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On July 12 2025 17:00 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 16:25 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 16:09 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 06:21 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 06:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 04:56 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 03:03 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 02:34 Dan HH wrote:On July 12 2025 01:29 WombaT wrote:On July 11 2025 19:27 Dan HH wrote:
[quote]
There's a very obvious one. There's obscene wealth inequality under every ism, current and historical. Capitalist Finland has a significantly lower Gini coefficient than socialist Cuba, Venezuela or Vietnam. Obscene wealth inequality has little to do with -ism and everything to do with culture.
If a country undergoes a cultural shift that makes them pursue a switch to socialism, it's that shift that would be the cause of decreased inequality, rather than socialism. If that switch happens by geopolitical happenstance (as we've seen in Eastern Europe) rather than a cultural shift, then there is no meaningful change in inequality, people just play slightly different games with different rules to get ahead than they did before. Correct IMO but I don’t think it’s a great argument that wealth inequality isn’t an absolute innate problem with capitalism. At least in a part A consideration, which is recognising a problem. The part B, getting a viable alternative is a good bit trickier, but one lacking a solid proposition doesn’t mean the analysis of part A is off base. I think you make a great point overall. One that’s frequently overlooked for, some reason. They’re economic systems absolutely, but they’re inextricable from cultural values. If the culture doesn’t shift, you’ll get quite similar outcomes. Socialism certainly suffers from not being the status quo, plus its history isn’t great. As much as some will deny the latter, I wouldn’t personally. There’s probably some alternate timeline where idk a nation like Finland went from capitalism with a kinder face, to something approaching socialism in a gradual way, and you don’t have these cautionary tales of authoritarian attempts at socialism and things look rather different. My point is that the importance of the ism is heavily overstated + Show Spoiler + and sort of misses the forest for the trees. The flavor of local capitalism or socialism and how much inequality they allow is dictated by local values rather than the other way around.
This isn't a chicken-and-egg situation, we know empirically that merely having a coup/revolution and changing the economic system without an underlying cultural shift doesn't fix this.
If we want a better future for everyone we need more people on 'team empathy' and make more people derive self-worth from something other than comparing possessions and holiday destinations.
The countries that would be good at socialism are the ones that need it the least, the ones with a culture that's already less individualistic and materialistic, and with a high level of trust in institutions and each other. The US is at the opposite end at the moment, thinking that the solution to its problems is a socialist revolution right now is sort of like thinking that the solution to 'how to build a bridge' is having an engineering degree mailed to you. It really isn't. Doing capitalism correctly specifically requires obscene wealth inequality and exploitation. I'm trying to focus on describing what many of us specifically and actually agree on, while you all keep jumping the gun and rushing to the socialist revolution you disagree with (or being weird and talking about furries). So far it seems we're mostly in agreement on the these three points thus far: 1. Obscene wealth inequality is inherently immoral and a risk to security of any state, the faster people realize that the faster we'll be able to fix it. 2. Obscene wealth inequality is inextricable from capitalism. 3. Capitalism/Capitalists must be overcome to overcome obscene wealth inequality I believe we should craft a 4th starting with 4. We need to overcome capitalism with a different system that does put checks on human greed (as suggested by Acro) Alternatively, you could also engage. It isn't hard to get agreement on "the current system is shit, it needs replacing". You'll find agreement on that even from MAGA people, you just don't like their proposal. Alternatively to what? I don't really want to talk about furries or be the 62094793409th time someone has fallen for oBlade's latest bad faith bait. Try explaining how your version of communism is going to avoid the pitfalls of the USSR, China, Venezuela and so on. That's not what I asked and neither did Dan. Americans, as a nation, firmly believe that capitalism is the best road to prosperity and the underlying culture is one of massive consumerism and love for all things money-related. I asked how he was going to change that, since, as Dan pointed out, simply changing the government system doesn't do much if people behave in the same way, i.e. system change is ineffective without cultural change. GH answered that he didn't need to convince people that socialism would be better for people's wellbeing than the existing system, i.e. a cultural change is unnecessary, that this wasn't how things worked in America, and that it was more important to make lists of things we all agree on. I find that answer on the disappointing side so I asked him to actually engage with the question. The reason why a lot of Americans believe capitalism is the ultimate good is because they've been fed capitalist propaganda throughout the Cold War. They didn't come to love capitalism on their own. Propagandists used the Soviet Union as a convenient villain and created a false dichotomy: look at them, then look at us. Which system fares better? Today those propagandists have a problem. The EU is looking much better than the US. We have a balanced mix between capitalism and socialism, and yet we're prospering. We're strictly better than the US, with a few exceptions such as Italy. As time progresses the EU is going to outpace the US even more. Especially when looking at specific countries and not just the whole block. It's even possible that the US will eventually fall behind in GDP. But that will take a few more generations. https://www.statista.com/statistics/1370584/g7-country-gdp-levels/Let's hope we continue to be outpaced in such a way
We had the GDP debate. You lost, get over it.
