What is the goal of capitalism?

Red Front · Aug 3, 2023

Toddsterpatriot said:
I was mocking your claim that anything they do involves the "goodness of their hearts"

Considering how absurd most of your positions are, hard to tell when you're just being sarcastic.

Red Front · Aug 3, 2023

Toddsterpatriot said:
The unemployables you want the government to hire are certainly not very productive.

A study from the International Labour Organization (ILO) shows that workers in poorer countries tend to work longer hours than those in wealthier countries.

You can work your ass off and still not be very productive. As evidenced by the workers in the poorer countries that you're referencing.

The unemployables you want the government to hire are certainly not very productive.

Capitalists don't decide that. I know that's difficult for you to understand.

You can work your ass off and still not be very productive. As evidenced by the workers in the poorer countries that you're referencing.

At least you recognize the poor can work hard and still remain poor. It's in the interest of American big-money capitalists for the poor abroad to remain poor. That's their source of dirt-cheap labor.

Toddsterpatriot · Aug 3, 2023

Red Front said:
Considering how absurd most of your positions are, hard to tell when you're just being sarcastic.

“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 self-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”

Toddsterpatriot · Aug 3, 2023

Red Front said:
Capitalists don't decide that. I know that's difficult for you to understand.

At least you recognize the poor can work hard and still remain poor. It's in the interest of American big-money capitalists for the poor abroad to remain poor. That's their source of dirt-cheap labor.

Capitalists don't decide that.

Capitalists absolutely decide if you are productive enough to keep you employed.
In the long run, only the government can employ huge numbers of the unproductive.

At least you recognize the poor can work hard and still remain poor.

Well, you are pretty clueless when it comes to economics and the real world.

dblack · Aug 3, 2023

ralfy said:
The bulk of the wealth of the 10 pct is based on the productivity of the 90 pct.

Why is the 90% giving the 10% their productivity? If they think it isn't fair, they should stop doing that.

Red Front · Aug 3, 2023

Toddsterpatriot said:
Of course, they do. How else are they going to pay for the equipment, rent, inventory, interest, taxes and other costs needed to build and run their businesses?

...or live in a waterfront mansion with a boat slip. Todd conveniently forgots to mention that.

According to Adam Smith, both the "masters" (capitalists according to Smith) and their "workmen" (and "servants", two terms used by Smith for employees) inherently have opposite interests.

Adam Smith, Against the masters (1776)

www.panarchy.org

That's one of the many contradictions of capitalism. There's no reason for the people who do the actual physical, drudgerous work (the working class), to allow a wealthy class of elite freeloaders and exploiters (manicured leeches), to pay them less than what they're producing to make a profit. You can complain about the cost of doing business with someone else, we don't give a shit.

You don't give a rat's ass about the needs and aspirations of workers, and we don't give a darn about your cynical, personal aspirations to accumulate capital at our expense.

Mass production is a social endeavor, not a private one. Those who work the business should own it together. In the 21st century, there's definitely no need for capitalist masters (privileged riff raffs). Advanced technology liberates the working class and eviscerates, cuts to pieces, the power of the wealthy elitist class of privileged, exploitative unelected masters:

Private property, unlike personal property, should be prohibited (eliminated) in society unless owned collectively and democratically. All unelected leadership should be rejected, both in politics and in the workplace. We should have ZERO TOLERANCE for unelected leadership. If someone is chosen by elected leadership, that bureaucrat or manager is still subject to the worker councils, which have the authority to recall (impeach), all elected officials and bureaucrats. The process must be easy, for a worker-council to recall an elected delegate and replace them with someone else. Easy peasy.

sesiAn-Asamblea-Nacional-Poder-Popular_CYMIMA20140703_0009_13-1.jpg

What's the distinction between private and personal? Private property is that which can be used to exploit human beings for profit (private capital accumulation). It's those properties that are needed for production (productive properties or enterprises). Personal property, are those properties or possessions that are for your personal use. Your home/s, your garden, your vehicle/s, your personal computer, your smart-phone, your collection of VHS, sci-fi movies from the 1980s, your toothbrush..etc. That's all yours. If you're now paying a mortgage to the bank, or rent to a landlord, you won't be paying that mortgage or rent to anyone, under American, 21st century, democratic socialism. All of those properties are legally yours.

While we have markets and money, we should transition all production to worker-owned, democratically-run co-ops, that way when intelligent robots (advanced automation/autonomous machines) replace human labor (or a significant % of it), society will be able to easily adopt a non-profit, democratic, centrally planned, economic system.