Can anyone say "Cookie-Cutter"? Look, the best way seems to be a resource based economy with the intelligent application of modern technology. We now know that there's enough to go around. Its time to create a society in which we design out scarcity, bigotry, most or all neuroses, and any other technical problems using the intelligent application of technology. The fractional reserve banking system which governs Earth, is mathematically defective; that is, poor pockets of society are built in.
"Buy it or else" isn't how Socialism works. You live off the state and make it your bitch, that land should be owned by the state as it should be. No one ever said everything is 'free' in a socialist system. You shouldn't be able to use that land without State clearance. I have no clue what FOX News is telling you other than Glenn Beck chanting "NAZI NAZI MARXIST OBAMA SOCIALIST"
"I have no clue what FOX News is telling you other than Glenn Beck chanting..."
You should thank the non-existent gods for Fox News&Glenn Beck, whom you can use as scapegoats to dismiss anything that does not conform to your obsolete statist dogma, because otherwise, you would have been forced to question your own faith in the state, which is something you are obviously unwilling to do.
@Akatam0t0ma You poor deluted bastard. If you were to.... RESEARCH Socialism, you'd under stand that it is ALL FOR the citizen. You can work any branch you'd want and if you choose, you can own your own business without the state. One thing I don't get is that you're smart enough to know that religion is false, but dumb enough to believe the lies the Right-Winged media tells you? You must hate equality.
"Dem darn dirty left-winged, brown skinned muslims n' homosexuals!"
Just because socialism claims to be "ALL FOR the citizen", doesn't actually mean it's "ALL FOR the citizen", and history consistently shows that the only ones who benefited when socialism was implemented by the state were the ruling elites who commandeered the socialist state, NEVER the average citizen. And if someone can own his own business without the state in your ideal socialist society, would he also be free from the state to leave him alone and not take his wealth at...
...the point of gun? If you answer is yes, than congratulations, you might actually be a free marketeer without knowing it, so now you know it. If your answer is no, then you are just an anti-social economically illiterate authoritarian statist who thinks other people owe him something by the virtue of his existence.
And I don't give to hoots about any "Right-Winged media", I just apply the same skepticism I apply towards religion...
...towards the state and politicians. It's too bad that economically illiterate fools like don't, and think the state has some sort of magic powers to make people prosperous only on their say so. Your "Right-Winged media" is nothing more than an imaginary scapegoat that you can use merely to make it easy for you to dismiss anyone who doesn't buy into your statetheist dogma, so you don't have to question it, just as the typical religionist drone uses "Satan"...
...as a scapegoat to brush away anything that would force him to question his dogma.
And depends what you mean by equality. If you mean in the economic sense, then yes, I indeed hate such equality,because a brain surgeon is not and should not be economically equal to a janitor.Who died and said that all people by default should be economically equal?Since when such equality became the most noble thing in the universe,that it justifies taking away people wealth at the point of a gun?
What if someone has more cows that could eat the free grass? What if someone had a bit of bad luck and could really use the land? Also, what if the land could produce more food through veg farming?
If the people as a whole owned the land, they could decide the most efficent way it could be used to support society, or better, the government could give ownership to the person who could use the land to benefit society most.
You think that anyone who wants it can have it as long as they're first.
What if someone has more cows that could eat the free grass? What if someone had a bit of bad luck and could really use the land? Also, what if the land could produce more food through farming?
If the people as a whole owned the land, they could decide the most efficent way it could be used to support society, or better, the government could give ownership to the person who could use the land to benefit society most.
You think that anyone who wants it can have it as long as they're first.
"what if the land could produce more food through farming?"
Then it should be privately owned by a farmer.
"If the people as a whole owned the land"
They can own it by purchasing it. There is nothing in a free market to prevent many people from owning a land. Contrary to what you may think, government doesn't know better than anyone else how land should be used.
"just don't expect anyone who has worked a day in their life to take you seriously."
I worked more than a day in my life, as Jake probably did too, and I do take him seriously, . Why are you so arrogant as to assume whom people will take seriously? Socialism is a god that failed, that has a fine track record of helping the elites who commandeer the wealth distribution apparatus and not the poor, which makes you a clueless economic illiterate drone for taking it seriously.
Most people are will seek profit under any system,be it capitalism or socialism. Whenever socialism was implemented it failed precisely for that reason,because when people have the option to obtain something for free,most of them will cease that opportunity, a simple fact of life that goes against your dogma.
"Keep on trying to justify your tyranical dictatorship of ownership"
Said the arrogant communist who thinks he is entitled to other people's property by his mere existence.
We strive for democratic revolutions - radical and fundamental changes in the structure and quality of economic, political, and personal relations - to abolish the power now exercised by the few who control great wealth and the government.Socialism is not mere government ownership, a welfare state, or a repressive bureaucracy. Socialism is a new social and economic order in which workers and consumers control production and community residents control their neighborhoods, homes, and schools.
The working class is the major force worldwide that can lead the way to a socialist future - to a real radical democracy from below. The Socialist Party fights for progressive changes compatible with a socialist future. We support militant working class struggles and electoral action, independent of the capitalist controlled two-party system, to present socialist alternatives.
workers have the right to form unions freely, and to strike and engage in other forms of job actions; and where the production of society is used for the benefit of all humanity, not for the private profit of a few. We believe socialism and democracy are one and indivisible. The working class is in a key and central position to fight back against the ruling capitalist class and its power.
THE SOCIALIST PARTY strives to establish a radical democracy that places people's lives under their own control - a non-racist, classless, feminist socialist society... where working people own and control the means of production and distribution through democratically-controlled public agencies; where full employment is realized for everyone who wants to work
I always thought Socialism connoted Public Ownership, whereas Communism connoted Common Ownership. Tragedy of the Commons is the result of Common Ownership. Goods that are owned publicly are rationed by a governing body.
