Without morality, the market economy will destroy itself(theguardian.com)
theguardian.com
Without morality, the market economy will destroy itself
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/dec/21/morality-capitalism-missing-link-marketplace
120 comments
This is in logical structure very similar to the argument which anti-drug people use to justify further crack-downs. They say 'the punishments are still not severe enough, we must make them stricter, to provide a real disincentive'. There is no end to that argument, they can carry on invoking it until people are being given life sentences for trivial drugs offenses (and beyond).
You are also making the mistake of framing all of these issues as part of a grand 'government vs. market' battle. There is no reason why a government cannot provide good public services from a reasonable tax rate, and also avoid corporatism and regulatory capture. In fact, I would say there's almost no connection between the former and latter. The US has a far more pro-market attitude than most of the rest of the Western world, but also has stronger links between private contractors (particularly military contractors) and government than would be acceptable in most of those other countries, and certainly its fair share of regulatory capture, particularly at local and state levels. Within Europe, there are low-tax economies, and there are high-tax economies, and no apparent connection between levels of taxation on the one hand, and on the other hand, economic success, levels of corruption, or poor regulation. These issues are actually a lot more granular, and a lot more complicated, than can be captured by the hope for the righteous and complete victory of one ideological force against another.
You are also making the mistake of framing all of these issues as part of a grand 'government vs. market' battle. There is no reason why a government cannot provide good public services from a reasonable tax rate, and also avoid corporatism and regulatory capture. In fact, I would say there's almost no connection between the former and latter. The US has a far more pro-market attitude than most of the rest of the Western world, but also has stronger links between private contractors (particularly military contractors) and government than would be acceptable in most of those other countries, and certainly its fair share of regulatory capture, particularly at local and state levels. Within Europe, there are low-tax economies, and there are high-tax economies, and no apparent connection between levels of taxation on the one hand, and on the other hand, economic success, levels of corruption, or poor regulation. These issues are actually a lot more granular, and a lot more complicated, than can be captured by the hope for the righteous and complete victory of one ideological force against another.
There is no reason why a government cannot provide good public services from a reasonable tax rate, and also avoid corporatism and regulatory capture.
Yes, there is: governments are run by people, subject to the same incentives as people in any other part of society, including the perverse and misaligned incentives that cause "market failures" in other parts of society.
The US has a far more pro-market attitude than most of the rest of the Western world
Attitude is not the same as reality. If the US really were more pro-market, instead of just talking like it, we would not have given a massive bailout to the same investment banks that tanked the economy in 2008. (Nor would we have allowed the various regulatory schemes that enabled the crash to happen in the first place.)
Yes, there is: governments are run by people, subject to the same incentives as people in any other part of society, including the perverse and misaligned incentives that cause "market failures" in other parts of society.
The US has a far more pro-market attitude than most of the rest of the Western world
Attitude is not the same as reality. If the US really were more pro-market, instead of just talking like it, we would not have given a massive bailout to the same investment banks that tanked the economy in 2008. (Nor would we have allowed the various regulatory schemes that enabled the crash to happen in the first place.)
> Yes, there is: governments are run by people, subject to the same incentives as people in any other part of society, including the perverse and misaligned incentives that cause "market failures" in other parts of society.
The same incentives exist in any system. In fact, in what you might call 'pro-market' sytems, you often find business people closely involved with regulation, and also a lot of government services sub-contracted out to private companies, which makes the incentives shift the other way. So, for instance, the incentives inherent in for-profit prisons led to the judge-kickback scandal:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal
You're also going up against the lack of evidence for your position. As I say, in Europe, the countries with the highest levels of taxation and regulation often have the best anti-corruption reputations, the most well-functioning regulatory systems, and the most buoyant economies.
The same incentives exist in any system. In fact, in what you might call 'pro-market' sytems, you often find business people closely involved with regulation, and also a lot of government services sub-contracted out to private companies, which makes the incentives shift the other way. So, for instance, the incentives inherent in for-profit prisons led to the judge-kickback scandal:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kids_for_cash_scandal
You're also going up against the lack of evidence for your position. As I say, in Europe, the countries with the highest levels of taxation and regulation often have the best anti-corruption reputations, the most well-functioning regulatory systems, and the most buoyant economies.
The same incentives exist in any system.
Yes; I never said otherwise.
in what you might call 'pro-market' sytems, you often find business people closely involved with regulation
I don't call these "pro-market" systems, precisely because business people being closely involved with regulation is not, IMO, "pro-market". It may be "pro-business", depending on the business, but businesses that succeed this way are not "pro-market".
a lot of government services sub-contracted out to private companies
That's not "pro-market" either; the companies may be private, but the demand they are satisfying is not, it's generated by the government.
In Europe, the countries with the highest levels of taxation and regulation often have the best anti-corruption reputations, the most well-functioning regulatory systems, and the most buoyant economies
References, please?
Yes; I never said otherwise.
in what you might call 'pro-market' sytems, you often find business people closely involved with regulation
I don't call these "pro-market" systems, precisely because business people being closely involved with regulation is not, IMO, "pro-market". It may be "pro-business", depending on the business, but businesses that succeed this way are not "pro-market".
a lot of government services sub-contracted out to private companies
That's not "pro-market" either; the companies may be private, but the demand they are satisfying is not, it's generated by the government.
In Europe, the countries with the highest levels of taxation and regulation often have the best anti-corruption reputations, the most well-functioning regulatory systems, and the most buoyant economies
References, please?
Regarding corruption I just stumbled upon this the other day: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Political_corruption
> Yes, there is: governments are run by people, subject to the same incentives as people in any other part of society, including the perverse and misaligned incentives that cause "market failures" in other parts of society.
That is simultaneously true and irrelevant. The price of good government is vigilance on the part of the population. People want to vote themselves a New Deal and a strong federal government without the trouble of amending the constitution to add the appropriate checks against the new powers the federal government claims by reinterpretation, here we are.
Governments are terrible blunt instruments that can be simultaneously corrupt and incompetent, but somebody has got to build the roads and stop corporations from dumping toxic waste in the water supply.
That is simultaneously true and irrelevant. The price of good government is vigilance on the part of the population. People want to vote themselves a New Deal and a strong federal government without the trouble of amending the constitution to add the appropriate checks against the new powers the federal government claims by reinterpretation, here we are.
Governments are terrible blunt instruments that can be simultaneously corrupt and incompetent, but somebody has got to build the roads and stop corporations from dumping toxic waste in the water supply.
>Yes, there is: governments are run by people, subject to the same incentives as people in any other part of society, including the perverse and misaligned incentives that cause "market failures" in other parts of society.
Then explain the proven successes of state regulatory mechanisms. And no, that doesn't allow explaining them away by trying to pretend they've never happened.
Then explain the proven successes of state regulatory mechanisms. And no, that doesn't allow explaining them away by trying to pretend they've never happened.
> Then explain the proven successes of state regulatory mechanisms.
Easy: they are simply less efficient than market solutions to the same problems.
Easy: they are simply less efficient than market solutions to the same problems.
proof please...
Then explain the proven successes of state regulatory mechanisms.
Examples, please?
Examples, please?
I don't have to worry about my next door neighbor starting a pig farm.
I rode an elevator today without worrying about falling to my death.
No one is spraying dioxin as a sealant on the streets in my area because it was the cheap option.
There are, quite literally, a million examples like this that may be hard to think of because, when regulation works, you don't have to think about it.
I rode an elevator today without worrying about falling to my death.
No one is spraying dioxin as a sealant on the streets in my area because it was the cheap option.
There are, quite literally, a million examples like this that may be hard to think of because, when regulation works, you don't have to think about it.
You're assuming that government regulation solves all these problems better than a free market system would. Let's see:
I don't have to worry about my next door neighbor starting a pig farm.
