Capitalism vs. Freedom

[Agnapostate]

I collected a few statements I'd made here and there to form a brief synthesis about the manner in which capitalism undermines freedom and related libertarian principles by establishing authoritarian social relationships effectively as dictatorial in nature as those of an authoritarian state. I've posted it elsewhere, and decided that our local Peter Schiff caucus should have a bone to gnaw on other than Petey's organ.

So reply if you'd like, and I'll be back by and by.

As I've previously noted, the economic framework of capitalism necessitates a scheme in which the private ownership of the means of production (acquired through a coercive process of "primitive accumulation") and consequent hierarchical subordination of labor under capital enables the extraction of surplus value from the working class in the production process through the use of wage labor and subsequent utilization in the circulation process in order to perpetuate a vicious cycle of capital accumulation. In visually pleasing terms:

Moreover, capitalism is necessarily antithetical to freedom. The hierarchical organization of the capitalist firm (a necessary demand of the financial and coordinator classes), necessitates the subordination of workers under bosses and higher-level employers, depriving them of the right to democratically manage a major aspect of their own lives. Nor is answering "you can simply change jobs" a sufficient response to this criticism, because just as the right to migrate between an island chain of kingdoms but not outside of them would not free one from monarchy, neither can the right to select specific masters in a capitalist economy free one from that tyranny.

Nor are external economic conditions based on freedom, so long as privileged and elite segments of the population (namely the financial class, as they have more dominance than the coordinator class outside of the internal structure of the firm), to make decisions that affect the rest of the population without their democratic input. After the unjust consolidation of the means of production and the resulting power that comes as a result of it during a stage of primitive accumulation (the state had a major role in class creation), the financial class, characterized by a small and elite segment of the population is thereby able to use their control over the means of production to drastically affect the vast majority of the population in whatever way they please, which is obviously a significant rationale for collectivizing the means of production, decentralizing them, and subjecting them to direct democratic management.

In our present state of affairs, this private ownership of the means of production permits the aforementioned utilization of wage labor, which is a critical element in the coercive nature of capitalism. Since the means of production are privately owned, large components of the public have no alternative but to subordinate themselves under an employer. The best way to illustrate this form of authoritarianism is to use the "robbery analogy." If a person were to be violently tackled by an assailant and have his/her valuables torn out of his/her pockets, we would accurately call this a robbery. Now, if the assailant were to instead point a gun at the victim and demand that the valuables be surrendered, we would still call this a robbery, as coercion was used to gain the valuables, if not outright physical violence. The fact that the victim technically "consented" to surrender his/her valuables is not pertinent, since it was consent yielded while under duress.

The former example represents the direct tyranny of statism, often blunt, direct, and brutal, whereas the latter represents the more subtle tyranny of capitalism, specifically wage labor, in which a person technically "consents" to work for an employer, but does this only because he/she has no other alternative for sustenance.

 

[del]

thanks, i'm out of ambien

 

[Agnapostate]

Out of Prozac too, judging by a few of your other posts.

 

[del]

Out of Prozac too, judging by a few of your other posts.

whatever, i'm sleepy that's all that counts, nem.

 

[Oddball]

Let's make a distinction between true laissez-faire and crony capitalism (corporate fascism) right here and now.

The latter requires collectivized coercion while the former does not.

 

[Agnapostate]

whatever, i'm sleepy that's all that counts, nem.

Well, you should have known the risks of leaving your cherry vodka unattended at the bathhouse, sparky. Roofies pack a mean wallop, though I'm sure your ass hurts worse.

Let's make a distinction between true laissez-faire and crony capitalism (corporate fascism) right here and now.

The latter requires collectivized coercion while the former does not.

The former is nonexistent, and attempts to establish something resembling it (Anglo-Saxon capitalism under the neoliberal regimes of Reagan and Thatcher, for instance), have resulted in massive socioeconomic problems. It's thus necessary to focus on actually existing capitalism.

