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if we needed to get rid of capitalism, could we?


gisiebob

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"Government and regulation bad" is a talking point embedded in our minds by neoliberal propaganda, and needs to die already because corporations acting without oversight or regulations has, and always will be, a complete fucking disaster.

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18 minutes ago, Sarah-Sylvia said:

@Epic TetusI don't care if others waste money. The government represents the people, our money deserves to be used well.

 

We need to watch the government. In a way lobbying being done not just behind the doors right now can be good to know what's going on. but things like that need to be brought up to be discussed and dealt with well, not bribing people who represent the people.

And you don't need money or capitalism to bribe people. It'll always be a problem that needs to be handled.

 

Gold is shiny and rare. Not sure what you wanna know more :P It makes great jewelry and more.

Hm - so, to clarify, the original post I responded to did NOT include the second two paragraphs. I'm sure you didn't mean anything by it, but editing posts after people have responded to them can be seen as acting in bad faith. Especially if you don't make it clear that you edited the post.

 

As far as bribing people without money, I'm sure there will always be some jerks around who try to take advantage of things. That said, money lets them accumulate vast amounts of wealth at other peoples' expense a lot easier than if everyone's basic needs were cared for and they were gifting like, some extra nice meals, or season tickets or something. There is a limit to how many resources on person can actually use, but there's not a limit to how much money someone can acquire. All that said, capitalism and money aren't the same thing. You can have each independent of the other, so talking about money is kind of past the point.

 

Lot's of things are shiny. Tin foil, glass, LEDs. Those things don't have particularly high value. Lots of things are rare, too. I'm a terrible artist, but I doodle on my notepad while I work. By weight, my doodles are FAR rarer than gold. But obviously no one would give me money for them. So if being rare doesn't make something valuable, and bering shiny doesn't make something valuable. . .what does? The answer is that people agree that it is valuable. That's it. We can see this by replacing me with Banksy. If Banksy had a bunch of doodles in a notebook, people would want to own those - probably even if they were the same quality as mine (this is not meant as a criticism of Banksy I don't know anything about art or Banksy). They'd have value because people agree they do.

 

Anyway, this is, again, beside the point, because as @rebis points out, you can still give people chunks of gold if that's what they want, even in a non-capitalist society. I just don't really understand the obsession with gold, and it has always confused me.

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Sarah-Sylvia

@Epic TetusI edited it before you replied. I didn't expect you to get to it that fast, but sorry for not putting all my thoughts before posting. Wasn't my intention to throw you off. I tend to forget I have to checkmark it to say ive edtied it, I'll try to remember.

Money is just a medium for something with value. People can and will accumulate regardless of it, it won't change a thing. Access, Connections, Control, or whatever, they have a lot more going on than just money. I think it's actually better we have money and that we can tax them. The problem of exempting some from taxes or giving subsidies that aren't needed is a problem on the governmental level, and it would just change form if the system was different. And sure, you can have a barter system without money, but money just makes it easier to trade. You don't need money, but it's useful. But how money gets created and the value it represents is another matter too.

People like gold. And just because you say it doesnt have value to you, doesn't mean it doesn't to others, and scarcity does influence value because of being able to have it or not easily. Meteor hits? More to have around, so the value goes down. It's just how it works when resources can be gotten easily or not, it can take more to get someone to exchange it to you. Any resource will mean it's harder or easier to get, and there'll be more or less demand, and that's something capitalism takes into account.

 

Art can be worth something, sure. But if anyone can doodle, then it has to be special in some way or another. People can't create gold. As far as I know XD.



 

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10 hours ago, gisiebob said:

ok, so to describe my mindset, I am thinking of two changes to your analogy, in functional scarcity and the concept of trade: there being nothing to prevent anyone else from also owning a lawnmower, they simply requisition one from a factory, or even make their own; and the absence of the mindset that someone mowing your lawn should be paid to do so, not that they should be forced to, just that lawnmowing would be a transaction in isolation.

 

however, I only want to offer that idea as structure, if there are others I would love to hear them

I agree that capitalism is intimately tied to the idea of scarcity. So the question is whether one can imagine a society without scarcity. It seems natural, if unfortunate, that humans desire to have more than their neighbors. As long as people feel that way there will always be scarcity. Can we change humans? Should we? 