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On July 12 2025 18:48 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 16:35 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 16:25 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 16:09 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 06:21 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 06:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 04:56 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 03:03 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 02:34 Dan HH wrote:On July 12 2025 01:29 WombaT wrote:
[quote]
Correct IMO but I don’t think it’s a great argument that wealth inequality isn’t an absolute innate problem with capitalism. At least in a part A consideration, which is recognising a problem. The part B, getting a viable alternative is a good bit trickier, but one lacking a solid proposition doesn’t mean the analysis of part A is off base.
I think you make a great point overall. One that’s frequently overlooked for, some reason. They’re economic systems absolutely, but they’re inextricable from cultural values. If the culture doesn’t shift, you’ll get quite similar outcomes.
Socialism certainly suffers from not being the status quo, plus its history isn’t great. As much as some will deny the latter, I wouldn’t personally.
There’s probably some alternate timeline where idk a nation like Finland went from capitalism with a kinder face, to something approaching socialism in a gradual way, and you don’t have these cautionary tales of authoritarian attempts at socialism and things look rather different. My point is that the importance of the ism is heavily overstated + Show Spoiler + and sort of misses the forest for the trees. The flavor of local capitalism or socialism and how much inequality they allow is dictated by local values rather than the other way around.
This isn't a chicken-and-egg situation, we know empirically that merely having a coup/revolution and changing the economic system without an underlying cultural shift doesn't fix this.
If we want a better future for everyone we need more people on 'team empathy' and make more people derive self-worth from something other than comparing possessions and holiday destinations.
The countries that would be good at socialism are the ones that need it the least, the ones with a culture that's already less individualistic and materialistic, and with a high level of trust in institutions and each other. The US is at the opposite end at the moment, thinking that the solution to its problems is a socialist revolution right now is sort of like thinking that the solution to 'how to build a bridge' is having an engineering degree mailed to you. It really isn't. Doing capitalism correctly specifically requires obscene wealth inequality and exploitation. I'm trying to focus on describing what many of us specifically and actually agree on, while you all keep jumping the gun and rushing to the socialist revolution you disagree with (or being weird and talking about furries). So far it seems we're mostly in agreement on the these three points thus far: 1. Obscene wealth inequality is inherently immoral and a risk to security of any state, the faster people realize that the faster we'll be able to fix it. 2. Obscene wealth inequality is inextricable from capitalism. 3. Capitalism/Capitalists must be overcome to overcome obscene wealth inequality I believe we should craft a 4th starting with 4. We need to overcome capitalism with a different system that does put checks on human greed (as suggested by Acro) Alternatively, you could also engage. It isn't hard to get agreement on "the current system is shit, it needs replacing". You'll find agreement on that even from MAGA people, you just don't like their proposal. Alternatively to what? I don't really want to talk about furries or be the 62094793409th time someone has fallen for oBlade's latest bad faith bait. Try explaining how your version of communism is going to avoid the pitfalls of the USSR, China, Venezuela and so on. That's not what I asked and neither did Dan. Americans, as a nation, firmly believe that capitalism is the best road to prosperity and the underlying culture is one of massive consumerism and love for all things money-related. I asked how he was going to change that, since, as Dan pointed out, simply changing the government system doesn't do much if people behave in the same way, i.e. system change is ineffective without cultural change. GH answered that he didn't need to convince people that socialism would be better for people's wellbeing than the existing system, i.e. a cultural change is unnecessary, that this wasn't how things worked in America, and that it was more important to make lists of things we all agree on. I find that answer on the disappointing side so I asked him to actually engage with the question. The reason why a lot of Americans believe capitalism is the ultimate good is because they've been fed capitalist propaganda throughout the Cold War. They didn't come to love capitalism on their own. Propagandists used the Soviet Union as a convenient villain and created a false dichotomy: look at them, then look at us. Which system fares better? Today those propagandists have a problem. The EU is looking much better than the US. We have a balanced mix between capitalism and socialism, and yet we're prospering. We're strictly better than the US, with a few exceptions such as Italy. As time progresses the EU is going to outpace the US even more. Especially when looking at specific countries and not just the whole block. It's even possible that the US will eventually fall behind in GDP. But that will take a few more generations. Capitalism has been a clear driver for prosperity. This is inarguable, it's not just propaganda. Based on what evidence exactly? The US is an outlier. Most EU countries are not capitalist and they manage to stand shoulder to shoulder with all the economic giants. Even China has been radically catching up and they're certainly not a capitalist country. They just became a bit less oppressive. There's very little evidence proving that full-blown capitalism is all that great for people's pockets or any other kind of prosperity. Under what definition of capitalism are you working where the US is capitalist but the EU is not?
And yes I know lots of EU countries are considered social democracies but fundamentally there is little difference between the EU and US in this. Largely the same systems as exist under EU social democracies also exist in the US, tho arguably worse.
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What a comprehensive implosion.
