5 ms·

I would call that the difference between a small town and a city, which isn't new. You establish those ties because you see the same grocer regularly - there's

by ip26 2y ago

I would call that the difference between a small town and a city, which isn't new. You establish those ties because you see the same grocer regularly - there's only two grocers in town, after all. Meanwhile, in the city, you could buy groceries twice a week and never see the same clerk twice.

theossuary 2y ago
This isn't the difference between a small town and city, it's the inevitable result of late stage capitalism. In cities it's still possible to go to small stores and create connection with your local grocer, butcher, etc. I purposefully do it, but I have to seek out the places it's still possible, they're dwindling every year. The problem is capitalism wants to consolidate and treat people as fungible to extract more value, which has the side effect of preventing the formation of social bonds.
- parineum 2y ago
  Capitalism isn't a person, it doesn't want things. The problem with people that talk about capitalism the way you do is that they mistake human nature for the system that was built around it so when they try to change the system, the people are maladapted and transgress against it by default then it fails miserably.
  - theossuary 2y ago
    No, the issue is pedantic people like you who can't understand that "want" is a simple way of saying that a system is biased towards certain outcomes. Capitalism is not an expression of human nature, it's a single possible pareto equilibrium. To say otherwise ignores huge swaths of humans history, and many modern nations which have achieved equilibrium in different ways.
    - parineum 2y ago
      Capitalism is a system built by people that recognize that humans are reliably selfish and seeks to align their selfish interests as best as it can with the rest of the populous. No nation has ever achieved equilibrium but we are enjoying the most peaceful times in history during a time after the previous wave of capitalism-alternatives failed miserably or acquiesced. Just about every measure of human flourishing is in the rise, globally.
      - arresin 2y ago
        And now the pitch.
        7thaccount 2y ago
        They're not wrong. Late stage capitalism sucks, but the alternative systems out there seem to lead to mass starvation or total collapse. People have been lifted out of poverty worldwide as well. Some kind of balance seems necessary.
        harimau777 2y ago
        The welfare states of Western Europe and the Nordic countries seem much better than America's system of late stage capitalism and they have not lead to mass starvation or total collapse. Likewise, America's economy seemed to be much more healthy when it had a more active/successful labor movement.
        Der_Einzige 2y ago
        Those welfare states only exist as such because the US subsidizes their drug discovery, R&D, defense, spooks, and related. Without the US taking one for the team, Europe could not maintain its social democracies or its welfare states.
        harimau777 2y ago
        Then I think that the US should stop taking one for the team and we can work from there.
    - stoperaticless 2y ago
      I understand capitalism as “things can be owned and sold” + “you can profit from investment”. > it's a single possible pareto equilibrium I propose that those other equilibriums’ stability depended on at least one of these: a) small population size&density b) violent totalitarian enforcement c) indoctrination in caste system and/or religion d) no contact with capitalism > Capitalism is not an expression of human nature Ownership is very natural for humans (2 year old already declares “it’s mine”). Finally, capitalism is just one part what makes a society. I bet there are quite significant societal differences between Sweden vs US now vs US 70 years ago.
      - harimau777 2y ago
        Both capitalism and socialism are spectrums of systems rather than single monoliths so any definition is going to be fuzzy. However, it's probably useful to specifically say that in capitalism specifically private property and/or capital can be owned. Generally speaking, socialist systems still allow personal property to be owned, they just place restrictions on the ownership or private property and/or capital. It's also probably worth considering that socialism doesn't necessarily have to forbid ownership of private property or capital outright. It could, for example, mean that revenue/profit/income derived from private property or capital is taxed more highly than revenue/profit/income derived from labor.
        stoperaticless 2y ago
        > Both capitalism and socialism are spectrums of systems rather than single monoliths Seems a reasonable and useful way to define it. > any definition is going to be fuzzy. Definitely! (That is why I preemptively added my attempt at the definition, to avoid a discussion past each other)
      - kragen 2y ago
