5 ms·

I don't even know how this is controversial, and yet here we are. You said the Mx word, I guess.

cmrdporcupine 7y ago
Whatever, it's just number points on the interwebbies. There is a libertarian tinge to discourse on HN, and libertarians have an opposite view of the state. I think this perspective on the state -- as "outside" and in permanent opposition to the market -- so permeates the dominant North American ideology that saying otherwise just sounds like nonsense to many people. I obviously don't think it's nonsense, but it doesn't surprise me it gets downvotes. I think it's sad though.
SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
I'm just not sure what it means to talk about "the class of people who own capital". It seems to presume a country that's strictly divided between owners and workers, which hasn't been true for decades at this point; most Americans own at least a little capital.
- cmrdporcupine 7y ago
  Americans, maybe. Worldwide, unlikely. But even saying that, having a mortgage and owning and having a few shares in your 401k ... you'd really call that owning capital? The depth of degree of difference between that and even the most minor members of a board of corporation is pretty huge. Not to mention it's very easy for us in the technical class to not even notice that the vast majority of the country isn't like us. Waiters at restaurants, house cleaners, and the typical taxi/Uber driver own 'capital' in only the most pedantic sense of the word. Honestly, with the wealth gap is wider than it's been since the 19th century, respectfully I think you're wrong.
  - SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
    I certainly wouldn't dispute that rich people have more power and influence than your average Joe, or that they lead very different lives than him. I just disagree that there's such a thing as a homogenous class of capital owners, who would have or could have "created" the state as a conspiracy to "continue to own and profit from their ownership of capital".
    - cmrdporcupine 7y ago
      I never claimed any "conspiracy"; there's no meeting or discussion (well, I guess there is stuff like Davos or whatever, but let's put that aside, that's mostly theatre). The formal mechanisms of the modern nation state were the outcome of a 200 year process, a development over time. The nation state _emerged_ along with the capitalist market system. Before that we had feudal autocracies. What we call a government now is a product of push and pull, trial and error, experimentation. And the dominant force shaping it has been the need for those with wealth to preserve a market of private ownership that keeps them wealthy, and to keep the simultaneously emergent forces of popular democracy from threatening that. The Marx quote might make it sound conspirational, but in the context of all the text around it, that's certainly not what he meant. For what it's worth, you don't have to go looking in Marx for this kind of analysis. Classical liberalism would also admit this role for the state -- just with a positive spin.
      - SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
        Sure, and I'm with you as far as that goes. But if that's what you meant it's a very strange response to the original comment. It's true that government bailouts wouldn't happen if the government were still run by a landed aristocracy that distrusts merchants, but I don't know if that's tremendously relevant to an analysis of actions in 2020.
    - rmrfstar 7y ago
      Your belief does not reflect reality. 10% of households own 84% of equities owned by households [1]. This is actually a rosy estimate, because the denominator is "equities owned by households". Extremely wealthy households shield their assets in trusts and pooled investment vehicles that are not reflected in this figure. As we know, the distribution wealth follows a power law despite the distribution of human endowments following a Gaussian. [1] https://www.ft.com/content/2501e154-4789-11ea-aeb3-955839e06441 https://www.ft.com/content/2501e154-4789-11ea-aeb3-955839e06...
- danharaj 7y ago
  The capital that most Americans "own" is managed by a very small class of capital managers at elite financial institutions. The point is, who controls the levers of power, and whose interest are they operating them in? The distinction you're making isn't much more than pedantry. It should be considered remarkable that Marx's observations need only minor adaptations after one hundred fifty fucking years.
  - SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
    Marx's observations need incredibly severe adaptations. By Marx's original standards, Uber drivers should be some of the least exploited workers in the world - they own the means of production!
    - cmrdporcupine 7y ago
      Only if you ignore that the Uber app, its customer base, its billing system, and everything else attached to the Uber system is owned by... Uber and its investors. Are you saying because they (maybe barely, if at all) own the car, they are capitalists? Anyways, Marx isn't scripture. Just a dude with some interesting writing some of us find cogent still. Marx himself would have bristled at being treated as some sort of biblical style authority. Of course it needs adaptations. But maybe not the ones you are suggesting.
    - danharaj 7y ago
      I know that you know this is a stupid point that can only be reached by reading Marx in the most obtuse way possible.
      - SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
        I don't know that. I'm aware that a lot of modern people do take Marxism to be a kind of vague position that wealth is bad and poor people are great, but I think they're wrong. What I've read of Marx makes it very clear that he's talking about the industrial labor class of his time, which really was terribly exploited in ways we've since eliminated.

