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Property rights and a market economy are not sufficient for capitalism. For capitalism you also need to leverage the work of others for your own profit, i.e. w

by esarbe 3y ago

Property rights and a market economy are not sufficient for capitalism. For capitalism you also need to leverage the work of others for your own profit, i.e. wage labor. Syndicalism, for example, also allows for private property and a market economy. It's not capitalism, though. Worker exploitation is a core principle of capitalism.

drekipus 3y ago
> Worker exploitation is a core principle of capitalism you can choose not to work. you just have to figure out how to get food and shelter on your own though. you can go into the woods, hunt and fish, and build your own shelter. as long as you're not breaking laws, you'll be fine. If work was owed to the state (or syndicate), then you have no choice (by being part of the state) - so which one is slavery and exploitation?
- jamilton 3y ago
  >as long as you're not breaking laws, you'll be fine. My expectation is that this would most likely be nearly impossible without money and therefore work, because you can't live on land you don't have the rights to. From a quick search, you can legally camp in national parks in the same spot for up to 2 weeks before you have to move at least 25 miles. And of course, there are legal restrictions on hunting and fishing that (I expect) would be make feeding yourself impractical. But that's besides the point. It's still exploitation even if other options are merely much more difficult/annoying/painful and not impossible.
  - drekipus 3y ago
    > It's still exploitation even if other options are merely much more difficult what wouldn't be exploitation, in your estimation? what is the meaning of the word? is me, telling my kids to take out the trash, exploitation? am I being exploited when i feed my kids and put them to bed?
    - esarbe 3y ago
      What a very good question. One that Marx already examined. I'm not a Marxist, but I find his analysis and conclusion to be spot-on. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploitation_of_labour https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploitation_of_labour
      - drekipus 3y ago
        "unfair" is in the first sentence, which is what I'm asking about, who defines fair? If you're not a Marxist, you are your own person, so what are your thoughts on the matter.
        esarbe 3y ago
        Also a very good question! Im my opinion, all employees in a business should receive about the same amount of money. Either someone is doing a necessary job and thus contributing just the same as everyone else, or that job is not necessary and then there is no need to pay someone to do it. There can some variance in the distribution and that might even be useful in some sense. That said; I'm a syndicalist. I think that the people working in business should own that business. That way there's no issue of exploitation. The capitalist model of economic progress allows too much inequality to creep in, something that in the long run is harmful for any society. It also allows of an unreasonable compounding of slight initial differences that then will explode into the madness we see today, where some individuals have more economic power than hundreds of millions of others - now that is unfair.
- deadfoxygrandpa 3y ago
  when marxists say "exploitation" it's just a mathematical fact, not a value judgement. it just means that workers, systemically (that is, it doesn't make a claim about any individual worker), don't get ownership over the full value that they produce. this must be true if you really think about it, otherwise there would be no reason to own a company that you aren't also a normal worker in
  - MichaelZuo 3y ago
    No, it's not zero sum, it's possible to destroy value, i.e. 1+1 could equal less than 2. And it's also possible to create value, i.e. 1+1 could equal more than 2. In the extreme case even literal bars of gold can become worthless after a few seconds of 'work', e.g. if someone throws them into an active volcano. After which no human individual or group would derive anything from it.
    - deadfoxygrandpa 3y ago
      that's not "socially necessary labor", so the labor theory of value doesn't have anything to say about something like that
      - MichaelZuo 3y ago
        Then it sounds like a pretty dumb theory.
        deadfoxygrandpa 3y ago
        how much of a typical capitalist economy is based on the throwing gold into a volcano industry?
        MichaelZuo 3y ago
        How would I know? I don't have insight into every bar of gold on Earth. For a practically possible scenario I think it definitely raises questions whenever a theory flat out ignores it.
- esarbe 3y ago
  > you can go into the woods, hunt and fish, and build your own shelter. as long as you're not breaking laws, you'll be fine. That's a big no-go in almost all European nations. Fishing and hunting is always regulated, requiring permit and all the bureaucracy leading up to that. Not an option for most - if any - nation on earth. > If work was owed to the state (or syndicate), That's neither what syndicalism proposes nor what I talked about.
alvah 3y ago
If an owner of capital, i.e. a capitalist, makes money from a combination of his own efforts & automated systems (physical or software) he has invested in, by your definition he is no longer a capitalist. Ergo, your definition is either wrong, or at best incomplete.
- esarbe 3y ago
  If you make money on your own, from no capital inherited except what society has given you and you don't ever have any employees, only making profit from your own labor, then yes; that's not a capitalist. How does that demonstrate that "my" definition is wrong or incomplete?
  - alvah 3y ago
    Because in the example I gave, you’re not making profit from your own labour, you’re also “exploiting” machines and software. How does this not meet the generally accepted definition of capitalism (a system in which private individuals or businesses own capital goods)?
    - esarbe 3y ago
      Because the generally accepted definition of capitalism isn't "a system in which private individuals own capital goods". (Software and machines are means of labor [0]. They are not workers and they don't receive wages.) That's a widely held misconception. We had economic systems with "private individuals owning capital goods" before and we didn't call them capitalism. [1] One central characteristic of capitalism is wage labor. If you don't make profit from leveraging disparages between wages paid and profits made, you're playing capitalism, but some other kind of game. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Means_of_labor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Means_of_labor [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism
      - alvah 3y ago
        From your own link: "Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit". You're talking about something else.

