I wrote this comment on the #askhubski post and would like more reactions to and criticisms of my opinion. My economic opinions have been rapidly evolving, and I'm sure I still have much to realize and learn.
- Here is what I think, and I'd love to hear some criticism and reactions to it. I'm far from well-read in economics or philosophy.
Capitalism is the same as anarchy to me. I think that capitalism is what happens when everyone acts "rationally" selfishly.
The purpose of a society/government is to restrict capitalism. If everyone were allowed to act perfectly selfishly, we would have chaos, and life would suck, so we sign the Social Contract and we give up the right to some selfish actions in return for a guarantee that others will do the same. We are protected from each other in some respects, and in the remaining respects we are allowed to act selfishly and exploit each other just as we would otherwise.
How "capitalist" or "socialist" a society is considered by most people is dependent on how many capitalist tendencies are regulated or restricted by the government. While the existence of any government at all is therefore socialist, the intrusiveness of that government determines where it lands on the traditional spectrum from capitalism to socialism.
Since capitalism is the result of unbridled greed, it results in the unbridled consumption of all available resources toward the production of wealth as efficiently as possible. This inherently leads to exploitation of both other people and natural resources expeditiously and thoughtlessly. In addition to causing most (if not all) social problems, this also causes all environmental problems. The environmental aspect is one many people forget about.
Socialism is necessary not only for the good of the people in the short term, but also for the good of the environment and therefore the good of the people in the long term. Unless we move toward a more socialist global society, capitalism will continue to exploit people and the environment as recklessly as it currently does, and this can only lead to disaster for the human race.
The key, as my colleagues have mentioned in this thread, is figuring out a good way to scale actual socialist governments.
Edit: paragraphs in the quoted block
If technology progresses far enough before the environment of this planet is ruined, we can always colonize another planet. I like capitalism for the competition and infinite potential. I don't see how in a socialist society there would be anything more than stasis. To me, a static society is far less appealing than one controlled by greed.
Surely you don't need Socialism to achieve this result, though - all you need is regulated Capitalism. That said, I'd like to point out that most all systems are a varying mix of the two. There are many Socialist aspects of the American economy (i.e. Police, Fire, National Parks, various social services, roadways, and many many more). Many European governments, although Socialist-leaning, have a great many Capitalist features - and by-the-by, innovation does not seem particularly stifled there, seems to me.
I used to think like you do. But then couple of realities struck me: 1. Pick any government. Any. Look what it has decided during the last year? If you don't find immense bullcrap buried somewhere there, PM me please. I'll move to that place. Democracy is kinda nice idea, but in practice it's always corrupt. And when it's not, it's outright stupid. - "In August 2012, a Gallup poll reported that Congress’s approval rating amongst Americans was at 10%" from Wikipedia. - My own country has made these super smart moves like a law forcing everybody to use cycling helmet. But then they ruled that not using it would not be punished in any way. The only effect is that now people take law less seriously. - In Finland they are currently spending time and taxpayers money to decide what kind of electronic surveillance our government would like to install to all cars. Just in order to gather payments from cars entering Helsinki, in order to reduce traffic congestion. How about rising gas taxes locally in Helsinki? No they need some pricey as hell electronic surveillance. - This hole SOPA stuff? We we're lucky really. The list goes on and on. So to me it looks like governments are always stupid. Best you can do is to limit their power, so they have less possibilities to be stupid. 2. Capitalism favors the cheapest thing. This may seem like nothing if you consider ecology. I'll throw few points and then a theory of mine. Yes they are weird points. - Some scientist examined what is more ecological. Plastic Christmas tree or a real pine. They found out that if you use it only one Christmas the real pine is better. But if you can use the same plastic one on several Christmastimes it's more ecological. Real pine cost's about 30-80 eur, plastic trees range from 70eur to 200eur. - Another study was made considering tomatoes. They found out that in Finland it's most ecological to consume domestic tomatoes. But in the winter Spanish import tomatoes are more ecological. Conveniently domestic tomatoes are cheaper in the summer, but in the winter Spanish imports are cheapest. I'm guessing that I would find other examples quite easily. Only problem is that studying what is most ecological is quite time consuming. So scientist don't do it that much. But what if the cheapest option would be generally the most ecological option? It would make sense in a way. If your company is producing tomatoes at two dollars per kilo, it's kind of hard to burn five dollars worth fossil fuels per kilo and have profitable company. So would it be kind of cool if our system had built in function to favor the most ecological products?
I actually had a similar discussion the other day on facebook about democracy. A person commented something to the effect of that if America elects bad leaders, then that's good because the people wanted it. I said in response that democracy for democracy's sake is pointless because the whole point of democracy is to have the most intelligent decisions possible made, and the assumption is that most of the time, the people know what's best for them. But sometimes they don't, and that's why the most ideal (imo) governments are those governments designed to limit bad decisions from being made. It should be hard to get something bad done, at the expense of the ease at which good things could be done. That's why democracy and separation/division of power is a good concept, because the process of making a influential decision is much more difficult. So what you said struck a chord and reminded me of my own thoughts:
Here's an interesting question: is Congress's ideal job to make intelligent laws that might not jive with the people necessarily, or to make dumb laws that do jive with the people?So to me it looks like governments are always stupid. Best you can do is to limit their power, so they have less possibilities to be stupid.
To me it seems simple that congress should make intelligent laws. The real problem is how to elect such congress? Who would decide what's intelligent if not voters? To have intelligent voters you have to educate them somehow and that sound quite like nationwide brainwash. Western democracies already apply education to pretty much everybody, and that's another weird problem. If people at 1800 elected stupid dudes who made stupid curriculum, then we are in a rut of stupidity educating stupidity, electing stupidity educating..... You get the point? Only fair thing to do is to limit voting for those who are actually interested in it. So no compulsive voting thank you. Then we get into meta-politics, could we somehow by the means of day to day politics inject some-kind of functions to our political systems that would make them inevitably better. It's too difficult thing for me, I'm just to become product designer. I don't need to design foolproof... ;) There are usually some already. Similar thing as congress in our country has to have 5/6 votes to pass a new constitution, and the next elected congress has to approve it with 2/3 or something. Would you know any kind community discussing meta-politics?
Yeah, you're right about education. Even if people are asked on election day which candidate is more intelligent, instead of which is "better", maybe that would help, but it seems to me that voters would just assume that they know what's best for themselves and choose an ignorant person anyway. Or maybe they already do that...it's impossible to tell unless we poll voters after elections why they voted as they did...but I'm pretty sure that's illegal, right? I agree with what you're saying about compulsory voting. I've been thinking of a web service (if you've seen me around hubski, you know that I'm a programmer) where users would basically set up the government of their choosing collectively, and they could attempt to make the best government possible. It'd be interesting to see, as a simulation, what people would come up with. They could make a constitution, or have anarchy, or whatever it may be. What do you think? I worry it might get out of hand, but it'd be interesting to watch. Since it's over the web, events could happen far quicker than in real life, I feel, so it'd make it easier to examine the broader trends that affect humanity.Would you know any kind community discussing meta-politics?
God, I wish I knew of one! I guess there could be a #meta-politics tag, or just use the #sociology tag, I suppose. I've been searching for a way to find how society ticks a la psychohistory (you know Asimov's foundation) so that it'd be possible to envision a system that works more perfectly.