Julian658 wrote:
There is no equality. All humans are different. Over time the most talented humans will do better and accumulate more wealth than the less talented. If you eliminate the economic hierarchy you are essentially preventing success and promoting mediocrity. This is exactly what happens is socialist nations.
There have never been any 'socialist nations' because the working class has never been in control of any country at any time in history, except for Russia for a brief period during the early part of the 20th century.
You're assuming that society, or the 'body politic', is reducible to *individuals*, when in fact society functions *organizationally*, and not *individually*. You're succumbing to a fallacy of *scale*:
History, Macro-Micro -- simplified
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Unthinking Majority wrote:
The problem is creating a practical system based on cooperation that works. Humans are social creatures but they're also selfish. There will also always be people who are greedy and violent no matter what, and there always has been, because it's part of human nature too. The world is filled with wolves and lambs, and no matter how nice you are you can't turn some wolves into lambs & they will eat you if you give them an inch.
This is a rather 'Aesop's Fables' kind of take on political economy -- as with Julian, you're thinking that society is organized *interpersonally*, and it's not. Society is organized based on organizations and *institutions*.
[1] History, Macro Micro -- Precision
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Unthinking Majority wrote:
You can have an organization where everyone cooperates but you still need some kind of incentive for people to work hard and punishment for not working hard, or else some people will inevitably slack off because they can. Maybe you reward extra vacation days to more productive workers, i dunno.
Here you're assuming that there's a linear, one-to-one relation between work effort input, and material productive *output*. Since the use of fuels we've been living in a world in which *fuel* provides a force-multiplier onto any human work efforts, to the point where only a *few* people need to work on a large agricultural factory farm, using industrial mechanical implements, to plant and harvest for the food needs of *tens of thousands* of people:
Amazing Farm Machines, Inventions and Farming Techniques
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Unthinking Majority wrote:
Anyways, we've been waiting 150+ years for someone to create this new system and nobody's found one that works in real life application yet. The best we've found is countries in Europe that mix cooperation (socialism) with self-interest (capitalism) that create statistically proven good outcomes for society. Why not take advantage of both aspects of human nature where needed?
Here's the plan, since it sounds like you missed the memo -- let AI automation produce the stuff that everyone needs, and let everyone *consume* the stuff without anyone having to work whatsoever. Annnnnd we're done.
Unthinking Majority wrote:
Most people on the left are typically compassionate, cooperative, peaceful, and well-meaning. But they can also be idealistic and naive. Sometimes you can screw a lot of things up unintentionally when you try to save the world when you don't know exactly what you're doing. Good intentions aren't enough.
Good intentions and individual personality traits have nothing to do with political economy and how society organizes its productive capacities.
Unthinking Majority wrote:
This is true. Since there is no equality among humans, socialism means taking from the people who do better to give to the ones who do worse.
*Or*, use today as the starting-line, and have everyone go forward from here on out, without having to exploit an entire section of humanity, the world's *working class*.
Unthinking Majority wrote:
As i've said, sometimes in moderate levels doing so can benefit society where needed. Taxing the people who do very well so that the less well off can have healthcare and education etc is a good thing to do. However, if you want everyone to have equal outcomes this is impossible without stealing everything the rich have, and then you provide no incentive for achieving anything and the people with ability flee to places where they'll benefit more from their abilities.
For instance, a ton of doctors educated in Canada fled for the US where they could make more money. This led to a "brain drain", and Canada had to attract immigrant doctors from developing countries to fill the gap and raise salaries for doctors. And obviously those immigrant doctors left their poorer countries because they'd rather make more money in a richer nation than help their own societies. That's why communist countries need to restrict freedom of movement to prevent people with money/ability from leaving. The Berlin Wall was built to keep people in, not to keep people out.
You don't even realize that you're unwittingly indicting capitalism here -- if people migrate for the sake of chasing exchange values (better wages), it's because of capitalism's system of labor commodification and valuating everything in terms of exchange values.
Julian658 wrote:
There are highly talented over achievers in every generation. Over time they accumulate wealth and hence some power. You are playing with words. If you prevent this success you end up with mediocrity. Furthermore, most rich people are wealth creators and this wealth is used for social programs to help the poor. If you get rid of the wealth creators you end up with a nation where people are uniformly poor.
You're assuming that everything productive *has* to be valued in terms of capitalist exchange values. Humanity doesn't need capitalism and its system of abstract floating exchange values, as exemplified with any kind of opportunistic *profiteering*.
Julian658 wrote:
Capitalism always promotes talent. That is why the NBA is 90% black and the NFL 70% black. The reason whites are vastly underrepresented is talent.
You're erroneously implying that capitalism is a perfect system, and that white people are the best executives. Yet corporations and the wealthy receive repeated *tax breaks* from the government, which you're obviously not railing against.
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Saeko wrote:
No, you're just simply uninformed. That statement is not a Robinhood style political slogan. It's describing the fundamental organizing principle of a hypothetical future communist economy that is so insanely efficient that it almost automatically 1) uses everyone's abilities as efficiently as possible in order to 2) produce products that satisfy their needs.
Julian658 wrote:
The Utopia you are describing is a bit like heaven. It will never happen.
There's no wishful thinking in making an estimation of what society has the *capacity* to produce, and what it requires for humane *consumption*.
Components of Social Production
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Julian658 wrote:
IN your system you will have people that are mediocre and will not contribute. What you are preaching only works in very small groups where there is kinship. For example, when it comes to my family I am a socialist.
Ever since industrialization human labor is less and less relevant for the realization of a humane, functional global society.
John Henry is an American folk hero. An African American, he is said to have worked as a "steel-driving man"—a man tasked with hammering a steel drill into rock to make holes for explosives to blast the rock in constructing a railroad tunnel.
The story of John Henry is told in a classic blues folk song, which exists in many versions, and has been the subject of numerous stories, plays, books, and novels.[1][2]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Henry_(folklore)
- By QatzelOk
- By KurtFF8