If the masses are crying about pareto-distribution why do they play the lottery? - Politics Forum.org | PoFo

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#14905366
The premise of communism is that the "masses" are really upset about the tendency in normal economics for a small percentage of players to win all the economic jelly beans, "Inequality". Leaving aside that isn't really what happens in most businesses, though it does happen, and that it is as likely to happen to "capital owners" as much as "workers" it still begs the question if that really bothered "the masses" that much why would they play the lottery? The lottery is a perfect and pure pareto-distribution game, not accidentally so but explicitly and deliberately designed to be so. The lottery: everyone puts in a small amount of money then one at random gets all the money, that's a lottery and it produces 1 (or few) winner(s) who gets everything with everyone else being a loser. So why do so many people voluntarily play a game they know is explicitly designed to create pareto distributions and nothing else? Pop music happens to be a pareto-distribution game but it wasn't designed to be and that isn't all it is, same with inventions, electoral politics, athletics etc so with any of them you could say well people don't realise they are pareto distribution games so when they lose and most lose and only a few win they will get mad but where do you hide with lotteries?
#14905405
What you're describing is not the crux of socialism (characterizing underpaid, impoverished working class people as people who whine, etc): it is that labor, itself, is exploited and stolen from the person doing the labor itself. For the record, most wealth is controlled by an extremely low count of people, a ratio that dwindles even further as time goes on.

A man has no choice but to sell his labor for a wage. The profits go to people who either do far less work than him, or to someone who does no actual work and simply lives off the work of others. The man who works quite possibly cannot afford to buy whatever product or service he made or provided with the wages he's paid. Instead of being able to profit from his own labor, that excess goes to someone else.

Capitalism is literally, and not figuratively, a system of inequality and exploitation of labor. It's how capitalism operates.
#14905406
Bulaba Jones wrote:What you're describing is not the crux of socialism (characterizing underpaid, impoverished working class people as people who whine, etc): it is that labor, itself, is exploited and stolen from the person doing the labor itself. For the record, most wealth is controlled by an extremely low count of people, a ratio that dwindles even further as time goes on.

A man has no choice but to sell his labor for a wage. The profits go to people who either do far less work than him, or to someone who does no actual work and simply lives off the work of others. The man who works quite possibly cannot afford to buy whatever product or service he made or provided with the wages he's paid. Instead of being able to profit from his own labor, that excess goes to someone else.

Capitalism is literally, and not figuratively, a system of inequality and exploitation of labor. It's how capitalism operates.


There is no honest rebuttal to this.
#14905409
SolarCross wrote:why would they play the lottery? The lottery is a perfect and pure pareto-distribution game, not accidentally so but explicitly and deliberately designed to be so. The lottery: everyone puts in a small amount of money then one at random gets all the money, that's a lottery and it produces 1 (or few) winner(s) who gets everything with everyone else being a loser. So why do so many people voluntarily play a game they know is explicitly designed to create pareto distributions and nothing else?


Why can't we just be assholes and do y'all dirty? It's like God's will and shit.
#14905435
We do not live in a Capitalist system. That's a filthy Marxist lie that nearly everyone seems to have bought into. We live in democracies with mixed economies that have non absolute private property. Communists want to overthrow democracy and force all to dance to the tune of some demented psychopath, like Stalin, Mao or Pol Pot. Marxists promise equality this is the most laughable lie. Although a Marxist himself, Tony Cliff in his book "State Capitalism in Russia" shows how the Soviet Union under Stalin had greater inequality than the United States at the time.

SolarCross wrote:Leaving aside that isn't really what happens in most businesses, though it does happen, and that it is as likely to happen to "capital owners" as much as "workers" it still begs the question if that really bothered "the masses" that much why would they play the lottery? The lottery is a perfect and pure pareto-distribution game, not accidentally so but explicitly and deliberately designed to be so.


