Capitalistic business malpratices and exploitation..CEO Salaries..

Economics Economics Questions
61

I like how you dismissed everything I said, and are now fixated on that quote, which should be obvious to any thinking adult. I must confess, I didn’t think that would be controversial.

I want to have sex with Megan Fox, in fact, I think about it all the time. Do I have the right to rape Megan Fox? Is this a logical conclusion? The people of Africa want food and clean water; indeed, many of them die each and every day from malnutrition. The ignorant man (you) will say that the starving Ethiopian’s should raid and pillage Saudi Arabia. But even if they are successful in this endeavor, they will only have enough food to keep themselves alive for a short and fixed period of time. The logical man says that Ethiopia should embrace capitalism, sound money, and private property, so that it can provide food for it self (Ethiopia) at a sustainable level, for an extended period of time.

Here’s a useful cliche: give a man a fish and he’ll eat for a day, teach a man to fish…

62

You are blaming illness on capitalism? Or is it that you are implying that infinite resources exist so that should we want to in a “just” society no one would have to suffer from illness?

My “second” mother who basically adopted me after I moved far away from home in hopes of a better life died of breast cancer. I quit my job during her final moths to take care of her full time and it was by far the most excruciating experience of my life. The utter helplessness of it all was devastating. I loved that woman with all my heart.
Socialized medicine would have cut her life much shorter though and despite the pain she suffered in those final months she wanted them. Those of us who loved her gave all we could to prolong her life as much as possible even though the final outcome was a foregone conclusion. No cost/benefit analysis involved. We loved her and were willing to pay for her life extension however hopeless it might be in the end. Not to mention despite slim odds it isn’t always hopeless.
You seem to argue that ability to pay should not be a determination in these factors. I cannot wholly disagree with that. What I can say is that it is far superior to a bureaucratic determination and a cost/benefit analysis of outcome.

You don’t honestly believe that the government (taxpayers) would pay for any and all treatments despite their probability of success do you?
If I have the money and I want my grandmother to live another couple months despite its $500,000 price tag than so be it. Should the taxpayers be held to the same standard? Of course not. They should let her die according to cost/benefit analysis.

Whether you like it or not scarce resources are a reality and must be split up amongst differing needs.
Who should split them up? The producers of those resources? Or a bureaucratic committee?
I for one don’t claim that “capitalism” as we know it is the be all end all of social evolution. What I do claim is that it is far superior to the proffered alternative of “socialism” or for that matter the “mixed economy.”

I am open to new ideas and a society that allows those new ideas to compete. An ideal I fear is a Utopian dream. For now then, I will defend free market capitalism to my dying breath until a better idea comes along.

63

Well me and many other people feel the same damn way I do. You can’t blame us for thinking that society should take care of everyone and us.

(Nobody’s blaming you. You can think what you want. Disagreeing with reality cannot change reality. If you cannot even attempt to understand this, you are in for a very miserable life, regardless of your economic standing.)

I honestly can’t see whats so illogical about not taking care of each other or socialism where all our needs and wants are provided for. I think I’ve said what i need to say here, feel free to message to me.

(Well, the bigger problem is that you have been told PRECISELY what is illogical about it several times, and have not heeded any of it. I guess the only way to show you is to ask you what exactly IS logical about it? How will this work? Have you pondered your own statement to demonstrate in any logical manner exactly how socialism provides for everyone’s wants and needs? You’re just saying it will. You’re saying it and expecting it to be true because it sounds nicer for everyone. But I can sit here and say that we should make a law saying all women should be beautiful, and making the law won’t make all women beautiful. That’s not even including the fact that we would need someone to decide definitively what beautiful IS.)

If I had a life-threatening illness, which I know someone who does, nothing you guys have said to me would matter to me. We didn’t make ourselves get sick, so we shouldn’t be stuck in a shitthole society that wont do anything about it but push us into a hole we didn’t even want to get into deeper.

(Knowing someone who has a life-threatening illness does not add weight to your argument. How does your logic stand on an island, where there is no one else, and you are sick and dying? You have the same choice. You can do whatever you can to live, or you can perish. The fact that someone works hard to become a doctor in no way obligates them to save your life, know matter how much you think it may be the right thing to do. What could you possibly suggest as an alternative? Do we enslave people by decree for whatever they are capable of? What do we do with the laborer? The doctor must heal, so the laborer MUST work the mines? The farmer MUST provide me with food? What if he can’t do it without starving himself? Where do we draw the line? And yet you pass over all the good that can come from the very society you point fingers at. We can feed ourselves cheaply. We have access to more health products than we could have imagined a hundred years ago. We live long, long years. You talk about being forty and working long hours when a few hundred years ago forty was about the time people were getting ready for the grave. We now see GRANDCHILDREN growing up. Society has taken care of itself without having to force doctors into slave labor, and just because we still have room for improvement you talk about how evil we are to allow doctors the freedom to decide how they work. There are people who are eighty…EIGHTY…who are still healthy enough to work in Wal-mart. I won’t pretend that everyone should be able to see at least a sparkle of wonder in the universe, but we’ve come a damn long way, and it has been through progress brought about by those willing to invest in the growth of business, which is where improvements in technology come from. My new iPod costs have as much as my first iPod. The first one had an LCD screen and a nifty little game you played but turning a wheel with your thumb. Now it can do shit-all without buttons. It can tell me the weather when I’m too lazy to turn on the TV or open up my laptop. I’m well below the poverty level and I live like a damn king. What the hell do you want? Everything that I have? That destroys your premise, because for you to achieve peace of mind I would have to suffer. Think for yourself for a few hours. Just sit down and think. All the nonsense you hear from people on TV, in school, from your friends, from your coworkers, and even on these message boards and in the books you read…just think about it for yourself for a while. Think about what is being said. Think about what it all boils down to, if you reflect on it. What really carries weight and what doesn’t? If you can’t even do that, why even bother discussing ANYTHING? You will be like the voices that assault you constantly. Nothing but words with no meaning.)