Claim Europe is going to outpace the US even more in the future. Realize by GDP Europe hasn't been outpacing the US at all, so they can't do it even more in the future because they haven't yet begun the outpacing. Highlight GDP per capita instead while discounting its importance also for some reason. + Show Spoiler +Probably after realizing the European countries who are really killing it when it comes to performance on that metric are only Turkey, tiny ones, and ones that reject immigration?
What exactly is the EU outpacing the US in? Feelings do not count. Sure GDP is invalid, show everyone the freedom and food safety and education stats.
Europe and the US are both experiencing economic growth. This is good. Not everything needs to be a dick measuring contest. China has grown so much as to make Germany's economy look like a bag of peanuts - That's not because of the inherent superiority of China's centralized market system, it's because the past 3 decades they were a developing country. No matter what system you have, the gains from going from peasant farming to an industrialized and commercial powerhouse are massive.
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On July 12 2025 20:26 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 18:48 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 16:35 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 16:25 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 16:09 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 06:21 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 06:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 04:56 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 03:03 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 02:34 Dan HH wrote:[quote] My point is that the importance of the ism is heavily overstated + Show Spoiler + and sort of misses the forest for the trees. The flavor of local capitalism or socialism and how much inequality they allow is dictated by local values rather than the other way around.
This isn't a chicken-and-egg situation, we know empirically that merely having a coup/revolution and changing the economic system without an underlying cultural shift doesn't fix this.
If we want a better future for everyone we need more people on 'team empathy' and make more people derive self-worth from something other than comparing possessions and holiday destinations.
The countries that would be good at socialism are the ones that need it the least, the ones with a culture that's already less individualistic and materialistic, and with a high level of trust in institutions and each other. The US is at the opposite end at the moment, thinking that the solution to its problems is a socialist revolution right now is sort of like thinking that the solution to 'how to build a bridge' is having an engineering degree mailed to you. It really isn't. Doing capitalism correctly specifically requires obscene wealth inequality and exploitation. I'm trying to focus on describing what many of us specifically and actually agree on, while you all keep jumping the gun and rushing to the socialist revolution you disagree with (or being weird and talking about furries). So far it seems we're mostly in agreement on the these three points thus far: 1. Obscene wealth inequality is inherently immoral and a risk to security of any state, the faster people realize that the faster we'll be able to fix it. 2. Obscene wealth inequality is inextricable from capitalism. 3. Capitalism/Capitalists must be overcome to overcome obscene wealth inequality I believe we should craft a 4th starting with 4. We need to overcome capitalism with a different system that does put checks on human greed (as suggested by Acro) Alternatively, you could also engage. It isn't hard to get agreement on "the current system is shit, it needs replacing". You'll find agreement on that even from MAGA people, you just don't like their proposal. Alternatively to what? I don't really want to talk about furries or be the 62094793409th time someone has fallen for oBlade's latest bad faith bait. Try explaining how your version of communism is going to avoid the pitfalls of the USSR, China, Venezuela and so on. That's not what I asked and neither did Dan. Americans, as a nation, firmly believe that capitalism is the best road to prosperity and the underlying culture is one of massive consumerism and love for all things money-related. I asked how he was going to change that, since, as Dan pointed out, simply changing the government system doesn't do much if people behave in the same way, i.e. system change is ineffective without cultural change. GH answered that he didn't need to convince people that socialism would be better for people's wellbeing than the existing system, i.e. a cultural change is unnecessary, that this wasn't how things worked in America, and that it was more important to make lists of things we all agree on. I find that answer on the disappointing side so I asked him to actually engage with the question. The reason why a lot of Americans believe capitalism is the ultimate good is because they've been fed capitalist propaganda throughout the Cold War. They didn't come to love capitalism on their own. Propagandists used the Soviet Union as a convenient villain and created a false dichotomy: look at them, then look at us. Which system fares better? Today those propagandists have a problem. The EU is looking much better than the US. We have a balanced mix between capitalism and socialism, and yet we're prospering. We're strictly better than the US, with a few exceptions such as Italy. As time progresses the EU is going to outpace the US even more. Especially when looking at specific countries and not just the whole block. It's even possible that the US will eventually fall behind in GDP. But that will take a few more generations. Capitalism has been a clear driver for prosperity. This is inarguable, it's not just propaganda. Based on what evidence exactly? The US is an outlier. Most EU countries are not capitalist and they manage to stand shoulder to shoulder with all the economic giants. Even China has been radically catching up and they're certainly not a capitalist country. They just became a bit less oppressive. There's very little evidence proving that full-blown capitalism is all that great for people's pockets or any other kind of prosperity. Under what definition of capitalism are you working where the US is capitalist but the EU is not? And yes I know lots of EU countries are considered social democracies but fundamentally there is little difference between the EU and US in this. Largely the same systems as exist under EU social democracies also exist in the US, tho arguably worse.
Since when is the US not considered more capitalist than literally the entire globe?