This is a very good point. It touches on the total and complete intellectual bankruptcy of Marxism. The lower classes don't want equality. This problem for leftist revolutionaries actually predates Marxism. We see it in the English and French Revolutions. The radicals seek to overthrow the power of the old privileged classes and castes, but then find the lower classes insufficiently radical so have to create a new aristocracy / bureaucracy.
#14905460
Bulaba Jones wrote:What you're describing is not the crux of socialism (characterizing underpaid, impoverished working class people as people who whine, etc): it is that labor, itself, is exploited and stolen from the person doing the labor itself. For the record, most wealth is controlled by an extremely low count of people, a ratio that dwindles even further as time goes on.

A man has no choice but to sell his labor for a wage. The profits go to people who either do far less work than him, or to someone who does no actual work and simply lives off the work of others. The man who works quite possibly cannot afford to buy whatever product or service he made or provided with the wages he's paid. Instead of being able to profit from his own labor, that excess goes to someone else.


What I am describing is that "inequality", or pareto distribution, is not something most people really care that much about and the proof is all around but lotteries are a particularly clear example.

On the other things you mention:

Human beings have 5 millions years or more of practice at "having no choice but to do stuff to survive". More if you count our pre-human generations who face the same existential issue. If anyone is operating on the assumption that the world owes them a living then they are a rare freak and not the mainstream of people whom you call the "masses" who tend to have a firmer grip on reality.

A wage earner is a business himself, his wages are his revenue and his disposable income is his profit. Ultimately we are all selling something to gain something we want more than we are letting go. The value of products vary: David Bowie's product (mysteriously because I think his stuff is crap) turned out to be more valuable than Joe Guitar who never made it out of the pub circuit. This is where the pareto-distributions kick in that create "inequality".

There is no theft where there is an agreement which is kept. Thefts are involuntary by nature.

Bulaba Jones wrote:Capitalism is literally, and not figuratively, a system of inequality and exploitation of labor. It's how capitalism operates.


Let's go with that, but ask who cares? Let's break it down, "system of inequality" yes in a normal (capitalist) economy pareto distributions occur, they might even be common, but as shown by the lottery and many other pareto-distribution games "the masses" literally do not care a hoot about it and actively go out and create pareto distributions and call it good. "The masses" made John Lennon the richest songsmith the world has ever known and the masses, by ignoring him, made Joe Guitar a poor nobody whose only win in life will be a darwin award at the end of it.

"exploitation of labour" - this is too narrow because actually capitalism is the exploitation of anything with value. The bloke who sweeps the floor at Wall Mart is exploiting the fact that WallMart has a lot of floor space which need to be kept clean for their customers. Right now I am exploiting pofo's need to be filled up with free user contributions to rant at airhead commies and pofo is exploiting me right back. What you call "exploitation" is really just trade and it is a bilateral exploitation meaning it goes both ways.

In contrast commies prefer slavery, conscription and rations, which is the unilateral exploitation of non-commies. Arguably that is the real exploitation.
#14905465
I realize the lottery is just an example, but it is a pet peeve. It is insidious because it is a tax on those who feel burdened by government. The people see it as an escape from the system, while the system continuously reduces the odds of you winning that escape. It is literally the government taxing you for daring have hope of escaping government burdens placed upon you.
If it was anything other than the government punishing you, the games would create many winners of one million and the governments take would be much less of a percentage to encourage more play. So, I don’t see a connection to Socialism, just an uncaring government. A socialist has the same incentive to play as anyone else.
#14905472
One Degree wrote:I realize the lottery is just an example, but it is a pet peeve. It is insidious because it is a tax on those who feel burdened by government. The people see it as an escape from the system, while the system continuously reduces the odds of you winning that escape. It is literally the government taxing you for daring have hope of escaping government burdens placed upon you.
If it was anything other than the government punishing you, the games would create many winners of one million and the governments take would be much less of a percentage to encourage more play. So, I don’t see a connection to Socialism, just an uncaring government. A socialist has the same incentive to play as anyone else.