 

There is also the question of the lawnmower. In an ideal world, there is no need for everyone to own a lawn mower, One is probably enough for a dozen houses. But who "controls" the use of that lawnmower? 

 

One of the problems with communist systems was that while the idea sounded nice, the group that controlled the distribution of resources became powerful and directed too many resources to themselves.

 

So is there a way to distribute resources that is not based on money, but which doesn't provide a concentration of power in a "party"

 

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3 hours ago, Sarah-Sylvia said:

@gisiebobanother system would offer less individual freedom. Any going away from the free the market means more government control. Unless you have some creative proposal.

 

There's changes that can be made in the current system that can allow for more. I'm actually not against universal income, in example, but it would have to be done really really well or else it could ruin the economy even more.

I have been curious if universal basic income could be a stepping stone towards what I think of, giving people an opportunity to think about what they would do if they didn't have to be paid to do it.

 

but I think what my "creative" idea comes down to is moving beyond currency, as a society realising that money does not bring food to the grocery stores or get houses built, it is the promise of living freely in society, and money is simply our rudimentary representation of that from when it was necessary, which I do not believe is the case any longer.

 

but, yes, I am asking for other creative ideas too

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5 minutes ago, gisiebob said:

I have been curious if universal basic income could be a stepping stone towards what I think of, giving people an opportunity to think about what they would do if they didn't have to be paid to do it.

 

but I think what my "creative" idea comes down to is moving beyond currency, as a society realising that money does not bring food to the grocery stores or get houses built, it is the promise of living freely in society, and money is simply our rudimentary representation of that from when it was necessary, which I do not believe is the case any longer.

 

but, yes, I am asking for other creative ideas too

I'm all for universal income. (if it's done properly)
But money really is just a medium for value. Food and resources have value, so it's worth something, and money helps have a way to exchange for it without bartering for other items.

 

I'm up to other or creative ideas for systems for sure. It's just important to be able to handle a lot that a system dose have.
What would be cool is to have advanced sim applications, where different systems could be tested to see what it can and doesn't handle. Once that exists it'll be very interesting to see things that can be shown to have success. (and what it relies on)

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9 minutes ago, uhtred said:

I agree that capitalism is intimately tied to the idea of scarcity. So the question is whether one can imagine a society without scarcity. It seems natural, if unfortunate, that humans desire to have more than their neighbors. As long as people feel that way there will always be scarcity. Can we change humans? Should we? 

 

There is also the question of the lawnmower. In an ideal world, there is no need for everyone to own a lawn mower, One is probably enough for a dozen houses. But who "controls" the use of that lawnmower? 

 

One of the problems with communist systems was that while the idea sounded nice, the group that controlled the distribution of resources became powerful and directed too many resources to themselves.

 

So is there a way to distribute resources that is not based on money, but which doesn't provide a concentration of power in a "party"

 

we have always been in an environment that has encouraged us to have more than our neighbors. before, when it was a struggle for survival, and now with that struggle brought with us artificially. I don't know for certain, but I think that behaviour is largely learned.

 

I think that central guidance of some kind would be useful, but I agree that central conrol is another avenue for corruption, and that the infrastructure we have working in a similar way to how it works currently, just without an assumption of the importance of wealth would support us: the person who mows the lawn is the person who opts to.

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9 minutes ago, Sarah-Sylvia said:

What would be cool is to have advanced sim applications, where different systems could be tested to see what it can and doesn't handle. Once that exists it'll be very interesting to see things that can be shown to have success. (and what it relies on)

if you are not willing to offer your own society to the experimentation towards a better one, do you want to be in a country that calls itself the great experiment?

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34 minutes ago, gisiebob said:

if you are not willing to offer your own society to the experimentation towards a better one, do you want to be in a country that calls itself the great experiment?

Huh? You don't mess up what's worked. Things are bad enough as they are. I don't want more decline. We need figure out our stuff and what can help, and be realistic, people don't want to be experimented on, and don't want to ditch an entire system they've been used to and that's been put a lot into.

 

A system has a lot built into it, and what we have took a lot of time to handle a lot of things. So much needs to be considered not just to transition, but also to make sure a new one would handle everything or more. But moving away from capitalism means more government control, which leads to issues that we still haven't handled, so the first steps would be.. a lot of conversations, theorizing, and simulations, or if there's large groups that would want to experiment that's fine, but they have to want to, be in for it. And that might help get ideas and see what values work out and what doesn't, and more.

