Yeah - Capitalism

a reply to: Metallicus

Even the Chinese use a form of capitalism.

No its not capitalism but its a system similar to what Yusgalavia had before its collapsed.

originally posted by: rickymouse
We should only have to work about thirty hours a week to support our families. Anything after that should be for things we want. Right now, most people have to work over forty hours a week and they still need the food stamps if they have a family.

I'd submit this is largely because, in our consumerist society, we spend a lot of money on things we don't actually need. If you're working 40 hours a week and have a television, Netflix, air conditioning, go to the movies AND have food to put on the table, a roof over your head, and basic transportation, you're getting what you want and what you need. Perhaps not as much as you want, but certainly more than you need.

Don't get me wrong, I love air conditioning, washing machines and the Internet, and want pretty much everyone to have it. I just feel compelled to point out they aren't strictly needs. Not very long ago, the average farmer probably worked 60 hours a week to achieve a similar standard of living: get next years crops, pay for house and transportation, send the kids to school, and buy a few more cows. And this was before air conditioning. We've got it much better now.

originally posted by: StalkerSolent

originally posted by: rickymouse
We should only have to work about thirty hours a week to support our families. Anything after that should be for things we want. Right now, most people have to work over forty hours a week and they still need the food stamps if they have a family.

I'd submit this is largely because, in our consumerist society, we spend a lot of money on things we don't actually need. If you're working 40 hours a week and have a television, Netflix, air conditioning, go to the movies AND have food to put on the table, a roof over your head, and basic transportation, you're getting what you want and what you need. Perhaps not as much as you want, but certainly more than you need.

Don't get me wrong, I love air conditioning, washing machines and the Internet, and want pretty much everyone to have it. I just feel compelled to point out they aren't strictly needs. Not very long ago, the average farmer probably worked 60 hours a week to achieve a similar standard of living: get next years crops, pay for house and transportation, send the kids to school, and buy a few more cows. And this was before air conditioning. We've got it much better now.

Working forty hours a week at ten bucks an hour does not supply what a family needs in today's society. It seems that schools are making it so the kids need internet service and modern computers so the kids can do their homework. This is not bad, because it can save the school money, but it shifts the costs to the parents.

Society dictates what clothes are acceptable each year to be accepted. This is a consumer based scam to make everyone buy new school clothes for their kids or they feel out of place. Styles change, a tactic of consumerism, and this is conditioned into people.

Gaming on computers means you need a good computer and also fast internet service. In the lower middle class, the big cable packages have become a sign of social class. So people have been led to believe they are well off by the amount of channels they have on their package. Another conditioning that has been targeting the middle class. Many people buy these bigger packages just so they can get football games. Along with this is the huge expensive television. No wonder we are getting blind, we don't need to even squint our eyes or distinguish between the colors that blur our vision giving the colors texture. Instead they give us ultra clear high definition TV that targets what our eyes see best, then real life looks blurry. We are conditioned to see only what they want us to see. In another few generations our eyes won't be able to see many things. We will only pay attention to what sticks out and triggers the sensors most. People won't see things when they are driving and soon we will all lose our licenses to drive.

You are right, we are being sold things we do not need, but we think we need them.

Society has so many fundraisers nowadays it is getting ridiculous. These come through the schools many times. Others are to raise money to fund research in medicine, we are giving more money to the ones who already make good money. Instead of fundraising to stimulate the economy, fund-raise to directly help people in need. Make sure they understand the difference between need and wants before giving them money. The medical industry already knows many of the chemicals that REALLY causes cancer and the companion chemistry that is needed to keep it from happening. But it would be non-beneficial for their workers job security to tell us the whole truth. Instead they leave out hints that most people can't completely understand.

I get calls and see things all the time about treating kids with major illnesses to trips to places their families cannot afford. One recent one is going to take this kid and family all over the world to see things. Now, wouldn't it be better if they could take their kid to the beach somewhere or let him experience nature instead of the pyramids and England tourist sites? Maybe if the kid got into a tranquil natural setting he would get better. Instead they stimulate the economy with donations, none of which actually helps the kid. If I had a kid with these problems, I would find a good lake with a bunch of small sunfish in it and let the kid have a ball catching them and playing with the fish. Nature is usually the cheapest thing there is.

originally posted by: beezzer
a reply to: sheepslayer247

How much is it going to cost me? (beezzer pulls out his check book)

This glorious people's republic of. . . what?

How will you pay for all this "free" stuff?

