[Truth To Power]

Which I am not.

Are you sure it has been argued* that there are only two possible archetypes in economic affairs: socialism and capitalism?

*Hans Hoppe, A Theory of Socialism and Capitalism

Hans-Hermann Hoppe is probably the most dishonest intellectual poseur in the feudal "libertarian" camp. I don't even have to look at that to know it is full of lies and absurdities. Hoppe having said something is effectively proof that it is false.

[Pants-of-dog]

I hear he once said that 2+2=4.

HHH was obviously wrong about that too.

[ingliz]

2+2=4.

Truth to Power responds:

False and dishonest garbage.

absurd.

asinine

lies.. lies...by lying Marxists and capitalists

evil... pure, naked, smirking, Satanic evil.

[SueDeNîmes]

@TTP

Your last post (and several before it) merely repeats what I was responding to. I repeat my responses.

[SueDeNîmes]

2+2=4.

Truth to Power responds:

False and dishonest garbage.

absurd.

asinine

lies.. lies...by lying Marxists and capitalists

evil... pure, naked, smirking, Satanic evil.

My favourite was "You are pissing on justice, defaecating on truth, picking your nose at honour, belching (etc)"

[Truth To Power]

I hear he once said that 2+2=4.

Can you provide any evidence for that claim?

Thought not.

HHH was obviously wrong about that too.

First you will need to provide some evidence, preferably peer-reviewed, that he said it.

I'm waiting.

But I am not holding my breath.

[Truth To Power]

Your last post (and several before it) merely repeats what I was responding to. I repeat my responses.

OK, so you know you have been comprehensively and conclusively refuted, and you have no answers; but you decline merely on that account to reconsider your proved-false beliefs.

Fine. That's pretty much the way this always turns out.

[SueDeNîmes]

I believe you believe that and am happy for you

[ingliz]

The conditions you describe had nothing to do with capital owners or even employment. They were the result of legal institutions

Owners of capital (property qualifications for MPs!) were the lawmakers.

[Truth To Power]

The conditions you describe had nothing to do with capital owners or even employment. They were the result of legal institutions

Owners of capital (property qualifications for MPs!) were the lawmakers.

No, you are just makin' $#!+ up again. It was LANDOWNERS who were the lawmakers, not capital owners. The legal qualification not only to be an MP but to VOTE was ownership of LAND, NOT CAPITAL. Capital owners who did not also own land could not serve as MPs and could not even vote.

You are again just flat, outright wrong as a matter of objective historical fact. You are permanently ignorant of all relevant facts because you refuse to know the fact that capital is produced by human beings and land is not, and that therefore owning land is an unjust privilege but owning capital is not.

How many more times, and in how many more different ways, do I have to prove you flat, outright wrong as a matter of objective fact before you will become willing to consider the possibility that you actually ARE wrong?

[ingliz]

LAND, NOT CAPITAL

You undervalue the more dynamic and entrepreneurial aspects of the landed elite, particularly evident after the 1780s. The diverse portfolios of assets possessed by many great landlords, as revealed by W.D. Rubinstein's research into probate valuations.

W. D. Rubinstein and D. H. Duman, 'Probate Valuations', Local Historian xi (1974-6)

capital is produced by human beings

A neoclassical economist's quip

If God had intended there to be three factors of production he would have made it easier to draw three-dimensional graphs.

[Truth To Power]

LAND, NOT CAPITAL

You undervalue the more dynamic and entrepreneurial aspects of the landed elite, particularly evident after the 1780s.

No, I do not. I value them exactly as much as they merit because unlike you, I am willing to know the fact that one actual human person can have more than one economic role, and their function in one economic capacity is not related to their functions in their other economic capacities. A man may own a farm, consisting of both land and improvements, and work as a laborer on the same farm. The labor he performs is neither landowning nor capital owning. The landowning he engages in is neither labor nor capital owning. His ownership of capital is neither labor nor landowning. Like Marx, you simply refuse to know these facts, because you have already realized that they prove your beliefs are false and evil.

The diverse portfolios of assets possessed by many great landlords, as revealed by W.D. Rubinstein's research into probate valuations.

W. D. Rubinstein and D. H. Duman, 'Probate Valuations', Local Historian xi (1974-6)

When you refuse to know the relevant facts, irrelevant ones such as the above seem relevant. You have to refuse to know the fact that great landlords obtained their diverse portfolios of assets precisely because THEY HAD ALL THE MONEY. If someone needed a loan, he had to go to a landowner (or a Jewish banker, because for many years Jews were forbidden to own land), so the landowner ended up with a loan asset. If someone needed money to start a business, he had to go to a landowner for it, so the landowner ended up owning the company stock. In many cases, kings beholden to landowners for support gave them additional assets such as trade monopolies, road toll privileges, etc. Unless there was a wastrel heir to gamble away the rents, the money just kept piling up, and they had to invest it somewhere.

capital is produced by human beings

A neoclassical economist's quip

Ah, no. The fact that capital is produced by human beings and land is not was known to the classical economists, and it is precisely the neoclassicals who have contrived to remove that fact from economics.