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5 hours ago, Sarah-Sylvia said:

Huh? You don't mess up what's worked. Things are bad enough as they are. I don't want more decline. We need figure out our stuff and what can help, and be realistic, people don't want to be experimented on, and don't want to ditch an entire system they've been used to and that's been put a lot into.

 

A system has a lot built into it, and what we have took a lot of time to handle a lot of things. So much needs to be considered not just to transition, but also to make sure a new one would handle everything or more. But moving away from capitalism means more government control, which leads to issues that we still haven't handled, so the first steps would be.. a lot of conversations, theorizing, and simulations, or if there's large groups that would want to experiment that's fine, but they have to want to, be in for it. And that might help get ideas and see what values work out and what doesn't, and more.

I agree, there is a titanic amount of sunk cost in the way of people figuring out how to move away from decline, and fix what isn't working. I started this thread in hopes of exploring what other things might be needed in transition, what changes would have to be made and how our society would react. 

 

what I don't understand about what you said, is why you keep on repeating that there would be more government control?

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It may be a definition question, but can one abolish capitalism without abolishing private ownership?  Is ownership by definition ownership of capital and does that imply capitalism?

 

I guess one could take a more limited definition and limit long term ownership. So for example any earnings need to be spent within a month or something.

 

Every time I try to think about it, it feels like communism, which was a wretched failure in the 20th century, but maybe there is some other way to not have capitalism?   I'm not imaginative enough to think of what that would be. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, uhtred said:

It may be a definition question, but can one abolish capitalism without abolishing private ownership?  Is ownership by definition ownership of capital and does that imply capitalism?

 

I guess one could take a more limited definition and limit long term ownership. So for example any earnings need to be spent within a month or something.

 

Every time I try to think about it, it feels like communism, which was a wretched failure in the 20th century, but maybe there is some other way to not have capitalism?   I'm not imaginative enough to think of what that would be. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I invite you to read what I have written here, in plain terms, without pretext that is not my own.

 

I feel like if capitalism is an inate aspect of possessing material, than that is certainly not what what I infer. I by no means wish to stand between a human and their ability to hold a stick.

 

I do certainly feel like that sort of reductive mindset is... plugging your ears. but I also think that we have worked hard to train ourselves to think like that about this.

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Sarah-Sylvia
2 hours ago, gisiebob said:

I agree, there is a titanic amount of sunk cost in the way of people figuring out how to move away from decline, and fix what isn't working. I started this thread in hopes of exploring what other things might be needed in transition, what changes would have to be made and how our society would react. 

 

what I don't understand about what you said, is why you keep on repeating that there would be more government control?

Capitalism is about a free market where private citizens and businesses can do or exchange something of value (based on demand, and competing businesses).
How else can you move away from that but by something or other being controlled by the government? If it's not private, then it'll be public. If value and the economy isn't determined naturally, by the free market, then it'll be controlled.

 

I don't want to move away from capitalism, because there's no better alternative for now. I want people to learn how to actually work it, and I am for regulation to help balance, as well as protect the environment. People can do what they want, but if it's harmful or discriminatory in some way then they're going too far and that needs to be handled.

I think there should be more to help people in some ways as well though, maybe more ways to contribute to society and be able to have stuff. Not letting as much stuff go to waste. I dunno, but worth thinking about.

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2 hours ago, Sarah-Sylvia said:

Capitalism is about a free market where private citizens and businesses can do or exchange something of value (based on demand, and competing businesses).
How else can you move away from that but by something or other being controlled by the government?

a free market where private citizens and businesses can provide each other with goods and services.

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off topic but i read the title as "if we needed to get rid of capitalization, could we?" and my answer would have been hell yes

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One of the things I often think about when I'm doing work is systems. The hole that I always find in many theories about how you could make better systems is that they always look at it from just a systems perspective. To disregard the psychology of people and their own instincts which are tied to why capitalism has flourished over all other systems is a mistake. More so, now we're faced with a more prominant problem. To make a new system, you'd have to impliment mass change across the globe due to globalism being a thing. The extent of that change would disrupt all of our processes entirely, because all of our processes are tied to capitalism in some form. 

