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The big propaganda win has always been “it’s either no holds barred free market capitalism or its central planning.” Of those two, free markets lead to better

by RC_ITR 3y ago

The big propaganda win has always been “it’s either no holds barred free market capitalism or its central planning.” Of those two, free markets lead to better outcomes, but rarely optimal outcomes. There are middle grounds. What’s worse is that America’s markets are already extremely skewed (tax deductible mortgage interest for example), but free market proponents ignore that, since it’s the baseline.

dingusdew 3y ago
[dead]
seiferteric 3y ago
Exactly, I find it funny that people will call themselves socialist, capitalist, communist... these are 19th century ideas or earlier. The reality is none of these ideologies are complete solutions, they are simply tools that can be used in certain cases. Yes it seems that capitalism/free markets works best most of the time (even China knows this) but there are many cases where it does not and something else has to happen (healthcare, housing etc.)
- umrcumrcu 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - seiferteric 3y ago
    You have misread what I said, it is not either capitalist or socialist. Policies can incorporate both, using subsidies, tax policies, law/regulations etc to incentivize desired outcomes
  - halostatue 3y ago
    I can’t speak toward the latter, but the existence of high quality healthcare in pretty much every single western country that has better average outcomes than the US indicates that capitalist healthcare is an utter failure. Yes, the US is great if you have that one-in-a-million weird disease and/or sizeable funds to call upon in some way, but for the average Jane, there’s nothing that recommends the US healthcare system as better than, say, Sierra Leone’s. As far as I can tell, most of the world does better.
    - NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
      It might be true that they have better "average" outcomes. Were I some sort of mathematical abstract that existed only in the imaginations of statisticians this might actually be a winning argument. If the average can be improved simply by giving slightly more to the 20% who are chronically unhealthy, while letting things get worse for the 80% (I assume I'm in this bucket), then you're asking for me to be worse off so that a smaller number of people who are half-dead anyway can have a few more weeks of slightly less misery.
      - seiferteric 3y ago
        Good thing there's nothing stopping you from paying more money to get better healthcare. That doesn't eliminate the good done from having some baseline healthcare provided to everyone.
      - deleted 3y ago
        [deleted]
      - halostatue 3y ago
        The average for Canada is substantially better than the average for the U.S. It’s even better in other countries. Hell, the average health outcomes in Cuba are better than the average for the U.S. And your assumptions are completely incorrect. In Canada’s universal healthcare, at least, the least served are indigent and unhoused people. People who have time to waste on HN generally have time to advocate for themselves with healthcare providers and get better outcomes even in a so-called "socialist" system. It’s almost as if people who are reflexively "anti-socialism" (specifically against the parody of socialism that is lampooned by what passes for intellectuals on the American right wing) are averse to looking at real world cases that prove every single assertion they make wrong. If you cannot be bothered to give a damn for the wellbeing of your fellow citizens by paying just a little more in taxes (and I promise you, it’s _only_ a little more), then I don’t know what can be said to address that selfishness. On that "little more": twenty-five years ago, my wife and I made about the same amount of money in local currency. She made about CA$55k and I made about US$50k. Between NC tax, federal tax, health premiums, etc. I had less disposable income at the end of the day than she did and had paid more tax plus I had to pay a ~$15 co-payment for each and every doctor’s visit that she didn’t have to pay. As far as I can tell, things have only gotten worse for the U.S., because healthcare premiums have gone up (2021 individual premiums are ~3x more expensive than 2000 individual premiums and 2022 family premiums are ~2.5x more expensive than 2001 family premiums) even as successive right-wing governments have cut taxes for the richest people. Oops.
- lamontcg 3y ago