Do you live in a covenant community? I do, which means it isn't government regulations that are stopping my next door neighbor from starting a pig farm, but the voluntarily adopted by-laws of the community, funded by the dues paid by homeowners. Do you have any evidence that homeowners in such communities pay more for the same benefits, on average, than homeowners in towns and cities where the local government's zoning laws are the applicable regulations?
I rode an elevator today without worrying about falling to my death.
How much did you pay in taxes for that assurance? How much would you have paid in a free market where private insurance companies enforced safety regulations--i.e., the inspection certificate inside the elevator was issued by an inspector hired by the insurance company that had liability for any injuries caused by a defect in the elevator, rather than an inspector hired by the government? Do you have any evidence that the latter cost would be higher than the former for the same benefit?
No one is spraying dioxin as a sealant on the streets in my area because it was the cheap option.
I didn't know dioxin was even an option for street sealing, but let's assume you meant "some harmful substance". Once again, you're paying taxes for this benefit; do you have any evidence that you're getting the benefit more cheaply than you would in a free market system where roads were privately owned, and the owners were liable for damages to neighboring property owners, just as I would be liable if I dumped toxic waste on your lawn?
when regulation works, you don't have to think about it.
Yep, right up until it stops working catastrophically. Ask the residents of Gulf coast communities how well government regulation prevented them from suffering serious damage as a result of the Deepwater Horizon spill. In a free market, BP could not have just gone and started drilling with a nudge-nudge wink-wink from Federal regulators who had no real stake in the outcome and who made no serious effort to sanity check what they were doing; they would have had to convince the Gulf residents themselves, directly, that the risks of drilling were worth the benefits.
I don't have to worry about my next door neighbor starting a pig farm.
Do you live in a covenant community? I do, which means it isn't government regulations that are stopping my next door neighbor from starting a pig farm, but the voluntarily adopted by-laws of the community, funded by the dues paid by homeowners. Do you have any evidence that homeowners in such communities pay more for the same benefits, on average, than homeowners in towns and cities where the local government's zoning laws are the applicable regulations?
I rode an elevator today without worrying about falling to my death.
How much did you pay in taxes for that assurance? How much would you have paid in a free market where private insurance companies enforced safety regulations--i.e., the inspection certificate inside the elevator was issued by an inspector hired by the insurance company that had liability for any injuries caused by a defect in the elevator, rather than an inspector hired by the government? Do you have any evidence that the latter cost would be higher than the former for the same benefit?
No one is spraying dioxin as a sealant on the streets in my area because it was the cheap option.
I didn't know dioxin was even an option for street sealing, but let's assume you meant "some harmful substance". Once again, you're paying taxes for this benefit; do you have any evidence that you're getting the benefit more cheaply than you would in a free market system where roads were privately owned, and the owners were liable for damages to neighboring property owners, just as I would be liable if I dumped toxic waste on your lawn?
when regulation works, you don't have to think about it.
Yep, right up until it stops working catastrophically. Ask the residents of Gulf coast communities how well government regulation prevented them from suffering serious damage as a result of the Deepwater Horizon spill. In a free market, BP could not have just gone and started drilling with a nudge-nudge wink-wink from Federal regulators who had no real stake in the outcome and who made no serious effort to sanity check what they were doing; they would have had to convince the Gulf residents themselves, directly, that the risks of drilling were worth the benefits.
>I do, which means it isn't government regulations that are stopping my next door neighbor from starting a pig farm, but the voluntarily adopted by-laws of the community, funded by the dues paid by homeowners. Do you have any evidence that homeowners in such communities pay more for the same benefits, on average, than homeowners in towns and cities where the local government's zoning laws are the applicable regulations?
That depends, what are your fees and what are the powers of your HOA? Seems a bit onerous to have to do a deep dive into a contract that covers everything that zoning laws and the like would have to cover just to see if that area is suitable to my needs.
>How much would you have paid in a free market where the inspection certificate inside the elevator was issued by an inspector hired by the insurance company that had liability for any injuries caused by a defect in the elevator...
And how do I check if that insurance company is legitimate every time I decide to use an elevator? In the case that they are legitimate how do I know they are not making actuarial judgement on the relative value of the human lives when it comes to inspection resources? IOW if I am visiting a building in a lower class neighborhoods, do I assume that fewer resources have been spent making sure the equipment in the area is safe?
>I didn't know dioxin was even an option for street sealing...
Neither did the residents of Times Beach, Missouri. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Times_Beach,_Missouri#Dioxin_co...
Do you think Russell Bliss, the waste hauler that was hired to seal the town's streets, had enough money or enough liability coverage to reimburse the entire town which had to be abandoned? Or should we just trust in market forces to keep such a short sighted massively destructive incident from occurring again...I mean, who is going to hire that guy for another sealant job? Problem solved, right?
The fact is that Libertarian dogma ignores reality on several fronts. One, it assumes near perfect information...a goal made even more impossible to reach than it is already considering the Cambrian explosion of agreements and jurisdictions that must be considered in every possible interaction between humans or between humans and anything constructed by humans where laws and regulations are thrown out of the window in favor of market interatcions. The second unrealistic assumption is that everyone has the capacity to cause only enough harm for themselves and their insurance to pay for. The third fantasy is that all harm that is caused by humans can be attributable to a bad actor after the fact so that the market can punish them appropriately...
The reality is that is is far easier and cheaper to allow the wisdom of those who came before stop problems before they start in the form of laws and regulations that supersede and outlast any ephemeral market dynamic or the memory of the negative consequences of some of those interactions.
Will there be failures? Sure. Previous failures is how we ended up with the laws and regulations we have now. It is our job to constructively add to that body of wisdom. Will some outlast their usefulness? Absolutely. We must be vigilant and change laws and regulations as necessary. But for the vast majority we can leave well enough alone.
That depends, what are your fees and what are the powers of your HOA? Seems a bit onerous to have to do a deep dive into a contract that covers everything that zoning laws and the like would have to cover just to see if that area is suitable to my needs.
>How much would you have paid in a free market where the inspection certificate inside the elevator was issued by an inspector hired by the insurance company that had liability for any injuries caused by a defect in the elevator...
And how do I check if that insurance company is legitimate every time I decide to use an elevator? In the case that they are legitimate how do I know they are not making actuarial judgement on the relative value of the human lives when it comes to inspection resources? IOW if I am visiting a building in a lower class neighborhoods, do I assume that fewer resources have been spent making sure the equipment in the area is safe?
>I didn't know dioxin was even an option for street sealing...
Neither did the residents of Times Beach, Missouri. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Times_Beach,_Missouri#Dioxin_co...
Do you think Russell Bliss, the waste hauler that was hired to seal the town's streets, had enough money or enough liability coverage to reimburse the entire town which had to be abandoned? Or should we just trust in market forces to keep such a short sighted massively destructive incident from occurring again...I mean, who is going to hire that guy for another sealant job? Problem solved, right?
The fact is that Libertarian dogma ignores reality on several fronts. One, it assumes near perfect information...a goal made even more impossible to reach than it is already considering the Cambrian explosion of agreements and jurisdictions that must be considered in every possible interaction between humans or between humans and anything constructed by humans where laws and regulations are thrown out of the window in favor of market interatcions. The second unrealistic assumption is that everyone has the capacity to cause only enough harm for themselves and their insurance to pay for. The third fantasy is that all harm that is caused by humans can be attributable to a bad actor after the fact so that the market can punish them appropriately...
The reality is that is is far easier and cheaper to allow the wisdom of those who came before stop problems before they start in the form of laws and regulations that supersede and outlast any ephemeral market dynamic or the memory of the negative consequences of some of those interactions.
