Capitalism: the cause of and solution to all life's problems

[rotting bones]

We can look at what people do, and it's not very encouraging. People have been warning about limited oil for at least half a century, and yet Americans keep buying gaz-guzzling SUVs and building cities based on cars. All countries are cooperating to exhaust one species of fish after another, to cut down all the forests, to pollute the water table, to use land in unsustainable ways. The French rioted when they were asked to pay more for fuel. Nerds are spending as much energy mining bitcoins as is used by the entire nation of Bangladesh. If you ask them, Americans will say that we should protect the environment. But they are not willing to change their lifestyle or do much about it at all.

This doesn't mean things are hopeless; it just means that waiting for an urge to waft up from the electorate is going to be a long, long wait.

Things are not hopeless, but they require leadership, both bottom-up and top-down. When you want people to change their lifestyle, basically, you need to help them out. Offer education and models, subsidize change, make the change as easy as possible, disincentivize the most dangerous activities.

I could keep quibbling, but the good old existential tension of robustness vs. survival is as good a point to end this particular argument as any.

[mèþru]

The delivery system is the system that produces and distributes goods according to demand. I claim that the quantity of value will change depending on the mechanism of manufacture and distribution we are using owing to differences in the patterns of scarcity they produce.

That's already incorporated into the theory of value held by mainstream economics. Scarcity affects utility.

[rotting bones]

There's the rub: there is money at stake. And getting rid of money won't save that problem: think of it in terms of labor, or opportunies lost, but we can't rebuild the whole way we've been using energy at no cost.

My argument is very specific: The environment is considered an externality in mainstream economics. If ignored, the environment will cause grave losses. Nevertheless, these losses are not not included in standard quantitative analyses. This gives the impression that managing the environment will cause losses rather preventing even more down the line. Under capitalism, this "impression" is part of the mechanism the market uses to allocate resources. If demand is decoupled from money, then we can ask workers to be environmentally conscious without telling them to directly vote for business losses that might cost them their jobs, etc. However, whether my proposal to mitigate the profit motive goes far enough is another judgment call.

[rotting bones]

That's already incorporated into the theory of value held by mainstream economics. Scarcity affects utility.

My argument is that the pattern of scarcity will change under socialism. By taking subjective fantasies like "exchange" to be the basic building blocks of reality, mainstream economics fails to correctly understand how different economic systems would operate.

[mèþru]

Nevertheless, these losses are not not included in standard quantitative analyses

This is not always true and is becoming increasingly less true over time. The problem is the focus on short term profit over long, which is a recent development of business culture more than something inherent to capitalism.

If demand is decoupled from money

Inherently impossible as money is a measurement of value. You might as well try to decouple the concept of meter from length.

My argument is that the pattern of scarcity will change under socialism. By taking subjective fantasies like "exchange" to be the basic building blocks of reality, mainstream economics fails to correctly understand how different economic systems would operate.

An exchange is a fundamental building block of reality. This is an exchange of ideas. In our body there is an exchange of ATP to power ourselves. All logistical systems are based on exchanges of kinds. Even physical labour is an exchage of energy for results. To the extent that mainstream economics cannot describe gift economies, it is because gift economies are not actually logistical systems but social ones and are furthermore not scalable to modern technology and the wide distribution networks necessary to maintain billions of people.

[rotting bones]

This is not always true and is becoming increasingly less true over time. The problem is the focus on short term profit over long, which is a recent development of business culture more than something inherent to capitalism.

Recent business culture is a result of capitalism's drive to maximize short-term profits. By the time their trendy discounting rates are overcome, it will be too late.

Inherently impossible as money is a measurement of value. You might as well try to decouple the concept of meter from length.

Those words have a very specific meaning in the context of my proposal.

An exchange is a fundamental building block of reality. This is an exchange of ideas. In our body there is an exchange of ATP to power ourselves. All logistical systems are based on exchanges of kinds. Even physical labour is an exchage of energy for results. To the extent that mainstream economics cannot describe gift economies, it is because gift economies are not actually logistical systems but social ones and are furthermore not scalable to modern technology and the wide distribution networks necessary to maintain billions of people.