If God had intended there to be three factors of production he would have made it easier to draw three-dimensional graphs.

That was a joke, and can be taken about as seriously as, "If God had intended man to fly, He wouldn't have given us railroads." There is no point in graphing land, as its supply is fixed. The fact that you have to resort to citing a joke to rationalize your refusal to know the difference between land and capital speaks volumes. Solow certainly knows the difference, as his endorsement of the famous Gorbachev letter on the subject proves:

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Open_lett ... chev_(1990)

If that doesn't convince you, you might want to take the matter up with physicists, as God apparently has no problem at all with a three-dimensional spatial universe, and three more dimensions of the physical universe: mass, time and charge. If anyone thinks the three factors of production are too difficult to graph, how is it that physics routinely deals with four physical dimensions?

[ingliz]

THEY HAD ALL THE MONEY... they had to invest it somewhere.

So for all your blathering you have now decided to agree with me, and just like that the owners of capital were lawmakers after all.

"the worst conditions they can get away with"...

Self-serving crap! You must know you can do some very bad things and get away with it when you are the one making the rules.

are not something they are responsible for.

I don't do morality but you. So quick to use the terms 'good' and 'evil', why are you so quick to dismiss the notion that capitalists are moral agents and responsible for their actions?

(a) “Whole groups can be held liable even though not all of their members are at fault...”

(b) “A group can be held collectively responsible through the fault, contributory or noncontributory, of each member.”

(c) “Group liability” through the contributory faults of each and every member”

and

(d) “Through the collective but non-distributive fault of the group itself" it bears liability independently of its members”

* Feinberg (1970) Doing & Deserving; Essays in the Theory of Responsibility.

[Truth To Power]

THEY HAD ALL THE MONEY... they had to invest it somewhere.

So for all your blathering you have now decided to agree with me, and the owners of capital were the lawmakers.

No, you are again, as usual, "misstating" what I have plainly written. I have corrected your erroneous claim that the owners of capital were the lawmakers, because they were not. It was the owners of land who were the lawmakers.

Let me try to explain this to you so clearly and simply that even a Marxist will be unable not to understand it: those who owned land but not capital made laws; those who owned capital but not land did not make laws; therefore, it was the owners of land, not of capital, who made the laws.

I'm not sure there is any clearer or simpler way to explain that to you. Possibly there is no way to state it so clearly and simply that you will consent to know it.

"the worst conditions they can get away with"...

Self-serving crap! You must know you can do some very bad things and get away with it when you are the one making the rules?

Of course; and landowners, who were making the rules while capital owners were not, got away with removing people's rights to liberty, and thus their bargaining power, and subjecting them to conditions much worse than capital owners could have if landowners had not removed their rights to liberty.

are not something they are responsible for.

Collective Moral Responsibility: A taxonomy of collective responsibility arrangements

(a) “Whole groups can be held liable even though not all of their members are at fault...”

But as I have proved to you, repeatedly, the group in question is indisputably landowners, not capital owners, because all landowners ARE at fault: every single landowner inherently abrogates others' rights to liberty. NO capital owner ever abrogates anyone else's rights qua capital owner, because no one is made worse off by his capital owning than if he had never existed. You merely refuse to know these facts because you have already realized that they prove your beliefs are false and evil.

(b) “A group can be held collectively responsible through the fault, contributory or noncontributory, of each member.”

It is the landowner's participation in economic activity that is in every case non-contributory, never the capital owner's, as already proved. Therefore, landowners as a group are collectively responsible for the working conditions for which you falsely blame capital owners. No member of the group of capital owners is ever at fault qua capital owner, but only insofar as he is a landowner or member of some other privileged group.

(c) “Group liability” through the contributory faults of each and every member”

Each and every member of the landowning class abrogates others' rights to liberty BY owning land. No member of the capital owning class ever abrogates anyone's right to liberty, or harms them in any other way, BY owning capital, because no one is made worse off than if the capital owner had never existed.

(d) “Through the collective but non-distributive fault of the group itself" it bears liability independently of its members”

The only such group that actually acts as a group is the House of Lords, which is a landowners' group.

Feinberg (1970) Doing & Deserving; Essays in the Theory of Responsibility

All very well, but as you refuse to know who is doing what, you cannot understand who deserves what.

[ingliz]

they had to invest it somewhere.

In Victorian England, prior to 1858 landowners are the lawmakers, but landowners are buying shares in companies; shareholders are a company's owners. As owners of companies are the owners of capital, owners of capital were MPs.

All very well, but as you refuse to know who was doing what, you cannot understand who deserves what.

ps. In 1858 under Lord Derby's ministry, the property qualification for MPs was removed.

[Truth To Power]

they had to invest it somewhere.