 

[Oddball]

[

The former is nonexistent, and attempts to establish something resembling it (Anglo-Saxon capitalism under the neoliberal regimes of Reagan and Thatcher, for instance), have resulted in massive socioeconomic problems. It's thus necessary to focus on actually existing capitalism.

Wrong.

Laissez-faire capitalism is alive and well in the "black markets", so decried by the fascist crony "capitalists".

Freedom doesn't require that some authoritarian dickweed declares it exists.

 

[Amanda]

All systems have their downside. I'd be in favor of communism if it actually worked. I'm a capitalist because I'm a hard worker and I want a chance to achieve more through my effort. I guess it doesn't work for everyone but I think that a lot of the people it doesn't work for are lazy or don't apply themselves. And life isn't fair. I started a thread about (economic) fairness, maybe you could pop in and share your thoughts Ag. I'd be interested in your take.

 

[Oddball]

Even if people are driven and apply themselves, they can still fail.

You hit it square on the head....Life ain't fair.

You've accepted the unfairness......Others have not.

I'll give odds on who will persevere in the face of the unfairness.

 

[Amanda]

Even if people are driven and apply themselves, they can still fail.

You hit it square on the head....Life ain't fair.

You've accepted the unfairness......Others have not.

I'll give odds on who will persevere in the face of the unfairness.

Sorry, I can't rep you again.

 

[Oddball]

That's M'kay...

I'm rep-ed in my mind.

Thanx, doll.

 

[Agnapostate]

Wrong.

Laissez-faire capitalism is alive and well in the "black markets", so decried by the fascist crony "capitalists".

Freedom doesn't require that some authoritarian dickweed declares it exists.

Is that right? Is the private ownership of the means of production a prevailing condition in the "black markets"? You do realize that mere market exchange is not a sufficient condition for capitalism, correct?

All systems have their downside. I'd be in favor of communism if it actually worked.

And there was a significant degree of anarchist communism established on the regional level, primarily in Aragon. Now, the variety of socialism practiced by the Spanish anarchists was primarily collectivism (which retained wages and vouchers), and there was a good deal of conflict between anarcho-communists and anarcho-syndicalists that I won't elaborate on here, but I'm of the opinion that the entire libertarian socialist movement during the Spanish Revolution retained a fundamental system centered around the principle of "[f]rom each according to their ability, to each according to their means."

Now, I don't expect such an economic system to be implemented in my lifetime, but that's not a sufficient reason to prevent me from nothing that it's functioned.

I'm a capitalist because I'm a hard worker and I want a chance to achieve more through my effort. I guess it doesn't work for everyone but I think that a lot of the people it doesn't work for are lazy or don't apply themselves. And life isn't fair. I started a thread about (economic) fairness, maybe you could pop in and share your thoughts Ag. I'd be interested in your take.

I think this is still based on the common misconception that socialism seeks to establish equality of outcome regardless of individual labor input. On the contrary, socialists merely seek to adjust compensation criteria according to measurements of ability and effort, not mere contribution, particularly when such contribution is augmented by the unearned accumulation of ill-gained productive resources. This is an unfortunately common phenomenon that continues to this day, as documented by Summers and Kotlikoff in The Role of Intergenerational Transfers in Aggregate Capital Accumulation. Consider the abstract:

This paper uses historical U.S. data to directly estimate the contribution of intergenerational transfers to aggregate capital accumulation. The evidence presented indicates that intergenerational transfers account for the vast majority of aggregate U.S. capital formation; only a negligible fraction of actual capital accumulation can be traced to life-cycle or "hump" savings.