by esarbe 3y ago

drekipus 3y ago

> Worker exploitation is a core principle of capitalism you can choose not to work. you just have to figure out how to get food and shelter on your own though. you can go into the woods, hunt and fish, and build your own shelter. as long as you're not breaking laws, you'll be fine. If work was owed to the state (or syndicate), then you have no choice (by being part of the state) - so which one is slavery and exploitation?

jamilton 3y ago
>as long as you're not breaking laws, you'll be fine. My expectation is that this would most likely be nearly impossible without money and therefore work, because you can't live on land you don't have the rights to. From a quick search, you can legally camp in national parks in the same spot for up to 2 weeks before you have to move at least 25 miles. And of course, there are legal restrictions on hunting and fishing that (I expect) would be make feeding yourself impractical. But that's besides the point. It's still exploitation even if other options are merely much more difficult/annoying/painful and not impossible.
- drekipus 3y ago
  > It's still exploitation even if other options are merely much more difficult what wouldn't be exploitation, in your estimation? what is the meaning of the word? is me, telling my kids to take out the trash, exploitation? am I being exploited when i feed my kids and put them to bed?
  - esarbe 3y ago
    What a very good question. One that Marx already examined. I'm not a Marxist, but I find his analysis and conclusion to be spot-on. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploitation_of_labour https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exploitation_of_labour
    - drekipus 3y ago
      "unfair" is in the first sentence, which is what I'm asking about, who defines fair? If you're not a Marxist, you are your own person, so what are your thoughts on the matter.
      - esarbe 3y ago
        Also a very good question! Im my opinion, all employees in a business should receive about the same amount of money. Either someone is doing a necessary job and thus contributing just the same as everyone else, or that job is not necessary and then there is no need to pay someone to do it. There can some variance in the distribution and that might even be useful in some sense. That said; I'm a syndicalist. I think that the people working in business should own that business. That way there's no issue of exploitation. The capitalist model of economic progress allows too much inequality to creep in, something that in the long run is harmful for any society. It also allows of an unreasonable compounding of slight initial differences that then will explode into the madness we see today, where some individuals have more economic power than hundreds of millions of others - now that is unfair.
deadfoxygrandpa 3y ago
when marxists say "exploitation" it's just a mathematical fact, not a value judgement. it just means that workers, systemically (that is, it doesn't make a claim about any individual worker), don't get ownership over the full value that they produce. this must be true if you really think about it, otherwise there would be no reason to own a company that you aren't also a normal worker in
- MichaelZuo 3y ago
  No, it's not zero sum, it's possible to destroy value, i.e. 1+1 could equal less than 2. And it's also possible to create value, i.e. 1+1 could equal more than 2. In the extreme case even literal bars of gold can become worthless after a few seconds of 'work', e.g. if someone throws them into an active volcano. After which no human individual or group would derive anything from it.
  - deadfoxygrandpa 3y ago
    that's not "socially necessary labor", so the labor theory of value doesn't have anything to say about something like that
    - MichaelZuo 3y ago
      Then it sounds like a pretty dumb theory.
      - deadfoxygrandpa 3y ago
        how much of a typical capitalist economy is based on the throwing gold into a volcano industry?
        MichaelZuo 3y ago
        How would I know? I don't have insight into every bar of gold on Earth. For a practically possible scenario I think it definitely raises questions whenever a theory flat out ignores it.
esarbe 3y ago
> you can go into the woods, hunt and fish, and build your own shelter. as long as you're not breaking laws, you'll be fine. That's a big no-go in almost all European nations. Fishing and hunting is always regulated, requiring permit and all the bureaucracy leading up to that. Not an option for most - if any - nation on earth. > If work was owed to the state (or syndicate), That's neither what syndicalism proposes nor what I talked about.

alvah 3y ago

If an owner of capital, i.e. a capitalist, makes money from a combination of his own efforts & automated systems (physical or software) he has invested in, by your definition he is no longer a capitalist. Ergo, your definition is either wrong, or at best incomplete.

esarbe 3y ago
If you make money on your own, from no capital inherited except what society has given you and you don't ever have any employees, only making profit from your own labor, then yes; that's not a capitalist. How does that demonstrate that "my" definition is wrong or incomplete?
- alvah 3y ago
  Because in the example I gave, you’re not making profit from your own labour, you’re also “exploiting” machines and software. How does this not meet the generally accepted definition of capitalism (a system in which private individuals or businesses own capital goods)?
  - esarbe 3y ago
    Because the generally accepted definition of capitalism isn't "a system in which private individuals own capital goods". (Software and machines are means of labor [0]. They are not workers and they don't receive wages.) That's a widely held misconception. We had economic systems with "private individuals owning capital goods" before and we didn't call them capitalism. [1] One central characteristic of capitalism is wage labor. If you don't make profit from leveraging disparages between wages paid and profits made, you're playing capitalism, but some other kind of game. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Means_of_labor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Means_of_labor [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Capitalism
    - alvah 3y ago
      From your own link: "Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit". You're talking about something else.