 

Let's look at this from another angle.

 

I often think about what I could do if I had the power to do it. One of my larger thoughts lately has been about, what would I do to help improve quality of life in my province? Let's isolate one thought to keep this simple. My province's power grid is shit. Considering that we live in a cold climate for over six months of the year, power outages can be fatal for people if they rely on electric heating that can go out for several hours. I think if I were to improve that, I'd shift our power grid from burning coal to hydro. My province has many bodies of water up north. Hydro has drawbacks such as wildlife and habitat disruption, but compared to the drawbacks of coal burning, or what happens if a nuclear reactor fails, hydro has the least negatives and pollution ratios.

 

So, I ask then, how would I go about making hydro electric dams up north? I'd need engineers. I'd need a certified company that wouldn't take shortcuts(need to outsource from another country). I'd need workers. I'd need the raw materials. Out of every other system I can think of, there's no system out there that enables people to build the things of the scale that we build in modern times short of slavery or very strict enforcement. And the core reason for this is psychology. Nobody would be motivated to build a dam up north if they weren't paid for it. You couldn't outsource to a company in another country because why the fuck would they come out here on good will? You couldn't say to the workers doing the concrete work, "Just do it, think of what it'll mean for the province if we get a better power grid."

 

There's a second part to this as well. I've thought about how inept the government in my province is. I asked what I could do to change them. The answer is that I can't. I can't make them re-open cut services. I can't make them build hydro dams up north. But if I had a stupid amount of money, I could pay for all those services and things, and outmaneuver the ineptitude of my own government by creating services and paying for them myself, while trying to generate revinue to sustain them. In a capitalistic system, the possibility of achieving this is possible due to what money does psychologically to most people. It motivates them to do what they wouldn't normally because now our system of survival is tied to money, rather than foraging for food and trying to survive harsh climates.

 

When it comes down to it, here's the actual reality of capitalism. 

 

Systems are dual. We build rocket boosters to leave orbit, and people use the same boosters to make intercontinental missiles. We use potassium to fertilize our plants, others use it to make gunpowder to fire bullets. Capitilism is the same.

 

If moderated and controlled via sanity, because unlimited growth isn't possible with finite resources, people can use capitalism to make immense strides in technology and improvements to quality of life. On the dual side, the negative, capitalism fuels greed, which is intrsinc to human beings as a survival mechanism. When left unchecked, when not controlled, you end up like you do today. Huge corporations nickle and diming everybody to the last, while cutting corners in services and technology growth and efficiency in the name of increasing profit.

 

Personally, I think we need to hybridize capitalism and regulate it so that it doesn't run unchecked. There needs to be limitations to how far it can go. We're in so deep now that any large scale change would shut down everything. And we arrive at the same conclusion no matter what system we devise anyway. Life is dual, and so are people. There's the possibility for sanity and reason, or corruption and abuse in any system we make. Rather than demolish what we have now, I'd opt to shift it gently. You don't need to shift much. Just add a few barriers via legal manuveurs.

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Sarah-Sylvia
21 minutes ago, kenny. said:

off topic but i read the title as "if we needed to get rid of capitalization, could we?" and my answer would have been hell yes

I don't know I don't mind it XD. Makes the beginning of each sentence special lol.

 

28 minutes ago, gisiebob said:

a free market where private citizens and businesses can provide each other with goods and services.

Yup that's capitalism 😜

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7 hours ago, uhtred said:

It may be a definition question, but can one abolish capitalism without abolishing private ownership?  Is ownership by definition ownership of capital and does that imply capitalism?

Good question. I think the answer is yes to the first question and no to the second, but that’s purely from a theoretical perspective.

 

Capitalism is a relatively recent system where someone can make more capital from investing capital; i.e. ownership of something can lead to ownership of more things, without necessarily doing anything (appreciate we tell ourselves they take a “risk” etc, but fundamentally it’s as simple as that).

 

Private ownership of land is also a relatively recent invention, in human evolutionary terms, although I guess private ownership of artefacts has been around much longer.

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3 hours ago, Sarah-Sylvia said:

I don't know I don't mind it XD. Makes the beginning of each sentence special lol.

