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> You assert that the Stock Market offers nothing. I never said that, I said it was crap. Things that are crap can still offer things of value, they just do so

> You assert that the Stock Market offers nothing. I never said that, I said it was crap. Things that are crap can still offer things of value, they just do so in a crappy way. Global capitalism is a prime example of that. I did say—in a different thread—that to a worker, the stock market offers nothing of value. I still stand by that. To a worker the shareholder-board of director relationship is such that it monopolizes job opportunities. The average worker has no choice but to hand over the fruit of their labor to shareholders and hope that their union will successfully negotiate a better wage—or worse hope they are allowed to unionize. As to your example of the Dutch treasure ships, we don’t live in a Mercantile world any more. We now have insurance companies which offers insurance on ventures like these. And if the risk is to great, the Dutch traders could ask their government to insure them to a point (and in return pay higher parts of their profits in taxes). There are more questions that arise when you bring this mercantile example to the modern setting: How are the Dutch traders the once that are making the millions off of this scheme? I would want to ask how much are the farmers growing and drying the spice making from this? Perhaps they deserve more. Perhaps the farmers should band together and use a more favorable distributor that offers them a fair share of the profits, rather then relying on these shady colonialists. Maybe the profits being made up in Holland shouldn’t be going there in the first place. Maybe we should standardize shipping such that distributors could rely on a global trade network, say by buying a container at a freight that departs from Bangkok and heads towards Rotterdam every 2 weeks. Then maybe the Dutch treasure ships won’t be needed at all, and their old unfair business model can rot along with their falling stock prices and their aging ships.

dragontamer 6y ago
> I did say—in a different thread—that to a worker, the stock market offers nothing of value. The ship-hands of the hypothetical 16th century Treasure Ship, what job would they have if investors didn't give them a ship to work on? > I would want to ask how much are the farmers growing and drying the spice making from this? Well, without Europeans to consume those spices, I presume they'd also be out of the job. Because they were growing those spices hoping that someone would come by and trade with them. That's why India was exporting spices: because they had far more / excesses of spices, while Europeans were importing spices (they couldn't grow those spices in Europe). The trade, and Treasure Ship, in fact benefited everyone. --------- > Maybe we should standardize shipping such that distributors could rely on a global trade network, say by buying a container at a freight that departs from Bangkok and heads towards Rotterdam every 2 weeks. Those ships and trading networks cost money. How will you build those networks? Answer: raise money, then with that money, buy ships. You can't just magically assume ships appear from nothingness. Someone has to make those, someone has to be the risk-taker to assume the risk when disasters (ex: hurricane sinks treasure ship) happens. ---------------- Lets take another example: Solar Panels. How do you expect for solar panels to be deployed? The Stock Market is really good at that: tons of solar panel companies got literal billions of dollars so that Solar Panels could be bought, and they hope for a slow-and-steady profit over the next 20 years (or whatever the lifespan of solar panels is). This is true for solar panel manufacturers, utility solar panel deployers, as well as solar-panel installers. All of them got large investments from the modern stock market. Sure, the US Government put down a few incentives, but the stock market created the possibility. ---------- How about this. Try to build a 20MW Solar Panel array. Maybe not "really build it", but really try to think through the steps of how you'd raise money and actually build the darn thing. And no magic thinking. You can't just imagine that money / resources pop out of no where. If you get money, tell me where you get the money from, and why they'd give it to you. If you say the government will do it, explain how easy it will be to make a law to increase taxes so that the government has the funds to take on the project. (Maybe you have some special legal scheme that you think everyone would agree too. I dunno, I can't think of anything on that front. I'd probably have the government tap into the Bond market honestly...)
- runarberg 6y ago
  I think you underestimate the efficacy and resourcefulness of the private enterprise. People are usually rewarded (a lot) when they find new markets, and in the modern economy, they do. There is no reason to expect they would stop doing that if we would abolish the stock market. I’m sure that the majority of all businesses are able to fund their own ventures (including solar panel manufacturers), if they don’t have the savings, there are also loans, government (and community) support, etc. I think your overestimate of the value (or rather the necessity) of the stock market stems from big, expensive, and risky ventures. Perhaps you are right and those would suffer if the stock market would suddenly collapse on it self. However like I said previously, I think you underestimate the resourcefulness of the private enterprise. In a world where there are no stocks, and a company wants to venture in a risky and expensive project, that nobody wants to loan for (not even the government) perhaps they would find a way to scale down the project, start earning profits (or demonstrate how the profits will come as the project is scaled up). Perhaps some loan agency will specialize in large risky loans (at a higher price), and perhaps we will (god forbids) re-invent the stock market. If I am wrong and I overestimate the resourcefulness of the private enterprise. Then the government can always kick in and fund the deployment of those solar panels. After all we do need them, and there is no risk for the government (well the risk is the other direction of letting those solar panels go undeployed and risk a runaway climate disaster; hence the green new deal).
  - dragontamer 6y ago
    The biggest private enterprises I'm aware of are Cargill and Koch, at estimated $115 Billion revenue each. Lets just look at the top companies in the world by revenue, shall we? 1. Walmart (Public, stock ticker WMT) -- 560 Billion/year revenue 2. Amazon (Public, AMZN) -- 386 Billion 3. Apple (Public, AAPL) -- 274 Billion 4. CVS (Public, CVS) -- 268 Billion 5. ExxonMobil (Public XOM) -- 264 Billion (Etc. etc. etc.) By revenue, we have to drop down all the way to #25: Bank of America ($113 Billion/year) before we find public companies close to the size of private ones. ---------- In fact, most private companies seek to go public. So that those private-shares can be "Cashed out" on the public market. Private companies do not have access to a market: you cannot leave your seat of ownership very easily. In contrast: public companies trade their ownership ("shares") millions of times a day on the public stock market. Its extremely easy to become an owner... or to leave your seat of power. As such, as large private companies's owners grow old (and eventually die), their successors naturally transition to public ownership models. As such, figures such as Bill Gates, can easily leave their seat as owner of Microsoft and move on with their life, doing something else. All Bill Gates had to do was sell his shares.

