Capitalism or Communism

by d 92 Replies latest jw friends

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  sammielee24

  Capitalism creates class structure - class structure is required to keep capitalism going. Working class. Middle class. Lower class. Poor class.

  Those classes in turn, buy the product they produce thereby putting directly back into the coffers of the corporation, the money they earned by said corporation.

  When those worker bees are forced out of the class, perhaps by illness, reduced profit for the corporation etc., they then become the dependant class.

  The dependant class then go cap in hand to the working class for a hand out or a hand up - just to survive.

  The worker who becomes a dependant in any form, is then used against the rest of the working class as a drain on their dollars and is held up by an example as lacking vision, education, responsibility - in other words a waste of space - regardless of whether this worker bee has contributed for 30 years to the profit of the corporation, has contributed as a taxpayer and a member of the community, he will be seen as wasting resources.

  Which is better? Probably neither.

  I don't know - but I like to think that a democratic country with social responsiblity would be a start. Blind capitalism is when people support a concept without engaging that idealogy and digging deeper. It's when people are only capable of using capitalism against communism without any recognition for any possibility of governing in between.

  sammies
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  NeckBeard

  Capitalism creates class structure - class structure is required to keep capitalism going. Working class. Middle class. Lower class. Poor class.

  So does communism/socialism. Every time. Human beings are hierarchical social animals. You can't get away from that, and no one ever has, in any system ever tried.
• 

  d

  Capitalism is soon to fail just like Communism.
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  NeckBeard

  State capitalism, sure. That has to die. But how can free market capitalism fail? It is what naturally occurs among people that are free because it works. Division of labor, and exchange of goods and services. Go to a farmers market and buy some vegetables. That is capitalism.
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  jgnat

  Again, d, you've picked the wrong polar opposites. It's free market versus communism, and democracy versus dictatorship. Democracy and capitalism are not necessarily joined at the hip. And there's all sorts of other flavours of economic systems in between.

  I've just finished The Fate of Africa by Martin Meridith, which outlines in painful detail the failure of "communism" and a multitude of economic and democratic reforms. The author concludes it was not an ideology that failed, but the leaders themselves. "Time and again [Africa's] potential for economic development has been disrupted by the predatory politics of ruling elites seeking personal gain, often precipitating violence for their own ends. 'The problem is not so much that development has failed...as that it was never really on the agenda in the first place.'" (p. 688)

  The book provides examples where the economy has collapsed, which I am guessing you are predicting for North America. What happens then? Several examples are provided in this book, including the poorest sections of South Africa "Only about half of the economically active population had formal-sector jobs. Several million more earned a living in the informal sector - hawkers, small traders, domestics and backyard businesses." (p. 650) People make do what they can do.

  For an economy to grow there has to be trust and some freedom of action. That is, a young person with ambition can embark on a plan to get ahead, and has a chance to succeed. Example, http://www.kiva.org/lend/215454

  I don't think the economy (based on capitalism) is on the verge of collapse. I don't think it can stay the way it is, either. There will be reforms and controls put in place, just as was done during the last recession.
• 

  d

  But just any syestem, it is faulty and prone to failure, just think of our massive national debt in the United States.
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  jgnat

  We could say that our computers and cars are "faulty and prone to failure", yet here we are, posting away. It wasn't Capitalism or Democracy that generated massive debt. I'd say it was involvement in an ill-advised war (among other things). The way out is always the same. Good leadership that the people have confidence in, personal sacrifice and hard work.
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  darthfader

  Well stated Jgnat!
• 

  BizzyBee

  how can free market capitalism fail?

  And yet it has brought us to the brink of disaster.

  OTOH , fair market capitalism gave this country a period of unparalleled prosperity.
• 

  NeckBeard

  And yet it has brought us to the brink of disaster.

  No it hasnt. We never had financial crisis of this scale back in the 1800s.

  But then we got progressive woodrow wilson and the Federal reserve in 1913. Then we got Hoover and FDR the Great Depression and this now, Great Depression II. A dollar in 1913 bought the same amount of stuff as a dollar in 1813. Now? A dollar is worth less than 5 cents in 1913 dollars. It has lost more than half of its value just since 1985.

  The banking system is pumping money into the system, which benefits the top 2%. The rest of us get screwed.

  So do the banks control the government or does the government control the banks? The end result is the same. jefferson and Jackson warned about this.

  OTOH, fair market capitalism gave this country a period of unparalleled prosperity.

  
  Check your history. The greatest period of growth in the country was between 1865-1913. The greatest rise in standards of living in human history. There was hardly any regulation then. You would think the country would have turned into a medieval feudal fiefdom system by that logic, but people were beating the door down to get into the US back then.