Wasn’t the “legendary” Pony Express a private company?
Just my two cents- but the above doesn’t help either. Especially if you don’t see why you should waste time, this post was useless. Forget taking things personally, people do that a bit too much on these forums. He’ll get to your answers when he gets to them- or maybe he never will- either way don’t have to get bothered by it.
So socialism means that workers must either be hired unconditionally or not at all, and no one can own stock in a company they don’t work for? I’ve never seen it defined that way before.
Well, most socialists would say you can’t own stock in a company at all, because that implies ownership… right? But I fail to see where I said either of these.
I advocate workers exercising more control over their workplace (and once again, that doesn’t just mean simple laborers) and a good way to do that would be for them to have a stake in the company (assuming we live in a capitalist economy). I also find it ideal for people not to have to work so much (tho if you want to, that’s awesome) just to maintain a decent existence, for many reasons; including unemployment issues (less work time means more time for more workers) family development, and pursuit of one’s desires, among other reasons.
when you mention the workplace as an area that you just happen to “find yourself having to work at”- you don’t consider it a voluntary agreement?(thats what is implied so please clarify)
It has to be put into context. Me working for the company specifically that I work for is, if defined a certain way, a voluntary exchange. But one must work (unless one is born to rich parents, then you can just live off dividends… lazy free loaders ). That can’t be denied. And one finds themselves most likely having to work for a capitalist, as they own nearly everything, and most labor is unskilled. It is a voluntary exchange much in the same way that a man with water finds a person in the desert dying of thirst; sure it’s voluntary, but it still sucks. And ethically, it seems the man with the water has a responsiblity to give it to the one dying of thirst… in my opinion.
Like if I said to you “Hey man do you wanna do some heavy lifting to move some stuff from my grandmother’s house to my house? I’ll give you $50- but please dress appropriately”
Would you consider it that I had no right in telling you to dress appropriately? but you have every right to take the $50 that I offered?
What if appropriate dress to me means naked? There’s nothing wrong with suggesting it, and one should have respect enough to follow. But it shouldn’t be a neccessary prerequisite for employment. Civil liberties, in my view, are not just a political thing, they’re economic as well.
Epicurus, you do not what you are talking about. First you spam your own thread. Second you do not answer the points I have made. Third what you write has nothing to do with what it actually is. For the moment I do not see why should I waste my time answering you anymore, as there are more of my questions pending unanswered.
Then don’t…? I have no responsiblity to answer your questions. Why so authoritarian?
But capitalists aren’t out to deny people work. They have a limited amount of money and a nearly unlimited amount of people who want that money- what can they do but choose what they hope are the best workers?
I would definitely say its the right thing to do to give water to a man dying of thirst- but that’s just not the same situation. When it comes to work, people aren’t being hired out of charity- they’re being hired because they’ve proved themselves valuable in some way. If I need someone to lift heavy objects for work, why would I hire someone who’s emaciated and starving? Not to say I couldn’t help that starving person some other way out of charity- but that’s not a work relationship.
Work isn’t charity by definition. I don’t think it sucks that people “have” to work, I think its good. If no one had to work we’d either be in a utopia because we get everything we wanted in some magical way or nothing would be done and there would be nearly no food or water to give to anyone. Capitalists become capitalists by offering people something they want. If they got their money by stealing- that’s when they aren’t considered capitalists anymore.
Well then can’t I argue that “Paying you $50 shouldn’t be a necessary prerequisite for you to help me out”. Money shouldn’t be a necessary prerequisite for helping your fellow man should it? Why not flip this around and argue that a pizza shop owner is always subject to an involuntary situation where he has to pay people just to convince them to help him make pizza? It just all seems so arbitrary.
Work is a “I do something for you, you do something for me” relationship.
So to you, work agreements should only go so far as “I do this work, you give me this money”- any other part of the agreement is unnecessary? The entire agreement is why you are getting paid. Wearing what I ask you to wear to work is PART of the work.
This is the goal of a capitalist economy, overall less work hours and more leisure. We don’t have to knit our own clothes, grow our own food, or even make our own toys. Without state intervention- this would keep going further and the disparity between work and leisure(in the favor of leisure) would increase.
Our goals aren’t different at all- we all want people in general to be better off than they were before.
Perhaps you could define what a socialist economy would look like to you because I admit(if you couldn’t tell) I’m a bit confused.
Last year the post office lost $8.5 billion. In 2009 they lost $4.7 billion. They lose billions of dollars every year. You just opened your mouth and demonstrated to every person here what a moron you are. “Oh gee since we mailed stuff and it got through, the post office is great…who cares that it’s a blackhole of stolen money?” The saddest part is they lose that much money with a government-enforced monopoly, too.
For years I co-ran an ebay business w my father. We used the post office everyday to send packages. We never had a problem, not once.
Any government service in existence can be used to anyones advantage: be it the military, peace corp, post office, priests, teachers, roads, PBS, NPR, Zionists etc.
