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I have a feeling that the same article could have been written 100 years ago, and still would be correct. (And even 200 years ago, Adam Smith was writing in the

by js8 7y ago

I have a feeling that the same article could have been written 100 years ago, and still would be correct. (And even 200 years ago, Adam Smith was writing in the same vein, that we should have a meritocratic system, not cronyism.) I think that capitalism, in the sense as described in the article, has always been just a dream, and never historically accurate. What actually somewhat changed it was adoption of social democracy as a response to the Great Depression (and the rise of USSR to some extent).

llamaz 7y ago
Social democracy is still fundamentally capitalism. Adam Smith was a left-wing radical living in a transnational period period between feudalism and capitalism where the main Tyrannical force was the state - now that has changed to corporations. Whether you're left or right wing economically, it's an accepted fact that capitalism has a cycle of boom and bust built into it. Right-libertarians (e.g. The Democrats and The Republican Party) believe that this can be avoided by freeing the market by removing deleterious incentives, centrist Keynesians (e.g. FDR with the New Deal, Bernie Sanders) don't trust capitalists to self regulate and instead accept the cycle of boom and bust, but try to avoid the social unrest by smoothing out and mollifying the crises, and left-libertarians (e.g. John McDonell, Richard Wolff, Paul Cockshott) try to eliminate the cycle of boom and bust, much like the right libertarians. This framing (e.g. of Democrats as economically right) may be provocative to Americans, but is natural in the rest of the world. I'm Australian and Bernie Sanders is to the right of our right wing party.
TomMckenny 7y ago
The Great Depression and the fact that vast quantities of capital were annihilated in two world wars which seriously reduced the power of those who own society. There is another point you hint at that I want to underline: nations freely use ideological rhetoric to hide the same thousand year old wealth patterns. China is not communist, N Korea is a kingdom, the NSDP outlawed and jailed socialists and, as the article points out, social mobility in the US is fought by the ruling class at every opportunity.

by js8 7y ago

llamaz 7y ago

Social democracy is still fundamentally capitalism. Adam Smith was a left-wing radical living in a transnational period period between feudalism and capitalism where the main Tyrannical force was the state - now that has changed to corporations. Whether you're left or right wing economically, it's an accepted fact that capitalism has a cycle of boom and bust built into it. Right-libertarians (e.g. The Democrats and The Republican Party) believe that this can be avoided by freeing the market by removing deleterious incentives, centrist Keynesians (e.g. FDR with the New Deal, Bernie Sanders) don't trust capitalists to self regulate and instead accept the cycle of boom and bust, but try to avoid the social unrest by smoothing out and mollifying the crises, and left-libertarians (e.g. John McDonell, Richard Wolff, Paul Cockshott) try to eliminate the cycle of boom and bust, much like the right libertarians. This framing (e.g. of Democrats as economically right) may be provocative to Americans, but is natural in the rest of the world. I'm Australian and Bernie Sanders is to the right of our right wing party.

TomMckenny 7y ago

The Great Depression and the fact that vast quantities of capital were annihilated in two world wars which seriously reduced the power of those who own society. There is another point you hint at that I want to underline: nations freely use ideological rhetoric to hide the same thousand year old wealth patterns. China is not communist, N Korea is a kingdom, the NSDP outlawed and jailed socialists and, as the article points out, social mobility in the US is fought by the ruling class at every opportunity.