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On July 12 2025 21:06 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 20:26 Gorsameth wrote:On July 12 2025 18:48 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 16:35 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 16:25 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 16:09 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 06:21 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 06:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 04:56 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 03:03 GreenHorizons wrote:[quote] It really isn't. Doing capitalism correctly specifically requires obscene wealth inequality and exploitation. I'm trying to focus on describing what many of us specifically and actually agree on, while you all keep jumping the gun and rushing to the socialist revolution you disagree with (or being weird and talking about furries). So far it seems we're mostly in agreement on the these three points thus far: 1. Obscene wealth inequality is inherently immoral and a risk to security of any state, the faster people realize that the faster we'll be able to fix it. 2. Obscene wealth inequality is inextricable from capitalism. 3. Capitalism/Capitalists must be overcome to overcome obscene wealth inequality I believe we should craft a 4th starting with 4. We need to overcome capitalism with a different system that does put checks on human greed (as suggested by Acro) Alternatively, you could also engage. It isn't hard to get agreement on "the current system is shit, it needs replacing". You'll find agreement on that even from MAGA people, you just don't like their proposal. Alternatively to what? I don't really want to talk about furries or be the 62094793409th time someone has fallen for oBlade's latest bad faith bait. Try explaining how your version of communism is going to avoid the pitfalls of the USSR, China, Venezuela and so on. That's not what I asked and neither did Dan. Americans, as a nation, firmly believe that capitalism is the best road to prosperity and the underlying culture is one of massive consumerism and love for all things money-related. I asked how he was going to change that, since, as Dan pointed out, simply changing the government system doesn't do much if people behave in the same way, i.e. system change is ineffective without cultural change. GH answered that he didn't need to convince people that socialism would be better for people's wellbeing than the existing system, i.e. a cultural change is unnecessary, that this wasn't how things worked in America, and that it was more important to make lists of things we all agree on. I find that answer on the disappointing side so I asked him to actually engage with the question. The reason why a lot of Americans believe capitalism is the ultimate good is because they've been fed capitalist propaganda throughout the Cold War. They didn't come to love capitalism on their own. Propagandists used the Soviet Union as a convenient villain and created a false dichotomy: look at them, then look at us. Which system fares better? Today those propagandists have a problem. The EU is looking much better than the US. We have a balanced mix between capitalism and socialism, and yet we're prospering. We're strictly better than the US, with a few exceptions such as Italy. As time progresses the EU is going to outpace the US even more. Especially when looking at specific countries and not just the whole block. It's even possible that the US will eventually fall behind in GDP. But that will take a few more generations. Capitalism has been a clear driver for prosperity. This is inarguable, it's not just propaganda. Based on what evidence exactly? The US is an outlier. Most EU countries are not capitalist and they manage to stand shoulder to shoulder with all the economic giants. Even China has been radically catching up and they're certainly not a capitalist country. They just became a bit less oppressive. There's very little evidence proving that full-blown capitalism is all that great for people's pockets or any other kind of prosperity. Under what definition of capitalism are you working where the US is capitalist but the EU is not? And yes I know lots of EU countries are considered social democracies but fundamentally there is little difference between the EU and US in this. Largely the same systems as exist under EU social democracies also exist in the US, tho arguably worse. Since when is the US not considered more capitalist than literally the entire globe? But that's not what you said. You called most EU countries are not capitalist. So what you actually meant was that they are a bit less capitalist?
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On July 12 2025 19:33 Magic Powers wrote:
All GDP debates are a distraction.
meh, i watched economic opportunity in Canada implode in real time. the decline started around 2009. i'm glad i left. it is sad watching hard working people get crushed. The decline continues today: the # of homeless people in Canada's largest city has more than doubled in the last 3 years.
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United States42638 Posts
Magic Powers uses his own definitions of words which are not aligned with those used by everyone else.
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On July 12 2025 21:08 Gorsameth wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 21:06 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 20:26 Gorsameth wrote:On July 12 2025 18:48 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 16:35 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 16:25 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 16:09 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 06:21 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 06:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 04:56 EnDeR_ wrote:
[quote]
Alternatively, you could also engage. It isn't hard to get agreement on "the current system is shit, it needs replacing". You'll find agreement on that even from MAGA people, you just don't like their proposal.
