Capitalism Is For Dummies.

reply to post by Germanicus


Ok, I see where you are coming from and its one of the following two possibilities:

1. You live in a communist country AND WORK for the communist/socialist country to spread this Crapola as propaganda.

2. You are a scholar (possibly Google scholar) with no practical experience. Problem with that is, that theories don't always apply in the real world.

So what country do you currently reside at?

reply to post by UltimateSkeptic1

Don't believe me? Go out in the street today and try to convince strangers to give you their money. Then go to Starbucks and look at the streams of people walking in handing money over for a cup of coffee. Of the hundreds of people going into Apple stores buying phones and computers.

That is very true! However, as we walk the slippery slope of how Capitolism came from and "idea" of being creative and being able to pull up your bootstraps to be able to be creative and grow a new business, how exactly has that been condusive to businesses today?

How has governmental involvement creating ridiculous laws helped the "small businessperson" to come up with a great idea and be able to make a "comfortable NOT RICH" living?

I can use and example, maybe not a great one, but a good one. I remember years ago, when a friend of mine from New Jersey was telling me about this GREAT Ice Tea made by a company called Snapple! He actually sent me some and when I tried it, I was blown away by how good it tasted. Fast Forward, Snapple was bought by a HUGE corporation. Can I blame the small company owner? Nope, but I can definately say, that the ingredients and the product went downhill since....

Just be observant and watch how when any small successful company in our country becomes popular and competes with our mega corporations. It seems that once the mega corporations deem them "compitition" they get a very lucrative offer and our bought out, only to have their products value be reduced by putting inferior and even sometimes dangerous ingredients to just turn a buck!

Do I blame the owner of that small company for selling and making a profit? Nope, not at all. That is Capitalism! However, when that mega corporation takes said product and puts unhealthy ingredients into the product it bought and is able to mass market it to the people, (who most, don't even know the company had been bought and the quality of the product itself has changed) that I believe becomes more "criminal" than a part of Capitalism as it was intended to be....

Just my two cents on the whole thing....

Originally posted by Jean Paul Zodeaux
reply to post by Germanicus

 

Do you have a PHD in rudeness. It is very telling.

The motto of this site is "Deny Ignorance". That doesn't mean to deny being ignorant, it means the members are encouraged to educate the ignorant. If you find that rude, particularly after creating a thread calling capitalists dummies, then you have more problems than ignorance.

I was saying that we are like Crash Test Dummies.

And all you have is an opinion. A flawed one at that. Capitalism will always lead to corporatism. Corporatism is a product of capitalism and a form of capitalism. If Free Market American Constitutionalsts defend captalism,they defend corporatism.

And the thrust of what I am saying in the opening post is that capitalist governments do not help us because that is removing a business opportunity. It is wrong. Capitalism holds us back. if you disagree I would love to hear why. Like I said,the private sector is almost always propped up by the taxpayer. Yet everything is a business so we are not helped,we are expoited. Capitalism holds us back for sure. Profit margins hold us back. Socialism can focus on what is important. Capitalism can not focus on what is important. If all the worlds problems were fixed,capitalism would have nobody left to exploit. Capitalism does not look for genuine solutions to problems,it looks to profit from them.

"Teach a man to fish,you ruin a wonderful business opportunity."- Karl Marx ( and no Im not a commie. I am socialist. )

reply to post by Germanicus


What country do you currently live in?

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reply to post by Erectus


There was not one single statement in your last post that either pointed out Capitalism inadequacy nor socialisms superiority. Simply stated, it was rhetoric devoid of substance.

And you still haven't answered my previous question... Name for me one single country bankrupted by Capitalism. Now compare that list to those countries bankrupted by Socialism. I rest my case.

reply to post by interupt42


Im just some guy from Australia. Even some guy from Australia can see that capitalism is flawed.. Capitalist or socialist,you must admit that our governments are working against us and it seems that they are wasting our money on purpose. They could not be so incompetent. My solar panel idea isnt perfect but what I mean is that governments would seriously be against it because by helping us they remove a business opportunity. Its absurd. Economy must be secondary to certain things. Regenerative medicine for example could help so many but it will mostly only be for the rich.

I live in Australia and in the 80's Australia was a bit socialist really. We had great public services and everything was run well. Now that we have been americanized and everything is going private you see that things are actually worse. Not better. Privatization makes sure we are ripped off as much as possible. There are great examples of Public Works that work. The Hoover Dam is a great example of a Public Works that helped people. The government is more interested in making us pay too much for water,water,to build a dam these days let alone help us out with the cost of energy. Even a 'capitalist' must admit that western governments work against the people.

Originally posted by seeker1963
Do I blame the owner of that small company for selling and making a profit? Nope, not at all. That is Capitalism! However, when that mega corporation takes said product and puts unhealthy ingredients into the product it bought and is able to mass market it to the people, (who most, don't even know the company had been bought and the quality of the product itself has changed) that I believe becomes more "criminal" than a part of Capitalism as it was intended to be....

Just my two cents on the whole thing....