Since capitalism is centered around the private ownership of the means of production, and since those means of production or the resources used to create or more efficiently utilize them were gained during an openly coercive phase of *primitive accumulation* of capital, it's thus the case that you're more likely to be successful as John Rockefeller's lazy grandson than as the far more active Joe Steelworker. The consolidation of productive resources into the hands of a few thus enables those few to undermine the endeavors of others, and thus prevent competitive market enterprise, a process that neither rewards individual effort nor maximizes efficiency. For instance, John Stuart Mill makes the point well in this letter:

Sir, I beg to enclose a subscription of [10 pounds] to aid, as far as such a sum can do it, in the struggle which the Co-operative Plate-Lock Makers of Wolverhampton are maintaining against unfair competition on the part of the masters in the trade. Against fair competition I have no desire to shield them. Co-operative production carried on by persons whose hearts are in the cause, and who are capable of the energy and self-denial always necessary in its early stages, ought to be able to hold its ground against private establishments and persons who have not those qualities had better not attempt it.

But to carry on business at a loss in order to ruin competitors is not fair competition. In such a contest, if prolonged, the competitors who have the smallest means, though they may have every other element of success, must necessarily be crushed through no fault of their own. Having the strongest sympathy with your vigorous attempt to make head against what in such a case may justly be called the tyranny of capital, I beg you to send me a dozen copies of your printed appeal, to assist me in making the case known to such persons as it may interest in your favour.

This simply scores to illustrate socialist economist Jaroslav Vanek's point that "[t]he capitalist economy is not a true market economy because in western capitalism, as in Soviet state capitalism, there is a tendency towards monopoly. Economic democracy tends toward a competitive market." The consolidation of the private ownership of the means of production by the financial class prevents fair market competition and maximization of efficiency.

Even if people are driven and apply themselves, they can still fail.

You hit it square on the head....Life ain't fair.

You've accepted the unfairness......Others have not.

I'll give odds on who will persevere in the face of the unfairness.

"Fair"? Socialism merely involves acknowledgment of the economic reality that efficiency and equity are positively related. At the heart of my agenda is a desire to maximize economic efficiency; I merely focus on capitalism's conflict with libertarian principles here because of the misappropriation of libertarianism that's occurred in America.

 

[neurosport]

AGNA your communist ass needs to get a brain.

Somewhere along the line in your analysis you FAILED to realize that not all people have the TALENT that it takes to multiply wealth.

What makes your stupid ass think that if the worker in your cartoon was given the full $100 that he makes he would spend it on machines ? What makes you think he wouldn't spend it on hookers ?

I would personally just get myself a BMW X6 M which would only be good for eating gas and rubber.

The person who had the sense to buy the machine is the one reaping the benefits.

You want to make it seem as if investing money wisely is something everybody would do. WRONG. Most people would buy a HOUSE which would then simply lose half of its value.

YOU ARE FULL OF SHIT AGNA.

what prevents ordinary people from starting businesses is their own fear, stupidity, laziness etc. yes money is ALSO a factor. but not the most important one.

i won't pretend that i have any excuses for not being a millionaire. i don't. it's all because i am a lazy. I LITERALLY DON'T DO SHIT 24/7. ABSOLUTELY NOTHING. i don't work, don't cook, don't clean and don't take out the garbage. i wipe my ass - that's as much work as i do.

that's me. for other people the are not rich simply because they're stupid.

 

[Agnapostate]

AGNA your communist ass needs to get a brain.

Somewhere along the line in your analysis you FAILED to realize that not all people have the TALENT that it takes to multiply wealth.

What makes your stupid ass think that if the worker in your cartoon was given the full $100 that he makes he would spend it on machines ? What makes you think he wouldn't spend it on hookers ?

I would personally just get myself a BMW X6 M which would only be good for eating gas and rubber.

The person who had the sense to buy the machine is the one reaping the benefits.

You want to make it seem as if investing money wisely is something everybody would do. WRONG. Most people would buy a HOUSE which would then simply lose half of its value.

The superior efficiency of worker-owned enterprises and labor cooperatives is a well-established economic reality. This is related to several critical elements of firm organization. Firstly, the equitable distribution of ownership, management authority, and job complexes amongst the workforce greatly reduces or eliminates the principal-agent problem due to the lack of involvement of the financial and coordinator classes. A common interest in profit maximization is thus inspired in firm employees, since the equitable (though not necessarily the equal) distribution of profits is a critical element of such enterprises. This is what accounts for the empirical literature almost unanimously demonstrating the superior efficiency and related productivity levels of workers' ownership and democratic management, a result almost unprecedented in such empirical analysis.