Alternatively to what? I don't really want to talk about furries or be the 62094793409th time someone has fallen for oBlade's latest bad faith bait. Try explaining how your version of communism is going to avoid the pitfalls of the USSR, China, Venezuela and so on. That's not what I asked and neither did Dan. Americans, as a nation, firmly believe that capitalism is the best road to prosperity and the underlying culture is one of massive consumerism and love for all things money-related. I asked how he was going to change that, since, as Dan pointed out, simply changing the government system doesn't do much if people behave in the same way, i.e. system change is ineffective without cultural change. GH answered that he didn't need to convince people that socialism would be better for people's wellbeing than the existing system, i.e. a cultural change is unnecessary, that this wasn't how things worked in America, and that it was more important to make lists of things we all agree on. I find that answer on the disappointing side so I asked him to actually engage with the question. The reason why a lot of Americans believe capitalism is the ultimate good is because they've been fed capitalist propaganda throughout the Cold War. They didn't come to love capitalism on their own. Propagandists used the Soviet Union as a convenient villain and created a false dichotomy: look at them, then look at us. Which system fares better? Today those propagandists have a problem. The EU is looking much better than the US. We have a balanced mix between capitalism and socialism, and yet we're prospering. We're strictly better than the US, with a few exceptions such as Italy. As time progresses the EU is going to outpace the US even more. Especially when looking at specific countries and not just the whole block. It's even possible that the US will eventually fall behind in GDP. But that will take a few more generations. Capitalism has been a clear driver for prosperity. This is inarguable, it's not just propaganda. Based on what evidence exactly? The US is an outlier. Most EU countries are not capitalist and they manage to stand shoulder to shoulder with all the economic giants. Even China has been radically catching up and they're certainly not a capitalist country. They just became a bit less oppressive. There's very little evidence proving that full-blown capitalism is all that great for people's pockets or any other kind of prosperity. Under what definition of capitalism are you working where the US is capitalist but the EU is not? And yes I know lots of EU countries are considered social democracies but fundamentally there is little difference between the EU and US in this. Largely the same systems as exist under EU social democracies also exist in the US, tho arguably worse. Since when is the US not considered more capitalist than literally the entire globe? But that's not what you said. You called most EU countries are not capitalist. So what you actually meant was that they are a bit less capitalist?
Most EU countries have mixed economies is what I said.
Maybe the reason people here are confused because they only know of one specific type of capitalism rather than the at least half a dozen different ones?
The US is strictly more capitalist than most EU countries, and if someone says otherwise they're falling for capitalist propaganda.
More specifically corporate think tank propaganda.
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On July 12 2025 14:40 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 08:04 ETisME wrote:
Every nation is a mixed market and difference is the scale and the subsequent effect.
Socialism leaning country need to have a strong gov, the most successful ones are Singapore and China.
It's not without a reason why many socialism heavy countries eventually get to dictatorship and totalitarian.
Because effectiveness of a socialism heavy nation requires not just the planning done well, but act together as one to make it effective. I don't agree with this reasoning. The US military is much bigger and the law enforcement is much more authoritarian than in various less capitalistic countries that have equal amounts (sometimes more) freedom. Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 08:34 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 08:04 ETisME wrote:
Every nation is a mixed market and difference is the scale and the subsequent effect.
Socialism leaning country need to have a strong gov, the most successful ones are Singapore and China.
It's not without a reason why many socialism heavy countries eventually get to dictatorship and totalitarian.
Because effectiveness of a socialism heavy nation requires not just the planning done well, but act together as one to make it effective. There are just as many capitalist dictatorships. The most successful ones are the Scandinavian countries and there are quite a few. This I also don't understand. Scandinavian dictatorships?
No, two separate points.
For some reason many on the right think all dictatorships are "socialist" which is wrong. Lots even think the Nazi's were.
Scandinavia countries are the most successful form socialism.
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On July 12 2025 16:09 EnDeR_ wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 06:21 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 06:15 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 04:56 EnDeR_ wrote:On July 12 2025 03:03 GreenHorizons wrote:On July 12 2025 02:34 Dan HH wrote:On July 12 2025 01:29 WombaT wrote:On July 11 2025 19:27 Dan HH wrote:On July 11 2025 09:38 WombaT wrote:On July 11 2025 09:03 GreenHorizons wrote:
[quote]
I agree (it's fun doing this).
I'd argue that the obscene wealth inequality is inextricable from capitalism. I’d love to hear a good argument that it isn’t, in actual practice. I’m yet to hear one though There's a very obvious one. There's obscene wealth inequality under every ism, current and historical. Capitalist Finland has a significantly lower Gini coefficient than socialist Cuba, Venezuela or Vietnam. Obscene wealth inequality has little to do with -ism and everything to do with culture. If a country undergoes a cultural shift that makes them pursue a switch to socialism, it's that shift that would be the cause of decreased inequality, rather than socialism. If that switch happens by geopolitical happenstance (as we've seen in Eastern Europe) rather than a cultural shift, then there is no meaningful change in inequality, people just play slightly different games with different rules to get ahead than they did before. Correct IMO but I don’t think it’s a great argument that wealth inequality isn’t an absolute innate problem with capitalism. At least in a part A consideration, which is recognising a problem. The part B, getting a viable alternative is a good bit trickier, but one lacking a solid proposition doesn’t mean the analysis of part A is off base. I think you make a great point overall. One that’s frequently overlooked for, some reason. They’re economic systems absolutely, but they’re inextricable from cultural values. If the culture doesn’t shift, you’ll get quite similar outcomes. Socialism certainly suffers from not being the status quo, plus its history isn’t great. As much as some will deny the latter, I wouldn’t personally. There’s probably some alternate timeline where idk a nation like Finland went from capitalism with a kinder face, to something approaching socialism in a gradual way, and you don’t have these cautionary tales of authoritarian attempts at socialism and things look rather different. My point is that the importance of the ism is heavily overstated + Show Spoiler + and sort of misses the forest for the trees. The flavor of local capitalism or socialism and how much inequality they allow is dictated by local values rather than the other way around.
