4 ms·

> I don't know, I view capitalism mostly as a way to allow people who have money to make more money without providing work or value from people who do work Wel

by _0ffh 2y ago

> I don't know, I view capitalism mostly as a way to allow people who have money to make more money without providing work or value from people who do work Well, that's not how capitalists view it, quite the opposite. In a free market economy, which relies on voluntary interactions, the only way to make money is to generate value for others. Take me buying a loaf of bread: To me the bread has more value than the money I give to the baker, otherwise I would not agree to the interaction. To the baker OTOH the money has more value than the bread, otherwise he would not agree to the interaction. Free markets are a positive-sum game.

wizzwizz4 2y ago
Free market capitalism doesn't really exist. The baker is the only baker in town, and could choose to increase prices and become filthy-rich (but doesn't, because he's a nice person). There are government regulations preventing me from setting up my own bakery without jumping through hoops – which is just as well, because if I could set up a bakery, I'd be selling people flavoured mud, sawdust, and plaster dust (zero-calorie bread: tastes just like the real thing!). Mutually-beneficial transactions are a good description of what's happening, but that's not a description we can use to do systems-level thinking, because it's not what's "really" going on.
- _0ffh 2y ago
  > but doesn't, because he's a nice person He doesn't, because he would quickly loose all his business to the competition, and if there was none, there quickly would be - unless government force provides him with an artificial monopoly. "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages." - Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations
forty 2y ago
The trick is that a very small number of people confiscated most of the wealth and their "added value" is releasing some of that wealth to those who were not lucky enough to have any wealth. I think I could be fine with a capitalist system where wealth is spread evenly (which should involve abolishing inheritance for example, but not only)
orwin 2y ago
That's called liberalism. Literally liberalism. Capitalism posit that capital owners, not labor, decide what should be produced by a company, and how it should be produced. That's all.
- _0ffh 2y ago
  Capitalism posits that it should be legal to privately own capital goods. If I own something, that makes me the one who decides what to do with it.
  - forty 2y ago
    There are systems which recognize private ownership which are not capitalists. Capitalism is just about the full control of means of production and of companies by capital owners as explained by your parent.
    - _0ffh 2y ago
      Do you own a hammer? Well, that's a capital good, so you're a capitalist! Congratulations!
      - forty 2y ago
        If that hammer is the mean of production of some company and as a result of owning the hammer I can get all the profits of the company, while doing no work and the people doing the actual work with the hammer get only low wages , then this is indeed capitalism :)
        _0ffh 2y ago
        The hammer allows the worker to be more productive than he would be without one, so he chooses freely to team up with the hammer-owner for a share of the additional value created by using the hammer. The endlessly repeated "but all muh profit goes to the evul capitalist" thing is logically nonsensical, as whatever share of the additional surplus generated by the hammer goes to the capitalist is by definition the capitalist's profit, however small. So you essentially demand to be handed someone else's property for no compensation at all, as that would be the only way for there to be no profit for the capitalist (if indeed, the product is successfully sold at all). The capitalist, who by the way is the one who invested not only in the hammer but in the raw materials needed for production, and who shoulders all of the risk and delayed gratification, while the worker gets a risk-free, immediate income, before the company even earns it's very first cent.

by _0ffh 2y ago

wizzwizz4 2y ago

Free market capitalism doesn't really exist. The baker is the only baker in town, and could choose to increase prices and become filthy-rich (but doesn't, because he's a nice person). There are government regulations preventing me from setting up my own bakery without jumping through hoops – which is just as well, because if I could set up a bakery, I'd be selling people flavoured mud, sawdust, and plaster dust (zero-calorie bread: tastes just like the real thing!). Mutually-beneficial transactions are a good description of what's happening, but that's not a description we can use to do systems-level thinking, because it's not what's "really" going on.

_0ffh 2y ago
> but doesn't, because he's a nice person He doesn't, because he would quickly loose all his business to the competition, and if there was none, there quickly would be - unless government force provides him with an artificial monopoly. "It is not from the benevolence of the butcher, the brewer, or the baker, that we expect our dinner, but from their regard to their own interest. We address ourselves, not to their humanity but to their self-love, and never talk to them of our own necessities but of their advantages." - Adam Smith, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations

forty 2y ago

The trick is that a very small number of people confiscated most of the wealth and their "added value" is releasing some of that wealth to those who were not lucky enough to have any wealth. I think I could be fine with a capitalist system where wealth is spread evenly (which should involve abolishing inheritance for example, but not only)

orwin 2y ago

That's called liberalism. Literally liberalism. Capitalism posit that capital owners, not labor, decide what should be produced by a company, and how it should be produced. That's all.

_0ffh 2y ago
Capitalism posits that it should be legal to privately own capital goods. If I own something, that makes me the one who decides what to do with it.
- forty 2y ago
  There are systems which recognize private ownership which are not capitalists. Capitalism is just about the full control of means of production and of companies by capital owners as explained by your parent.
  - _0ffh 2y ago
    Do you own a hammer? Well, that's a capital good, so you're a capitalist! Congratulations!
    - forty 2y ago
      If that hammer is the mean of production of some company and as a result of owning the hammer I can get all the profits of the company, while doing no work and the people doing the actual work with the hammer get only low wages , then this is indeed capitalism :)
      - _0ffh 2y ago
        The hammer allows the worker to be more productive than he would be without one, so he chooses freely to team up with the hammer-owner for a share of the additional value created by using the hammer. The endlessly repeated "but all muh profit goes to the evul capitalist" thing is logically nonsensical, as whatever share of the additional surplus generated by the hammer goes to the capitalist is by definition the capitalist's profit, however small. So you essentially demand to be handed someone else's property for no compensation at all, as that would be the only way for there to be no profit for the capitalist (if indeed, the product is successfully sold at all). The capitalist, who by the way is the one who invested not only in the hammer but in the raw materials needed for production, and who shoulders all of the risk and delayed gratification, while the worker gets a risk-free, immediate income, before the company even earns it's very first cent.