 

Yup that's capitalism 😜

that is not capitalism, in that I was drawing a distinct contrast to what you said. consider what is different about what we said.

 

 

also: I don't know what seems so special about the sTart of a sentence

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6 hours ago, gisiebob said:

that is not capitalism, in that I was drawing a distinct contrast to what you said. consider what is different about what we said.

 

 

also: I don't know what seems so special about the sTart of a sentence

You'll have to explain what you think is different, because it's not from what you said.

 

Someone can 'give' something in the current system if they want. If you're saying someone would willingly do that, provide resources, you're ignoring most's human nature, or what you're talking about is a vast change in attitude, not the system. And that won't happen, people will want something in exchange as incentive, and sometimes it's crucial if some resource could go in different places including outside the country (depleting of something that might be important instead of getting value in return).

 

To add more, not thinking about exchange or currency is only a downgrade, because people will come to want incentive to 'provide' a resource. Different people and businesses can want the resource, and if people are free to say well hey I'll give you this resource in return if you provide me with yours, so then of course they'll be oh well yeah then I'd rather do that then just send it somewhere that won't serve my own projects since no one else has or wants to provide that resource for me. And then without money then there can only be barter which means less flexibility since you can only get something from those who want what you have.

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14 hours ago, uhtred said:

It may be a definition question, but can one abolish capitalism without abolishing private ownership?  Is ownership by definition ownership of capital and does that imply capitalism?

Private ownership in this context doesn't mean what you and many other people think. It means the private ownership of production.

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16 hours ago, uhtred said:

It may be a definition question, but can one abolish capitalism without abolishing private ownership?  Is ownership by definition ownership of capital and does that imply capitalism?

 

I guess one could take a more limited definition and limit long term ownership. So for example any earnings need to be spent within a month or something.

 

Every time I try to think about it, it feels like communism, which was a wretched failure in the 20th century, but maybe there is some other way to not have capitalism?   I'm not imaginative enough to think of what that would be.

I feel like there are people with better lefty cred than me here who might have a clearer explanation, but basically, private ownership is not unique to capitalism.

 

When we talk about owning capital in this case, we are talking about the means of production, rather than just owning any object. The means of production are things that are used to perform work, like machines, factories, or mines. A capitalist uses their ownership of this capital in order to exploit labor by paying people to use the things they own to produce goods or provide services, which the capitalist then sells. Profit comes from the capitalist paying the workers less than the value of the results of their labor.

 

In a non-capitalist system, the factory could still produce goods, but when sold, the proceeds of the sale would go to the people who worked in the factory. No one person or entity owns and profits from the ownership of the factory or the machines within.

 

That's the essence of capitalism.

 

So currency, free markets, piles of gold, owning hats - all of these things might be features of  a capitalist society, but they are not necessary OR sufficient to one. You can have any or all of those things without having capitalism, or vice versa.

 

All this to say, most people living in capitalist societies aren't 'the capitalists' - most of us don't own factories, and what machines we do own, we operate ourselves, and are generally on such a small scale that they would not really be 'the means of production'.

 

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6 hours ago, Still said:

Private ownership in this context doesn't mean what you and many other people think. It means the private ownership of production.

Agreed - but the boundary has become blurred in recent times.  A "private" car can be used to work for Uber.  A privately owned computer to do small projects for hire.   People rent out rooms in their own houses etc.

 

Education / training is also a form of capital - it require time and often money to gain them, and then they can be used for production


I'm not sure there is a clean separation anymore between private property and what was formerly considered "means of production". 

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5 minutes ago, uhtred said:

Agreed - but the boundary has become blurred in recent times.  A "private" car can be used to work for Uber.  A privately owned computer to do small projects for hire.   People rent out rooms in their own houses etc.

It's not as blurred as you might think:

 

- Uber: The car is owned by the worker (the driver) - this would be expressly non-capitalist EXCEPT the app is owned by the owner of Uber, and they pay the driver less than they get from the fare.

 

- Privately owned computer: This is the means of production (the computer) being used by its owner (the worker) to provide a service. Nothing particularly capitalist about this. 

 

- Renting rooms in your own house: Rent is a weird issue for a lot of reasons. You could probably make some kind of argument that rent isn't inherently capitalist. No one will probably bother though, because most anti-capitalists really hate the idea of rent, and believe that access to shelter and other basic needs should be universally granted.

