Fewer Than Half of Young Americans Are Positive About Capitalism (cnbc.com) 1445
gollum123 writes: According to a new poll from Gallup, young Americans are souring on capitalism. Less than half, 45 percent, view capitalism positively. "This represents a 12-point decline in young adults' positive views of capitalism in just the past two years and a marked shift since 2010, when 68 percent viewed it positively," notes Gallup, which defines young Americans as those aged 18 to 29. Meanwhile, 51 percent of young people are positive about socialism. This age group's "views of socialism have fluctuated somewhat from year to year," reports Gallup, "but the 51 percent with a positive view today is the same as in 2010."
Not surprising (Score:4, Insightful)
The boomers pulled the ladder up on them.
Capitalism is fine (Score:5, Insightful)
As long there is strong regulation behind it keep things honest and upfront.
No-small-print capitalism.
Re: Capitalism is fine (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Capitalism is fine (Score:5, Insightful)
Except those branches are being sold out to profit-extracting enterprises.
Just look at the private prison industry.
Re: Capitalism is fine (Score:4, Insightful)
Privatization is everywhere. The more general services we rely on become privatized (plus voncentrated) and not public resources, the more rights we lose to those private "entities" because businesses are "people" which have "rights."
Re: Capitalism is fine (Score:5, Insightful)
Some people worship it like it's Emacs or something.
Re: Capitalism is fine (Score:5, Funny)
EMACS is not that bad!
It has a vi emulator!
Re: Capitalism is fine (Score:5, Informative)
Over-regulation is, in fact, Fascism [wikipedia.org].
Not according to your link:
An important aspect of fascist economies was economic dirigism,[16] meaning an economy where the government often subsidizes favorable companies and exerts strong directive influence over investment, as opposed to having a merely regulatory role. In general, fascist economies were based on private property and private initiative, but these were contingent upon service to the state.[17]
The article directly contrasts fascism with government regulation.
Re: Capitalism is fine (Score:5, Insightful)
As long there is strong regulation behind it keep things honest and upfront. No-small-print capitalism.
True capitalism assumes perfect information [wikipedia.org] in the market to determine a price. Unfortunately, we live in a world of imperfect information.
Re: Capitalism is fine (Score:5, Insightful)
True capitalism assumes perfect information in the market to determine a price. Unfortunately, we live in a world of imperfect information.
Fortunately, the other systems don't need perfect information to be perfect. Oh wait, they do.
A free market may not be "perfect" but it's a better solution to the calculation problem [wikipedia.org] than the alternatives.
Is it really capitalism then? (Score:5, Insightful)
He's pretty right wing. Has a got family who worked in defense. So he gets his political views from there.
When asked about healthcare he understands that he needs socialized medicine or he dies. Again, he's smart. He's figured out that in a pure capitalist economy he couldn't possibly earn the money to pay for his care. You should hear the convoluted mess of a healthcare system he came up with that preserves his ideological system while ensuring he gets care. It was like Obamacare but with much bigger subsidies and more guarantees of care. To his credit when I pointed out that he agreed that he'd basically created a socialized medicine but with a 30% surcharge for private insurance profits.
I'm not saying we can't have a mixed system. I'm in favor of single _payer_, e.g. the gov't pays but otherwise stays out of things. But that's still socialism. At some point I think we have to admit that capitalism as we idolize it just plain doesn't work.
Re:Is it really capitalism then? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:No, there are two ways he could obtain his insu (Score:4, Insightful)
Charities don't give the money out equitably. For the most part they have an agenda and you either have to meet a criteria or do something for the charity. What happens to the people who don't meet the criteria or are incapable of what is asked? Gay youth make up something like 40% of the homeless children. I can guarantee you that most of the Christian charities would ask them to "renounce their wicked ways" before helping them. Since being gay isn't a choice, that would be a little difficult for the kids to do.
Charity isn't a guarantee. You say charity would be a more robust net and that may be true for some, but the net would definitely have larger holes in it than the one the government provides. A thin blanket is better than none at all.
I would also point out that terrible people always find a way. If we were to switch to social safety nets based on charity, there would immediately be people taking advantage of both sides of the system. The rich would use their promises of donations to distort the missions of charities to favor the rich and the scammers would set up shop finding ways of getting more than they should. That is inevitable.
In fact, while writing this, it occurred to me that shifting everything over to charity would allow for much less oversight. There would be more grift. What is the purpose of that? The charities that you know may be stellar, but you can't deny there are terrible people out there willing to use the word "charity" to make money. Heck, our president uses his "charity" to pay off his legal fees. It's like we are in a cave of scarcity and you anti-government people want the rest of us to throw away the flashlight. And it really sounds like you just don't want to pay taxes for the programs that you disagree with and to hell with other people.
Also, Medicare alone is 702 billion dollars per year. 402 billion isn't going to cover it.
Also, also, I realized that the system you are suggesting would resemble the scholarship system for colleges. Have you ever applied for scholarships? It is a PITA. It is always not enough, there are always conditions on the money, and you always find the great ones after it is too late to apply. Scholarships are what happen when you leave college tuition funding to charity.
Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Insightful)
... seeing as how fewer than half of them will ever be able to pay off their college loans. Maybe if we want to prove capitalism can work for everyone we should stop letting rich people write all the laws?
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Insightful)
If you're blaming capitalism for their student loan issues, you're barking up the wrong tree. The major issue with student loans is that they're guaranteed by the federal government. This is a tried and true way to increase the price of something, massively, and that's exactly what we've seen with rising tuition costs. Government loan guarantees have nothing to do with capitalism - they're central economic planning.