You missed the point of his video. Using "Socialism" or "Communism" as scare words is silly. You are not scared of Socialism, you dislike it. He was not speaking to the logial and real problems that socialism faces, but the fear and hatred used. He is speaking out against the illogical arguments used against socialism.
If a Socialist Glenn Beck existed, and made a face and put up pictures of Industrial accidents and Oil spills every time he mentioned free markets or capitalism....
Michael Moore, rings a bell? Naomi Klein, rings a bell? I'm not a huge fan of Beck, but there are plenty of pundits out there who do exactly what you described.
@Akatam0t0ma Good call. There are some minor differences that make Beck more noteable....but just minor ones.
I didn't even think of these fools when posting, I don't listen to them, and most of the people I end up arguing against support Beck. That's the only reason I know about him.
@SpamSpamNEggs He also implied that the area referred to as New York City would not have sewage systems or trash collectors without socialism. Which is probably false. An easy way to take the video was the message that without the government, these services would not be provided.
@AtheistAltar Well he does have a good point. Lets look at London instead of NYC. There was no Public sewage in 1600. It was common practice to just pitch the contents of your chamber pot out into the street. It was not handled by the private sector. Sewage didn't happen until it was taken on as a public works by the government.
@SpamSpamNEggs If there's demand, there will be an entrepreneur waiting to cash in. That's probably more an issue with medieval technology than it is with freedom.
Roads receive similar criticism. I think Walter Block has done a good job in his defense of free market roads.
@AtheistAltar There was demand for sewage in 1600 London. No one liked having the chamber pot emptied on their head. It was a public demand....someone (not me) should do some thing about it. For every individual it was not worth it to pay to have the waste removed.....pitching it in the street was much faster and cheaper. Do you really think that every one in NYC would pay for trash removal if it was voluntary?
Glenn Greenwald posted an article a couple of days ago that points out another problem of state monopolies on such services. One example he laid out is that now Hawaii is not only laying off teachers but are now starting to furlough their students for the rest of the year. What we can infer from this example is that when the state finally runs out of money the services won't be rendered at all.
Really? Do you really think that public education would be offered to the poor by a private sector? Can you give me even one example of a country that has no public education where the literacy rates are above %80? The only people a privatised system would be cheaper for are the upper middle class and rich. The poor and lower middle class would have to spend more money and I really can't understand how you can't see this as a problem, maybe you can enlighten me on how you came to the conclusion.
If a firm will always sell the same amount of product, regardless of how the quality or price of that product meshes with consumer preference, then the firm probably will not strive to improve its performance. Worse, even if it tried to do so, it would be severely hampered by the lack of market pricing of its factors of production, and the absence of interaction with the value scales of its "customers".
@PanzerDivisionBOM I should refer you to a study done by the CEP and nces concluded that private schooling is in no way at all better than public schooling. Education simply isn't something that the public can be trusted with, they do not understand how an education system should work. In the private schooling one sees vastly more religious schools and school promoting false ideas like homeopathy and spirituality over science. Of course give me one statistical resource by a reputable source.
@PanzerDivisionBOM A private system doesn't sell based on a public need for quality of education but a public demand for a type of education. If the public mostly believes in ghost, anti-vaccination, homeopathy, intelligent design, geocentrism and among other subjects then this is what the market will provide. Again provide EVIDENCE that one-private is better than public- and two- A country where public education doesn't exist with a population literacy of over %80.
Do you, by the word "private", refer to free market institutions? As in, firms which are not subject to state intervention, either through subsidy, regulation, state-enforced union edicts and so forth, and which are not necessarily pushed into a niché market by a coercively subsidized or otherwise protected competitor?
If not, then you have a good argument against privatization as advocated by the political Right, but not against free market provision of education service.
1: If I presented the argument from economic rationality poorly, then please ask me to rephrase, or else let me refer you to the article Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth.
2: I do not know of any place where no state has deigned fit to interfere in education. The closest fit would be Somalia, which is significantly less advanced than the West in terms of capital accumulation and general empathy, and which lost enormous subsidies to its education upon attaining statelessness.
@PanzerDivisionBOM Canada before 1869 was a stateless country without regulations, wars fought between major companies started by HBC. It was bad and Canada was in no way less advanced. Do you really think that private education is pushed into any kind of niche by the government? Is it that %40 of Americans believe that 911 was a conspiracy and that evolution is a hoax? Also there is no evidence that a free market is better at allocating resources than a centralised system with regulations.
On the market, there exists prices which reflect the conditions of supply and demand, allowing entrepreneurs to make decisions according to the value scales of their target market and the expected future conditions of scarcity. Remove the market process, and no such prices exist. There can be no entrepreneurs guided by profit and loss, but only bureaucrats, and an endless number of heterogeneous potential production goods, -
which they must somehow allocate among each of a limitless number of potential employments in compliance with value scales with which they cannot interact.
The market is how people communicate their preferences, and reconcile those preferences with the conditions of material reality. It is the rational solution method for problems of social organization, and any time you replace a price or prohibit an uncoerced transaction, you necessarily remove some vital piece of information from society.
@PanzerDivisionBOM There has been no example of a society benefiting more from a privatised education and health system. Canada had privatized health up until about 1950s and it has stayed that way since because universal medicine is just simply better. More expensive for the rich but vastly cheaper for the poor, as a result the poor become market contributors because they do not have to worry about medical costs. The market gets its money back and then some by making this investment.
@PanzerDivisionBOM And what about things that are important to society but can not survive a market base? Do we complete abandon space exploration because the masses don't want to invest in it because it will have zero financial gain? I am sorry I will never support that. Also education functions on a manner that must be determined by professionals not the market, I would agree with you if we were talking about weat or a type of material product, but education and health are different matters.
What you're talking about is herding people around at gunpoint. If you want someone to tell you how you should live your life and spend the better part of your money, then leave me out of it.