  Well give me a term that other people understand that I can use instead of socialist. I do tend to agree with most socialist diagnosis of the problems of capitalism, I just don't tend to agree on the cure for the disease (or if there even is a cure, and not just limiting the damage). The fact that the terms don't really exist are a good indication of how well the propaganda is working I guess. > Yes it seems that capitalism/free markets works best most of the time (even China knows this) but there are many cases where it does not and something else has to happen (healthcare, housing etc.) And I don't necessarily agree with this. I think money+markets will need to exist. I don't agree that the current top-down hierarchical nature of corporations is the best. CEOs are all tinpot dictators and we've universally decided that this is just okay and commands flow down from the top and people don't question that. I've found that to be a pretty shitty model, just on the basis of not having enough feedback loops from the bottom to the top which leads to badly performing economic machines. And as corporations consolidate and grow to become the size of governments the CEOs are becoming real political dictators and a ruling class.
  - seiferteric 3y ago
    I don't know about new terms, but I prefer pragmatism over the other 'isms out there, as long as they respect individuals rights and dignity. A far as CEO's as dictators, I don't think we see eye to eye, because this can be a GOOD thing in a lot of cases. Rule by committee instead of a single minded focus of someone with a vision is a recipe for mediocrity... up until a certain scale anyway. This is where I think things tend to break down. It's like Newton's laws, they work fine up until things get too big, or fast, then you have to correct for them with something else. As long as companies aren't so big and powerful as to disrupt the function of government, or negatively affect the populous without recourse, then I think it is fine, but after that ya, you need regulation at least.
- peterashford 3y ago
  My take on this is that all philosophies tend to get pathogical at the extremes: Communism as the extreme end of socialist ideas, unfettered libertarianism / neoliberalism as the extreme end of capitalism. Speech with no consequences and an expectation of a platform as the extreme end of free speech ideas. Abortion bans as the extreme end of "respect for life". My heuristic is that any time you're espousing a "pure", "unadulterated", "absolutist" philosophy, you're probably on the path to becoming a monster. The real world is never black and white and morally grey areas are unavoidable, if messy. Rant over =)
fallingknife 3y ago
Interest expenses are deductible from all businesses taxes. (Wouldn't make sense if they weren't, as a money losing company could still be forced to pay income tax.) So If I build an apartment building and rent out the units, my interest expenses are deducted, and nobody is arguing with that. So if I buy a house and live in it, why shouldn't I be able to deduct the same?
- RC_ITR 3y ago
  Ok, and credit card interest?
  - fallingknife 3y ago
    I would argue that should be deductible
    - RC_ITR 3y ago
      Ok let’s play that out. If I’m at the top marginal rate, I effectively gain 40 cents for every untaxed dollar. Loewe then tells me that instead of paying $5k for my calfskin bag today, I can take out a 1 year $1k loan with a 400% APR via store credit card. So now instead of needing $8.3k of gross income to afford that bag, I only need $5.7k! And you know who loses that $2.6k? The government. It’s a market skew, most people agree that frivolous consumption shouldn’t be subsidized in that way, but the home thing is still up for debate (though I think it’s a bad skew now that we aren’t trying to win the Cold War, personally).
      - fallingknife 3y ago
        You are not the first person to notice the tax shield effect of debt. Companies take on debt the don't need all the time to optimize their balance sheet to minimize tax liability. If they can do it, why not individual taxpayers?
GauntletWizard 3y ago
Tax deductible mortgage interest is a favorite whipping boy, but consider the alternative - It would be more effective for corporations to buy properties and rent them out, because corporations could still charge the mortgage payments as operating loss. I would gladly incorporate a C-Corp and rent my house at market rate to myself.
- RC_ITR 3y ago
  I would prefer that too. The more people are exposed to the true cost of housing, the more likely they are to care about it. I also don’t think it’s an intrinsic good that people own their homes. Looks what it has done in places like CA where nothing gets built anymore.