        probably a lot of people are using terrible definitions of 'capitalism' such as '“things can be owned and sold” + “you can profit from investment”', which explains why these discussions are full of so much nonsense wikipedia's current definition says: Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price systems, private property, property rights recognition, self-interest, economic freedom, meritocracy, work ethic, consumer sovereignty, profit motive, entrepreneurship, commodification, voluntary exchange, wage labor and the production of commodities. In a market economy, decision-making and investments are determined by owners of wealth, property, or ability to maneuver capital or production ability in capital and financial markets—whereas prices and the distribution of goods and services are mainly determined by competition in goods and services markets. this is not a perfect definition but it is a much better one
    - anon291 2y ago
      Capitalism is biased towards whatever the governing authority says it is. In America, due to onerous regulations and taxes, it's difficult for independent players to become established and the regulations favor a handful of large companies in most sectors. This is not universally true in every country, and they're just as capitalist (arguably more so) than us
      - HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
        Onerous? More like pathetically lacking.
    - deleted 2y ago
      [deleted]
    - somenameforme 2y ago
      I think capitalism is fundamentally different than other systems because of one important nuance. In capitalism you can buy a plot of land and go start a communist society, or a socialist one, or whatever you want. So long as your little society can feed itself, you can do whatever you want. Well even if it can't feed itself, it can still do whatever it wants - but it probably won't be particularly long lived. But in socialist or communist societies you can't just go start up your own little capitalist society.
jazzyjackson 2y ago
There can be small grocers in big cities and faceless corporations in small towns, in fact in my experience in midwest America small towns (sub 5000, say) have 0 shops, people drive the 15 minutes to the nearest walmart midsize cities / college towns ~100k will have a specialty butcher and a tobacconist where you can actually get to know the shopowners
- somenameforme 2y ago
  I'd generally agree with the stuff about everybody just driving to Walmart, but that was just to stock up on nonperishables/freezeables. There was always the local mini mart/gas station, movie store, school, church, pool hall, bar, etc. And everybody tends to know everybody anyhow, because you often have inter-family relations dating back generations.
anon291 2y ago
> Meanwhile, in the city, you could buy groceries twice a week and never see the same clerk twice. So even a cursory reading of older books and novels that detail city life just a few hundred years ago shows this not to be the case. What's gone on is that the phenomenon described above has started in cities and spread everywhere, for better or worse.
- notahacker 2y ago
  If urban city shops and restaurants have had regularly rotating staff for decades then loss of those touchpoints can't have much difference to do with the claimed decline in mental health of the last couple of generations as suggested upthread though. (A few hundred years back cities were mostly only the size of small towns today anyway, the average person didn't really frequent stores and rural communities were sometimes really isolated, and we don't really have an accurate picture of how any of this affected mental health)
- HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
  The city of Rome had a population of a million people. The anonymity of the crowd is not new it's been here for millennia.
  - kragen 2y ago
    i live in a city with a population of 14 million people, but still most of my everyday transactional interactions like buying churros, chicken wings, or electrical supplies are with people i know and transact with repeatedly. that's because i walk there, lacking a motor vehicle. i imagine this was also true of day-to-day commerce in ancient rome, and of course the patron-client and master-slave relationships that were so central in roman society were anything but anonymous
    - alwa 2y ago
      I agree: I live on and off in a city of many, many millions. Maybe it’s just the idiosyncrasy of how I choose to live and shop, but I personally know most of the people with whom I transact regularly in the same way you describe. Including many of the specific humans who staff the handful of Anonymous Big Chain kinds of enterprises that have weaseled their way into our city: even one of those branches tends to have familiar faces managing or preferring to work the shift that overlaps with when I visit. I would know how to seek social and transactional anonymity if I wanted to—just go do my shop in a different neighborhood!—but I don’t want to, and that seems pretty consistent with the way things are done in my city.