If you really do think that your program is beneficial to me, then is it too much to ask that you treat me like a human being, and make that appeal to my self-interest? Don't presume to tell me what's good for me, and then enforce your preference through the state.
@PanzerDivisionBOM I like my government and social system and will fight for it. You got a problem with it? Then gtfo and move to Somalia. Somalia is a wonderful place I hear, feel free to move there. However I am not moving to change Canada's social system but only to improve on it, better tribe rights, welfare, cannabis legalisation etc. If you want to change Canada then do it through the same democratic process that you so gladly dismiss. Though I suspect you will never convince the masses.
@PanzerDivisionOF The free market system has been tried and has failed every single time. Almost every country in the world now has some form of social welfare because it had been determined that it is the most beneficial. Your ideal system is riddled with errors and fallacies (mostly about human psychology) and you have absolutely no evidence that it would work. No statistics it will work...Nothing. I am not risking the health and well being of people because you want to do what ever you want.
@PanzerDivisionBOM You think corporations would not herd people around at gunpoint? Really why don't you actually research the HBC? With out government it is clear to every sane person that corporations will oppress the people for their own benefit and power. This is exactly what happens in free market situations; eg, Canada<1869, China<1910 and the current issue of globilization where companies exploit work in the third world then sell product in Canada/US etc pushing out local businesses.
Do you think that I advocate the destruction of the vast majority of the accumulated capital of the West and a return to tribal religion and child-rearing practices, or that I claim that statelessness acts as an instant panacea for all human ills? If not, then your comment on Somalia is either ill-considered or highly disingenious.
As is, I might add, your comments on globalization. Have you ever heard of trade barriers? A sugar cube is three times as expensive in Europe
as it is anywhere else in the world - a discrepency which any speculator would be eager to resolve, much to the delight of destitute third-world farmers. State officials in third-world countries, selling local monopolies to the highest bidder, or herding people en masse into dense urban centers through punitive taxation?
Finally, I urge you to look up the difference between a corporation and a regular firm. That alone should illustrate the contradiction inherent to your position.
@PanzerDivisionBOM Omfg you must be dense to not understand that without a state someone who seeks power would simply produce their OWN government! Democracy is a competitive environment where the people have the ability to speak their issues and have them heard. It is not a dictatorship and it does not herd people. However, a person with a lot of economic power could easily craft a situation where the lower classes would have no medium to speak their issues other than violence.
@PanzerDivisionBOM There is a serious error in your mind set that you think this would not happen. The government protects the people from exploitation, harassment, unlawful activities on the part of corporations (dumping of toxic material in rivers, diverting of rivers etc). It also provides a very important medium for people to have their issues heard and represented. Anyone can participate in government and related activities and have equal say in the passing of policies.
@PanzerDivisionBOM In other words, what would you prefer? A system where one, or a handful, of individuals with vast economic power control the regulations and laws of society. Or a system where millions of calculators all cooperate together to achieve a certain compromise that is, ultimately, greater for the majority.
Experience has shown me that privatization of any industry that it is not cheaper and certainly not better quality. Are you saying British Rail improved since it's privatization? HOld ups and prices are at least 10 times what they used to be. Catching the local bus to work would once cost me 10 pence now costs me 1 pound 25 pence.... and the bus is still late and substandard.
@AsheIsTheRaven The word "privatization" is misleading. The great majority of the time that I look into the cases of the government "privatizing" something and then saying "Look! They're charging you more!" are not cases of true privatization, but cases of corporatization. That is to say they create barriers to entry so that only a single one business (the one that bribed them the most) will be allowed to do business in that market.
How much does a stamp cost? Assuming we privatized the post office, would I be able to send a letter to my friend in NY from the west coast for 42 cents, or what ever? Does privatization guarantee that all, or even most people, will have access to the things you mention @ 2:20? I am not a socialist, but I don't think your reasoning follows here at all. On your example about the cows, how does a person establish ownership of a natural commodity like grass? Are they not stealing from nature?
We can't know for sure, because letter mail is currently monopolized by the state and the USPS is so heavily subsidized that the price structure is fucked. It's like state healthcare: it *appears* cheaper because everyone is coerced into paying it, and the money they are forced to sacrifice to that end is more or less wasted.
Also, you can't "steal from nature." I can't "steal" from a tree because it is not a sentient agent capable of property ownership by any consensus.
@doucher337 1st point: How much cheaper than 42cents could it get? The point is things like education, postage, roads, fire, police etc are already provided for us very cheaply.
2nd: I think you are missing my point. Jacob says it can't be everyones land, and it can't be the govt.'s land. So I am asking how can an individual purchase the land if no one owns it. There is an obvious problem here, because it means finders keepers and makes natural community ownership exploitative and arbitrary.
@WayOfTheBastard Your quote of 42 cents is very misleading, because the Post Office does not make its revenue from stamps, but rather the government funding it gets which comes from your taxes. What percentage of your taxes goes to the Post Office in one way or another? I have no idea, but to be intellectually honest, you must add that to the price of stamps.
To say that it's cheap is also misleading, since we have no free market based service to compare it to.
@JacobSpinney I believe I did state in a comment down below that taxes are part of the price. I am a college student who pays almost nothing in taxes on a yearly basis, so a stamp does cost me around 42 cents. Obviously this is not the case for everyone one, but running the post office isn't that expensive (comparably speaking) for the Gov, and I don't think we're going to find that vast majority of people get taxed more than 5 cents per letter, if not less. cont-
@WayOfTheBastard Don't tell me that saying '42 cents is cheap' is misleading. We're not talking about gumballs, I am talking about having an envelope delivered 3000+ miles away to the exact address I specify, that's cheap by our economic standards.
As for homesteading, what happens when two individuals both find the same resource at the same time and don't want to share? How do you homestead off shore oil reserves and other resources that require no initial improvements (like forests)?