This isn't a chicken-and-egg situation, we know empirically that merely having a coup/revolution and changing the economic system without an underlying cultural shift doesn't fix this.
If we want a better future for everyone we need more people on 'team empathy' and make more people derive self-worth from something other than comparing possessions and holiday destinations.
The countries that would be good at socialism are the ones that need it the least, the ones with a culture that's already less individualistic and materialistic, and with a high level of trust in institutions and each other. The US is at the opposite end at the moment, thinking that the solution to its problems is a socialist revolution right now is sort of like thinking that the solution to 'how to build a bridge' is having an engineering degree mailed to you. It really isn't. Doing capitalism correctly specifically requires obscene wealth inequality and exploitation. I'm trying to focus on describing what many of us specifically and actually agree on, while you all keep jumping the gun and rushing to the socialist revolution you disagree with (or being weird and talking about furries). So far it seems we're mostly in agreement on the these three points thus far: 1. Obscene wealth inequality is inherently immoral and a risk to security of any state, the faster people realize that the faster we'll be able to fix it. 2. Obscene wealth inequality is inextricable from capitalism. 3. Capitalism/Capitalists must be overcome to overcome obscene wealth inequality I believe we should craft a 4th starting with 4. We need to overcome capitalism with a different system that does put checks on human greed (as suggested by Acro) Alternatively, you could also engage. It isn't hard to get agreement on "the current system is shit, it needs replacing". You'll find agreement on that even from MAGA people, you just don't like their proposal. Alternatively to what? I don't really want to talk about furries or be the 62094793409th time someone has fallen for oBlade's latest bad faith bait. Try explaining how your version of communism is going to avoid the pitfalls of the USSR, China, Venezuela and so on. That's not what I asked and neither did Dan. Americans, as a nation, firmly believe that capitalism is the best road to prosperity and the underlying culture is one of massive consumerism and love for all things money-related. I asked how he was going to change that, since, as Dan pointed out, simply changing the government system doesn't do much if people behave in the same way, i.e. system change is ineffective without cultural change. GH answered that he didn't need to convince people that socialism would be better for people's wellbeing than the existing system, i.e. a cultural change is unnecessary, that this wasn't how things worked in America, and that it was more important to make lists of things we all agree on. I find that answer on the disappointing side so I asked him to actually engage with the question.
I did not say that you did. I was just suggesting another approach he could try after 10+ years of trying the America/capitalism bad approach.
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On July 12 2025 22:39 Billyboy wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 14:40 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 08:04 ETisME wrote:
Every nation is a mixed market and difference is the scale and the subsequent effect.
Socialism leaning country need to have a strong gov, the most successful ones are Singapore and China.
It's not without a reason why many socialism heavy countries eventually get to dictatorship and totalitarian.
Because effectiveness of a socialism heavy nation requires not just the planning done well, but act together as one to make it effective. I don't agree with this reasoning. The US military is much bigger and the law enforcement is much more authoritarian than in various less capitalistic countries that have equal amounts (sometimes more) freedom. On July 12 2025 08:34 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 08:04 ETisME wrote:
Every nation is a mixed market and difference is the scale and the subsequent effect.
Socialism leaning country need to have a strong gov, the most successful ones are Singapore and China.
It's not without a reason why many socialism heavy countries eventually get to dictatorship and totalitarian.
Because effectiveness of a socialism heavy nation requires not just the planning done well, but act together as one to make it effective. There are just as many capitalist dictatorships. The most successful ones are the Scandinavian countries and there are quite a few. This I also don't understand. Scandinavian dictatorships? No, two separate points. For some reason many on the right think all dictatorships are "socialist" which is wrong. Lots even think the Nazi's were. Scandinavia countries are the most successful form socialism.
Got it. And you're right, Norway for example combines a welfare state with a free market, which is a common form of a mixed economy. Their success depends largely on the framework of taking the best of both worlds, rather than overemphasizing capitalism or socialism.
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On July 12 2025 22:58 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 22:39 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 14:40 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 08:04 ETisME wrote:
Every nation is a mixed market and difference is the scale and the subsequent effect.
Socialism leaning country need to have a strong gov, the most successful ones are Singapore and China.
It's not without a reason why many socialism heavy countries eventually get to dictatorship and totalitarian.
Because effectiveness of a socialism heavy nation requires not just the planning done well, but act together as one to make it effective. I don't agree with this reasoning. The US military is much bigger and the law enforcement is much more authoritarian than in various less capitalistic countries that have equal amounts (sometimes more) freedom. On July 12 2025 08:34 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 08:04 ETisME wrote:
Every nation is a mixed market and difference is the scale and the subsequent effect.