No, it's not. It is a building block of an economic system. In reality, there is no ATP, let alone bodies. Only fundamental particles interacting in space. The economic system is a high-level description of their interaction. "Exchange" is not. It is a literary trope that can be whimsically applied to all sorts of things, including aspects of economic systems.

[Ares Land]

My argument is very specific: The environment is considered an externality in mainstream economics. If ignored, the environment will cause grave losses. Nevertheless, these losses are not not included in standard quantitative analyses. This gives the impression that managing the environment will cause losses rather preventing even more down the line.

I'm not sure the problem lies there. Everyone, besides a few conspiracy theorists, understand that those losses need to be prevented down the line.

The problem is that preventing these cost money (or labor, if you prefer!), and no one's willing to pay the bill.

(Of course, right now, it's the business class that is mostly holding us back. But assuming we switch to your system, how happy will people be that utopia fails to materialize, and the temptation to cut corners with respect to the environment will be strong -- see how the Soviet Union dried the Aral Sea, or adopted a cheaper but less safe type of nuclear reactors and played a little fast with the safety regulations at Pripiat? Everyone was aware of the potential problems but, hey, production targets had to be met.)

A planned system isn't magically immune to SNAFUs either. If The People demand a certain quantity of strawberries be produced, you've got a very strong incentive to meet the target regardless of which corners you have to cut. It doesn't necessarily require the local fruit production manager to be evil or gaming the system, simply unwilling to say he failed and be out of a job.

My argument is that the pattern of scarcity will change under socialism. By taking subjective fantasies like "exchange" to be the basic building blocks of reality, mainstream economics fails to correctly understand how different economic systems would operate.

I'm really not sure I follow you.
How would socialism change patterns of scarcity? And I really don't get what you mean about exchange.

[mèþru]

I don't think there is much of a point in conversation if someone believes that abstractions cannot be fundamentals and that there is nothing but fundamental particles. By that logical, economies don't exist and neither does anything larger than a molecule. (by the way ATP is a molecule, and it is part of the respiratory process of every single living thing)

[rotting bones]

I'm not sure the problem lies there. Everyone, besides a few conspiracy theorists, understand that those losses need to be prevented down the line.

The problem is that preventing these cost money (or labor, if you prefer!), and no one's willing to pay the bill.

The way I see it, the problem is that if businesses start taking losses, too many of them will stop paying their workforce and shut down. The wealthy will be relatively okay with their saved cash, but the poor will be miserable. That is the specific bill that the poor are unwilling to pay.

(Of course, right now, it's the business class that is mostly holding us back. But assuming we switch to your system, how happy will people be that utopia fails to materialize, and the temptation to cut corners with respect to the environment will be strong -- see how the Soviet Union dried the Aral Sea, or adopted a cheaper but less safe type of nuclear reactors and played a little fast with the safety regulations at Pripiat? Everyone was aware of the potential problems but, hey, production targets had to be met.)

Which is part of why I oppose state capitalism.

I'm really not sure I follow you.
How would socialism change patterns of scarcity? And I really don't get what you mean about exchange.

Okay, let's start from first principles. Exchange implies ownership. In reality, no one owns anything. Different economic systems have different assumptions about how to treat the commons. Therefore, to start with the idea of exchange is to axiomatically validate capitalist notions of ownership.

[rotting bones]

I don't think there is much of a point in conversation if someone believes that abstractions cannot be fundamentals and that there is nothing but fundamental particles. By that logical, economies don't exist and neither does anything larger than a molecule. (by the way ATP is a molecule, and it is part of the respiratory process of every single living thing)

No living thing has ever existed. Sorry, I can't resist answering contradictions with contradictions. See my answer to Ares Land.

PS. Naturally, there are no molecules either.

[rotting bones]

To explain what I mean by exchange being a literary trope, notice that exchange implies ownership in the context of economic theory, but something entirely different in the context of molecules. This is what I mean when I say that it is applied whimsically. It is a literary metaphor like "root", which means different things in the context of biological trees, mathematical trees, etymologies, etc. These different meanings are united by a literary theme or family resemblance.