dragontamer 6y ago

> I did say—in a different thread—that to a worker, the stock market offers nothing of value. The ship-hands of the hypothetical 16th century Treasure Ship, what job would they have if investors didn't give them a ship to work on? > I would want to ask how much are the farmers growing and drying the spice making from this? Well, without Europeans to consume those spices, I presume they'd also be out of the job. Because they were growing those spices hoping that someone would come by and trade with them. That's why India was exporting spices: because they had far more / excesses of spices, while Europeans were importing spices (they couldn't grow those spices in Europe). The trade, and Treasure Ship, in fact benefited everyone. --------- > Maybe we should standardize shipping such that distributors could rely on a global trade network, say by buying a container at a freight that departs from Bangkok and heads towards Rotterdam every 2 weeks. Those ships and trading networks cost money. How will you build those networks? Answer: raise money, then with that money, buy ships. You can't just magically assume ships appear from nothingness. Someone has to make those, someone has to be the risk-taker to assume the risk when disasters (ex: hurricane sinks treasure ship) happens. ---------------- Lets take another example: Solar Panels. How do you expect for solar panels to be deployed? The Stock Market is really good at that: tons of solar panel companies got literal billions of dollars so that Solar Panels could be bought, and they hope for a slow-and-steady profit over the next 20 years (or whatever the lifespan of solar panels is). This is true for solar panel manufacturers, utility solar panel deployers, as well as solar-panel installers. All of them got large investments from the modern stock market. Sure, the US Government put down a few incentives, but the stock market created the possibility. ---------- How about this. Try to build a 20MW Solar Panel array. Maybe not "really build it", but really try to think through the steps of how you'd raise money and actually build the darn thing. And no magic thinking. You can't just imagine that money / resources pop out of no where. If you get money, tell me where you get the money from, and why they'd give it to you. If you say the government will do it, explain how easy it will be to make a law to increase taxes so that the government has the funds to take on the project. (Maybe you have some special legal scheme that you think everyone would agree too. I dunno, I can't think of anything on that front. I'd probably have the government tap into the Bond market honestly...)

runarberg 6y ago
I think you underestimate the efficacy and resourcefulness of the private enterprise. People are usually rewarded (a lot) when they find new markets, and in the modern economy, they do. There is no reason to expect they would stop doing that if we would abolish the stock market. I’m sure that the majority of all businesses are able to fund their own ventures (including solar panel manufacturers), if they don’t have the savings, there are also loans, government (and community) support, etc. I think your overestimate of the value (or rather the necessity) of the stock market stems from big, expensive, and risky ventures. Perhaps you are right and those would suffer if the stock market would suddenly collapse on it self. However like I said previously, I think you underestimate the resourcefulness of the private enterprise. In a world where there are no stocks, and a company wants to venture in a risky and expensive project, that nobody wants to loan for (not even the government) perhaps they would find a way to scale down the project, start earning profits (or demonstrate how the profits will come as the project is scaled up). Perhaps some loan agency will specialize in large risky loans (at a higher price), and perhaps we will (god forbids) re-invent the stock market. If I am wrong and I overestimate the resourcefulness of the private enterprise. Then the government can always kick in and fund the deployment of those solar panels. After all we do need them, and there is no risk for the government (well the risk is the other direction of letting those solar panels go undeployed and risk a runaway climate disaster; hence the green new deal).
- dragontamer 6y ago
  The biggest private enterprises I'm aware of are Cargill and Koch, at estimated $115 Billion revenue each. Lets just look at the top companies in the world by revenue, shall we? 1. Walmart (Public, stock ticker WMT) -- 560 Billion/year revenue 2. Amazon (Public, AMZN) -- 386 Billion 3. Apple (Public, AAPL) -- 274 Billion 4. CVS (Public, CVS) -- 268 Billion 5. ExxonMobil (Public XOM) -- 264 Billion (Etc. etc. etc.) By revenue, we have to drop down all the way to #25: Bank of America ($113 Billion/year) before we find public companies close to the size of private ones. ---------- In fact, most private companies seek to go public. So that those private-shares can be "Cashed out" on the public market. Private companies do not have access to a market: you cannot leave your seat of ownership very easily. In contrast: public companies trade their ownership ("shares") millions of times a day on the public stock market. Its extremely easy to become an owner... or to leave your seat of power. As such, as large private companies's owners grow old (and eventually die), their successors naturally transition to public ownership models. As such, figures such as Bill Gates, can easily leave their seat as owner of Microsoft and move on with their life, doing something else. All Bill Gates had to do was sell his shares.