Socialism leaning country need to have a strong gov, the most successful ones are Singapore and China.
It's not without a reason why many socialism heavy countries eventually get to dictatorship and totalitarian.
Because effectiveness of a socialism heavy nation requires not just the planning done well, but act together as one to make it effective. There are just as many capitalist dictatorships. The most successful ones are the Scandinavian countries and there are quite a few. This I also don't understand. Scandinavian dictatorships? No, two separate points. For some reason many on the right think all dictatorships are "socialist" which is wrong. Lots even think the Nazi's were. Scandinavia countries are the most successful form socialism. Got it. And you're right, Norway for example combines a welfare state with a free market, which is a common form of a mixed economy. Their success depends largely on the framework of taking the best of both worlds, rather than overemphasizing capitalism or socialism.
Yeah, I think they have much greater trust in their government as well (which I'm sure is a bit chicken and egg) which allows them to do what they think is best with the support of the public. It wouldn't mean no mistakes but it would create a much higher chance of success and when things do not work out a chance to improve and fix rather than trash it all and start over with the other side.
Like I wonder how much waste there is in the US when it flops Rep - Dem or Dem to Rep and they completely undo and redo whatever the other guys do just for political points.
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On July 12 2025 19:33 Magic Powers wrote:This should put an end to the ridiculous GDP debate. It's a deflection and nothing more. 100% statistical fallacies, 0% validity. https://www.visualcapitalist.com/real-gdp-per-capita-growth-country-2014-2024/GDP is useless. GDP per capita is still useless. Real GDP per capita growth is still useless. All GDP debates are a distraction. (in before BJ calls my source dumb and wrong)
Thanks for sharing another graph showing US growth more than doubling the G7 average, I guess?
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On July 12 2025 13:48 BlackJack wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 13:01 Belisarius wrote:On July 12 2025 10:20 BlackJack wrote:On July 12 2025 09:07 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 08:33 BlackJack wrote:On July 12 2025 02:48 KwarK wrote:On July 11 2025 10:44 BlackJack wrote:On July 11 2025 10:14 Sermokala wrote:
A lot of the lives lost in Texas could have easily been saved if the people wernt brain rotted against the government being able to do anything to better the lives of people. The very simple infrastructure to combat and monitor flash flooding could have been built at any time, and the funding for it was given to them by Bidens infrastructure bill.
Do you have a source for this? When I googled it I could only find that the county had made several requests for funding for a warning system but they were unable to procure the funds. Hard to believe they would turn down free money just because it came from Biden's bill. Did you see the minutes of the meeting I posted? They didn’t believe it was free money, they believed it was part of the 15 minute city secret plan. They weren’t specifically rejecting flood sirens in that meeting, just infrastructure money generally, but they were very insistent that it should returned. Though the money wasn’t even on the agenda in that meeting, it was just a group of “patriots” that had gotten themselves extremely worked up role playing Facebook Red Dawn and organized to mob a random unrelated meeting to save America. It’s like how the lunatics kept showing up at elementary school board meetings demanding an end to CRT without checking whether CRT was taught. Those social media circles get extremely incestuous and unhinged as they work each other into a frenzy with escalating stories they heard about furries. I read a few lines of it but not much. It was kind of long. It also appeared to consist just of public comments where anyone and everyone can get up and say whatever they want. I've seen a lot of whackos in those types of meetings. I was looking more for a source that says something like the city council rejected free funds, not that there exists some unhinged residents that wanted to reject the money but ultimately had no authority on the matter. According to this its a combination of factors, like messing up the application but then also wanting to reject the Federal money and then using some of it but on other stuff. https://www.texastribune.org/2025/07/10/texas-kerr-county-commissioners-flooding-warning/In 2021, Kerr County was awarded a $10.2 million windfall from the American Rescue Plan Act, or ARPA, which Congress passed that same year to support local governments impacted by the pandemic. Cities and counties were given flexibility to use the money on a variety of expenses, including those related to storm-related infrastructure. Corpus Christi, for example, allocated $15 million of its ARPA funding to “rehabilitate and/or replace aging storm water infrastructure.” Waco’s McLennan County spent $868,000 on low water crossings.
Kerr County did not opt for ARPA to fund flood warning systems despite commissioners discussing such projects nearly two dozen times since 2016. In fact, a survey sent to residents about ARPA spending showed that 42% of the 180 responses wanted to reject the $10 million bonus altogether, largely on political grounds.
“I’m here to ask this court today to send this money back to the Biden administration, which I consider to be the most criminal treasonous communist government ever to hold the White House,” one resident told commissioners in April 2022, fearing strings were attached to the money.