Once again, apologies to mèþru. I promise to keep my lameness in check from now on.

[Ares Land]

The way I see it, the problem is that if businesses start taking losses, too many of them will stop paying their workforce and shut down. The wealthy will be relatively okay with their saved cash, but the poor will be miserable. That is the specific bill that the poor are unwilling to pay.

How is it any different under your system? Whether socialist or communist, you can't pay the workforce if you're taking a loss.

(Of course, right now, it's the business class that is mostly holding us back. But assuming we switch to your system, how happy will people be that utopia fails to materialize, and the temptation to cut corners with respect to the environment will be strong -- see how the Soviet Union dried the Aral Sea, or adopted a cheaper but less safe type of nuclear reactors and played a little fast with the safety regulations at Pripiat? Everyone was aware of the potential problems but, hey, production targets had to be met.)

Which is part of why I oppose state capitalism.

Sure, but again, how is it different under your system? What happens if whatever the people voted for isn't produced in sufficient quantity?

I'm really not sure I follow you.
How would socialism change patterns of scarcity? And I really don't get what you mean about exchange.

Okay, let's start from first principles. Exchange implies ownership. In reality, no one owns anything. Different economic systems have different assumptions about how to treat the commons. Therefore, to start with the idea of exchange is to axiomatically validate capitalist notions of ownership.
[/quote]
Are you in favor of slavery? If not, you'll recognize that people at least own their body and their own time. They are free to do what they like with their body in their own time. And if they are free to do that, they surely can exchange whatever they do in that time in exchange for something someone else did?

It's not a physical reality but it's a prevalent social convention. (Myself, I find it an useful one, especially the 'no slavery' bit.)

But let's assume, for argument's sake, that there is no such thing as exchange or ownership. How does that change anything about scarcity?

[mèþru]

Exchange in economic theory does not have to assume ownership in the sense of property rights - whether something is owned in an exchange is not relevant to whether an exchange took place. Indeed in exchanges involving services instead of goods, ownership can smetimes be impossible to define. I definitely see exchange in respiration cycles and exchange in human economy as being fundamentally the same thing, because they are both logistical systems.

Also personal property exists in all types of socieites, including hunter-gatherer gift economies, and the Marxian distinction between private and personal property is at the best a continuum rather than binary.

[Raphael]

Are you in favor of slavery? If not, you'll recognize that people at least own their body and their own time.

This is a very minor point, not really related to your or rotting bones's major point, but when it comes to human bodies and ownership, IMO the best, or at least least bad, rule is not that everyone owns their own body, but that the whole concept of ownership is simply not applied to human bodies.

[mèþru]

I agree with Raphael on that.

Also one could say instead of ownership in the sense of property rights, exchange implies possesion. Possession is self-evident - either I possess a keyboard to type this sentence or I do not. Since there is scarcity, an economy must have a mechanism for determining who possesses what in what quantity. This is emphatically not the same as ownership - a family in the Soviet Union is provided a house they do not own and do not control, but it can still said to be in their possesion.

[rotting bones]

How is it any different under your system? Whether socialist or communist, you can't pay the workforce if you're taking a loss.

The jobs are created by vote, not profitability.

Sure, but again, how is it different under your system? What happens if whatever the people voted for isn't produced in sufficient quantity?

The total goods produced are divided by the fraction of total average man hours worked.

But that is not the point. The point is that, under my system, demand is what zompist calls careless, unconstrained by the threat of homelessness.

Are you in favor of slavery? If not, you'll recognize that people at least own their body and their own time. They are free to do what they like with their body in their own time. And if they are free to do that, they surely can exchange whatever they do in that time in exchange for something someone else did?

It's not a physical reality but it's a prevalent social convention. (Myself, I find it an useful one, especially the 'no slavery' bit.)

I argued in favor of democracy the most strongly out of everyone in this thread. I'm only pointing out that slavery is real. It is a bad idea for many reasons, but it is not intrinsically fake. Why am I saying this? To point out the relativism of economic categories under different production mechanisms.