The post office is basically going bankrupt at the same time that Fedex is profiting, despite the fact that they charge the same price.
As for universal access, Imagine a police force that only served the rich while ignoring the poor or schools that only taught the rich while ignoring the poor, that is what we have now. When goods are given out by the government, they go to the politically connected. AKA the rich
@Empathica1 I am not sure I agree with your second point. I will say it's certainly far from perfect, but access is near universal and free (obvious yes we pay taxes). Why should we expect private schooling to make access to education any better? Are there historical examples the demonstrate this?
Schools in the inner cities are absolutely terrible and don't educate their students at all while schools in the rich suburbs get all the good teachers and good facilities. If schools were privatized, parents and students would choose good schools. the inner city schools would have to get better if they wanted to survive.
School Choice is a program where people choose which government school to go to. I think its been successful, but I'm no expert on schools
@Empathica1 I agree with you that the state of the school system is imperfect.
BUT- My why should we think abandoning public school entirely is going to solve that problem? Are all private schools going to be equal? Why wouldn't the exact same situation appear again, budget schools with mediocre education and expensive schools with fantastic facilities that again, only the rich can go to. Also poor inner city schools is not as much a problem with the system so much as implementation.
@WayOfTheBastard Why would you want them to be equal? That would just result in a lack of innovation. In a free market the schools that offered the best education would have it's method copied by other schools competing with it. With public schools most problems are simply treated with increases funding which most of the times ends up in the hands of administrators not the kids that are suffering most because of the problem.
@crazypants88 I think equal is a value that cannot exist. I am saying there will still be shitty schools for the poor and nice ones for the rich, changing to a private system will not change that. That problem is not a necessary condition of public schooling and most of Europe has solved that problem, even if the US lags behind.
@WayOfTheBastard Yes it can, you were just appealing to your subjective value of equality one comment earlier.
I'm sure there will be shitty schools in a free market, but I'm not sure any parent would send their kids to them when their is competition against the shitty school that offer better education. Also schools in a free market could actually experiment and see what are the best ways to educate instead simply following a mandate from the state.
@WayOfTheBastard Well the reason the U.S. lags behind is mostly because of the students themselves, many either refuse to learn or just can't because of inherent incapability, case in point one of my teachers can't even read at a college level. But that in itself won't be solved by either public or private education, the former is a social issue and can't be solved by any government entity, and the latter is a gentetic, which could be solved by government, but I wouldn't reccomend that they do
@KingPiccolOwned I personally think that inherent capability (inborn aptitude and cognitive capacity,) are not so responsible for our plight, as culture is. America is, and has been for some time, in a reverse renaissance if you will. It's cool to be stupid, that's peddled often, mostly to the low income inner city populations via popular media. Also, by using welfare and such programs to remove the incentive for self reliance and improvement, the state keeps the poor pliable, and compliant.
@SunTzuLao I also think that's the main reason, but I just figured I'd throw in the second part to acknowlege those who do try, but just aren't that good.
Certainly privatization would not end disparity, but it would allow people to choose to go to a better school. Any school that decided to charge so much that the poor and middle class couldn't afford it would lose those students to cheaper schools, even if those schools were worse. That would push the most expensive prices down to levels that most people could afford. More choices always makes things better.
@KingPiccolOwned That's besides the point, read my comment below that responds to that. I am trying to get the question answered, "How can ownership of a commodity by an individual be justified?"
@crazypants88 Ok, I am not sure I am following you. Certainly we could come to a consensus on a proper justification for most private property, even if we are appealing to subjective values to do so. I don't think this is difficult to do or a problem.
The problem arises when we have things like natural commodities and then it becomes very difficult. This is something an anarchist needs to account for though, because it stands to disrupt their foundational beliefs if left unaddressed.
@WayOfTheBastard Not a 100% consensus which is possible on a free market. There you could simply purchase a service from a service provider you think would give you the best service for you money. Everyone could do their thing. In a democracy it would be the majority that made that choice for the minority
How are "natural commedities" a problem for anti-statists?
@crazypants88 & Empathica1 We have had periods in US history were schooling was not offered by the government, mainly college schooling. Prior to the creation of public colleges, the overwhelming majority of Americans could not afford to go college nor did they have access to it. Why wouldn't this be the case with the privatization k-12 education? Also as daiitokumyouou899 pointed out, is there even one example of a country with private schooling that has greater than 80% literacy?
i'm curious which you would favor more; completely doing away with the public school system immediately, or a gradual phasing out of public schools say over a 10 year span.
Can anyone say "Cookie-Cutter"? Look, the best way seems to be a resource based economy with the intelligent application of modern technology. We now know that there's enough to go around. Its time to create a society in which we design out scarcity, bigotry, most or all neuroses, and any other technical problems using the intelligent application of technology. The fractional reserve banking system which governs Earth, is mathematically defective; that is, poor pockets of society are built in.
OnePieceWonPeace 1 year ago
"Buy it or else" isn't how Socialism works. You live off the state and make it your bitch, that land should be owned by the state as it should be. No one ever said everything is 'free' in a socialist system. You shouldn't be able to use that land without State clearance. I have no clue what FOX News is telling you other than Glenn Beck chanting "NAZI NAZI MARXIST OBAMA SOCIALIST"
It's like the man has Tourettes Syndrome.
Sheepytown 1 year ago
@Sheepytown:
"You live off the state and make it your bitch"
No, actually the state makes YOU its bitch.
"I have no clue what FOX News is telling you other than Glenn Beck chanting..."
You should thank the non-existent gods for Fox News&Glenn Beck, whom you can use as scapegoats to dismiss anything that does not conform to your obsolete statist dogma, because otherwise, you would have been forced to question your own faith in the state, which is something you are obviously unwilling to do.
