send food aid to China when it descended into famine in the 20s? 3. It certainly hasn’t transitioned to a free society with shared values and an open free market system Enjoy downvoting this
        geofft 7y ago
        (For the record, I'm not downvoting anything in this thread: I consider it rude to both downvote and reply. So someone else is downvoting both of us.)
- SQueeeeeL 7y ago
  All systems of government lead to death because humans are fucking awful at holding power, that's why I'm sending the from my bunker in Alaska
merpnderp 7y ago
Isn't communism a political system that nearly always implements extreme socialism? I mean the last 30 years in China have shown a communist country successfully implement a capitalist system and bring nearly a billion people out of extreme poverty and into wide spread prosperity, but aren't they the only one?
- Gibbon1 7y ago
  China is a large scale command economy[1] with a market driven middle tier. Far as I can tell this is the organization that works well. The neoliberal/fresh water economic pipe dream doesn't. The problem with the latter is it lack top level coherence and degenerates into looting[2]. [1] State supported heavy industry, export sector, and large public works projects. [2] Russia after shock treatment is economically worse off than under communism. Roll that over.
SQueeeeeL 7y ago
Sure but in capitalism, the wealth goes to individual value holders (landlords and rent seekers are derogatory terms for this). In true communism, the wealth goes to the state. The difference to most employees is honestly pretty small, working for McDonald's versus being a janitor for the post office are functionally the same, no one really cares who the guy at the top of the chain is. The main benefit of capitalism is the dream of being the wealthy person, if you're a janitor it's almost impossible, but the dream is there
- crimsonalucard 7y ago
  That's the theory right? In reality, it really depends on the situation.
  - SQueeeeeL 7y ago
    Does it? If you work super hard at your job, the best thing you can hope for is a bonus or promotion. They tend to offer you stock options to make you invested
    - crimsonalucard 7y ago
      Like I said it depends on the situation.
- ptr 7y ago
  Isn't the main benefit of Capitalism what striving towards that dream causes? Ie, there are incitements for improving for other people.
  - SQueeeeeL 7y ago
    I think it only applies in certain cases were mobility is possible. If someone is a janitor earning hourly wages, functionally their lives will be the same, poverty, no potential for advancement. If you believe the Bernie hype, under communism at least they'd get to go to the hospital, but it's a system with no real attempts
AnimalMuppet 7y ago
Communism also generates wealth for significantly fewer people. You think the concentration of wealth is bad in capitalist countries? It is. But communism spreads the wealth even more unevenly.
- TaylorAlexander 7y ago
  Got a source for that? We’ve got extreme wealth inequality today on broadly capitalist terms. I think it depends on whether you mean state communism, where state officials can enrich themselves, or anarcho communism which would be truly democratic. Actually in most cases I think wealth concentration has a lot to do with how much democracy you have. In America the wealthy classes control our democracy and so we have a lot of inequality. In Soviet Russia the state officials had control and so there was a lot of inequality. A lot of anarchist theory is schemes for more democracy. The whole idea of anarchism is to eliminate unnecessary hierarchy.
  - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
    My source was communism, as it was actually in the communist bloc, rather than communism in theory. The capitalist west not only did better at generating wealth than the communist bloc, it also did better at spreading it to more people in society. (Not well - just better.) But if we want to compare communism in ideal theory, we have to compare it to capitalism in ideal theory, right? At that point, nobody has any actual data.
    - TaylorAlexander 7y ago
      So you’re saying the USSR had more wealth inequality than the United States today? I’m genuinely curious if that’s true or not. But it doesn’t sound like you have a source. Is that just a feeling you have?
      - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
        Well, officially the USSR had very little wealth inequality. But... what fraction of the population got to shop at the special stores? (You might consider them the "rich", because they could buy more things, and for less money.) I'm pretty sure they weren't more than 5% of the population, and maybe significantly less, but I don't recall specifically. And that's if communism was functioning "normally". Didn't Romania turn into a kleptocracy? What was the level of wealth inequality there?