But let's assume, for argument's sake, that there is no such thing as exchange or ownership. How does that change anything about scarcity?

You are free to check my previous posts if you don't believe me, but my point is not that these things don't exist, but rather that they mean different things under different economic systems. For example, exchange exists under socialism, but a socialist would not start reasoning about economics from the standard libertarian scenario of two people on a desert island, one with fish and another with coconuts, who exchange half of each. Maybe a division of labor to increase the common pool of resources.

[mèþru]

I don't think they mean different things in different systems, just that there are interpretations that are wrong. The mainstream theory's principles do not cease to be true if an economy isn't capitalist - as I pointed out the marginal utility theory applies to any logistical system, even non-human

[rotting bones]

Exchange in economic theory does not have to assume ownership in the sense of property rights - whether something is owned in an exchange is not relevant to whether an exchange took place. Indeed in exchanges involving services instead of goods, ownership can smetimes be impossible to define. I definitely see exchange in respiration cycles and exchange in human economy as being fundamentally the same thing, because they are both logistical systems.

Also personal property exists in all types of socieites, including hunter-gatherer gift economies, and the Marxian distinction between private and personal property is at the best a continuum rather than binary.

My understanding is that any economic theory that starts out with exchange as a fundamental concept presupposes that the parties own the things they exchange. Otherwise, it will be difficult to prove that total social capital was maximized, which is the whole point of the theory. But I could be wrong. Could you send me resources on this?

I don't think they mean different things in different systems, just that there are interpretations that are wrong. The mainstream theory's principles do not cease to be true if an economy isn't capitalist - as I pointed out the marginal utility theory applies to any logistical system, even non-human

To me, this sounds like you are just being stubborn. Instead of looking at the arguments, you are jumping straight to the conclusion.

[mèþru]

Otherwise, it will be difficult to prove that total social capital was maximized, which is the whole point of the theory.

I'm talking positive economics, which is about describing reality rather than making suggestions or proposals of what to do. The only goal have in this point of conversation is to describe how mainstream economists think logistical systems work, perhaps mixed with my own observations here and there. Whether maximising capital for everyone, maximising a specific group or individual's capital, or even just prducing large quantities of cheese is a goal of the designer of an economic system, there is an underlying logic that applies to all systems. To briefly go into normative economics, which is about proposal and policy, capitalism is better than a command economy, whether dictatorial or democratic, because it uses measurement of value as a signal for how to handle distribution, which while not always being ideal for every situation is better than setting fixed values by vote because it is responsive to the internal mechanisms of logistical systems.

[Ares Land]

The jobs are created by vote, not profitability.

(...)

The total goods produced are divided by the fraction of total average man hours worked.

(...)

But that is not the point. The point is that, under my system, demand is what zompist calls careless, unconstrained by the threat of homelessness.

(...)

To point out the relativism of economic categories under different production mechanisms.

(...)
You are free to check my previous posts if you don't believe me, but my point is not that these things don't exist, but rather that they mean different things under different economic systems. For example, exchange exists under socialism, but a socialist would not start reasoning about economics from the standard libertarian scenario of two people on a desert island, one with fish and another with coconuts, who exchange half of each. Maybe a division of labor to increase the common pool of resources.

I get your point... But we were talking about the cost of defending the environment.
Leaving economy aside, switching to a zero-carbon economy is not trivial: it will require plenty of hard work, or technological advances or both.
This will directly affect people's lives and standards of living, no matter what economic system you're using.

Someone will have to build the commuter rail lines, for instance, and this time and labor spent that will not be used for other projects.

Switching to socialism doesn't make that change any easier.

Considering the temptation to cut costs: some producers are, blandly, better than others. Some people are better farmers than others. Others just happen to be unlucky. If some farm produces less than another and as a result total production is lower than what people wanted... Well, someone will look into that. Generally people don't like to be seen as a poor producer (with the negative consequences that entails). So poor producers will cut corners whenever possible. Depending on how dire the consequences are (bankruptcy, reassignment to Siberia), unlucky producers will cut corners too.
This, again, is an issue under capitalism or socialism.