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
@Akatam0t0ma You poor deluted bastard. If you were to.... RESEARCH Socialism, you'd under stand that it is ALL FOR the citizen. You can work any branch you'd want and if you choose, you can own your own business without the state. One thing I don't get is that you're smart enough to know that religion is false, but dumb enough to believe the lies the Right-Winged media tells you? You must hate equality.
"Dem darn dirty left-winged, brown skinned muslims n' homosexuals!"
Sheepytown 1 year ago
@Sheepytown:
Just because socialism claims to be "ALL FOR the citizen", doesn't actually mean it's "ALL FOR the citizen", and history consistently shows that the only ones who benefited when socialism was implemented by the state were the ruling elites who commandeered the socialist state, NEVER the average citizen. And if someone can own his own business without the state in your ideal socialist society, would he also be free from the state to leave him alone and not take his wealth at...
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
@Sheepytown:
...the point of gun? If you answer is yes, than congratulations, you might actually be a free marketeer without knowing it, so now you know it. If your answer is no, then you are just an anti-social economically illiterate authoritarian statist who thinks other people owe him something by the virtue of his existence.
And I don't give to hoots about any "Right-Winged media", I just apply the same skepticism I apply towards religion...
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
@Sheepytown:
...towards the state and politicians. It's too bad that economically illiterate fools like don't, and think the state has some sort of magic powers to make people prosperous only on their say so. Your "Right-Winged media" is nothing more than an imaginary scapegoat that you can use merely to make it easy for you to dismiss anyone who doesn't buy into your statetheist dogma, so you don't have to question it, just as the typical religionist drone uses "Satan"...
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
@Sheepytown:
...as a scapegoat to brush away anything that would force him to question his dogma.
And depends what you mean by equality. If you mean in the economic sense, then yes, I indeed hate such equality,because a brain surgeon is not and should not be economically equal to a janitor.Who died and said that all people by default should be economically equal?Since when such equality became the most noble thing in the universe,that it justifies taking away people wealth at the point of a gun?
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
What if someone has more cows that could eat the free grass? What if someone had a bit of bad luck and could really use the land? Also, what if the land could produce more food through veg farming?
If the people as a whole owned the land, they could decide the most efficent way it could be used to support society, or better, the government could give ownership to the person who could use the land to benefit society most.
You think that anyone who wants it can have it as long as they're first.
cjoe94 1 year ago
What if someone has more cows that could eat the free grass? What if someone had a bit of bad luck and could really use the land? Also, what if the land could produce more food through farming?
If the people as a whole owned the land, they could decide the most efficent way it could be used to support society, or better, the government could give ownership to the person who could use the land to benefit society most.
You think that anyone who wants it can have it as long as they're first.
cjoe94 1 year ago
This has been flagged as spam show
@cjoe94:
"what if the land could produce more food through farming?"
Then it should be privately owned by a farmer.
"If the people as a whole owned the land"
They can own it by purchasing it. There is nothing in a free market to prevent many people from owning a land. Contrary to what you may think, government doesn't know better than anyone else how land should be used.
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
@BolshieBlog:
"just don't expect anyone who has worked a day in their life to take you seriously."
I worked more than a day in my life, as Jake probably did too, and I do take him seriously, . Why are you so arrogant as to assume whom people will take seriously? Socialism is a god that failed, that has a fine track record of helping the elites who commandeer the wealth distribution apparatus and not the poor, which makes you a clueless economic illiterate drone for taking it seriously.
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
@BolshieBlog:
Most people are will seek profit under any system,be it capitalism or socialism. Whenever socialism was implemented it failed precisely for that reason,because when people have the option to obtain something for free,most of them will cease that opportunity, a simple fact of life that goes against your dogma.
"Keep on trying to justify your tyranical dictatorship of ownership"
Said the arrogant communist who thinks he is entitled to other people's property by his mere existence.
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
This has been flagged as spam show
We strive for democratic revolutions - radical and fundamental changes in the structure and quality of economic, political, and personal relations - to abolish the power now exercised by the few who control great wealth and the government.Socialism is not mere government ownership, a welfare state, or a repressive bureaucracy. Socialism is a new social and economic order in which workers and consumers control production and community residents control their neighborhoods, homes, and schools.
amsterdam78 1 year ago
The working class is the major force worldwide that can lead the way to a socialist future - to a real radical democracy from below. The Socialist Party fights for progressive changes compatible with a socialist future. We support militant working class struggles and electoral action, independent of the capitalist controlled two-party system, to present socialist alternatives.
amsterdam78 1 year ago
workers have the right to form unions freely, and to strike and engage in other forms of job actions; and where the production of society is used for the benefit of all humanity, not for the private profit of a few. We believe socialism and democracy are one and indivisible. The working class is in a key and central position to fight back against the ruling capitalist class and its power.
amsterdam78 1 year ago
THE SOCIALIST PARTY strives to establish a radical democracy that places people's lives under their own control - a non-racist, classless, feminist socialist society... where working people own and control the means of production and distribution through democratically-controlled public agencies; where full employment is realized for everyone who wants to work
amsterdam78 1 year ago
I always thought Socialism connoted Public Ownership, whereas Communism connoted Common Ownership. Tragedy of the Commons is the result of Common Ownership. Goods that are owned publicly are rationed by a governing body.
gunsandbullhorns 1 year ago
Went off on a bit of a tangent, I would have just played a clip of the Berlin Wall falling.
poopster102 1 year ago
You missed the point of his video. Using "Socialism" or "Communism" as scare words is silly. You are not scared of Socialism, you dislike it. He was not speaking to the logial and real problems that socialism faces, but the fear and hatred used. He is speaking out against the illogical arguments used against socialism.
If a Socialist Glenn Beck existed, and made a face and put up pictures of Industrial accidents and Oil spills every time he mentioned free markets or capitalism....
SpamSpamNEggs 1 year ago
@SpamSpamNEggs:
"If a Socialist Glenn Beck existed..."