Personally I love collecting stamps and coins and listening to one of the few damn outlets for compositional music on the radio in NPR. What is your point?
This is what you intended LS ^^^^^ (Chris’ post)
And it worked.
I never said I love th PO. I said it isn’t as ineffecient as some people try to claim. I did say I doubt it had lost billions, and if that is wrong, which has been asserted twice, I apologize.
(I’m about to hit the sack, but I will get to your post tomorow Auctionguy)
Personally I love collecting stamps and coins and listening to one of the few damn outlets for compositional music on the radio in NPR. What is your point?
That the USPS isn’t as terribly inneficient, at least in my experience (which is anectdotal at best) as some people were trying to claim in the thread I posted this in.
That the USPS isn’t as terribly inneficient
Compared to what? What is the inefficient/ efficient without a market mechanism to tell what is what? Is the US Government efficient at corporotism, imperialism, etc?
EDIT: Yes governments can have some services due to the existence of markets. There is really no debate on this.
EDIT: Yes governments can have some services due to the existence of markets. There is really no debate on this.
I’m just curious - what services are you referring to?
But capitalists aren’t out to deny people work. They have a limited amount of money and a nearly unlimited amount of people who want that money- what can they do but choose what they hope are the best workers?
Oh but they are. YOu can only hire so many people and still turn a profit. It’s not their fault, it’s the nature of the system. There could be 50 qualified and dedicated workers wanting the job. But owner wants a mansion, so he’s only hiring 3 of them. Capitalism needs and creates scarcity to thrive. That goes from burning crops to keep the price high, or even to unemployment to keep wages down.
Since we need to work, shouldn’t everyone who wants to work be able to?
(Let me clarify that I am not a marxist. I have no problem with markets and competition. I just view them much as Adam Smith did; that they’re good, but only under ideal circumstances.)
Work isn’t charity by definition. I don’t think it sucks that people “have” to work, I think its good. If no one had to work we’d either be in a utopia because we get everything we wanted in some magical way or nothing would be done and there would be nearly no food or water to give to anyone. Capitalists become capitalists by offering people something they want. If they got their money by stealing- that’s when they aren’t considered capitalists anymore.
They aren’t considered capitalists by YOU (and the AE school/rightlibertarins in general). But the bank and/or the company that needs investing really doesn’t care where you got your money. It just wants your money.
Well then can’t I argue that “Paying you $50 shouldn’t be a necessary prerequisite for you to help me out”. Money shouldn’t be a necessary prerequisite for helping your fellow man should it? Why not flip this around and argue that a pizza shop owner is always subject to an involuntary situation where he has to pay people just to convince them to help him make pizza? It just all seems so arbitrary.
I don’t believe we can get rid of the price mechanism until scarcity is eliminated (and who knows if that’s even possible w replicators) but no, money, ideally, should not be a necessary prerequisite for exchange. Desire, resource, and labor should be… and are. It’s just in a monetary society, money is the easiest way to find those necessary prerequisites.
Speaking for me personally, if I’m not strapped for cash, I will move your grandma’s stuff free of charge. There’s also a slight difference in this situation as it is not production for exchange, but rather for utility. If say, YOU were making $150 off your grandma, and only giving me $50, even though I did half the work (and in many situations, you would only pay me 1/3 even if I did ALL of the work)… that is a form of tacit stealing. Only your arbitrary relationship to your gma entitles you to 2/3 of the money.
It is very arbitrary, that’s the nature of human relationships. Isn’t that the whole point of the STV?
Work is a “I do something for you, you do something for me” relationship
No arguments here. THe only problem is the nature of wealth accumulation and it’s ability to create heirarchial systems of power. Wealth is not a meritocracy, once you have it. Getting it often is, tho not always. But once you have it, that’s it, you have it. It becomes a dependancy where those without must beg those with for a piece of the pie (even if that is just begging for a job).
This would change were everyone gauranteed an adequate domicile and nutrition.
So to you, work agreements should only go so far as “I do this work, you give me this money”- any other part of the agreement is unnecessary? The entire agreement is why you are getting paid. Wearing what I ask you to wear to work is PART of the work.
Yes, and under ideal situations I could just walk away. But if I don’t know where I’m getting next months rent, or groceries for my children, I can’t just walk away from the deal. I have to accept it, or starve.. or at the very least beg. And why woudl you want to force someone into a situation of begging?
I started my business mostly because I smoke weed, and everybody drug tests. But not everyone is an entrepreneur. Some people don’t care for thinking in the big picture, and just want to labor. I would not want to consider myself better than them (and ergo more entitled) because of it.
I’m just curious - what services are you referring to?
Any service that exists or has existed in the past I suppose; be it the USSR auto industry, the Cuban Health care system, or NASA. I am just saying due to market mechanisms governments can operate things.
I hope you don’t mind if I ask you some more technical questions on what “socialism” means to you.
Regarding worker control, how do you think this control should be exercised? Given your support for “democracy”, is a simple majority or plurality vote sufficient for worker control to exist? Or else what, in your view, would be sufficient?