Will there be failures? Sure. Previous failures is how we ended up with the laws and regulations we have now. It is our job to constructively add to that body of wisdom. Will some outlast their usefulness? Absolutely. We must be vigilant and change laws and regulations as necessary. But for the vast majority we can leave well enough alone.
Seems a bit onerous to have to do a deep dive into a contract that covers everything that zoning laws and the like would have to cover just to see if that area is suitable to my needs.
You would have to do the same with the zoning laws to know whether they are really meeting your needs, not to mention whether they are effectively enforced. For example, there is an industrial building within earshot of our house that likes to switch out trash dumpsters at 5 in the morning, when my wife and I would greatly prefer to be asleep. We complained to the HOA, but since the industrial building is not on land owned by the community, they can't do anything directly; all they can do is appeal to the county government to enforce its zoning ordinance, which supposedly prohibits such activities within a certain distance of residences. Did the county actually do anything about it? Hollow laugh.
how do I check if that insurance company is legitimate every time I decide to use an elevator?
How do you know the government inspector is legitimate?
Neither did the residents of Times Beach, Missouri.
And who hired the waste hauler there? The city government.
it is far easier and cheaper to allow the wisdom of those who came before stop problems before they start in the form of laws and regulations
I'm sympathetic to this argument. However, I don't see governments actually doing this. I see the "wisdom of those who came before" embodied, not in governments, but in social structures and organizations that people create and join voluntarily. For example, whatever your opinion might be about religion as a belief system, churches typically do far more to help the needy than governments do.
You would have to do the same with the zoning laws to know whether they are really meeting your needs, not to mention whether they are effectively enforced. For example, there is an industrial building within earshot of our house that likes to switch out trash dumpsters at 5 in the morning, when my wife and I would greatly prefer to be asleep. We complained to the HOA, but since the industrial building is not on land owned by the community, they can't do anything directly; all they can do is appeal to the county government to enforce its zoning ordinance, which supposedly prohibits such activities within a certain distance of residences. Did the county actually do anything about it? Hollow laugh.
how do I check if that insurance company is legitimate every time I decide to use an elevator?
How do you know the government inspector is legitimate?
Neither did the residents of Times Beach, Missouri.
And who hired the waste hauler there? The city government.
it is far easier and cheaper to allow the wisdom of those who came before stop problems before they start in the form of laws and regulations
I'm sympathetic to this argument. However, I don't see governments actually doing this. I see the "wisdom of those who came before" embodied, not in governments, but in social structures and organizations that people create and join voluntarily. For example, whatever your opinion might be about religion as a belief system, churches typically do far more to help the needy than governments do.
> I see the "wisdom of those who came before" embodied, not in governments, but in social structures and organizations that people create and join voluntarily
I see it in both. Though I would be willing to entertain the idea that people, at the age of majority or at certain milestone ages throughout their life, sign a 'declaration of civil life' or some such that basically says "Yes, I am aware of the laws and mores that cover my area and I agree to be a good citizen and, in return, I expect to have a voice in that governance."
Those that don't sign can move to a zone with laws they do agree with or a Christiania type 'freezone' where people can live free of social agreements that they would have otherwise inherited by accident of birth.
I support this because there has not really been a government free zone in any stable sense since before the written word. I'd be curious how it actually plays out.
I see it in both. Though I would be willing to entertain the idea that people, at the age of majority or at certain milestone ages throughout their life, sign a 'declaration of civil life' or some such that basically says "Yes, I am aware of the laws and mores that cover my area and I agree to be a good citizen and, in return, I expect to have a voice in that governance."
Those that don't sign can move to a zone with laws they do agree with or a Christiania type 'freezone' where people can live free of social agreements that they would have otherwise inherited by accident of birth.
I support this because there has not really been a government free zone in any stable sense since before the written word. I'd be curious how it actually plays out.
What about producing products that kill people (the infant formula in China with plastic in it) in the name of higher profit? Free market often causes irreparable harm. What about farming all the fish out of the sea? Another example of the free market.
There are some great aspects of the free market and some terrible ones.
People have been dealing with these issues for thousands of years. See those Sumerian? scripts proscribing punishment to a carpenter if a house he/she builds collapses.
There are some great aspects of the free market and some terrible ones.
People have been dealing with these issues for thousands of years. See those Sumerian? scripts proscribing punishment to a carpenter if a house he/she builds collapses.
This reminds me of the separate California, floating island ideas. I think the real qualm is what principles those places will work against. Given the actors, they believe in free market all the way. That scares the crap out of me.
So basically you are saying, that capitalism can not tolerate people who cheat out of their self interest, but if only we had the "Austrian New Man" to build a society on, it would work wonderful?
Unsure of how you inferred all that from the words OP actually wrote.
I do not see any proclamations of what capitalism can and cannot tolerate. Just a statement that we've never seen an actual free market, since we regulate the hell out of everything.
I did not see anything about an "Austrian New Man", or even the characteristics necessary for market participants. Just a statement that we've never seen an actual free market, since we regulate the hell out of everything.
I do not see any proclamations of what capitalism can and cannot tolerate. Just a statement that we've never seen an actual free market, since we regulate the hell out of everything.
I did not see anything about an "Austrian New Man", or even the characteristics necessary for market participants. Just a statement that we've never seen an actual free market, since we regulate the hell out of everything.
We have seen a lot of deregulation in the past decades, and I do not think that the experience suggests that more capitalism is the way to go. So the OP's argument seems to be, if we just deregulate even more, then - contrary to experience - we get a better system. Which sounds quite similar to the argument Leninists use to defend the Soviet Union. Hence the quip about the "Austrian New Man".
> I do not think that the experience suggests that more capitalism is the way to go
The point is if you're looking at The Real World, there's no evidence -- pro or con -- for or against a free market system. We've never experienced one. Regulated markets aren't in any sense comparable to an actual free market.
Even the smallest regulation in a free market system makes it an entirely different beast. For example if you decide to impose a tariff on a single industry in an economy, that alone will result in massive inefficiency -- and as a result, wealth disparity -- such that the system can't meaningfully be called a 'free market'. At all. It's just a regulated market economy, like we currently have.
Hence you can't take mixed economies with varying degrees of 'free-marketness' and infer from those how actual free markets will work.
There's the question of whether implementing free markets is even possible. It would certainly take a lot of barricading of human behavior from the market -- is that achievable? I don't know.
But the point is we've never tried it, so why not try it before we shoot it down?
>contrary to experience
The only experience we have is of regulated markets. There's no "contrary to experience" to ascribe to free markets, because we've never experienced free markets.
We've theorized free markets. Again, models we've built say free markets would likely be extremely efficient and beneficial for all of us.
But we've never seen, empirically, free market anything. As stated above, a mixed economy -- even one that's, like, 99% 'free' or whatever -- isn't at all comparable to a true free market. The smallest of tamperings with a true free market turns it into a completely different beast, when we're looking at things whole-economy scale.
>So the OP's argument seems to be, if we just deregulate even more, then - contrary to experience - we get a better system
In sum, OP's argument isn't that we should 'deregulate even more'. It's that we've never seen a free market, but should try one. Trying a true free market isn't a matter of 'deregulating more', it's a matter of deregulating entirely. Blank slate, start again.
The point is if you're looking at The Real World, there's no evidence -- pro or con -- for or against a free market system. We've never experienced one. Regulated markets aren't in any sense comparable to an actual free market.
Even the smallest regulation in a free market system makes it an entirely different beast. For example if you decide to impose a tariff on a single industry in an economy, that alone will result in massive inefficiency -- and as a result, wealth disparity -- such that the system can't meaningfully be called a 'free market'. At all. It's just a regulated market economy, like we currently have.
Hence you can't take mixed economies with varying degrees of 'free-marketness' and infer from those how actual free markets will work.