Michael Moore, rings a bell? Naomi Klein, rings a bell? I'm not a huge fan of Beck, but there are plenty of pundits out there who do exactly what you described.
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
@Akatam0t0ma good call on the socialist glenn beck!
SunTzuLao 1 year ago
@Akatam0t0ma Good call. There are some minor differences that make Beck more noteable....but just minor ones.
I didn't even think of these fools when posting, I don't listen to them, and most of the people I end up arguing against support Beck. That's the only reason I know about him.
SpamSpamNEggs 1 year ago
@SpamSpamNEggs He also implied that the area referred to as New York City would not have sewage systems or trash collectors without socialism. Which is probably false. An easy way to take the video was the message that without the government, these services would not be provided.
AtheistAltar 1 year ago
@AtheistAltar Well he does have a good point. Lets look at London instead of NYC. There was no Public sewage in 1600. It was common practice to just pitch the contents of your chamber pot out into the street. It was not handled by the private sector. Sewage didn't happen until it was taken on as a public works by the government.
SpamSpamNEggs 1 year ago
@SpamSpamNEggs If there's demand, there will be an entrepreneur waiting to cash in. That's probably more an issue with medieval technology than it is with freedom.
Roads receive similar criticism. I think Walter Block has done a good job in his defense of free market roads.
AtheistAltar 1 year ago
@AtheistAltar There was demand for sewage in 1600 London. No one liked having the chamber pot emptied on their head. It was a public demand....someone (not me) should do some thing about it. For every individual it was not worth it to pay to have the waste removed.....pitching it in the street was much faster and cheaper. Do you really think that every one in NYC would pay for trash removal if it was voluntary?
SpamSpamNEggs 1 year ago
Glenn Greenwald posted an article a couple of days ago that points out another problem of state monopolies on such services. One example he laid out is that now Hawaii is not only laying off teachers but are now starting to furlough their students for the rest of the year. What we can infer from this example is that when the state finally runs out of money the services won't be rendered at all.
christopher81818 1 year ago
pwnage
greenghost2008 1 year ago
This has been an episode of kicking a baby down the stairs.
hugesinker 1 year ago
@hugesinker lol!
crazypants88 1 year ago
Really? Do you really think that public education would be offered to the poor by a private sector? Can you give me even one example of a country that has no public education where the literacy rates are above %80? The only people a privatised system would be cheaper for are the upper middle class and rich. The poor and lower middle class would have to spend more money and I really can't understand how you can't see this as a problem, maybe you can enlighten me on how you came to the conclusion.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@daiitokumyouou899
If a firm will always sell the same amount of product, regardless of how the quality or price of that product meshes with consumer preference, then the firm probably will not strive to improve its performance. Worse, even if it tried to do so, it would be severely hampered by the lack of market pricing of its factors of production, and the absence of interaction with the value scales of its "customers".
That's the situation with public schooling.
PanzerDivisionBOM 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM I should refer you to a study done by the CEP and nces concluded that private schooling is in no way at all better than public schooling. Education simply isn't something that the public can be trusted with, they do not understand how an education system should work. In the private schooling one sees vastly more religious schools and school promoting false ideas like homeopathy and spirituality over science. Of course give me one statistical resource by a reputable source.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM A private system doesn't sell based on a public need for quality of education but a public demand for a type of education. If the public mostly believes in ghost, anti-vaccination, homeopathy, intelligent design, geocentrism and among other subjects then this is what the market will provide. Again provide EVIDENCE that one-private is better than public- and two- A country where public education doesn't exist with a population literacy of over %80.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@daiitokumyouou899
Do you, by the word "private", refer to free market institutions? As in, firms which are not subject to state intervention, either through subsidy, regulation, state-enforced union edicts and so forth, and which are not necessarily pushed into a niché market by a coercively subsidized or otherwise protected competitor?
If not, then you have a good argument against privatization as advocated by the political Right, but not against free market provision of education service.
PanzerDivisionBOM 1 year ago
1: If I presented the argument from economic rationality poorly, then please ask me to rephrase, or else let me refer you to the article Economic Calculation in the Socialist Commonwealth.
2: I do not know of any place where no state has deigned fit to interfere in education. The closest fit would be Somalia, which is significantly less advanced than the West in terms of capital accumulation and general empathy, and which lost enormous subsidies to its education upon attaining statelessness.
PanzerDivisionBOM 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM Canada before 1869 was a stateless country without regulations, wars fought between major companies started by HBC. It was bad and Canada was in no way less advanced. Do you really think that private education is pushed into any kind of niche by the government? Is it that %40 of Americans believe that 911 was a conspiracy and that evolution is a hoax? Also there is no evidence that a free market is better at allocating resources than a centralised system with regulations.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@daiitokumyouou899
On the market, there exists prices which reflect the conditions of supply and demand, allowing entrepreneurs to make decisions according to the value scales of their target market and the expected future conditions of scarcity. Remove the market process, and no such prices exist. There can be no entrepreneurs guided by profit and loss, but only bureaucrats, and an endless number of heterogeneous potential production goods, -
PanzerDivisionBOM 1 year ago
which they must somehow allocate among each of a limitless number of potential employments in compliance with value scales with which they cannot interact.
The market is how people communicate their preferences, and reconcile those preferences with the conditions of material reality. It is the rational solution method for problems of social organization, and any time you replace a price or prohibit an uncoerced transaction, you necessarily remove some vital piece of information from society.
PanzerDivisionBOM 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM There has been no example of a society benefiting more from a privatised education and health system. Canada had privatized health up until about 1950s and it has stayed that way since because universal medicine is just simply better. More expensive for the rich but vastly cheaper for the poor, as a result the poor become market contributors because they do not have to worry about medical costs. The market gets its money back and then some by making this investment.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM And what about things that are important to society but can not survive a market base? Do we complete abandon space exploration because the masses don't want to invest in it because it will have zero financial gain? I am sorry I will never support that. Also education functions on a manner that must be determined by professionals not the market, I would agree with you if we were talking about weat or a type of material product, but education and health are different matters.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@daiitokumyouou899
What you're talking about is herding people around at gunpoint. If you want someone to tell you how you should live your life and spend the better part of your money, then leave me out of it.