Those are all well and good. But what about businesses that don’t do such things? Would you allow them not to?
I agree with this, actually. My agreement, however, comes from my understanding that private property is basically inherent within human nature. Without an over-arching authority telling its subjects that they can’t own X, people will take or create X, own it, buy it, sell it, etc.
Do you consider people to be prima facie entitled to certain things? If so, do you recognize that, regardless of your basis for such a consideration, no one has to agree with you?
It would be nice if you could provide one or more actual quotes from Adam Smith that clearly demonstrate this alleged position on markets and competition. Otherwise, since ideal circumstances never exist, it seems fair to say that you do have problems with markets and competition.
Which is easier – to convince someone to use your semantics, or to use theirs once you recognize that they’re different from your own?
Would you then consider yourself justified in taking what you consider to be your “fair share” – by force, if necessary? (I use “taking” there to avoid any moral or ethical implications.)
While you may well consider the value of your work to be $75, no one else is prima facie obligated (here I mean in the sense of some physical law) to agree. If you’re taking $50 for the work, I’d say you have no cause to then claim a right to another $25, regardless of your own valuation thereof.
You seem to imply that wealth is static once obtained – that is, its “value” never changes. Why is that? Say I buy a house and lot for $100,000 and subsequently let it go into decline. Later on I want to sell it, but I can only get $50,000 for it. It would seem that I’ve lost half of the wealth I had accumulated, wouldn’t it? So saying “once you have it, that’s it, you have it” doesn’t follow whatsoever.
I’m sorry but I have to call weasel on this. Can you explain exactly what you mean by “adequate domicile” and “adequate nutrition”?
Without a State, how can such things ever be “guaranteed”?
You can always “just walk away”. What you’re describing is analogous to The Oracle’s quote from The Matrix Reloaded: “You’ve already made the choice. Now you have to understand it.”
Regarding worker control, how do you think this control should be exercised? Given your support for “democracy”, is a simple majority or plurality vote sufficient for worker control to exist? Or else what, in your view, would be sufficient?
I’ve never been a fan of simple mob rule democracy. Anything >2/3 majority is a pitiful representation of belief. Mob rule is a very crude way to democratically decide something.
Those are all well and good. But what about businesses that don’t do such things? Would you allow them not to?
Generally, and I’m not (much of) a violent uprising (more MLK, tho I do think some violent uprisings are in order, like India against Brittain or such) . But I do think a certain economic bill of rights is in order. And this should protect the entrepreneur as much as the worker.
I agree with this, actually. My agreement, however, comes from my understanding that private property is basically inherent within human nature. Without an over-arching authority telling its subjects that they can’t own X, people will take or create X, own it, buy it, sell it, etc.
That’s actually why I’m a libertarian socialist. I don’t think you realize the heirarchical nature of the business structure
Do you consider people to be prima facie entitled to certain things? If so, do you recognize that, regardless of your basis for such a consideration, no one has to agree with you?
Well, I think that’s impossible to believe really. There’s no way I could enforce it. But I do believe people are entitled to (if not prima facie) adequate shelter and nutrition. I find a non-belief in that, no offense, to be barbaric.
But I understand that not everyone will agree with me. I would like them to. There’s a quote by Booker T (I think) that says something like “if you want to help yourself rise up, help the people around you.” I think there’s a lot of truth in that.
It would be nice if you could provide one or more actual quotes from Adam Smith that clearly demonstrate this alleged position on markets and competition. Otherwise, since ideal circumstances never exist, it seems fair to say that you do have problems with markets and competition.
http://www.chomsky.info/books/warfare02.htm
It would be fair to say I have certain problems with markets and competition. Markets themselves do; McDonald’s cannot thrive w/o McDonald-Douglas. Markets many times, imo, must be protected from themselves. And the history of markets shows this to be true. Even the NFL has a draft policy that protects the loser.
Which is easier – to convince someone to use your semantics, or to use theirs once you recognize that they’re different from your own?
Which would be truer to myself (and truer to history)?
You seem to imply that wealth is static once obtained – that is, its “value” never changes. Why is that? Say I buy a house and lot for $100,000 and subsequently let it go into decline. Later on I want to sell it, but I can only get $50,000 for it. It would seem that I’ve lost half of the wealth I had accumulated, wouldn’t it? So saying “once you have it, that’s it, you have it” doesn’t follow whatsoever.
I would not argue with any of that. But it is true, that generally, wealth is self-reinforcing. “You gotta have money to make money” and all that.
Without a State, how can such things ever be “guaranteed”?
The same way anything is guaranteed w/o a state; by the people themselves. One does not need a monopoly on violence for people to come together in union. Consent of the governed is still consent of the governed if you let some poeple out of it.
" Capitalism needs and creates scarcity to thrive"
huh??? capitalism creates scarcity??? i did not know that, i always thought scarcity was already part of life…
So am I to understand that if we want a prosperous society we should ignore demonstrated consumer preferences and instead give our money to those who EiK deems worthy?