There's the question of whether implementing free markets is even possible. It would certainly take a lot of barricading of human behavior from the market -- is that achievable? I don't know.
But the point is we've never tried it, so why not try it before we shoot it down?
>contrary to experience
The only experience we have is of regulated markets. There's no "contrary to experience" to ascribe to free markets, because we've never experienced free markets.
We've theorized free markets. Again, models we've built say free markets would likely be extremely efficient and beneficial for all of us.
But we've never seen, empirically, free market anything. As stated above, a mixed economy -- even one that's, like, 99% 'free' or whatever -- isn't at all comparable to a true free market. The smallest of tamperings with a true free market turns it into a completely different beast, when we're looking at things whole-economy scale.
>So the OP's argument seems to be, if we just deregulate even more, then - contrary to experience - we get a better system
In sum, OP's argument isn't that we should 'deregulate even more'. It's that we've never seen a free market, but should try one. Trying a true free market isn't a matter of 'deregulating more', it's a matter of deregulating entirely. Blank slate, start again.
>Even the smallest regulation in a free market system makes it an entirely different beast.
Bullshit. Purest bullshit. No theoretical ideal can ever exist 100% pure in the real world. If you claim that it must, then you're building castles on clouds.
>In sum, OP's argument isn't that we should 'deregulate even more'. It's that we've never seen a free market, but should try one. Trying a true free market isn't a matter of 'deregulating more', it's a matter of deregulating entirely. Blank slate, start again.
This is a bullshit argument which relies on a known poison becoming a not merely effective but transhumanly miraculous cure-all pill when taken in 100% purity. You might as well become a homeopath.
Bullshit. Purest bullshit. No theoretical ideal can ever exist 100% pure in the real world. If you claim that it must, then you're building castles on clouds.
>In sum, OP's argument isn't that we should 'deregulate even more'. It's that we've never seen a free market, but should try one. Trying a true free market isn't a matter of 'deregulating more', it's a matter of deregulating entirely. Blank slate, start again.
This is a bullshit argument which relies on a known poison becoming a not merely effective but transhumanly miraculous cure-all pill when taken in 100% purity. You might as well become a homeopath.
Wouldn't some place like Somalia be considered a free market, or any place that has no functional government and, consequently, no regulations? How efficient is the market in those places?
Antarctica may also be officially government-less, but my guess is that it would be considered an artificial economy, due to the transient nature of the inhabitants and the mounds of government capital required to run the various camps.
Antarctica may also be officially government-less, but my guess is that it would be considered an artificial economy, due to the transient nature of the inhabitants and the mounds of government capital required to run the various camps.
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Real capitalism has never worked "by the book". "The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and expecting a different result."
And how about government? Are we insane to keep trying that as well?
Have you read his comment ? Or you just wanted to make a blanket statement devoid of sense?
Of course I've read it. However, demanding that capitalism work according to how Milton Friedman or anyone else described it is about as effective as demanding that it rain tomorrow, simply because it was forecasted to do so. You're standing there shaking your fist because reality doesn't want to conform to the stories you've told yourself.
Or the original poster could be trying to impose his story on reality, in which case I'd have to ask why he thinks that's such a great story in the first place[1]!
[1] http://jacobinmag.com/2013/09/dont-mention-the-war/
Or the original poster could be trying to impose his story on reality, in which case I'd have to ask why he thinks that's such a great story in the first place[1]!
[1] http://jacobinmag.com/2013/09/dont-mention-the-war/
The poster isn't painting capitalism with a broad brush, we're specifically talking about a free market economy.
We've never seen how a free market economy actually works because we don't let free market economies form without first destroying them via regulation.
We have models which persuasively suggest that a free market economy would be the most efficient possible form of trade, or at least way more efficient than our overrregulated fustercluck.
So the poster seems to be saying "jeeze, why don't we try an actual free market economy"!
Which seems eminently reasonable to me, and not at all "imposing his story on reality".
We've never seen how a free market economy actually works because we don't let free market economies form without first destroying them via regulation.
We have models which persuasively suggest that a free market economy would be the most efficient possible form of trade, or at least way more efficient than our overrregulated fustercluck.
So the poster seems to be saying "jeeze, why don't we try an actual free market economy"!
Which seems eminently reasonable to me, and not at all "imposing his story on reality".
This is equivalent to saying that criticisms of the Soviet Union have nothing to do with socialism because, "Workers controlling the means of production has never been tried!"
Yes it has. If you are going to claim that your desired system has never existed on the face of Earth, then your desired system is a utopian ideal that most likely cannot exist in the real world, or worse, would behave like a standard revolutionary utopia by destroying actually existing societies when you attempt to create it.
Oh, wait, that's exactly how neoliberalism behaves.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actually_existing_capitalism
Yes it has. If you are going to claim that your desired system has never existed on the face of Earth, then your desired system is a utopian ideal that most likely cannot exist in the real world, or worse, would behave like a standard revolutionary utopia by destroying actually existing societies when you attempt to create it.
Oh, wait, that's exactly how neoliberalism behaves.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Actually_existing_capitalism
>This is equivalent to saying that criticisms of the Soviet Union have nothing to do with socialism because, "Workers controlling the means of production has never been tried!"
The word you want is communism, not socialism. And the criticism is valid: the USSR was far from a communist state. It was more like a mixed economy leaning communist. Nobody is going to deny that there were elements of socialism in the USSR, just as there are elements of socialism in the USA now. Socialism != communism.
And I'll repeat: we're talking about a specific thing, not all capitalism. This thread is re: whether or not pure free markets work, not whether or not capitalism works. Hence your link misses the point; as, I suspect, do you.
The word you want is communism, not socialism. And the criticism is valid: the USSR was far from a communist state. It was more like a mixed economy leaning communist. Nobody is going to deny that there were elements of socialism in the USSR, just as there are elements of socialism in the USA now. Socialism != communism.
And I'll repeat: we're talking about a specific thing, not all capitalism. This thread is re: whether or not pure free markets work, not whether or not capitalism works. Hence your link misses the point; as, I suspect, do you.
I always wonder why people bring up the 2008 crisis as an example of the problems with Capitalism; in my view, it was just the self balancing mechanisms inherent in the market economy kicking in. The fact the crisis happened at all is a testament to the viability and adaptability of Capitalism. State sponsored market deficiencies can go for much longer and have worse implications.
I don't like the tone of that article at all. When you start demanding that morality, for all its subjectivity and relativity, be involved with economics, you invite troubles. The next step is for morality to be mandated through regulations. Such regulations rarely do more than benefit specific players, those who know how to bend the rules or those with higher up connections.
While I was expecting the author to call for such regulation, he surprisingly didn't.
In my view, the correct way of fighting monopolies would be using the great social tools at our disposal to make consumers more informed about the distant implications of their buying decisions. This will create an informed Capitalism, one where in the consumers are the ultimate regulators.
I don't like the tone of that article at all. When you start demanding that morality, for all its subjectivity and relativity, be involved with economics, you invite troubles. The next step is for morality to be mandated through regulations. Such regulations rarely do more than benefit specific players, those who know how to bend the rules or those with higher up connections.
While I was expecting the author to call for such regulation, he surprisingly didn't.
In my view, the correct way of fighting monopolies would be using the great social tools at our disposal to make consumers more informed about the distant implications of their buying decisions. This will create an informed Capitalism, one where in the consumers are the ultimate regulators.
> When you start demanding that morality, for all its subjectivity and relativity, be involved with economics, you invite troubles. The next step is for morality to be mandated through regulations.
That logic is the problem -- particularly on the part of the people who actually want to implement it. Legislating morality is a disease that encourages people to believe they only need to act morally when the law forces them to.