In Victorian England, prior to 1858 landowners are the lawmakers, but landowners are buying shares in companies;

No; some were, and some weren't. Buying shares was not a requirement for landowners. Owning land was a requirement for voters and MPs. You are just trying to find some way of not knowing that fact, because you have already realized it proves you wrong.

shareholders are a company's owners. As owners of companies are the owners of capital, owners of capital were MPs.

Wrong again. Owners of companies are not the owners of capital. Owners of capital may own company stock, or may own capital goods directly. You're just factually and logically wrong, as usual.

Anyway, you could with equal "logic" say that as landowners' children typically learned Latin at school, it was Latin speakers who were the lawmakers. Clearly, your claim that capital owners were the lawmakers is just false, stupid, and dishonest garbage designed to delete the fact that all the evils Marx and his dittoheads attribute to private ownership of capital were in fact caused by private ownership of land. You just have to find some way of not knowing that fact, because you have already realized it proves your beliefs are false and evil.

So quick to use the terms 'good' and 'evil',

Because I know what they mean, and I am not afraid to identify evil for what it is. Almost all the great evils of history would have been impossible if someone had just had the courage to identify them as such loudly, publicly, and often. The invariable historical evils of socialism are inevitable because socialism is evil, just as the invariable historical evils of capitalism are inevitable because capitalism is evil.

why are you so quick to dismiss the notion that capitalists are moral agents and responsible for their actions?

OTC, I INSIST that they are moral agents and responsible for their actions. But removing people's rights to liberty and forcing them into desperate circumstances where they can be exploited is not one of those actions. It is an action performed by landowners, and capital owners are therefore not responsible for it. You just have to pretend capital owners are responsible for the evil landowners do because you have to contrive some rationalization for denying the former's rightful property in what they produce.

[ingliz]

Buying shares was not a requirement for landowners.

But they still bought shares hence the need for the trust, the mortgage and the lease to get round the strict settlement laws. Land was not fully commodified and made freely transferable until the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

Owners of companies

Shareholders are a company's owners.

are not the owners of capital.

If they did not have the capital to invest, they would not be shareholders.

[Truth To Power]

Buying shares was not a requirement for landowners.

But they still bought shares

Nope. Some did, some didn't, and those who did had no more power to make laws than those who didn't. You are just factually wrong. Again.

hence the need for the trust, the mortgage and the lease to get round the strict settlement laws.

None of which affects your factual wrongness.

Land was not fully commodified and made freely transferable until the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.

So you agree that you are factually wrong, and it was ownership of land and not capital that conferred power to make law, and that subjected the landless to the removal of their rights and thus their economic bargaining power, and made their exploitation possible and inevitable.

Owners of companies

Shareholders are a company's owners.

are not the owners of capital.

If they did not have the capital to invest, they would not be shareholders.

Blatant equivocation fallacy. Capital in the economic sense -- products of labor devoted to production, also called capital goods -- is quite different from capital in the accounting sense (purchasing power devoted to obtaining income), which is what you are talking about. Accounting capital can be used to buy anything: capital goods, land, slaves, debt instruments, privileges, etc., some of which -- slaves, land and privileges -- abrogate others' rights, and others of which -- capital goods and debt instruments -- do not.

[ingliz]

So you agree that you are factually wrong, and it was ownership of land and not capital that conferred power to make law

No, capital bought power as there was nothing to stop the "moneyed interest", manufacturers, merchants and financiers, from buying land. In the nineteenth century, new men found it easier to buy smaller estates because strict settlement burdened landowners' with debt and charges.

* Habakkuk, Marriage, Debt and the Estates System: English Landownership 1850-1950.

[Truth To Power]

So you agree that you are factually wrong, and it was ownership of land and not capital that conferred power to make law

No, capital bought power

No, it most certainly did not. You are absolutely and indisputably wrong again, and have been proved wrong on this issue repeatedly. In France, just as the most blatant example, capital was so far from buying power that Colbert effectively taxed it out of existence, de-industrializing and impoverishing the country while Britain was industrializing.

as there was nothing to stop the "moneyed interest", manufacturers, merchants and financiers, from buying land.

There most certainly was: the reluctance and even inability of its owners to sell it. Why would they sell it, when keeping it guaranteed them more rent income and capital gains than the proceeds of the sale could reasonably be expected to yield in other investments?

In any case, you have just explicitly agreed that you have been wrong all along: if the moneyed interests had to buy land to gain political power, which they did, it was self-evidently and indisputably not ownership of capital that conferred power, but ownership of land. You have just explicitly admitted that I have been completely right and you have been completely wrong all along. I'm not sure there is any clearer or simpler way of explaining that to you.

In the nineteenth century, new men found it easier to buy smaller estates because strict settlement burdened landowners' with debt and charges.
* Habakkuk, Marriage, Debt and the Estates System: English Landownership 1850-1950.

So you clearly know that you are so indisputably wrong, you even have to try to change the subject to the period AFTER the time of rampant child labor, brutal working conditions, and subsistence wages.

This is like shooting fish in a barrel. You have raised being objectively wrong to an art, a way of life, almost a philosophical system.