For instance, we could refer to Doucouliagos's Worker participation and productivity in labor-managed and participatory capitalist firms: A meta-analysis. Consider the abstract:

Using meta-analytic techniques, the author synthesizes the results of 43 published studies to investigate the effects on productivity of various forms of worker participation: worker participation in decision making; mandated codetermination; profit sharing; worker ownership (employee stock ownership or individual worker ownership of the firm's assets); and collective ownership of assets (workers' collective ownership of reserves over which they have no individual claim). He finds that codetermination laws are negatively associated with productivity, but profit sharing, worker ownership, and worker participation in decision making are all positively associated with productivity. All the observed correlations are stronger among labor-managed firms (firms owned and controlled by workers) than among participatory capitalist firms (firms adopting one or more participation schemes involving employees, such as ESOPs or quality circles).

Doucouliagos's work is critical for several reasons. Firstly, it is a meta-analysis, which somewhat exempts it from criticisms of insufficient review that may plague individual studies and thus enables us to form a more comprehensive analysis. Secondly, it illustrates the reality that worker ownership schemes are clearly augmented further by the establishment of democratic management in the workplace. This is a promising sign for the prospective benefits that would be reaped from the establishment of full-blown autogestion (workers' self-management).

 

[neurosport]

Agna efficiency doesn't fucking matter.

You can be very efficient at producing FECES and somebody else will be less efficient at producing CRACK COCAINE - who do you think will make more money ?

that's how Communism and Socialism fail - they produce what nobody needs.

Yes an efficiently managed business would have SOME input from the workers as well as give them company SOME company shares BUT !

THE PERSON WHO HAD THE TALENT TO OBTAIN THE CAPITAL IN THE FIRST PLACE IS ALSO THE ONE MOST QUALIFIED TO MANAGE IT - THIS IS SO OBVIOUS EVEN YOU CAN UNDERSTAND IT AGNA !

it can be then HIS DECISION to give workers some stake in the business.

 

[Agnapostate]

Agna efficiency doesn't fucking matter.

You can be very efficient at producing FECES and somebody else will be less efficient at producing CRACK COCAINE - who do you think will make more money ?

That's not a very intelligent example, given the need to combine efficiency with effectiveness.

EDIT: The perfect illustration of that effectiveness would likely come through consultation of other empirical evidence, namely that of Logue and Yates in Cooperatives, Worker-Owned Enterprises, Productivity and the International Labor Organization. Consider the abstract:

A survey of empirical research on productivity in worker-owned enterprises and cooperatives finds a substantial literature that largely supports the proposition that worker-owned enterprises equal or exceed the productivity of conventional enterprises when employee involvement is combined with ownership. The weight of a sparser literature on cooperatives tends toward the same pattern. In addition, employee-owned firms create local employment, anchor jobs in their communities and enrich local social capital.

Perhaps you're feeling charitable enough to acknowledge the benefits of increased local employment, maintenance of local jobs, and enrichment of local social capital?

 

[neurosport]

Perhaps you're feeling charitable enough to acknowledge the benefits of increased local employment, maintenance of local jobs, and enrichment of local social capital?

fuck no ! let the Chinese work and we will collect the DOLLAR BILLZ

your research basically concludes that it is more efficients for objects to fall upwards.

where are all these ultra-successful worker owned companies ? if they make so much money why don't they reinvest it into themselves and to buy up other companies ? why aren't all companies worker owned ?

 

[Agnapostate]

fuck no ! let the Chinese work and we will collect the DOLLAR BILLZ

your research basically concludes that it is more efficients for objects to fall upwards.

where are all these ultra-successful worker owned companies ? if they make so much money why don't they reinvest it into themselves and to buy up other companies ? why aren't all companies worker owned ?