64

I have nothing better to spend my money and time on other than books that won’t get me a job.

65

Feeling something doesn’t make it true, and yes, I can.

All lovely to muse about, but what’s it got to do with socialism when it is economically infeasible? Why should others be coerced to shoulder your burdens?

66

Because I would be willing to do the same for my neighbor. Oh, and here is that very point put beautifully. Socialism is progress to TRANSCEND the term “economic”. It would be evolution beyond the human predatory.

“The observable economic facts belong to that phase and even such laws as we can derive from them are not applicable to other phases. Since the real purpose of socialism is precisely to overcome and advance beyond the predatory phase of human development, economic science in its present state can throw little light on the socialist society of the future. Second, socialism is directed towards a social-ethical end.” - Albert Einstein.

67

So what?

And make pigs fly. This meaningless jibber jabber means nothing to me.

Sounds like special pleading to me. And no, I do not acknowledge Einstein as an authority on economics, so the quoting here will do you no good.

68

Thorstein Veblen called it “the predatory phase” of human development. I’m guessing the need for Capitalism is based on this phase of human development. Its called EVOLUTIONARY ECONOMICS.

Economics is a science. Einstein was an authority on science. He may not have the knowledge that Carl Menger or Marx had, but he is an authority on science.

69

A pretty clueless description of free markets.

No no, he was an authority on physics. Krugman is supposedly an authority on economics yet he’s full of shit. So even if Einstein were one, it would not preclude him from talking nonsense, which of course he is, there.

70

Its called Evolutionary Economics.

Krugman is full of shit because he’s a tool of the political elite. Einstein wrote for himself.

71

That’s a contradiction in terms.

72

You sound like a rather bad troll right now. It could call itself divinely-inspired-absolutely-100%-correct economics for all I care, it would not make it anymore silly. Unless it acknowledges the problem of scarcity and details how it is to be dealt with, it is a non-starter.

And still managed to get it so wrong, eh?

73

The Theory of the Leisure Class man

74

Have you even read Thorstein’s critique of consumerism?

Einstein didn’t come up with all those ideas. His foundation was TLC.

75

Don’t start with the “have you even read…” crap. Outline the argument you think is convincing, or else I will just retort for you to go read Mises or Rothbard. If Einstein did not come up with them he was just parotting nonsense anyway.

76

How exactly is evolutionary economics nonsense? It takes into account human behavior, evolution and anthropology.. something no other economic schools have done.

77

Sure, when humans stop making conscious decisions and scarcity is no longer an issue, Einstein may be right. In the meantime, we have scarcity and we make conscious decisions.

78

I notice you make no effort to outline the arguments. So you too are parotting nonsense now. Good to know. BTW, give Mike Schermer a read if you’re so big on the “evolutionary” tag. He’s an Austrian, FYI.

79

That is because the purpose of economics is to overcome behavior and psychology and persuade humans to act rationally.

80

Just wondering…you know, in case you were interested in whatever it is you’re trying to say… You understand what that quote means, right? I mean, I’ll be nice here and skip over the whole “Quoting Einstein does not make your argument correct, especially if you have made no argument” part. What that quote is saying is the the economics we use can’t really shed light on the socialist society of the future, because we assume the socialist society of the future would take place AFTER the predatory phase of human development, which we are currently in. Now, even ignoring that people like Ludwig von Mises pointed out quite well exactly what would happen if we evolved into a non-self-interest species, how does this help whatever backing you are trying to give socialism? The quote you have given still points out explicitly that we are not in a phase of evolution in which socialism is viable. You can hurl rhetoric all you like. You can write all the letters to Santa your heart desires. In the end, all that will happen is your auntie will pinch your cheek and say “That’s ADORABLE.” Logical argument does kinda have to be based on actually foundations, you know. For instance…There is not a shred of evidence, anywhere, in any study of evolution, that points a finger and says “There. That’s where we are headed. We’re evolving into creatures who do not put ourselves and our own interests above society.” Evolutionary economics is really more of a hypothesis than a theory, not because the idea itself is absurd, but because there is not really much of a way to set up an experiment. Now it’s like I’m talking to high-schoolers…