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7 hours ago, Sarah-Sylvia said:

If you're saying someone would willingly do that, provide resources, you're ignoring most's human nature, or what you're talking about is a vast change in attitude, not the system

no, I am talking about changes to the system that creates and fortifies such additudes.

 

it is human nature to use violence to create a desired environment. we have chosen systems in our society that hinder and dissuade that nature instead of boistering it, is that wrong?

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22 minutes ago, gisiebob said:

no, I am talking about changes to the system that creates and fortifies such additudes.

 

it is human nature to use violence to create a desired environment. we have chosen systems in our society that hinder and dissuade that nature instead of boistering it, is that wrong?

None of what you just said makes sense for or has to do with capitalism tho. Or moving away from it.
If you want people to be nicer, that's its own thing. What change do you have in mind that would change someone's attitude on what they choose to do with their resources?

 

We have a legal system, people aren't allowed to be violent. Capitalism just has to do with how people own, produce and trade stuff. (& it's a free market)

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2 hours ago, Epic Tetus said:

It's not as blurred as you might think:

 

- Uber: The car is owned by the worker (the driver) - this would be expressly non-capitalist EXCEPT the app is owned by the owner of Uber, and they pay the driver less than they get from the fare.

 

- Privately owned computer: This is the means of production (the computer) being used by its owner (the worker) to provide a service. Nothing particularly capitalist about this. 

 

- Renting rooms in your own house: Rent is a weird issue for a lot of reasons. You could probably make some kind of argument that rent isn't inherently capitalist. No one will probably bother though, because most anti-capitalists really hate the idea of rent, and believe that access to shelter and other basic needs should be universally granted.

Why doesn't the computer count?  It seems like an object with value that is used for production. I don't see it as any different from a piece of machinery in a factory.  Imagine if the owner buys several computers and rents time on them - increasing until they own a server farm.

Imagine there is no Uber app and the owner is running a private taxi service.  Then the car is capital used for production, or at least used to generate wealth.

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7 minutes ago, uhtred said:

Why doesn't the computer count?  It seems like an object with value that is used for production. I don't see it as any different from a piece of machinery in a factory.  Imagine if the owner buys several computers and rents time on them - increasing until they own a server farm.

Imagine there is no Uber app and the owner is running a private taxi service.  Then the car is capital used for production, or at least used to generate wealth.

Yeah, both those examples would be capitalist endeavors. Capitalism is about the relationship between capital and labor. The guy who owns his own computer and builds websites for people is not necessarily engaging in a capitalist endeavor as he is the labor and the owner of the capital. He gets all the proceeds of his own labor.

 

If he instead works for someone else, who has him use a computer they own to produce websites, then sells the websites to clients, then the guy will not get the proceeds of his own labor. That value he creates goes to the owner, who then pays him for his labor. Integral to this relationship is the concept of exploitation: the laborer will always be paid LESS than the value of the work they do. That difference between the amount of value created by the laborer and the amount the laborer is paid is where the capitalist can find profit.

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3 hours ago, Sarah-Sylvia said:

None of what you just said makes sense for or has to do with capitalism tho. Or moving away from it.
If you want people to be nicer, that's its own thing. What change do you have in mind that would change someone's attitude on what they choose to do with their resources?

 

We have a legal system, people aren't allowed to be violent. Capitalism just has to do with how people own, produce and trade stuff. (& it's a free market)

if you and I agree to trade one thing for another, is it just a thing that is a notion about what people own produce and trade that ensures that agreement?

 

please try to avoid reductionist arguments like capitalism is simply someone holding something. this is clearly not what I am wanting to discuss.

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8 minutes ago, gisiebob said:

if you and I agree to trade one thing for another, is it just a thing that is a notion about what people own produce and trade that ensures that agreement?

 

please try to avoid reductionist arguments like capitalism is simply someone holding something. this is clearly not what I am wanting to discuss.

I mentioned the system. I dunno what to tell you. You're pinning way too much on it that has more to do with how people are, some which could be changed in a better world, some which can't and the system takes into account and is actually a good thing.

I don't understand your question. If we're free to own things and trade them of our own accord, it's entirely in our hands what type of agreement we make. It can become legally binding so that if someone breaks the agreement we can take it to court tho.

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