You are flat out WRONG! That is NOT Capitalism. And until you people start to understand that, then you are all products of indoctrination, and this conversation is moot. Almost NONE of you even know what Capitalism is. You have accepted the liberal/socialist/communist propagandized definition of Capitalism which doesn't even equate to what capitalism is.

Now I understand how Capernicus and Galileo felt.

Originally posted by Germanicus
reply to post by interupt42

 

Even a 'capitalist' must admit that western governments work against the people.

Alas, something we can agree on! A bit of a different topic, but certainly related. The reason that it is like this is because we have given government a financial interest in corporations. And by extension, we have turned our governments into corporations unto themselves. This is ALWAYS the course followed when governments get involved in economics - we have seen it in the fall of every great nation.

Originally posted by Jean Paul Zodeaux
reply to post by Germanicus

 

Corporatism predates capitalism by at least 440 years!

The word "corporation" derives from corpus, the Latin word for body, or a "body of people." Entities which carried on business and were the subjects of legal rights were found in ancient Rome, and the Maurya Empire in ancient India.[7] In medieval Europe, churches became incorporated, as did local governments, such as the Pope and the City of London Corporation. The point was that the incorporation would survive longer than the lives of any particular member, existing in perpetuity. The alleged oldest commercial corporation in the world, the Stora Kopparberg mining community in Falun, Sweden, obtained a charter from King Magnus Eriksson in 1347. Many European nations chartered corporations to lead colonial ventures, such as the Dutch East India Company or the Hudson's Bay Company, and these corporations came to play a large part in the history of corporate colonialism.

You must been on a full scholarship for that PHD in ignorance.

Capitalism runs on from mercantilism. Its hard to know where one ends and one begins. Mercentilism was bad too. And the Roman Empire was run the same as the American capitalist Empire in many ways. Rome was not as demonic as America though. Romans valued the common good. Imperialism is at the crux. That is why National Socialism is the answer.

And you have been practicing rudeness for years hey.

reply to post by Germanicus

Capitalism runs on from mercantilism. Its hard to know where one ends and one begins.

You claim all I have to offer is opinion and then you just keep spewing your opinions.

Mercantilism:

Mercantilism is now known as an attempt to create trade imbalances between nations, as well as between colonies and their imperial rulers, so that one nation prospers at the cost of others. The word "mercantilism" also has a less known usage, which simply means the principles and methods of commerce. Mercantilism started as trade between towns, but it was not necessarily competitive trade. Originally, each town had vastly different products and services that were slowly homogenized by demand over time. After the homogenization of goods, trade was carried out in wider and wider circles: town to town, county to county, province to province, and, finally, nation to nation. When too many nations were offering similar goods for trade, the trade took on a competitive edge that was sharpened by strong feelings of nationalism in a continent that was constantly embroiled in wars.

During the age of colonialism and mercantilism, the nations seeding the world with colonies were not trying to increase their trade. Most colonies were set up with an economic system that smacked of feudalism, with their raw goods going back to the motherland and, in the case of the British colony in America, being forced to buy the finished product back with a pseudo-currency that prevented them from trading with other nations.

It was Adam Smith who noticed that mercantilism was not a force of development and change, but a regressive system that was keeping the world from advancing. His ideas for a free market opened the world to capitalism.

For the ignorant, I have no doubt it is hard to know where mercantilism ends and capitalism begins. For the willfully ignorant, I have no doubt it is hard to know their ass from their elbow.

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux

You claim all I have to offer is opinion and then you just keep spewing your opinions.

Mercantilism Main article: Mercantilism See also: Protectionism A nationalist form of early capitalism where national business interests are tied to state interests, and consequently, the state apparatus is utilized to advance national business interests abroad. An example of this is colonists living in America who were only allowed to trade with and purchase goods from their respective mother countries (Britain, France, etc.). Mercantilism holds that the wealth of a nation is increased through a positive balance of trade with other nations.

en.wikipedia.org...

Like I said,early form of capitalism. Hard to tell where one ends and the other begins


edit= mercentilism was not as bad as the corporatism of today. Capitalism just keeps getting worse doesnt it?

reply to post by Germanicus


Here's a video explaining Einstein's opinion of Capitalism. Poor Einstein.
He was such a "dummy".

ETA: Good thread, Germanicus.

reply to post by Germanicus


Good thread, makes perfect sense. But you are preaching to the capitalist brainwashed masses on ATS, the vast majority of whom have never benefited in any way from capitalism, indeed theyve probably suffered greatly under it yet still defend it, reminiscent of some bizarre iteration of Stockholm syndrome.

Any intelligent person will realize that humanity's way forward, from an evolutionary stand point in all regards, must include socializing abundance (wealth, opportunity, etc) and turning its back on centralized power and control, which capitalism facilitates.

Of course, we need to go the very root of the problem, and eliminate that root for capitalism to whither and die, because capitalism is a symptom and outward manifestation of a greater issue lurking beneath the surface, which is Greed, stemming from Pride.

Unfortunately, as long as the roots of pride ("I am better than you") run so deep within humanity's collective heart, the tree of greed that grows out of those roots will always remain, and even if cut down by some catastrophic disaster, or felled under its own weight, will always grow back, unless its roots are destroyed.