The thing about markets is that they don't want anything in particular. It isn't "markets" that want poor people to remain poor, it's a collection of specific instances of non-poor people who choose to value something else over improving the lot of the poor. A market is just a collection of people doing whatever it is they think is best. It doesn't have a conscience outside of the individuals that make it up, but its results do reflect the collective choices of the participants.
That logic is the problem -- particularly on the part of the people who actually want to implement it. Legislating morality is a disease that encourages people to believe they only need to act morally when the law forces them to.
The thing about markets is that they don't want anything in particular. It isn't "markets" that want poor people to remain poor, it's a collection of specific instances of non-poor people who choose to value something else over improving the lot of the poor. A market is just a collection of people doing whatever it is they think is best. It doesn't have a conscience outside of the individuals that make it up, but its results do reflect the collective choices of the participants.
In my view, the correct way of fighting monopolies would be using the great social tools at our disposal to make consumers more informed about the distant implications of their buying decisions. This will create an informed Capitalism, one where in the consumers are the ultimate regulators.
Can't upvote this enough.
Can't upvote this enough.
Great idea/ideal, and I share it... but until I'm wearing a HUD that can tell me what materials and processes in which factories and ports were used at each step of production and distribution contributing to each lot of cereal in the store, I'm not really informed enough at the point of economic decision to accurately reflect my utility function through my purchases. And good luck getting the producers of goods to share details even approaching that. As a class, they routinely fight additional labeling of their products, getting access to their production and distribution databases will be a far worse fight.
One might say being an informed consumer is a moral imperative, because investing time and energy into being informed sure doesn't provide a competitive advantage.
I agree, up to a point. People with disposable income can 1) spend what's required - in time and money - to be informed and 2) be willing to spend more money, if they deem it necessary, to support those distant implications - or not. But how many people are in a position to do that? In the U.S., that number seems to be dwindling, as the middle-class shrinks. Of course, the middle-class is growing in some other countries, but. . .
It's either you let the lower classes decide what self serving causes they want to support (near as in low price, or far as in environmental concerns), or you force these choices on them by the way of regulation.
Other than that, the middle-upper class is becoming more aware, informed and caring, and that more than makes up for the lack of involvement of the lower classes.
Other than that, the middle-upper class is becoming more aware, informed and caring, and that more than makes up for the lack of involvement of the lower classes.
Without morality, people will destroy themselves regardless of their socio-political-economic system.
I didn't find a single argument in favor of the claim in the title, i.e. that the market economy will somehow destroy itself without morality. It's just a firm belief the author has, or perhaps a hope ...
Yes, there's zillions of better articles. But why would a serious argument against markets be voted up here? (Any serious market abolitionist would explain pervasive externalities, enormous inefficiency of markets, rewarding participants for acting sociopathically and punishing others, etc.) But this is a place where people discuss hawking things called "minimum viable products" and so on.
I've been meaning to read The Bourgeois Virtues, a book entirely about the importance of morality in functioning market economies. But while morality is very important in a market economy, planned and traditional economies destroy themselves even more quickly in the face of moral breakdown.
Some causes of market destruction could be monopolies (that grow powerful enough to close market to new entrants) and "market for lemons". Not sure how morality could help though.
For the argument, see Schumpeter's Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy.
I used to believe that at least the consumer market economy would start to correct itself once we reached the point where there were no longer enough gainfully employed people to buy the goods and services being offered. And that would push corporations to start to re-hire the unemployed and not slash to the bone in pursuit of astronomical quarterly gains.
But that was a very myopic, "developed" nation view. I hadn't considered the use of cheap global labor and the rise of the middle and upper classes in developing nations that would provide the necessary demand for goods and services, making the "workers" in developed nations mere surplus to be discarded/ignored. (I'm watching "A Christmas Carol" right now.)
But that was a very myopic, "developed" nation view. I hadn't considered the use of cheap global labor and the rise of the middle and upper classes in developing nations that would provide the necessary demand for goods and services, making the "workers" in developed nations mere surplus to be discarded/ignored. (I'm watching "A Christmas Carol" right now.)
Reminds me of "Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other." (John Adams)
"Friedrich Hayek once said that to complain about the workings of the market was like complaining about the weather. But at least the Met Office never colonised our souls."
Seems to be a lot of expressions like that in left wing journalism. "Colonised our souls." Like all of a sudden you're reading a Yeats poem.
Seems to be a lot of expressions like that in left wing journalism. "Colonised our souls." Like all of a sudden you're reading a Yeats poem.
In my experience you almost never see phrases like that being used, certainly not in news sections. In any case, this article is an opinion piece, on Comment Is Free, which is a free-for-all, and it's not written by a journalist, but by an aide to the Archbishop of Canterbury.
For those who don't know, the Archbishop of Canterbury is the leader of the Church of England, and the current incumbent, Justin Welby, used to a finance executive in the oil industry, and tends to be engaged with these sorts of issues.
For those who don't know, the Archbishop of Canterbury is the leader of the Church of England, and the current incumbent, Justin Welby, used to a finance executive in the oil industry, and tends to be engaged with these sorts of issues.
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This is a bit off topic, but I hate it when they use pictures of malls to illustrate capitalism. I consider myself a capitalist and I despise malls, they represent mindless consumerism. They might be somewhat related to capitalism, but they will never be a paradigmatic example.
Capitalism needs consumerism to deal with its overproduction crises. The imagined "sober Protestant bourgeois ethic" of capitalism stopped having any basis in reality hundreds of years ago, around the time usury and Enclosure Laws, and Poor Laws were used to evict the peasantry from their land to forcibly create a landless proletariat.
Capitalism needs consumerism to deal with its overproduction crises.
This only illustrates the fact that "capitalism" and "free markets" are not synonymous. In a free market, producers who overproduce go out of business.
This only illustrates the fact that "capitalism" and "free markets" are not synonymous. In a free market, producers who overproduce go out of business.
Actually, in a free market overproducers try like hell to increase demand. They do that through better advertising, which these days means directed advertising. Mass media (starting with newspapers) has really changed the way the world works because it gives producers a way to affect the very fabric of society. Advertisements, TV commercials, billboards - we just accept these as part of the landscape. We accept the constant intrusion of private enterprise to influence our thought, which is strange indeed.
Mark Twain wrote a remarkable little book called "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court", which to me is the quintessentially American book on capitalism as it is fetishized by Ayn Rand etc. The man travels back in time, and proceeds to use his technical knowledge to enrich himself, and civilize the medieval society. One of the steps he takes is to introduce advertising to the knights shields. This is presented un-ironically.
Of course Twain grew up in a very different time where the ratio of city to country was far different, and cities themselves were much humbler affairs. It was easy (and indeed the default) to be "in nature". So the product of "American ingenuity" no matter how crass represented lovely "civilization", and one could turn away from it if one didn't like it, and venture back into the forest. But now, with our mega-cities there are few forests left, and they are far away, and if we turn away from one advertisement we are just confronted with another and another and then another.
Mark Twain wrote a remarkable little book called "A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court", which to me is the quintessentially American book on capitalism as it is fetishized by Ayn Rand etc. The man travels back in time, and proceeds to use his technical knowledge to enrich himself, and civilize the medieval society. One of the steps he takes is to introduce advertising to the knights shields. This is presented un-ironically.
Of course Twain grew up in a very different time where the ratio of city to country was far different, and cities themselves were much humbler affairs. It was easy (and indeed the default) to be "in nature". So the product of "American ingenuity" no matter how crass represented lovely "civilization", and one could turn away from it if one didn't like it, and venture back into the forest. But now, with our mega-cities there are few forests left, and they are far away, and if we turn away from one advertisement we are just confronted with another and another and then another.
Actually, in a free market overproducers try like hell to increase demand.
They can try, yes; but if they don't succeed, they go out of business. In systems that are referred to by the term "capitalism", OTOH, they can often get the government to force increases in demand--for example, railroad owners in the late 1800's who had failed in open competition went to the government to get laws passed that gave them exclusive rights to certain routes.