You've evidently not read very thoroughly. In addition to my mentions of market concentration, as well as the unscrupulous tactics that well-established capitalist firms engage in to prevent development (specifically underselling in the case that I mentioned), there are often negative externalities generated by a capitalist economy that effectively render the assimilation of worker-owned enterprises and labor cooperatives akin to the assimilation of freshwater fish into the ocean.

There are several critical reasons involved in this. The first and perhaps most important is that the financial class obviously does not have an interest in financing institutions that would bring about far more equity in profit whilst simultaneously surpassing the efficiency of the conventional capitalist firm. Meanwhile, their private control of the means of production permits them to consolidate both wealth and effectively authoritarian power, thus preventing workers from obtaining the resources and capital to finance the creation of independent worker-owned enterprises and labor cooperatives. Jaroslav Vanek states the point exceedingly well in an interview.

If you go to a bank and ask for a loan to start a co-op, they will throw you out. Co-ops in the West are a bit like sea water fish in a freshwater pond. The capitalist world in the last 200 years has evolved its own institutions, instruments, political frameworks etc. There is no guarantee that another species could function if it had to depend on the same institutions. In capitalism, the power is embedded in the shares of common stock, a voting share. This has no meaning in economic democracy. Economic democracy needs its own institutions for one simple reason. Workers are not rich. Let's face it, most working people in the world today are either poor or unemployed. They do not have the necessary capital to finance democratic enterprises.

It's also a reality that the existence of more established capitalist firms, along with their access to an exceedingly greater amount of capital and resources, plays a role in preventing the development of worker-owned enterprises, regardless of the ability of the latter to utilize their own resources more efficiently (and effectively), than the capitalist firm. Hence, the role of inequivalent access to productive resources and financial capital prevents the worker-owned enterprises from engaging in fair competition with capitalist firms.

However, when this is not the case, worker-owned firms are often able to thrive. For instance, the worker-owned Mondragon Cooperative Corporation is one of the largest corporations in Spain and the largest in the Basque region.

But this thread is not for the discussion of the efficiency of socialism. It's intended for discussion of the anti-libertarian elements of capitalism.

 

[neurosport]

hey Agna. what if you have a worker owned company of 20 people and you want to expand to 100 people - how do you do that ? do you give away 80% of your company to these new people who have done nothing to deserve it ?

 

[editec]

I collected a few statements I'd made here and there to form a brief synthesis about the manner in which capitalism undermines freedom and related libertarian principles by establishing authoritarian social relationships effectively as dictatorial in nature as those of an authoritarian state. I've posted it elsewhere, and decided that our local Peter Schiff caucus should have a bone to gnaw on other than Petey's organ.

So reply if you'd like, and I'll be back by and by.

As I've previously noted, the economic framework of capitalism necessitates a scheme in which the private ownership of the means of production (acquired through a coercive process of "primitive accumulation") and consequent hierarchical subordination of labor under capital enables the extraction of surplus value from the working class in the production process through the use of wage labor and subsequent utilization in the circulation process in order to perpetuate a vicious cycle of capital accumulation. In visually pleasing terms:

Moreover, capitalism is necessarily antithetical to freedom.

Here's a little heads up for you ...

Coexisting with people under ANY economic system, or for that matter ANY social system is anthetical to INDIVIDUAL freedom.

The hierarchical organization of the capitalist firm (a necessary demand of the financial and coordinator classes), necessitates the subordination of workers under bosses and higher-level employers, depriving them of the right to democratically manage a major aspect of their own lives.

And a non heirarchical COOPERATIVE ANARCHIC SOCIALIST SYSTEM also nesessitates the subordination of its voluntary members under the RULES OF WHATEVER SYSTEM the members choose UNLESS those members can democratically manage to arrive at 100% consensus on each and every issue.

So what, you think? The membership is voluntary, so there is no coersion.

That's what you believe, don't you Agna.

Well. here's why your system will also inevitably lead to a LOSS of individual freedom.