Capitalism is just a branch, albeit a very large branch, of that tree.

We cannot change others; there is no way to do so. Power over others is illusionary; the only true power any of us have is over ourselves. Humanity's way forward then can only be accomplished if the collective heart of humanity changes, and becomes an environment unsuitable for the roots of pride to thrive in. How thats done for each individual is an individual thing, not the same for any two people. But what is universally needed, is a willingness to change, and a desire to move forward out of materialism and ego.

But seeing as this concept Im relaying now has been spoken of for thousands of years (at LEAST if we want to consider the last 5k - 8k years as humanity's only iteration), yet very little, if any, progress has been made. In fact, it might be argued that regression has been seen, rather than progression. The immediate future is not looking good.

"Love your neighbor as yourself"
"Treat others as you would be treated"

How much simpler can it get? Apparently despite its simplicity, the vast majority of humans just cant grasp the tremendous wisdom of those oh so simple concepts.

Humanity has a long, long, LONG way to go.

reply to post by Germanicus

edit= mercentilism was not as bad as the corporatism of today. Capitalism just keeps getting worse doesnt it?

Corporatism is not capitalism and corporatism has nothing at all to do with free markets and the only fools calling corporatism capitalism are the ignorant socialists.

Originally posted by Jean Paul Zodeaux
reply to post by Germanicus

 

edit= mercentilism was not as bad as the corporatism of today. Capitalism just keeps getting worse doesnt it?

Corporatism is not capitalism and corporatism has nothing at all to do with free markets and the only fools calling corporatism capitalism are the ignorant socialists.

The only ones I see defending corporatism is capitalists like yourself. You do not believe in putting a limit on a Market Share do you? You do not believe in putting a limit on profit margins do you? You do not bellieve in a salary cap do you/? Capitalists cannot keep in their corporatist cousins in check,even if they do claim to be from another family.

Socialism is the thing that can stop corporations from exploiting us. Even if capitalists claim to be against monopolization,you are still one and the same as the corporatists. Capitalists. Corporatists can get around 'capitalists' because 'capitalists' are more concerned with the problems created by the poor than the root problems of the corporatist 'job creators'.

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reply to post by kozmo

Especially to one who is so brainwashed that they continue to advocate for a system, socialism, that has FAILED everywhere is has been tried.

Wrong all of these countries has socialist programs that work. Canada, France, Great Britian, Germany, The Netherlands, Sweden, Belgium, Norway, Portugal, New Zealand and Iceland. In fact the country with the highest standard of living is socialist.

Also stocks in socialist countries have outperformed the US since the Reagan era.

Stocks Of Socialized Countries Have Outperformed U.S. Since Reagan Era

It's time for a new model....

No Capitalism doesn't work, even the proposed "pure capitalism".

Humanities goal should be advancement, both physically and spiritually. That however doesn't mix too well with capitalism.

As an example: What if the discovery has already been made that would grant us eternal life and health? How could it be marketed to us? Who would be able to afford it? Very few IF anyone. The result is that the discovery would be forgotten or at the best, they would attempt to water it down to the point where they could sell us small doses. Thus insuring they have a steady stream of people needing to buy a dose and keep themselves healthy and alive for a year.

THAT in itself shows why capitalism is severely flawed and not in the best interests of humanity.

The entire world is a victim of ego and separatism. Working together we could have solved our problems and ascended a LONG time ago. It's the reason we keep reincarnating until we get it right.

Socialism and countries who attempt socialism are sabotaged in every way possible to make it appear unattractive to the masses. Simply because those who wish to be separate and elite to us don't desire equality. They wish to rule!

People will cite how socialism has failed or how it has a dictator as examples but the problem is....who says there must be a dictator. The examples we have of socialism with dictatorships is because when the socialism was implemented.....there was ALREADY a dictator and the people weren't free to begin with! DUHHHH! So that dictator granted himself privileges and excluded from the system.

In order for socialism or something close to it to work, it has to be implemented by a free society. Central planning would be necessary but it's rather easy to implement a organization that has checks and balances. It could be as simple as having a rotating board, one which any and every citizen can chair for a small period of time.

The reason this world is coming to an end is because people of good spirit are realizing how unfair this world is and are beginning to rebel. Those of bad spirit realize this also but they have a "well I made it so everyone else can too". Instead of desiring to make the needed changes.

reply to post by Jean Paul Zodeaux


Dude I dont even know you. I came across you in two threads I think. And I have read a couple of your threads. I am glad we agree on something Your Founding Fathers were no corporatists. They tried a cleaner form of capitalism but the Bankers get around these things with capitalism. They find Woodrow Wilsons and the like. Traitors. Socialism can protect us better. You would be better off with a curbed fair Free Market under National Socialism. If you are patriotic you would appreciate the fact that National Socialism means economic independence. No more sending jobs and profits to China and India. National Socialism would be great. We would have to trade for oil and certain things but Autarky offers alot. Even an incomplete Autarky would create alot of opportunity in domestic markets,you must admit.