I was talking about lotteries in general not just national lotteries. Lottery is a very simple game anyone can play it, you could get together with your football buddies each agree to throw in a few bucks into a hat and then throw a dice for who gets the contents and that would be a lottery as much as some vast national lottery organised by a government.
#14905475
SolarCross wrote:I was talking about lotteries in general not just national lotteries. Lottery is a very simple game anyone can play it, you could get together with your football buddies each agree to throw in a few bucks into a hat and then throw a dice for who gets the contents and that would be a lottery as much as some vast national lottery organised by a government.


Of course, that slipped my mind because the government outlaws individuals doing the same things they do.:)
#14905482
SolarCross wrote:I guess that depends on the government, they don't all outlaw the same things.


Sorry for distracting from your topic. I could see a socialist supporting a lottery as a means to an end. It could be viewed as combining your resources to give an individual their use which would result in increased benefits for all. The individual would have no way to invest these funds within the socialist community. They would have to be used outside the community and the returns of necessity would be shared with the community. It would only violate socialism if the winner left the community.
#14905502
One Degree wrote:Sorry for distracting from your topic. I could see a socialist supporting a lottery as a means to an end. It could be viewed as combining your resources to give an individual their use which would result in increased benefits for all. The individual would have no way to invest these funds within the socialist community. They would have to be used outside the community and the returns of necessity would be shared with the community. It would only violate socialism if the winner left the community.


Yeah I have seen commies on other forums talk about distributing luxury goods looted during the revolution by means of a lottery. So they imagine after raiding the upper half of society they will have tonnes of oil paintings, Lamborghinis and gold plated toilets to distribute amongst themselves. Well it's a fair question who gets the Lamborghini and who gets the gold plated toilet? Their preferred method was a lottery. The value of lotteries to a socialist though isn't that it produces pareto distributions but that it is random. When you get deep down into the psychology of socialism what you find is a tetchy inferiority complex, a fear that some of the rich might actually deserve what they have is a more horrible idea to them than the idea that they are just lucky and won a kind of lottery. A surprisingly large number of socialists come from wealthy backgrounds, but like as not they also don't themselves have the personal qualities which made their parents and grandparents wealthy so they are haunted by a sensation that they don't really deserve what they have. Even they don't really care about pareto distribution or otherwise they would give away their trust funds to the poor and then make their own fortune like their parents did, but they don't do that they hoard it and cry about "exploitation" meaning the self-made winners who make them feel inferior. Random wins don't hurt even the tenderest low self-esteem.
#14905521
SolarCross wrote:Yeah I have seen commies on other forums talk about distributing luxury goods looted during the revolution by means of a lottery. So they imagine after raiding the upper half of society they will have tonnes of oil paintings, Lamborghinis and gold plated toilets to distribute amongst themselves. Well it's a fair question who gets the Lamborghini and who gets the gold plated toilet? Their preferred method was a lottery. The value of lotteries to a socialist though isn't that it produces pareto distributions but that it is random. When you get deep down into the psychology of socialism what you find is a tetchy inferiority complex, a fear that some of the rich might actually deserve what they have is a more horrible idea to them than the idea that they are just lucky and won a kind of lottery. A surprisingly large number of socialists come from wealthy backgrounds, but like as not they also don't themselves have the personal qualities which made their parents and grandparents wealthy so they are haunted by a sensation that they don't really deserve what they have. Even they don't really care about pareto distribution or otherwise they would give away their trust funds to the poor and then make their own fortune like their parents did, but they don't do that they hoard it and cry about "exploitation" meaning the self-made winners who make them feel inferior. Random wins don't hurt even the tenderest low self-esteem.


Compelling argument. Socialism as the ultimate safety net would be most likely supported by those with the greatest fear of failing. Of course this is probably just our fear of dying. Then again, since we are all weaker than we pretend, socialism has some appeal to all of us probably. The terminology just varies. But yes, socialism could easily be viewed as a very selfish endeavor.

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