Also, a free market means that if people choose to buy something, then that something gets made, whether or not it's something that you think "ought" to be made.
with our mega-cities there are few forests left
Do you have any actual numbers to back up this claim? AFAIK there is still a lot of land occupied by forests and other "natural" environments. I live near a major city but there is plenty of forest an hour's drive away. Maybe you need to get out more?
if we turn away from one advertisement we are just confronted with another and another and then another
I think that depends on how you choose to spend your time. Yes, if you spend a lot of time watching TV you can't avoid seeing a lot of ads. I solve that problem by not watching much TV. Similar remarks apply to other kinds of advertising.
Btw, I'm not trying to say I'm in favor of advertising; I'm not. I think most of it is a great waste of effort. But ads aren't aimed at someone like me anyway; they're aimed at people who are actually influenced by them. So if you really want to get rid of ads, you need to find a way to convince people that they shouldn't be influenced by them. Which, btw, is what a true free market requires anyway: it means the responsibility for making sure that your buying decisions reflect your actual values lies with you.
They can try, yes; but if they don't succeed, they go out of business. In systems that are referred to by the term "capitalism", OTOH, they can often get the government to force increases in demand--for example, railroad owners in the late 1800's who had failed in open competition went to the government to get laws passed that gave them exclusive rights to certain routes.
Also, a free market means that if people choose to buy something, then that something gets made, whether or not it's something that you think "ought" to be made.
with our mega-cities there are few forests left
Do you have any actual numbers to back up this claim? AFAIK there is still a lot of land occupied by forests and other "natural" environments. I live near a major city but there is plenty of forest an hour's drive away. Maybe you need to get out more?
if we turn away from one advertisement we are just confronted with another and another and then another
I think that depends on how you choose to spend your time. Yes, if you spend a lot of time watching TV you can't avoid seeing a lot of ads. I solve that problem by not watching much TV. Similar remarks apply to other kinds of advertising.
Btw, I'm not trying to say I'm in favor of advertising; I'm not. I think most of it is a great waste of effort. But ads aren't aimed at someone like me anyway; they're aimed at people who are actually influenced by them. So if you really want to get rid of ads, you need to find a way to convince people that they shouldn't be influenced by them. Which, btw, is what a true free market requires anyway: it means the responsibility for making sure that your buying decisions reflect your actual values lies with you.
Capitalism needs a government that succeeds in protecting individual rights. The situation you describe is one where property rights were not protected. That's not a failure of capitalism, but of government.
>Capitalism needs consumerism to deal with its overproduction crises.
No it doesn't. Capitalism still works just fine if people decide to work less and spend less.
No it doesn't. Capitalism still works just fine if people decide to work less and spend less.
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The many legions of people more thoughtful than us all throughout the millennia who have moralized against greed might've made a dent by now if moralizing were the answer.
Yeah we haven't found any new solutions to old problems for millennia, in fact progress stopped centuries ago. I wish people would just stop trying to improve the world and just enjoy being cynical about it instead.
its interesting that you assume I mean then that cynicism is the answer. I think we have an economic structure that uses fear as its primary motivator. Fear of depression, homelessness, suffering, and death. Working toward a solution of quantifiable inspiration would be a much more meaningful approach.
I think you can intentionally inspire people, since we all have experienced people who do it to us over and over again. So all that must be done is treat that as an abstract principle rather than intangibility, define it, and apply it more broadly.
I think you can intentionally inspire people, since we all have experienced people who do it to us over and over again. So all that must be done is treat that as an abstract principle rather than intangibility, define it, and apply it more broadly.
Your original comment did sound cynical. This comment on the other hand sounds as though it is grounded in a morality.
I agree but I am not moralizing, which I believe are different things. If there is an immoral action or event recurrently happening it is because the structure of society is allowing it to happen. It will not be solved through shaming anyone.
It makes no more sense to shame poor people who are desperate for welfare than it does to shame wall street bankers. Both are products of the same system, and both groups can be given the space to change themselves through modifying the way things work rather than who is working in them.
It makes no more sense to shame poor people who are desperate for welfare than it does to shame wall street bankers. Both are products of the same system, and both groups can be given the space to change themselves through modifying the way things work rather than who is working in them.
Shaming and moralizing aren't the same thing either. I agree with you about the structure of the system producing immoral actions, however I think that in order to change the structure, we must recognize the immorality otherwise this is just an empty abstraction.
It is finally powerful as an abstraction. Assigning the immorality to individuals is exactly what perpetuates the overall system.
Sure - don't assign immorality to individuals. However you have to assign it to something - so what do you assign it to?
If someone is acting immorally, rather than condemning them think about how they came to be. Look at how the system corresponds to that. And then, ask how to change that system to encourage different behavior without using more abuse/punishment/rat traps to induce that new systemic output. I think you will find that few people desire to act immorally, but they also are bound within their system. They get defensive when you tell them they have to be different; they know it will not work given the framework they operate within.
If instead you ask them how to change the system, allowing them to be better, they can be your ally. I do not think approaching them with a pre-formulated answer will as effectively draft them into the cause as genuinely asking them how they would do it.
If instead you ask them how to change the system, allowing them to be better, they can be your ally. I do not think approaching them with a pre-formulated answer will as effectively draft them into the cause as genuinely asking them how they would do it.
I'm asking you, and it isn't working. That's not a good start.
Also really, while I'm sympathetic to the idea that people's behavior is a largely a product of circumstance, if I ask a poor person who had resorted to crime to survive how to change the system, I expect familiar answers about making the system more fair.
If I ask a Wall Street Banker, who is happily extracting maximum profits from the poor, regardless of cost, I expect familiar answers about how they shouldn't make poor economic decisions.
I have actually spoken to people at all levels of society, and I haven't heard a lot of great solutions about how to change the system.
Since you have either had different results from your conversations, or have ideas of your own, I invite you to share some here.
Also really, while I'm sympathetic to the idea that people's behavior is a largely a product of circumstance, if I ask a poor person who had resorted to crime to survive how to change the system, I expect familiar answers about making the system more fair.
If I ask a Wall Street Banker, who is happily extracting maximum profits from the poor, regardless of cost, I expect familiar answers about how they shouldn't make poor economic decisions.
I have actually spoken to people at all levels of society, and I haven't heard a lot of great solutions about how to change the system.
Since you have either had different results from your conversations, or have ideas of your own, I invite you to share some here.
Those are great points, it is not an easy thing to induce in a single question. I attempted, in perhaps a way that will seem too distant,in this short piece I wrote here:
http://atljmi.tumblr.com/post/69789805435/a-girl-who-cant-di...
It is possible. It's asking people to abstract themselves from their material circumstances and consider the underlying principles of their world and,given those principles, think about how they can be shifted toward something better. I did not need to moralize first against the school system's injustices in order to reach that little girl in that moment; that is a displacement from the actual thing I wanted to do. I had to think about how to reach her in that moment itself within the boundaries as they are. Directly addressing the moment itself rather than ways to make the future version of this moment more palatable.
http://atljmi.tumblr.com/post/69789805435/a-girl-who-cant-di...
It is possible. It's asking people to abstract themselves from their material circumstances and consider the underlying principles of their world and,given those principles, think about how they can be shifted toward something better. I did not need to moralize first against the school system's injustices in order to reach that little girl in that moment; that is a displacement from the actual thing I wanted to do. I had to think about how to reach her in that moment itself within the boundaries as they are. Directly addressing the moment itself rather than ways to make the future version of this moment more palatable.
That sounds a lot as though you engaged in a spontaneous act of something like process oriented psychology, which is often very effective as a method of healing. Maybe if more people in a leadership or teaching role understood this method, they would do less harm.