by ip26 2y ago

theossuary 2y ago

This isn't the difference between a small town and city, it's the inevitable result of late stage capitalism. In cities it's still possible to go to small stores and create connection with your local grocer, butcher, etc. I purposefully do it, but I have to seek out the places it's still possible, they're dwindling every year. The problem is capitalism wants to consolidate and treat people as fungible to extract more value, which has the side effect of preventing the formation of social bonds.

parineum 2y ago
Capitalism isn't a person, it doesn't want things. The problem with people that talk about capitalism the way you do is that they mistake human nature for the system that was built around it so when they try to change the system, the people are maladapted and transgress against it by default then it fails miserably.
- theossuary 2y ago
  No, the issue is pedantic people like you who can't understand that "want" is a simple way of saying that a system is biased towards certain outcomes. Capitalism is not an expression of human nature, it's a single possible pareto equilibrium. To say otherwise ignores huge swaths of humans history, and many modern nations which have achieved equilibrium in different ways.
  - parineum 2y ago
    Capitalism is a system built by people that recognize that humans are reliably selfish and seeks to align their selfish interests as best as it can with the rest of the populous. No nation has ever achieved equilibrium but we are enjoying the most peaceful times in history during a time after the previous wave of capitalism-alternatives failed miserably or acquiesced. Just about every measure of human flourishing is in the rise, globally.
    - arresin 2y ago
      And now the pitch.
      - 7thaccount 2y ago
        They're not wrong. Late stage capitalism sucks, but the alternative systems out there seem to lead to mass starvation or total collapse. People have been lifted out of poverty worldwide as well. Some kind of balance seems necessary.
        harimau777 2y ago
        The welfare states of Western Europe and the Nordic countries seem much better than America's system of late stage capitalism and they have not lead to mass starvation or total collapse. Likewise, America's economy seemed to be much more healthy when it had a more active/successful labor movement.
        Der_Einzige 2y ago
        Those welfare states only exist as such because the US subsidizes their drug discovery, R&D, defense, spooks, and related. Without the US taking one for the team, Europe could not maintain its social democracies or its welfare states.
        harimau777 2y ago
        Then I think that the US should stop taking one for the team and we can work from there.
  - stoperaticless 2y ago
    I understand capitalism as “things can be owned and sold” + “you can profit from investment”. > it's a single possible pareto equilibrium I propose that those other equilibriums’ stability depended on at least one of these: a) small population size&density b) violent totalitarian enforcement c) indoctrination in caste system and/or religion d) no contact with capitalism > Capitalism is not an expression of human nature Ownership is very natural for humans (2 year old already declares “it’s mine”). Finally, capitalism is just one part what makes a society. I bet there are quite significant societal differences between Sweden vs US now vs US 70 years ago.
    - harimau777 2y ago
      Both capitalism and socialism are spectrums of systems rather than single monoliths so any definition is going to be fuzzy. However, it's probably useful to specifically say that in capitalism specifically private property and/or capital can be owned. Generally speaking, socialist systems still allow personal property to be owned, they just place restrictions on the ownership or private property and/or capital. It's also probably worth considering that socialism doesn't necessarily have to forbid ownership of private property or capital outright. It could, for example, mean that revenue/profit/income derived from private property or capital is taxed more highly than revenue/profit/income derived from labor.
      - stoperaticless 2y ago
        > Both capitalism and socialism are spectrums of systems rather than single monoliths Seems a reasonable and useful way to define it. > any definition is going to be fuzzy. Definitely! (That is why I preemptively added my attempt at the definition, to avoid a discussion past each other)
    - kragen 2y ago
      probably a lot of people are using terrible definitions of 'capitalism' such as '“things can be owned and sold” + “you can profit from investment”', which explains why these discussions are full of so much nonsense wikipedia's current definition says: Capitalism is an economic system based on the private ownership of the means of production and their operation for profit. Central characteristics of capitalism include capital accumulation, competitive markets, price systems, private property, property rights recognition, self-interest, economic freedom, meritocracy, work ethic, consumer sovereignty, profit motive, entrepreneurship, commodification, voluntary exchange, wage labor and the production of commodities. In a market economy, decision-making and investments are determined by owners of wealth, property, or ability to maneuver capital or production ability in capital and financial markets—whereas prices and the distribution of goods and services are mainly determined by competition in goods and services markets. this is not a perfect definition but it is a much better one
  - anon291 2y ago
    Capitalism is biased towards whatever the governing authority says it is. In America, due to onerous regulations and taxes, it's difficult for independent players to become established and the regulations favor a handful of large companies in most sectors. This is not universally true in every country, and they're just as capitalist (arguably more so) than us
    - HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
      Onerous? More like pathetically lacking.
  - deleted 2y ago
    [deleted]
  - somenameforme 2y ago
    I think capitalism is fundamentally different than other systems because of one important nuance. In capitalism you can buy a plot of land and go start a communist society, or a socialist one, or whatever you want. So long as your little society can feed itself, you can do whatever you want. Well even if it can't feed itself, it can still do whatever it wants - but it probably won't be particularly long lived. But in socialist or communist societies you can't just go start up your own little capitalist society.

jazzyjackson 2y ago

There can be small grocers in big cities and faceless corporations in small towns, in fact in my experience in midwest America small towns (sub 5000, say) have 0 shops, people drive the 15 minutes to the nearest walmart midsize cities / college towns ~100k will have a specialty butcher and a tobacconist where you can actually get to know the shopowners

somenameforme 2y ago
I'd generally agree with the stuff about everybody just driving to Walmart, but that was just to stock up on nonperishables/freezeables. There was always the local mini mart/gas station, movie store, school, church, pool hall, bar, etc. And everybody tends to know everybody anyhow, because you often have inter-family relations dating back generations.

anon291 2y ago

> Meanwhile, in the city, you could buy groceries twice a week and never see the same clerk twice. So even a cursory reading of older books and novels that detail city life just a few hundred years ago shows this not to be the case. What's gone on is that the phenomenon described above has started in cities and spread everywhere, for better or worse.

notahacker 2y ago
If urban city shops and restaurants have had regularly rotating staff for decades then loss of those touchpoints can't have much difference to do with the claimed decline in mental health of the last couple of generations as suggested upthread though. (A few hundred years back cities were mostly only the size of small towns today anyway, the average person didn't really frequent stores and rural communities were sometimes really isolated, and we don't really have an accurate picture of how any of this affected mental health)
HeatrayEnjoyer 2y ago
The city of Rome had a population of a million people. The anonymity of the crowd is not new it's been here for millennia.
- kragen 2y ago
  i live in a city with a population of 14 million people, but still most of my everyday transactional interactions like buying churros, chicken wings, or electrical supplies are with people i know and transact with repeatedly. that's because i walk there, lacking a motor vehicle. i imagine this was also true of day-to-day commerce in ancient rome, and of course the patron-client and master-slave relationships that were so central in roman society were anything but anonymous
  - alwa 2y ago
    I agree: I live on and off in a city of many, many millions. Maybe it’s just the idiosyncrasy of how I choose to live and shop, but I personally know most of the people with whom I transact regularly in the same way you describe. Including many of the specific humans who staff the handful of Anonymous Big Chain kinds of enterprises that have weaseled their way into our city: even one of those branches tends to have familiar faces managing or preferring to work the shift that overlaps with when I visit. I would know how to seek social and transactional anonymity if I wanted to—just go do my shop in a different neighborhood!—but I don’t want to, and that seems pretty consistent with the way things are done in my city.