In just 2012, 100 of the richest men in world paychecks were enough to get the worlds economi to stand strong. There would be enough money for every single person in the world to live in a normal class starndard x4!! It's also sick that one rich family owns 80 % of the worlds economi!! Now u know what capitalism rly is! And for you people who is like "I'm self-employed and i'm fine, every one else could just do like me".. well everything isn't just about you and no it's the fewest people in the world who can actually do that!! there is a lot more people that you can imagine in your little heads

a reply to: simpelmatter

In just 2012, 100 of the richest men in world paychecks were enough to get the worlds economi to stand strong. There would be enough money for every single person in the world to live in a normal class starndard x4!!

Then why didn't the other 7 billion people take it away ?

a reply to: theantediluvian

The government controlled schools teach a "government saves the day" history. Propaganda is not completely untrue, but it tends to present facts in a context designed for specific conclusions. Like advertising.

Capitalism makes all the products we take for granted today, and enabled time off from work as well.

Unions and tariffs (today's central bank monopoly inflation and deficit spending) take money and choice away from the basic voluntary transactions of purchasing or hiring, which are the most democratic human actions.

That money and freedom, kept in the capitalistic mode, would enable more purchasing by the consumers, more discretion about employment by the workers, and better production machinery by the employers.

What unions lose in income, everyone gets in purchasing power and job prospects. The tariff then and inflation now, increases the cost of living. Penny bread and dime steak is what the collectivists have cost us, in the name of a belief in artificial political control.

originally posted by: rickymouse

Working forty hours a week at ten bucks an hour does not supply what a family needs in today's society. It seems that schools are making it so the kids need internet service and modern computers so the kids can do their homework. This is not bad, because it can save the school money, but it shifts the costs to the parents.

I think you could cover food, shelter, and education for children with that (assuming public schooling, and public libraries–which are great for both education and also usually have computers, at least in the US.) I'm sure a lot of this depends on how big the family is, though; once you have more than one or two extra hungry mouths, that 20,000 dollars is going to be stretched mighty thin, especially after taxes (which, to be fair, are paying for the schooling and libraries. Working 60 hours a week instead of 40 would go a long ways towards easing the pain, and it's not unreasonable; that's ten hours a day for six days a week. If there's two working adults in the family, you can hit median income at ten bucks an hour and still go to the kid's ball games and the grandparents for Christmas.

The sad thing about the situation I'm describing, though, is that living hand-to-mouth doesn't go a long way towards bringing about a better standard of living; it just provides bare essentials. Without careful planning, it seems like our family will live hand-to-mouth indefinitely unless they can break the cycle through wage increases (hopefully these will come with time), savings, and hopefully having children diligent and hard-working enough to make their way through college (state-run schools aren't hard to get through with a part-time job and scholarships) and onto a future of more than ten dollars an hour.

I'm glad we agree that consumerism is selling stuff we don't need to be buying, and I think we agree that 10 bucks an hour is a pretty raw deal. I'm NOT saying it's an idea situation, just that it's survivable, and I think able to be overcome in the long run with long-term planning and hard work. I think you have some good ideas about how to save money; you're dead on that Nature is usually cheap. But that doesn't make anyone money, so let's pretend like it doesn't exist :/

a reply to: StalkerSolent

We have a society that has gone downhill over the last thirty years, partly because of our condition to support the economy and partly because people can only see things that benefit them as good.

It wasn't like that before when I was young. The guy could find a job that could supply a living wage for his family and the wife would take care of the kids and sometimes get a part time job so the family could get ahead and save money to go on vacations and to buy a little nicer clothes.

Although I agree that people got greedy and with the help of unions went overboard with wage increases which made our products overly expensive, it is better than what we now have. There were manufacturing jobs here. If people would have been more reasonable and have been satisfied with a little less increases in wages, this would have not happened so badly. Safety on the job increased greatly with the unions, but now the safety guidelines may have gotten excessive and this can cause extra for our products also. Everything we do has some health risk. Too many safety regulations and sooner or later we get our stuff from China. Which has happened.

If you are out gardening, you don't wear a mask while working out there or wear protective gear and knee pads. You don't go get tested for hearing loss because you listen to music on the stereo. You don't need product safety sheets on the dishsoap you wash your dishes with. All these things need to be done in a business setting if it applies.

Are our jobs going to come back to America so most of us can work. Not if we keep this consumer based society.

I was listening to one of my favoriate radio programs, "The Scholar's Circle", on KPFK coming home from the grocery store.

www.armoudian.com...

Ms. Armoudian was interviewing Garrett Albert Duncan (education.wustl.edu...) he said something that is very relevant to this discussion namely that capitalism in general and the US in special value property rights over human right. He didn't phrase it quite that way, it came up when his was speaking about the ongoing incident in Ferguson, MO. He pointed out that the police didn't go into 'military' mode until 'property' was endangered. That they didn't protect the citizens, but rather, protected private property. And then he went on to talk about the history of property rights and how it always trumps human rights.

originally posted by: rickymouse


Although I agree that people got greedy and with the help of unions went overboard with wage increases which made our products overly expensive, it is better than what we now have. There were manufacturing jobs here. If people would have been more reasonable and have been satisfied with a little less increases in wages, this would have not happened so badly.