If you really do think that your program is beneficial to me, then is it too much to ask that you treat me like a human being, and make that appeal to my self-interest? Don't presume to tell me what's good for me, and then enforce your preference through the state.
PanzerDivisionBOM 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM I like my government and social system and will fight for it. You got a problem with it? Then gtfo and move to Somalia. Somalia is a wonderful place I hear, feel free to move there. However I am not moving to change Canada's social system but only to improve on it, better tribe rights, welfare, cannabis legalisation etc. If you want to change Canada then do it through the same democratic process that you so gladly dismiss. Though I suspect you will never convince the masses.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionOF The free market system has been tried and has failed every single time. Almost every country in the world now has some form of social welfare because it had been determined that it is the most beneficial. Your ideal system is riddled with errors and fallacies (mostly about human psychology) and you have absolutely no evidence that it would work. No statistics it will work...Nothing. I am not risking the health and well being of people because you want to do what ever you want.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM You think corporations would not herd people around at gunpoint? Really why don't you actually research the HBC? With out government it is clear to every sane person that corporations will oppress the people for their own benefit and power. This is exactly what happens in free market situations; eg, Canada<1869, China<1910 and the current issue of globilization where companies exploit work in the third world then sell product in Canada/US etc pushing out local businesses.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@daiitokumyouou899
Do you think that I advocate the destruction of the vast majority of the accumulated capital of the West and a return to tribal religion and child-rearing practices, or that I claim that statelessness acts as an instant panacea for all human ills? If not, then your comment on Somalia is either ill-considered or highly disingenious.
As is, I might add, your comments on globalization. Have you ever heard of trade barriers? A sugar cube is three times as expensive in Europe
PanzerDivisionBOM 1 year ago
as it is anywhere else in the world - a discrepency which any speculator would be eager to resolve, much to the delight of destitute third-world farmers. State officials in third-world countries, selling local monopolies to the highest bidder, or herding people en masse into dense urban centers through punitive taxation?
Finally, I urge you to look up the difference between a corporation and a regular firm. That alone should illustrate the contradiction inherent to your position.
PanzerDivisionBOM 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM Omfg you must be dense to not understand that without a state someone who seeks power would simply produce their OWN government! Democracy is a competitive environment where the people have the ability to speak their issues and have them heard. It is not a dictatorship and it does not herd people. However, a person with a lot of economic power could easily craft a situation where the lower classes would have no medium to speak their issues other than violence.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM There is a serious error in your mind set that you think this would not happen. The government protects the people from exploitation, harassment, unlawful activities on the part of corporations (dumping of toxic material in rivers, diverting of rivers etc). It also provides a very important medium for people to have their issues heard and represented. Anyone can participate in government and related activities and have equal say in the passing of policies.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
@PanzerDivisionBOM In other words, what would you prefer? A system where one, or a handful, of individuals with vast economic power control the regulations and laws of society. Or a system where millions of calculators all cooperate together to achieve a certain compromise that is, ultimately, greater for the majority.
daiitokumyouou899 1 year ago
Experience has shown me that privatization of any industry that it is not cheaper and certainly not better quality. Are you saying British Rail improved since it's privatization? HOld ups and prices are at least 10 times what they used to be. Catching the local bus to work would once cost me 10 pence now costs me 1 pound 25 pence.... and the bus is still late and substandard.
AsheIsTheRaven 1 year ago
@AsheIsTheRaven The word "privatization" is misleading. The great majority of the time that I look into the cases of the government "privatizing" something and then saying "Look! They're charging you more!" are not cases of true privatization, but cases of corporatization. That is to say they create barriers to entry so that only a single one business (the one that bribed them the most) will be allowed to do business in that market.
JacobSpinney 1 year ago
How much does a stamp cost? Assuming we privatized the post office, would I be able to send a letter to my friend in NY from the west coast for 42 cents, or what ever? Does privatization guarantee that all, or even most people, will have access to the things you mention @ 2:20? I am not a socialist, but I don't think your reasoning follows here at all. On your example about the cows, how does a person establish ownership of a natural commodity like grass? Are they not stealing from nature?
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard
We can't know for sure, because letter mail is currently monopolized by the state and the USPS is so heavily subsidized that the price structure is fucked. It's like state healthcare: it *appears* cheaper because everyone is coerced into paying it, and the money they are forced to sacrifice to that end is more or less wasted.
Also, you can't "steal from nature." I can't "steal" from a tree because it is not a sentient agent capable of property ownership by any consensus.
doucher337 1 year ago
@doucher337 1st point: How much cheaper than 42cents could it get? The point is things like education, postage, roads, fire, police etc are already provided for us very cheaply.
2nd: I think you are missing my point. Jacob says it can't be everyones land, and it can't be the govt.'s land. So I am asking how can an individual purchase the land if no one owns it. There is an obvious problem here, because it means finders keepers and makes natural community ownership exploitative and arbitrary.
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard Your quote of 42 cents is very misleading, because the Post Office does not make its revenue from stamps, but rather the government funding it gets which comes from your taxes. What percentage of your taxes goes to the Post Office in one way or another? I have no idea, but to be intellectually honest, you must add that to the price of stamps.
To say that it's cheap is also misleading, since we have no free market based service to compare it to.
JacobSpinney 1 year ago
@JacobSpinney I believe I did state in a comment down below that taxes are part of the price. I am a college student who pays almost nothing in taxes on a yearly basis, so a stamp does cost me around 42 cents. Obviously this is not the case for everyone one, but running the post office isn't that expensive (comparably speaking) for the Gov, and I don't think we're going to find that vast majority of people get taxed more than 5 cents per letter, if not less. cont-
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard Don't tell me that saying '42 cents is cheap' is misleading. We're not talking about gumballs, I am talking about having an envelope delivered 3000+ miles away to the exact address I specify, that's cheap by our economic standards.
