4 ms·

I like to think of it biomimetically. Organisms and ecosystems have both competition and collaboration at every level of organization. If I were to design a go

I like to think of it biomimetically. Organisms and ecosystems have both competition and collaboration at every level of organization. If I were to design a government from scratch I think it would actually be relatively easy to know what's best nationalized and what's best privatized. Nationalize the things that you do not want to be driven by the profit incentive because they need to be fair and accessible to all (mass transit, healthcare, utilities, communication networks, science), and privatize everything else (entertainment, retail, food, services).

throw5673985 2y ago
> privatize everything else [including] food yet: > Nationalize the things that [...] need to be fair and accessible to all Should food be accessible to all? Or is food production privatized because market economies more accurately meet consumer demand?
- short_sells_poo 2y ago
  Food is tricky. The food supply is one of the highest national security concerns IMO. Free market proponents love to go about saying that growing food should be left to countries and regions who do it well (due to climate and infrastructure), but if your country cannot grow enough food to supply it's own citizens' basic calorie needs, you are literally living on borrowed time. If the food supply is cut off for any reason, things go down very-very rapidly and the government has days, if not hours to sort things out before things descend into chaos. At the same time, governments do not have a good track record of running the food/ags industry. I guess a system where the government heavily subsidizes it and incentivises domestic production, but lets farmers do their thing is probably as good as we can do?
  - robertlagrant 2y ago
    > Free market proponents love to go about saying that growing food should be left to countries and regions who do it well (due to climate and infrastructure), I think this is globalism rather than free market.
  - noduerme 2y ago
    Countries that allow markets to control food prices have a far better track record of not starving, spiraling into hyperinflation, and losing wars than do countries which attempt to regulate food prices.
  - foobarbecue 2y ago
    Good point. I learned this from Silo! I say the government needs to ensure no one starves (food stamps, soup kitchens, etc. depending on the situation), and all food is safe to eat (it amazes me how well governments do this in most countries today), but otherwise production and distribution should be competitive.
noduerme 2y ago
I agreed with your first statement about competition and collaboration both being necessary. But if you extend that over time you see that those states in nature exist in a state of endless conflict, not in parallel. So in the realm of governing economies (democratically or otherwise), one of the most unfortunate but profitable outcomes of the human desire to oscillate between competition and collaboration is to be something like Argentina: Nationalize those things you want to be fair and accessible every 10 years and then privatize them again every other 10 years. This way, each new generation can lean capitalist or communist and make a killing by raiding whatever wealth was built by the previous generation in the name of fixing the system. Because after all, neither system is real. Both are just ways to paper over the fact that each new generation of young people are animals who kill their parents.
- foobarbecue 2y ago
  8-0

throw5673985 2y ago

> privatize everything else [including] food yet: > Nationalize the things that [...] need to be fair and accessible to all Should food be accessible to all? Or is food production privatized because market economies more accurately meet consumer demand?

short_sells_poo 2y ago
Food is tricky. The food supply is one of the highest national security concerns IMO. Free market proponents love to go about saying that growing food should be left to countries and regions who do it well (due to climate and infrastructure), but if your country cannot grow enough food to supply it's own citizens' basic calorie needs, you are literally living on borrowed time. If the food supply is cut off for any reason, things go down very-very rapidly and the government has days, if not hours to sort things out before things descend into chaos. At the same time, governments do not have a good track record of running the food/ags industry. I guess a system where the government heavily subsidizes it and incentivises domestic production, but lets farmers do their thing is probably as good as we can do?
- robertlagrant 2y ago
  > Free market proponents love to go about saying that growing food should be left to countries and regions who do it well (due to climate and infrastructure), I think this is globalism rather than free market.
- noduerme 2y ago
  Countries that allow markets to control food prices have a far better track record of not starving, spiraling into hyperinflation, and losing wars than do countries which attempt to regulate food prices.
- foobarbecue 2y ago
  Good point. I learned this from Silo! I say the government needs to ensure no one starves (food stamps, soup kitchens, etc. depending on the situation), and all food is safe to eat (it amazes me how well governments do this in most countries today), but otherwise production and distribution should be competitive.

noduerme 2y ago

I agreed with your first statement about competition and collaboration both being necessary. But if you extend that over time you see that those states in nature exist in a state of endless conflict, not in parallel. So in the realm of governing economies (democratically or otherwise), one of the most unfortunate but profitable outcomes of the human desire to oscillate between competition and collaboration is to be something like Argentina: Nationalize those things you want to be fair and accessible every 10 years and then privatize them again every other 10 years. This way, each new generation can lean capitalist or communist and make a killing by raiding whatever wealth was built by the previous generation in the name of fixing the system. Because after all, neither system is real. Both are just ways to paper over the fact that each new generation of young people are animals who kill their parents.

foobarbecue 2y ago
8-0