by RC_ITR 3y ago

dingusdew 3y ago

[dead]

seiferteric 3y ago

Exactly, I find it funny that people will call themselves socialist, capitalist, communist... these are 19th century ideas or earlier. The reality is none of these ideologies are complete solutions, they are simply tools that can be used in certain cases. Yes it seems that capitalism/free markets works best most of the time (even China knows this) but there are many cases where it does not and something else has to happen (healthcare, housing etc.)

umrcumrcu 3y ago
[flagged]
- seiferteric 3y ago
  You have misread what I said, it is not either capitalist or socialist. Policies can incorporate both, using subsidies, tax policies, law/regulations etc to incentivize desired outcomes
- halostatue 3y ago
  I can’t speak toward the latter, but the existence of high quality healthcare in pretty much every single western country that has better average outcomes than the US indicates that capitalist healthcare is an utter failure. Yes, the US is great if you have that one-in-a-million weird disease and/or sizeable funds to call upon in some way, but for the average Jane, there’s nothing that recommends the US healthcare system as better than, say, Sierra Leone’s. As far as I can tell, most of the world does better.
  - NoMoreNicksLeft 3y ago
    It might be true that they have better "average" outcomes. Were I some sort of mathematical abstract that existed only in the imaginations of statisticians this might actually be a winning argument. If the average can be improved simply by giving slightly more to the 20% who are chronically unhealthy, while letting things get worse for the 80% (I assume I'm in this bucket), then you're asking for me to be worse off so that a smaller number of people who are half-dead anyway can have a few more weeks of slightly less misery.
    - seiferteric 3y ago
      Good thing there's nothing stopping you from paying more money to get better healthcare. That doesn't eliminate the good done from having some baseline healthcare provided to everyone.
    - deleted 3y ago
      [deleted]
    - halostatue 3y ago
      The average for Canada is substantially better than the average for the U.S. It’s even better in other countries. Hell, the average health outcomes in Cuba are better than the average for the U.S. And your assumptions are completely incorrect. In Canada’s universal healthcare, at least, the least served are indigent and unhoused people. People who have time to waste on HN generally have time to advocate for themselves with healthcare providers and get better outcomes even in a so-called "socialist" system. It’s almost as if people who are reflexively "anti-socialism" (specifically against the parody of socialism that is lampooned by what passes for intellectuals on the American right wing) are averse to looking at real world cases that prove every single assertion they make wrong. If you cannot be bothered to give a damn for the wellbeing of your fellow citizens by paying just a little more in taxes (and I promise you, it’s _only_ a little more), then I don’t know what can be said to address that selfishness. On that "little more": twenty-five years ago, my wife and I made about the same amount of money in local currency. She made about CA$55k and I made about US$50k. Between NC tax, federal tax, health premiums, etc. I had less disposable income at the end of the day than she did and had paid more tax plus I had to pay a ~$15 co-payment for each and every doctor’s visit that she didn’t have to pay. As far as I can tell, things have only gotten worse for the U.S., because healthcare premiums have gone up (2021 individual premiums are ~3x more expensive than 2000 individual premiums and 2022 family premiums are ~2.5x more expensive than 2001 family premiums) even as successive right-wing governments have cut taxes for the richest people. Oops.
lamontcg 3y ago
Well give me a term that other people understand that I can use instead of socialist. I do tend to agree with most socialist diagnosis of the problems of capitalism, I just don't tend to agree on the cure for the disease (or if there even is a cure, and not just limiting the damage). The fact that the terms don't really exist are a good indication of how well the propaganda is working I guess. > Yes it seems that capitalism/free markets works best most of the time (even China knows this) but there are many cases where it does not and something else has to happen (healthcare, housing etc.) And I don't necessarily agree with this. I think money+markets will need to exist. I don't agree that the current top-down hierarchical nature of corporations is the best. CEOs are all tinpot dictators and we've universally decided that this is just okay and commands flow down from the top and people don't question that. I've found that to be a pretty shitty model, just on the basis of not having enough feedback loops from the bottom to the top which leads to badly performing economic machines. And as corporations consolidate and grow to become the size of governments the CEOs are becoming real political dictators and a ruling class.
- seiferteric 3y ago
  I don't know about new terms, but I prefer pragmatism over the other 'isms out there, as long as they respect individuals rights and dignity. A far as CEO's as dictators, I don't think we see eye to eye, because this can be a GOOD thing in a lot of cases. Rule by committee instead of a single minded focus of someone with a vision is a recipe for mediocrity... up until a certain scale anyway. This is where I think things tend to break down. It's like Newton's laws, they work fine up until things get too big, or fast, then you have to correct for them with something else. As long as companies aren't so big and powerful as to disrupt the function of government, or negatively affect the populous without recourse, then I think it is fine, but after that ya, you need regulation at least.
peterashford 3y ago
My take on this is that all philosophies tend to get pathogical at the extremes: Communism as the extreme end of socialist ideas, unfettered libertarianism / neoliberalism as the extreme end of capitalism. Speech with no consequences and an expectation of a platform as the extreme end of free speech ideas. Abortion bans as the extreme end of "respect for life". My heuristic is that any time you're espousing a "pure", "unadulterated", "absolutist" philosophy, you're probably on the path to becoming a monster. The real world is never black and white and morally grey areas are unavoidable, if messy. Rant over =)

fallingknife 3y ago

Interest expenses are deductible from all businesses taxes. (Wouldn't make sense if they weren't, as a money losing company could still be forced to pay income tax.) So If I build an apartment building and rent out the units, my interest expenses are deducted, and nobody is arguing with that. So if I buy a house and live in it, why shouldn't I be able to deduct the same?

RC_ITR 3y ago
Ok, and credit card interest?
- fallingknife 3y ago
  I would argue that should be deductible
  - RC_ITR 3y ago
    Ok let’s play that out. If I’m at the top marginal rate, I effectively gain 40 cents for every untaxed dollar. Loewe then tells me that instead of paying $5k for my calfskin bag today, I can take out a 1 year $1k loan with a 400% APR via store credit card. So now instead of needing $8.3k of gross income to afford that bag, I only need $5.7k! And you know who loses that $2.6k? The government. It’s a market skew, most people agree that frivolous consumption shouldn’t be subsidized in that way, but the home thing is still up for debate (though I think it’s a bad skew now that we aren’t trying to win the Cold War, personally).
    - fallingknife 3y ago
      You are not the first person to notice the tax shield effect of debt. Companies take on debt the don't need all the time to optimize their balance sheet to minimize tax liability. If they can do it, why not individual taxpayers?

GauntletWizard 3y ago

Tax deductible mortgage interest is a favorite whipping boy, but consider the alternative - It would be more effective for corporations to buy properties and rent them out, because corporations could still charge the mortgage payments as operating loss. I would gladly incorporate a C-Corp and rent my house at market rate to myself.

RC_ITR 3y ago
I would prefer that too. The more people are exposed to the true cost of housing, the more likely they are to care about it. I also don’t think it’s an intrinsic good that people own their homes. Looks what it has done in places like CA where nothing gets built anymore.