As for homesteading, what happens when two individuals both find the same resource at the same time and don't want to share? How do you homestead off shore oil reserves and other resources that require no initial improvements (like forests)?
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard As for acquiring unowned land, please look into the theory of homesteading.
JacobSpinney 1 year ago
The post office is basically going bankrupt at the same time that Fedex is profiting, despite the fact that they charge the same price.
As for universal access, Imagine a police force that only served the rich while ignoring the poor or schools that only taught the rich while ignoring the poor, that is what we have now. When goods are given out by the government, they go to the politically connected. AKA the rich
Empathica1 1 year ago
@Empathica1 I am not sure I agree with your second point. I will say it's certainly far from perfect, but access is near universal and free (obvious yes we pay taxes). Why should we expect private schooling to make access to education any better? Are there historical examples the demonstrate this?
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard
Schools in the inner cities are absolutely terrible and don't educate their students at all while schools in the rich suburbs get all the good teachers and good facilities. If schools were privatized, parents and students would choose good schools. the inner city schools would have to get better if they wanted to survive.
School Choice is a program where people choose which government school to go to. I think its been successful, but I'm no expert on schools
Empathica1 1 year ago
@Empathica1 I agree with you that the state of the school system is imperfect.
BUT- My why should we think abandoning public school entirely is going to solve that problem? Are all private schools going to be equal? Why wouldn't the exact same situation appear again, budget schools with mediocre education and expensive schools with fantastic facilities that again, only the rich can go to. Also poor inner city schools is not as much a problem with the system so much as implementation.
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard Why would you want them to be equal? That would just result in a lack of innovation. In a free market the schools that offered the best education would have it's method copied by other schools competing with it. With public schools most problems are simply treated with increases funding which most of the times ends up in the hands of administrators not the kids that are suffering most because of the problem.
crazypants88 1 year ago
@crazypants88 I think equal is a value that cannot exist. I am saying there will still be shitty schools for the poor and nice ones for the rich, changing to a private system will not change that. That problem is not a necessary condition of public schooling and most of Europe has solved that problem, even if the US lags behind.
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard Yes it can, you were just appealing to your subjective value of equality one comment earlier.
I'm sure there will be shitty schools in a free market, but I'm not sure any parent would send their kids to them when their is competition against the shitty school that offer better education. Also schools in a free market could actually experiment and see what are the best ways to educate instead simply following a mandate from the state.
crazypants88 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard Well the reason the U.S. lags behind is mostly because of the students themselves, many either refuse to learn or just can't because of inherent incapability, case in point one of my teachers can't even read at a college level. But that in itself won't be solved by either public or private education, the former is a social issue and can't be solved by any government entity, and the latter is a gentetic, which could be solved by government, but I wouldn't reccomend that they do
KingPiccolOwned 1 year ago
@KingPiccolOwned I personally think that inherent capability (inborn aptitude and cognitive capacity,) are not so responsible for our plight, as culture is. America is, and has been for some time, in a reverse renaissance if you will. It's cool to be stupid, that's peddled often, mostly to the low income inner city populations via popular media. Also, by using welfare and such programs to remove the incentive for self reliance and improvement, the state keeps the poor pliable, and compliant.
SunTzuLao 1 year ago
@SunTzuLao I also think that's the main reason, but I just figured I'd throw in the second part to acknowlege those who do try, but just aren't that good.
KingPiccolOwned 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard
Certainly privatization would not end disparity, but it would allow people to choose to go to a better school. Any school that decided to charge so much that the poor and middle class couldn't afford it would lose those students to cheaper schools, even if those schools were worse. That would push the most expensive prices down to levels that most people could afford. More choices always makes things better.
Empathica1 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard No, because nature can't own anything it is a thing. Does your computer own the programs on it, or do you?
KingPiccolOwned 1 year ago
@KingPiccolOwned That's besides the point, read my comment below that responds to that. I am trying to get the question answered, "How can ownership of a commodity by an individual be justified?"
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard I think it's hard to answer that because what is and isn't justified is based on subjective values.
crazypants88 1 year ago
@crazypants88 Ok, I am not sure I am following you. Certainly we could come to a consensus on a proper justification for most private property, even if we are appealing to subjective values to do so. I don't think this is difficult to do or a problem.
The problem arises when we have things like natural commodities and then it becomes very difficult. This is something an anarchist needs to account for though, because it stands to disrupt their foundational beliefs if left unaddressed.
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
@WayOfTheBastard Not a 100% consensus which is possible on a free market. There you could simply purchase a service from a service provider you think would give you the best service for you money. Everyone could do their thing. In a democracy it would be the majority that made that choice for the minority
How are "natural commedities" a problem for anti-statists?
crazypants88 1 year ago
@crazypants88 & Empathica1 We have had periods in US history were schooling was not offered by the government, mainly college schooling. Prior to the creation of public colleges, the overwhelming majority of Americans could not afford to go college nor did they have access to it. Why wouldn't this be the case with the privatization k-12 education? Also as daiitokumyouou899 pointed out, is there even one example of a country with private schooling that has greater than 80% literacy?
WayOfTheBastard 1 year ago
i'm curious which you would favor more; completely doing away with the public school system immediately, or a gradual phasing out of public schools say over a 10 year span.
cristoballs 1 year ago
oh god jacob... you found him too huh?
Ilikenuman 1 year ago
@Ilikenuman:
Thanks to me ;-)
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago
haha good point
Ioganstone 1 year ago
Wow, that was FAST! Thanks Jake! Fantastic job as usual! ;-)
Akatam0t0ma 1 year ago