And, to use your framing from earlier, I'm curious about what change in the system would make you able to be better?
And, to use your framing from earlier, I'm curious about what change in the system would make you able to be better?
Incidentally the original posting has nothing to do with moralizing.
"It's not about morality versus markets" (my emphasis)
Markets are a great optimization mechanism. It is up to societies to decide what they should optimize.
Markets are a great optimization mechanism. It is up to societies to decide what they should optimize.
This is a wonderful way to say it.
My further extrapolation is to turn the full might of the market to advertise and sell poverty relief without treating it like charity but instead treating it like a product. None of the moralizing, just focus on what the purchaser will get out of the exchange, like any other product.
My further extrapolation is to turn the full might of the market to advertise and sell poverty relief without treating it like charity but instead treating it like a product. None of the moralizing, just focus on what the purchaser will get out of the exchange, like any other product.
Markets optimize whatever you define as being capital, distributing it to the owners of whatever you define as being property. They are not moral in and of themselves, neither do they achieve anything that another optimization process couldn't achieve if it likewise relied on massively parallel, breadth-first heuristic searches of the possibility space.
But of course, that takes all the delicious magic out of them, so people are going to have to yell something about freedom now.
But of course, that takes all the delicious magic out of them, so people are going to have to yell something about freedom now.
or maybe they were wrong, and what they called "greed" was an ill defined and useless concept. In order to say what is "greed", one must usually define some means of obtaining wealth that are immoral. But given this one might as well say not to do immoral things, and forget the concept of greed.
While the article was not unreasonable, I had the feeling he was trying to reinterpret these millennia of moralizing into something that made economic sense, and all he could come up with was "monopolies are bad". Which is true in most cases, but I don't think he made a convincing connection with personal ethical behavior.
While the article was not unreasonable, I had the feeling he was trying to reinterpret these millennia of moralizing into something that made economic sense, and all he could come up with was "monopolies are bad". Which is true in most cases, but I don't think he made a convincing connection with personal ethical behavior.
It's not like anyone ever just said "don't be greedy" and nothing more. But even then:
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greed
Also see: selfishness, double standards, externalizing risks and costs while the reaping profits. Such things (can) stem from greed, and they can add up to catastrophic effects. These effects linger, while the "gains" from greed end when the greedy person dies.
>a convincing connection with personal ethical behavior
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greed
Also see: selfishness, double standards, externalizing risks and costs while the reaping profits. Such things (can) stem from greed, and they can add up to catastrophic effects. These effects linger, while the "gains" from greed end when the greedy person dies.
>a convincing connection with personal ethical behavior
aggregate = 0;
last_aggregate = 0;
while (true)
{
for (i = peeps.length; i--;)
{
aggregate += peeps[i].behaviour(world.state, last_aggregate);
}
world.update(aggregate);
last_aggregate = aggregate;
}If you want to define greed as imposing externalities on others (e.g. someone who finds that burning plastic in their backyard is legal because of some loophole, and so creates a garbage disposal facility there) then I agree that this is something we should try to avoid, but this is not what has been preached for millennia. In fact the discussion on gentrification shows that most people still cannot distinguish what is and is not an externality.
I couldn't understand what your code was supposed to prove, probably because it was full of premature optimization and mutable state.
I couldn't understand what your code was supposed to prove, probably because it was full of premature optimization and mutable state.
> If you want to define greed as imposing externalities on others
No, but I mentioned those things because they can result from greed, which is why greed is bad. If greed didn't result in destructive action, or if the negative effects were borne by those causing them, it wouldn't matter. And those things, multiplied by millions or even billions of people in an endless loop, can lead to vast destruction, too.
> this is not what has been preached for millennia
Whoever oppresses the poor to increase his own wealth, or gives to the rich, will only come to poverty -- Proverb 22:16
No, but I mentioned those things because they can result from greed, which is why greed is bad. If greed didn't result in destructive action, or if the negative effects were borne by those causing them, it wouldn't matter. And those things, multiplied by millions or even billions of people in an endless loop, can lead to vast destruction, too.
> this is not what has been preached for millennia
Whoever oppresses the poor to increase his own wealth, or gives to the rich, will only come to poverty -- Proverb 22:16
But you still haven't shown that Greed is a meaningful concept. Indeed, the link you posted shows
You still have failed to define greed (or show that it causes these bad things you refer to). And your quote is very vague, I have no idea what it is saying a person should avoid doing.
Greed (englisch für Gier) ist:
der Originaltitel des Films Gier (1924)
der Name einer deutschen Band, siehe Greed (Band)
der Name des Albums der Swans, siehe Greed
You still have failed to define greed (or show that it causes these bad things you refer to). And your quote is very vague, I have no idea what it is saying a person should avoid doing.
I am sorry, wikipedia shows me German search results by default, I wanted to link to the English one but messed up.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greed
> the inordinate desire to possess wealth, goods, or objects of abstract value with the intention to keep it for one's self, far beyond the dictates of basic survival and comfort.
or, in German: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habgier ^^
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greed
> the inordinate desire to possess wealth, goods, or objects of abstract value with the intention to keep it for one's self, far beyond the dictates of basic survival and comfort.
or, in German: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Habgier ^^
How do you define happiness?
Putting money over people.
What makes you think the world wouldn't be an ever darker place without it? What else do you suggest?
we've spent a great deal of energy solving how to reverse engineer depression with moderate success. how about taking it the next step and figuring out how to quantifiably induce inspiration.
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Without morality, ANY social system, not just a market economy, will have problems, since many moral constructs directly lead to social stability. Some basic examples:
1) Thou shalt not steal, cheat, murder, etc... 2) Notions of karma -- i.e. everything you do unto others will come back to you.
1) Thou shalt not steal, cheat, murder, etc... 2) Notions of karma -- i.e. everything you do unto others will come back to you.
From the headline I thought this was a stunning result from academia. Then in the first two paragraphs I read the words "Pope", "Rush Limbaugh", "Archbishop", "Jesus", "Marxist", etc.
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There are no moral phenomena, only moral interpretations.
This is true in the sense that a market economy, i.e. capitalism, is based on morality. Few people are aware of the moral justification for capitalism. Morality trumps politics. Without a moral justification, the market economy won't survive.
> "No social system (and no human institution or activity of any kind) can survive without a moral base. On the basis of the altruist morality, capitalism had to be—and was—damned from the start." -Ayn Rand, Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, 30
> "No social system (and no human institution or activity of any kind) can survive without a moral base. On the basis of the altruist morality, capitalism had to be—and was—damned from the start." -Ayn Rand, Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal, 30
When was capitalism ever based on altruism? Isn't the idea rather that everybody being as selfish as possible magically leads to good results?
Initially it was based on that. Then, when that didn't work, it shifted over to Ayn Rand's "material self-interest is the only good" system of ethics.
The idea you are referring to is about self interest not selfishness.
I know that the idea is enlightened self-interest.
Is it in the enlightened self-interest of a person that after they died, there is still life in the Universe? Is it in my enlightened self-interest that those who starve and have no water have a better life?
What, exactly, is the difference between self-interest and selfishness? Is one not just a euphemism for the other?
Is it in the enlightened self-interest of a person that after they died, there is still life in the Universe? Is it in my enlightened self-interest that those who starve and have no water have a better life?
What, exactly, is the difference between self-interest and selfishness? Is one not just a euphemism for the other?
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The latest podcast of Freakonomics discussed this; believe it or don't, but it was quite thought provoking nonetheless.
"Many have argued that capitalism does not offer a satisfactory moral message. But that is like saying that calculus does not contain cabrohydrates, amino acids, or other essential nutrients. Everything fails by irrevelant standards."
-- Thomas Sowell
-- Thomas Sowell
Wait does that mean slavery is morally neutral?
