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This isn't a productive comment until you define "capitalism" in your own words, and what "things" there are that aren't capitalism. Right now this is just dog-

• AndrewKemendo 2y ago
  Certainly Capitalism is a philosophy that believes chiefly property or capital is a real objectively measured thing, and that property ownership and labor inputs and the rightful owner of value increases are separate, but interconnected and managed by rational actors with increasingly perfect information Specifically that there should be, not just that there is, but that the natural state of the world is that there is a distinction between capital ownership and labor inputs with respect to assignment of value an ownership More specifically capitalism‘s core claim is that value creation is independent of labor inputs and as a result, the capital owner is the expected and rightful claimant to whatever portions of the value increase they can demand. A modern capitalist economist would point at the “failure” of the labor theory of value to actually be put into use in a economic system. Further, it assumes that labor has perfect economic flexibility and mobility, and that the flexibility and mobility of capital is simply limited by trade agreements and lack of intermediaries in price setting across all markets So the final end result of the process of capitalism is what the Mises Institute economists, and all of the Chicago school would effectively finally land at which is this pure economic liberalism otherwise known as anarcho-capitalism where every single individual is its own independent legal entity with perfect information making perfect rational decisions disintermediated from governments or groups.
  • JumpCrisscross 2y ago
    > Capitalism is a philosophy that believes chiefly property or capital is a real objectively measured thing, and that property ownership and labor inputs and the rightful owner of value increases are separate No. Capitalism is an economic system based on private ownership of the means of production and their operation for private profit. > interconnected and managed by rational actors Rational actors are a simplifying assumption that toy models make, like frictionless surfaces. Both are taught in 101 classes. The difference is physics rarely has political implications while economics commonly does, so you get a lot of people who think their 101 class (or less) qualifies them on economics in general. (Another point of defining rational systems is to observe how they deviate from reality. Sometimes, this yields useful insight into how humans behave, like hyperbolic discounting. Sometimes, it reveals inefficiency and corruption.) > with increasingly perfect information This article is about Milgrom, who wrote the book on auction theory. Auction theory is all about describing actors with imperfect and incomplete information. > capitalism‘s core claim is that value creation is independent of labor inputs and as a result, the capital owner is the expected and rightful claimant to whatever portions of the value increase they can demand No. Every macroeconomic model of note involves capital, labor and productivity to create value. Capital and labor compete for their claims to value production. > pure economic liberalism otherwise known as anarcho-capitalism These are vastly different concepts and at the fringe of both politics and economics.
    • AndrewKemendo 2y ago
      Perfect example of what I’m discussing You ignore the assumptions that define the system as implied and non-differentiated So, not all economic systems define private property as a valid concept- yet you want to smuggle it in as though it’s a homogenous assumption across all disciplines Capitalism is distinct in this and simply collapsing into “privately held means of production” is specifically a perspective long the Marx - smith axis ignoring the anarchist (Proudhon) and mutualist-indigenous hunter gather tradition You need to explicate all assumptions in order to make a definition Your definition is already corrupted by assuming property is a valid concept
      • JumpCrisscross 2y ago
        > not all economic systems define private property as a valid concept- yet you want to smuggle it in as though it’s a homogenous assumption across all disciplines I literally said “capitalism is an economic system based on private ownership.” That makes zero universal assumptions. If you don’t have private ownership in your economic system, it isn’t capitalist. (There is a limited universality to the concept of means of production, though you can absolutely define an economic system without it. It will simply struggle to describe an industrial society. Similar to how a classic capitalist model struggles to describe the complexity of informal social interaction.) > simply collapsing into “privately held means of production” is specifically a perspective long the Marx - smith axis The existence of a spectrum doesn’t imply the non-existence of another. Like, if I say red light is about 700 nm, that doesn’t say nor even imply that I don’t recognise neutrinos. > definition is already corrupted by assuming property is a valid concept It’s an internal definition. Property is a capitalist concept. Arithmetics is commonly defined as “an elementary branch of mathematics that studies numerical operations like addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division” [1]. The fact that addition is a term that, in this context, entirely derives its meaning from within arithmetics is both circular and okay and does not corrupt the definition. (We can do the same thing with natural sciences. Entomologists study insects, with the term insect being internally defined by entomology and/or biology.) [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arithmetic https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arithmetic