Whatever, it's just number points on the interwebbies. There is a libertarian tinge to discourse on HN, and libertarians have an opposite view of the state. I think this perspective on the state -- as "outside" and in permanent opposition to the market -- so permeates the dominant North American ideology that saying otherwise just sounds like nonsense to many people. I obviously don't think it's nonsense, but it doesn't surprise me it gets downvotes. I think it's sad though.

SpicyLemonZest 7y ago

I'm just not sure what it means to talk about "the class of people who own capital". It seems to presume a country that's strictly divided between owners and workers, which hasn't been true for decades at this point; most Americans own at least a little capital.

cmrdporcupine 7y ago
Americans, maybe. Worldwide, unlikely. But even saying that, having a mortgage and owning and having a few shares in your 401k ... you'd really call that owning capital? The depth of degree of difference between that and even the most minor members of a board of corporation is pretty huge. Not to mention it's very easy for us in the technical class to not even notice that the vast majority of the country isn't like us. Waiters at restaurants, house cleaners, and the typical taxi/Uber driver own 'capital' in only the most pedantic sense of the word. Honestly, with the wealth gap is wider than it's been since the 19th century, respectfully I think you're wrong.
- SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
  I certainly wouldn't dispute that rich people have more power and influence than your average Joe, or that they lead very different lives than him. I just disagree that there's such a thing as a homogenous class of capital owners, who would have or could have "created" the state as a conspiracy to "continue to own and profit from their ownership of capital".
  - cmrdporcupine 7y ago
    I never claimed any "conspiracy"; there's no meeting or discussion (well, I guess there is stuff like Davos or whatever, but let's put that aside, that's mostly theatre). The formal mechanisms of the modern nation state were the outcome of a 200 year process, a development over time. The nation state _emerged_ along with the capitalist market system. Before that we had feudal autocracies. What we call a government now is a product of push and pull, trial and error, experimentation. And the dominant force shaping it has been the need for those with wealth to preserve a market of private ownership that keeps them wealthy, and to keep the simultaneously emergent forces of popular democracy from threatening that. The Marx quote might make it sound conspirational, but in the context of all the text around it, that's certainly not what he meant. For what it's worth, you don't have to go looking in Marx for this kind of analysis. Classical liberalism would also admit this role for the state -- just with a positive spin.
    - SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
      Sure, and I'm with you as far as that goes. But if that's what you meant it's a very strange response to the original comment. It's true that government bailouts wouldn't happen if the government were still run by a landed aristocracy that distrusts merchants, but I don't know if that's tremendously relevant to an analysis of actions in 2020.
  - rmrfstar 7y ago
    Your belief does not reflect reality. 10% of households own 84% of equities owned by households [1]. This is actually a rosy estimate, because the denominator is "equities owned by households". Extremely wealthy households shield their assets in trusts and pooled investment vehicles that are not reflected in this figure. As we know, the distribution wealth follows a power law despite the distribution of human endowments following a Gaussian. [1] https://www.ft.com/content/2501e154-4789-11ea-aeb3-955839e06441 https://www.ft.com/content/2501e154-4789-11ea-aeb3-955839e06...
danharaj 7y ago
The capital that most Americans "own" is managed by a very small class of capital managers at elite financial institutions. The point is, who controls the levers of power, and whose interest are they operating them in? The distinction you're making isn't much more than pedantry. It should be considered remarkable that Marx's observations need only minor adaptations after one hundred fifty fucking years.
- SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
  Marx's observations need incredibly severe adaptations. By Marx's original standards, Uber drivers should be some of the least exploited workers in the world - they own the means of production!
  - cmrdporcupine 7y ago
    Only if you ignore that the Uber app, its customer base, its billing system, and everything else attached to the Uber system is owned by... Uber and its investors. Are you saying because they (maybe barely, if at all) own the car, they are capitalists? Anyways, Marx isn't scripture. Just a dude with some interesting writing some of us find cogent still. Marx himself would have bristled at being treated as some sort of biblical style authority. Of course it needs adaptations. But maybe not the ones you are suggesting.
  - danharaj 7y ago
    I know that you know this is a stupid point that can only be reached by reading Marx in the most obtuse way possible.
    - SpicyLemonZest 7y ago
      I don't know that. I'm aware that a lot of modern people do take Marxism to be a kind of vague position that wealth is bad and poor people are great, but I think they're wrong. What I've read of Marx makes it very clear that he's talking about the industrial labor class of his time, which really was terribly exploited in ways we've since eliminated.