Because when people are vested into their cooperative, they cannot simply afford to walk away from their lives if they do not agree with that cooperative's democratically chosen path.

Therefore, these people voluntarily must deny themselves FREEDOM of choice when they are in the minority.

Where is their freedom to choose? Subordinated by the reality that they are committed and vested into the cooperative, that's where it is.

They are not really any more (or any less) free to join another cooperative than they are under the capitalist system to find another job

Nor is answering "you can simply change jobs" a sufficient response to this criticism, because just as the right to migrate between an island chain of kingdoms but not outside of them would not free one from monarchy, neither can the right to select specific masters in a capitalist economy free one from that tyranny.

Yeah, but in your universe they have essantially the EXACT same non-choice as they have under capitalism...as I pointed out previously.


All the worker can do when they find themselves OUT OF STEP with the majority, is either abandon their share of the cooperative, and try to find another position in that island chain of cooperatives, or suck it up and go with the flow in the cooperative which they are currently allied.

Nor are external economic conditions based on freedom, so long as privileged and elite segments of the population (namely the financial class, as they have more dominance than the coordinator class outside of the internal structure of the firm), to make decisions that affect the rest of the population without their democratic input.

Agreed. But in your universe, a society composed of anarchistic cooperatives, the external economic condiitions are ALSO not based on freedom as the worker in one copperative has NO INPUT into any other cooperative.

Hence, every circumstance outside his coop which effects his coop is ALSO outside of his control.

After the unjust consolidation of the means of production and the resulting power that comes as a result of it during a stage of primitive accumulation (the state had a major role in class creation), the financial class, characterized by a small and elite segment of the population is thereby able to use their control over the means of production to drastically affect the vast majority of the population in whatever way they please, which is obviously a significant rationale for collectivizing the means of production, decentralizing them, and subjecting them to direct democratic management.

True

In our present state of affairs, this private ownership of the means of production permits the aforementioned utilization of wage labor, which is a critical element in the coercive nature of capitalism.

True.


Now imagine an unaffiliated worker seeking to find a position in your universe.

The means of production is currently owed by all the affliated workers in your cooperatives.

So the worker seeking to become a member of any of those coops, must subordinate his freedom in order to fit into those coops.

Seriously, how different is that REALLY, from what workers face now?

Do you really think that the arbitrary rules of the coop are any less arbitrary thatn the arbitrary rules of the master class?

And if you do...why?

Do you think the MOB is any less a threat to individual freedom than individuals with the power of the MOB?

Since the means of production are privately owned, large components of the public have no alternative but to subordinate themselves under an employer.

And Since the means of production are cooperatively owned, large components of the public have no alternative but to subordinate themselves under an cooperative.

The best way to illustrate this form of authoritarianism is to use the "robbery analogy." If a person were to be violently tackled by an assailant and have his/her valuables torn out of his/her pockets, we would accurately call this a robbery. Now, if the assailant were to instead point a gun at the victim and demand that the valuables be surrendered, we would still call this a robbery, as coercion was used to gain the valuables, if not outright physical violence. The fact that the victim technically "consented" to surrender his/her valuables is not pertinent, since it was consent yielded while under duress.

Yes, true

The former example represents the direct tyranny of statism, often blunt, direct, and brutal, whereas the latter represents the more subtle tyranny of capitalism, specifically wage labor, in which a person technically "consents" to work for an employer, but does this only because he/she has no other alternative for sustenance.

Summary...Agna you and I can BOTH agree with what is wrong with the system we currently have.

I think you quite accurately describe why individuals are not and can never really be FREE in the capitalist system.

But where you and I must part ways is this...

The problem you describe will be, to great extent, no solved by your cooperative systems, either.

What the system you advocate is doing is replace the OWNER CLASS for the MOB CLASS.

As either of them pertain to the INDIVIDUAL, both are quite capable of becoming oppressive.

That is NOT to say they are indentical, but that is to say that as it pertains to freedom of the individual, you system is essantially not all that much different that any other economic or social system.