aldoushuxley001 7y ago

sure, but with significantly more deaths associated with it

deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
crimsonalucard 7y ago
The whole death thing really just depends on the situation.
lotsofpulp 7y ago
How has this been measured?
- justinhj 7y ago
  The entirety of recent history?
  - geofft 7y ago
    Have a meme, because we're clearly not citing reliable sources in this thread: https://i.redd.it/usuxsd2ex5cy.png https://i.redd.it/usuxsd2ex5cy.png
    - aldoushuxley001 7y ago
      I must have missed the part where communism saved those people instead... The reality is that Capitalism is the worst type of economy except for all the others, just like Democracy is for governance.
      - geofft 7y ago
        OK, but that's changing the goalposts, the claim here is that communism has more deaths. If we're now saying people are going to die under both communism and capitalism, then "people will die under communism" isn't an argument to go with capitalism (nor vice versa) and we should find some other way to save their lives instead of putting our hope in either capitalism or communism.
    - justinhj 7y ago
      In this article are 10 object ways the world is getting better. Your "meme" is not capturing the gradual, and quite amazing, lifting our of poverty of hundreds of millions in the last few decades. The failures of communism in Russia, China, Venezuela are their own meme. https://singularityhub.com/2016/06/27/why-the-world-is-better-than-you-think-in-10-powerful-charts/ https://singularityhub.com/2016/06/27/why-the-world-is-bette...
      - geofft 7y ago
        1. Can you link the world getting better with capitalism specifically? (Are we more able to feed and heal the world because the discoverers of new techniques were motivated by profit and capitalism enabled them to do their work? Norman Borlaug and Alexander Fleming would probably disagree with that.) 2. How would Russia, China, and Venezuela have fared if it weren't for US sanctions and military threat? We don't see communism in a vacuum, we see communism spending all its resources defending itself from existential threats from "capitalist" countries with significant (taxpayer-funded) militaries. 3. Hasn't poverty gotten worse in Russia after the transition to capitalism?
        justinhj 7y ago
        1. Capitalism does not succeed on its own. The success of the west is combining free markets, capitalism and shared values about individual rights and freedoms. 2. Sure blame America. Wait didn’t America send food aid to China when it descended into famine in the 20s? 3. It certainly hasn’t transitioned to a free society with shared values and an open free market system Enjoy downvoting this
        geofft 7y ago
        (For the record, I'm not downvoting anything in this thread: I consider it rude to both downvote and reply. So someone else is downvoting both of us.)
SQueeeeeL 7y ago
All systems of government lead to death because humans are fucking awful at holding power, that's why I'm sending the from my bunker in Alaska

merpnderp 7y ago

Isn't communism a political system that nearly always implements extreme socialism? I mean the last 30 years in China have shown a communist country successfully implement a capitalist system and bring nearly a billion people out of extreme poverty and into wide spread prosperity, but aren't they the only one?

Gibbon1 7y ago
China is a large scale command economy[1] with a market driven middle tier. Far as I can tell this is the organization that works well. The neoliberal/fresh water economic pipe dream doesn't. The problem with the latter is it lack top level coherence and degenerates into looting[2]. [1] State supported heavy industry, export sector, and large public works projects. [2] Russia after shock treatment is economically worse off than under communism. Roll that over.

SQueeeeeL 7y ago

Sure but in capitalism, the wealth goes to individual value holders (landlords and rent seekers are derogatory terms for this). In true communism, the wealth goes to the state. The difference to most employees is honestly pretty small, working for McDonald's versus being a janitor for the post office are functionally the same, no one really cares who the guy at the top of the chain is. The main benefit of capitalism is the dream of being the wealthy person, if you're a janitor it's almost impossible, but the dream is there

crimsonalucard 7y ago
That's the theory right? In reality, it really depends on the situation.
- SQueeeeeL 7y ago
  Does it? If you work super hard at your job, the best thing you can hope for is a bonus or promotion. They tend to offer you stock options to make you invested
  - crimsonalucard 7y ago
    Like I said it depends on the situation.
ptr 7y ago
Isn't the main benefit of Capitalism what striving towards that dream causes? Ie, there are incitements for improving for other people.
- SQueeeeeL 7y ago
  I think it only applies in certain cases were mobility is possible. If someone is a janitor earning hourly wages, functionally their lives will be the same, poverty, no potential for advancement. If you believe the Bernie hype, under communism at least they'd get to go to the hospital, but it's a system with no real attempts

AnimalMuppet 7y ago

Communism also generates wealth for significantly fewer people. You think the concentration of wealth is bad in capitalist countries? It is. But communism spreads the wealth even more unevenly.

TaylorAlexander 7y ago
Got a source for that? We’ve got extreme wealth inequality today on broadly capitalist terms. I think it depends on whether you mean state communism, where state officials can enrich themselves, or anarcho communism which would be truly democratic. Actually in most cases I think wealth concentration has a lot to do with how much democracy you have. In America the wealthy classes control our democracy and so we have a lot of inequality. In Soviet Russia the state officials had control and so there was a lot of inequality. A lot of anarchist theory is schemes for more democracy. The whole idea of anarchism is to eliminate unnecessary hierarchy.
- AnimalMuppet 7y ago
  My source was communism, as it was actually in the communist bloc, rather than communism in theory. The capitalist west not only did better at generating wealth than the communist bloc, it also did better at spreading it to more people in society. (Not well - just better.) But if we want to compare communism in ideal theory, we have to compare it to capitalism in ideal theory, right? At that point, nobody has any actual data.
  - TaylorAlexander 7y ago
    So you’re saying the USSR had more wealth inequality than the United States today? I’m genuinely curious if that’s true or not. But it doesn’t sound like you have a source. Is that just a feeling you have?
    - AnimalMuppet 7y ago
      Well, officially the USSR had very little wealth inequality. But... what fraction of the population got to shop at the special stores? (You might consider them the "rich", because they could buy more things, and for less money.) I'm pretty sure they weren't more than 5% of the population, and maybe significantly less, but I don't recall specifically. And that's if communism was functioning "normally". Didn't Romania turn into a kleptocracy? What was the level of wealth inequality there?