“We don't want to be bought by the federal government, thank you very much,” another resident told commissioners. “We'd like the federal government to stay out of Kerr County and their money.” So they petitioned the federal government for funding, but didn't receive it. Then they eventually got some federal pandemic relief money and they spent it, just not on a flood warning system. Quite a bit different than how Serm's post reads, which made it sound like they turned down federal money for a flood warning system because let's go brandon. This seems accurate to me. They got knocked back, then later they got money, but they decided to spend it on other stuff. However, this is completely consistent with Serm's post, so I'm not sure what the argument is. On July 11 2025 10:14 Sermokala wrote:
A lot of the lives lost in Texas could have easily been saved if the people wernt brain rotted against the government being able to do anything to better the lives of people. The very simple infrastructure to combat and monitor flash flooding could have been built at any time, and the funding for it was given to them by Bidens infrastructure bill. This also seems correct. Biden gave them 10x the money to do this. They knew they needed it and could have built it, but they built something else instead. Now they've paid the price. Whether they literally mailed the money back to Biden is irrelevant. Eh... I take more issue with the part of the post that you didn't bold. The "This could have easily been prevented if the people weren't brain rotted against the government being able to do anything to better the lives of people." The county requested funds from the federal government. It didn't get the funds it requested but they did get some funds from the federal government and then they spent those funds on their local government. It's a lot of funding and fund-seeking for government on behalf of people brain-rotted against the government. Apparently, the lion's share of the $10 million went to upgrading their emergency services communications system. The neighboring city was modernizing their system and unless the county followed suit the firefighters/paramedics/police would not be able to communicate with each other. That also seems kind of important... In hindsight we can say they should have budgeted differently to be able to pay for the flood warning system. But I don't see how spending the money on their emergency services communications instead of on an emergency warning system means they are brain rotted against the government helping people.
In review, they got the money, they've had the time, and they only spent money on something beacuse their neighbors also spent money on that. If you look at the evidence of local polling, public comments and the very clear actions the community took It is very reasonable to say they were brain rotted to not solve the problem. They had every reason to, they had the money to, they had the time to, yet they refused to.
If you read the posts people make and engage with the stuff they quote you get conversation about those topics. If you refuse to read them and refuse to entertain even the possibility of being wrong you get what you post.
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On July 12 2025 22:58 Magic Powers wrote:Show nested quote +On July 12 2025 22:39 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 14:40 Magic Powers wrote:On July 12 2025 08:04 ETisME wrote:
Every nation is a mixed market and difference is the scale and the subsequent effect.
Socialism leaning country need to have a strong gov, the most successful ones are Singapore and China.
It's not without a reason why many socialism heavy countries eventually get to dictatorship and totalitarian.
Because effectiveness of a socialism heavy nation requires not just the planning done well, but act together as one to make it effective. I don't agree with this reasoning. The US military is much bigger and the law enforcement is much more authoritarian than in various less capitalistic countries that have equal amounts (sometimes more) freedom. On July 12 2025 08:34 Billyboy wrote:On July 12 2025 08:04 ETisME wrote:
Every nation is a mixed market and difference is the scale and the subsequent effect.
Socialism leaning country need to have a strong gov, the most successful ones are Singapore and China.
It's not without a reason why many socialism heavy countries eventually get to dictatorship and totalitarian.
Because effectiveness of a socialism heavy nation requires not just the planning done well, but act together as one to make it effective. There are just as many capitalist dictatorships. The most successful ones are the Scandinavian countries and there are quite a few. This I also don't understand. Scandinavian dictatorships? No, two separate points. For some reason many on the right think all dictatorships are "socialist" which is wrong. Lots even think the Nazi's were. Scandinavia countries are the most successful form socialism. Got it. And you're right, Norway for example combines a welfare state with a free market, which is a common form of a mixed economy. Their success depends largely on the framework of taking the best of both worlds, rather than overemphasizing capitalism or socialism.
I'd argue that the success of Norway is based on being an oil-rich state that is not a corrupt kleptocracy and actually uses that oil wealth for the long-term good of its citizens. It think it is very hard to apply any lessons from Norway to countries which don't have that wealth base.
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What about the rest of the Nordic countries? The quality of life is about the same in Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, and Finland.
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On July 13 2025 06:50 LightSpectra wrote:
What about the rest of the Nordic countries? The quality of life is about the same in Denmark, Iceland, Sweden, and Finland.
Then I'd recommend talking about those instead of Norway, which is pretty unique.
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You can assume Norwegian resources are the reason why the country is above Denmark, Sweden and Finland in stats like GDP per capita or HDI.
I don't have any hard data but I think it's safe to guess Norway was quite behind Denmark and Sweden in those those stats before its resources became easily accessible.
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As of 2023, Iceland is above Norway on the HDI and GDP per capita, and they're both just barely above Denmark, Sweden, and Finland.
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EPT![[image loading]](https://www.voronoiapp.com/_next/image?url=https%3A%2F%2Fcdn.voronoiapp.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2Fc811f842-7201-4853-82c1-75fe3dd8b977.webp&w=1080&q=85)