Because capitalism predates feudalism as the economic model and slavery predates feudalism.
Because capitalism predates feudalism as the economic model and slavery predates feudalism.
The real problem is that capitalism does not care about efficiency, it only cares about billing someone else for any inefficiencies you create. See: Enterprise IT.
For some reason, I thought of Rahm Emanual (used to be Obama's chief of staff) when he said "You never want a serious crisis to go to waste" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yeA_kHHLow
Unfortunately, you have leftist statists that want market economies to fail so they can impose their statist, opressive regimes on people under the guise of "helping the people"
Unfortunately, you have leftist statists that want market economies to fail so they can impose their statist, opressive regimes on people under the guise of "helping the people"
>Unfortunately, you have leftist statists that want market economies to fail so they can impose their statist, opressive regimes on people under the guise of "helping the people"
You really believe this is the case with people like Emanuel and the Obama admin in general? Because, I wonder: what do you think their endgame is? What is their true motivation for wanting to establish a statist, oppresive regime?
It seems to me that we currently have a corporatist regime. If I am to choose between rule by corporations (where the motive is profit) and rule by the state (where I presumably have a voice), I'd choose the latter.
Problem is, however, we currently have the worst of both worlds: rule by a corporatist state.
You really believe this is the case with people like Emanuel and the Obama admin in general? Because, I wonder: what do you think their endgame is? What is their true motivation for wanting to establish a statist, oppresive regime?
It seems to me that we currently have a corporatist regime. If I am to choose between rule by corporations (where the motive is profit) and rule by the state (where I presumably have a voice), I'd choose the latter.
Problem is, however, we currently have the worst of both worlds: rule by a corporatist state.
The bottom line (a big one) is that corporations don't have guns and can take you away.
Author: "Malcolm Brown is director of mission and public affairs for the Church of England".
All social problems will be eventually solved through technology, not morality.
Interesting that you chose to specify social problems. I would say that social problems are perhaps those which technology is particularly poor at addressing, even though it is very good at solving practical ones (how to get from point A to point B, how to live longer, how to better keep track of your information, etc.). As opposed to these practical problems, social problems seem to be the ones without any clear cut "correct" answer, and I couldn't really say that technology is a good tool for solving ambiguous problems.
(By the way the "social" I'm referencing here are things like class conflict, racism, etc. - not "social" as in communication tools.)
(By the way the "social" I'm referencing here are things like class conflict, racism, etc. - not "social" as in communication tools.)
What do you mean there is no clear, correct answer to social problems? I think there are many solutions, the impossibility to solve them has more to do with either upper social classes not wanting to lose power (nothing can be enforced to the enforcers) or precisely because is "morally" wrong to do what will surely work.
Social problems aren't objective in the way that, say, math problems are. They are conflicts of the current state of objective reality with some set of subjective preferences. And the fact that a group of people shares preference to an extent that they can agree on the problem doesn't mean that they share preferences enough that the same solution would be optimum—or even better than the status quo—for all members of the group.
You made a very interesting point here, I guess I will re-evaluate my opinion on this topic, thanks!
Alternatively, technology may amplify social problems instead.
Why instead? Actually it can be doing both at the same time. My point is that only technology that works inside the society will stay. Most likely the ones that create social problems will be replaced for those that don't.
Why most likely? It's just as possible that the social problems will impede our ability to develop or introduce technology that makes society better.
Morality was one of the first technologies.
While it can be certainly categorized as technology, I don't consider it so because it's based in purely subjective concepts like "good" and "bad" (right or wrong), instead of objective ones (working or not working). I agree that subjective concepts can control society, but so can art too (basically any idea has an impact on the human mind) and we do not normally classify art as technology. I understand that some rules in our moral code are indeed required for a working society, and because of those people see moral as indispensable, but still we can do much better without carrying the historical (and probably religious) payload.
Is this Nietzschean or something? What is it saying?
At some point in our past we transitioned from being an amoral animal to a self-aware species with notions of morality. Certain things/behaviors are right and others are wrong. That clearly had a survival advantage.
Moral facts are not self-evident. We became aware of disagreement, but about the games we use to describe right and wrong. It's what comes after the "because".
Saying "X is wrong" and "Y knows X is wrong" mean two very different things depending on your analysis. "Notions of morality" is about the first statement and about the second. Does Y know X is wrong in virtue of the moral fact that X is wrong? If grass is green, there's something I'm learning when I read "Grass is green" — or is it upon seeing grass that I know grass is green?
The point here is the features of facts: one does not see the wrongness of an act in the way that one sees grass is green, irrespective to the question of language. Now, of course, morality is primarily codified into symbols — do facts exist here, behind the veil of language? Perhaps. But the main question here is the structure of a fact: Is it a picture? If I know the constant of gravity, I know something about the shape of galaxies through relativity. I can see regularity across the heavens. I can test it and measure its components, but only in virtue of axiomitization, which is linguistic. Well, how does one test morality? Does one collect report on opinion, or does one look into the world to discover their structure? Certainly reports on moral opinion will be picture-like, but do they disclose the structure we would find if morality could be discovered in the world without reports on it? Is direct evidence possible without the existence of indirect evidence?
Saying "X is wrong" and "Y knows X is wrong" mean two very different things depending on your analysis. "Notions of morality" is about the first statement and about the second. Does Y know X is wrong in virtue of the moral fact that X is wrong? If grass is green, there's something I'm learning when I read "Grass is green" — or is it upon seeing grass that I know grass is green?
The point here is the features of facts: one does not see the wrongness of an act in the way that one sees grass is green, irrespective to the question of language. Now, of course, morality is primarily codified into symbols — do facts exist here, behind the veil of language? Perhaps. But the main question here is the structure of a fact: Is it a picture? If I know the constant of gravity, I know something about the shape of galaxies through relativity. I can see regularity across the heavens. I can test it and measure its components, but only in virtue of axiomitization, which is linguistic. Well, how does one test morality? Does one collect report on opinion, or does one look into the world to discover their structure? Certainly reports on moral opinion will be picture-like, but do they disclose the structure we would find if morality could be discovered in the world without reports on it? Is direct evidence possible without the existence of indirect evidence?
Are ants self-aware or moral? Let me be honest, I don't think there was a "transition"; as far as we lived in groups, we were always using social rules that work, instead of those that didn't.
If the prophets of technological revolution weren't such complete jerks when it came to social issues, I might actually still be naive enough to believe that.
I'm not sure if you're thinking into physical modern technology like electronics and stuff, but just in case, I meant technology more broadly (any human-made tool, machine, technique or system).
That in itself would simply constitute yet another social problem, and solve nothing.
There is also the matter of subsidy and when the government bails a company out. Old business models get kept running when the invisible hand of the market would have swept them to one side, maybe to allow new business models to take hold.
Then there is outright corruption - backhanders to win government contracts. This is not 'letting the market decide'.
Even worse there is the likes of Lockheed Martin able to own the government, listen in through NSA on rival contractors bids and win favourable contracts for themselves and the companies they do business with.
Then there is the small matter of law. Larger businesses can get away with polluting the environment and running unfair business practices that mean their rivals are not playing on a level playing field.
Also, there are costs to business that are not paid for by those businesses. If the taxpayer is expected to pay for the road to an industrial estate on a greenfield site just to get some lousy business to setup in that area then again this is not 'market economy'.
Also there are those government services that are sold on the private marketplace. For instance, the market in weather information, e.g. for television news, should be a profitable one, however, if the government's private arm of their weather service - e.g. the UK Met Office - competes in that space then again things are not fair.
However you look at it we have not got a 'market economy', we have something corrupt, with cronies and their backhanders rigging the marketplace. It is not free and fair trade. We can forget about 'morality', let's just do things by the book.