The union's are not at fault and neither are working class family's both of which only wanted their fair share of the increase in productivity over those same years. What happened was that that increase only went into the coffers of the elite capitalist class (by definition working class cannot be capitalists - in theory perhaps but not by definition).

originally posted by: xuenchen
a reply to: sheepslayer247

Sounds "Authoritatively" cozy.

How would you handle the "Individualists" ?

Don't worry, collectivists always use "camps" to send individualists to "reeducate" them so they think the right way...or else.

a reply to: FyreByrd

Maybe the property damage is a crime.



Confusing.

originally posted by: Semicollegiate
a reply to: theantediluvian

The government controlled schools teach a "government saves the day" history. Propaganda is not completely untrue, but it tends to present facts in a context designed for specific conclusions. Like advertising.

Can't get past the first paragraph, again.

Public schools teach what big business wants them to teach through such programs as no-child left behind, etc. to, yes, dumb down the working class and enrich the testing business, the textbook business, the private school business, the student loan business, etc.

It used to be less capitalist rah-rah then it is today, one did hear about labor history and human rights. But now it's stricting a marketing and recruiting wing of the big business circus.

And advertising is propoganda and I learned that years ago in a US public school. It's called media literacy this days - get some.

originally posted by: xuenchen
a reply to: simpelmatter

In just 2012, 100 of the richest men in world paychecks were enough to get the worlds economi to stand strong. There would be enough money for every single person in the world to live in a normal class starndard x4!!

Then why didn't the other 7 billion people take it away ?

Because that would take effort and might be too much like work?

originally posted by: xuenchen
a reply to: simpelmatter

In just 2012, 100 of the richest men in world paychecks were enough to get the worlds economi to stand strong. There would be enough money for every single person in the world to live in a normal class starndard x4!!

Then why didn't the other 7 billion people take it away ?

Frankly because the working class (serfs and such) weren't educated at all. No reading, writing or figuring. Public education is a new idea and one that in the US is declining. Countries with strong public education systems - thrive the others (like the US) die.

Interesting note on the subject: When English was originally turned into a written form their were three competing systems proposed to 'the King'. The one chosen was the most difficult to understand and pronounce specifically so that it would require time and capital in order to learn thereby keeping the serfs in the dark (the church used that method by using latin).

a reply to: FyreByrd

But American High School graduates and college students and graduates are educated.

Why didn't they take it away ?

Why didn't any world educated people take anything away from the "100" ?

How many would be needed to take it all away ?

originally posted by: Semicollegiate

You could say that, you would be begging the question.

Capitalism makes products and services, perversion and abuse happen after that.

Are cars responsible for distracted driving?

No - Capitalism doesn't make any products or provide any services. Workers make the products and provide the services; Capital well supplies the input resources, workers transform those resources into profit. Captial and Workers should both benfit from the transformation. Econ 101.

originally posted by: xuenchen
a reply to: FyreByrd

Maybe the property damage is a crime.

Confusing.

Maybe - private property is the crime.

a reply to: FyreByrd

I worked on half a dozen union jobs, some closed shop some open. Some of the workers on the union jobs would stall the job so they didn't have to be expected to work hard ever. They would purposely not produce so their bosses would not expect more of them. I worked for the county and the city on the road crews. Now, these are the people who fill our potholes and plow our roads. They would go out of their way not to get things done. There attitude was that if you got more done they would expect more always. Yet, they produced little in a day and complained when someone actually worked.

The counties now sub out much of their work because of attitudes like this. I also worked at Kohler and saw this attitude in some of the people. How can an employer pay more wages if they do not sell as much or produce anything.

Like I said, things were better in the sixties and seventies though overall

originally posted by: FyreByrd

originally posted by: xuenchen
a reply to: FyreByrd

Maybe the property damage is a crime.

Confusing.

Maybe - private property is the crime.

Is it? Why? Would you be okay then, if I walked into your place and helped myself to whatever I wanted?

Private property is the inspiration to do better. In every housing complex from Kiev to Cabrini Green, if people do not take ownership if their home, if falls into disrepair because "what do I care its not mine." Even in the poorest neighborhoods, when someone owns their home, the keep it up, they mow the grass, they slap some pain on once in a while, they plant flowers. Every housing project falls into disrepair almost immediately. Ownership brings pride and a sense of caring for it.