Blaming capitalism for student loan debt is like blaming Iraq for 9/11 - a classic case of "someone hit me, I'm gonna hit somebody by god!"
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Interesting)
Don't forget they protect that debt so that not even bankruptcy can discharge it.
They saw a problem (cost to do college was getting a bit too high and becoming too needed) and inadvertently poured gasoline on the problem by triggering a huge escalation of cost through trying to provide relief while compromising with the private sector (you can spend government money and the debts *will* be repaid, but the government will not step in to negotiate terms because *that* would just not be capitalist enough).
The state of college funding represents the worst blend of capitalism and government intervention. More government control over pricing or less government meddling in the loans would likely work better.
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Insightful)
Try the alternative. In much of the US, your ability to get a good education depends on your family's wealth. Medical bankruptcy is pretty common. The grass is always greener, but is it really?
At least you get back a decent level of services for what you pay in tax.
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:4, Informative)
Common in the United States. Or, at least, it was before Obamacare helped fix it. For years the number one trigger of personal bankruptcy was medical debt.
Your attitude is a big part of the problem. Because YOU PERSONALLY don't see something, it isn't a problem? Please don't do that. The world is bigger than what you personally experience.
Time has a good article on the subject right here: http://time.com/money/4765443/obamacare-bankruptcy-decline/ [time.com]
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Informative)
Try the alternative. Medical bankruptcy is pretty common.
Common where? I'm sure that it happens, but I'm in my mid 60's and no one I've ever known even slightly has had a medical bankruptcy.
Common in the US. Depending on how you define a "medical bankruptcy", estimates range from 250,000 - 640,000 medical bankruptcies per year in the US. Split the difference and you have just under half a million medical bankruptcies per year, or about 1 in 300 households per year. Considering less than 20% of bankruptcy filers are repeat filers, my guess is only around 1 in 150-200 households ever declare a medical bankruptcy.
I'm not sure how many households you are close enough with for them to admit a medical bankruptcy with you, but it could easily be under 200. Medical bankruptcies can certainly affect millions of people per year and you could still not really notice it in your life. That doesn't mean it isn't happening though.
Re: Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Insightful)
Societies protect 'dumb' (or vulnerable or less educated or naive or whatever makes you feel superior, ya fuckin' dumbass) people because it's more economical in the long run. We want people to succeed, because they contribute to our society. We don't want them to fail. This is costly to all of us. This masturbatory fantasy of your where letting people suffer the consequences of whatever happens to them in a fully free market because it teaches them or others do act differently is just that - a masturbatory fantasy that is more costly to society and economy in the long run.
We can talk specifics, but this point of yours that people should bear the brunt of every decision they ever make fully and personally completely ignores that it isn't an ideal just world, that people's success and failures impact those around them like friends, families, citizens, and that in many respects is cheaper for society to look after it's dumdums. You reek of somebody who has succeeded and decided to use whatever faculties you had to get there (hard work, brains, and other things you erroneously think *you* alone are responsible for) to be a fucking tool about it. I'm successful too, on my own terms, but I also acknowledge I had help along the way, from other people to government to consumer and investor protection rules. Anyone who thinks they made it by themselves is both a liar and a sanctimonious twit.
Re: Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:4, Informative)
You forget the third option -- removing those failures from our society.
If you're too busy trying to emulate the Jersey Shore to learn anything useful to society you should be voted off the island.
Ah yes. Eugenics. The end game of every sanctimonious prick.
Eugenics is a fantastically stupid idea because that's not how genetics works. Albert Einstein's parents were unremarkable people. Isaac Newton's parents were unremarkable people. Pick any genius you care to name, and you will typically find the bemused average people who birthed them standing behind them, completely unable to understand what their child has created, but proud nonetheless.
The culture of Jersey Shore is almost assuredly completely worthless. Feel free to denigrate it all you like, discourage your own children from embracing it, shun people in it, and make snide comments on Slashdot about it. But you do not get to "vote them off the island." One of them may birth the genius that extends quantum theory far enough to render relativity obsolete. The odds are against it, but then, the odds are always against it.
Re: Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Insightful)
Hmm...well, it was that way for me, most everyone I know, and for people in ages back before us.
Yes indeed. And we had higher crime, poverty, disease, infant mortality... basically all of the human maladies were much more commonplace in the past. What is attractive about that to you? Sick people, homeless people, and imprisoned people cannot contribute effectively to the economy, which increases the tax burden on everyone else and makes the society generally crappier to live in.
This glorification of the "good ol' days" is completely incoherent and disconnected from the facts of history.
Re: Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:4, Insightful)
mm...well, it was that way for me, most everyone I know, and for people in ages back before us.
We decided as a society that some of the things that went on in the past, were wrong.
Hell, a good example of this no consequences thing, is the increasing deadbeat or deserter dads in many communities.
There is no increase, in fact it's been declining for years. Highest in the 70's and 80's. And I'm rather sure this is a subtle racist dog whistle, since "deadbeat dads" has been used as such before.
In the past, there were consequences society put on fathers that abandoned their kids and responsibilities...now, not so much and look what has happened!
In the past it was EASY for fathers to get away, back say in the Great Depression, fathers could just skip out. And they skipped out a LOT. Social Security numbers? Not a thing. Photo ID's? Not a thing. Now we have computers and such, they are easier to track. We actually garnish wages and put people on trial for non-support. There are more penalties now than ever.
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Insightful)
The income disparity is exactly why it is NOT working for a lot of people. Sure, it works great for the top of the pyramid, but that could also be said of feudalism. Communism also worked well for the top of the pyramid in the USSR. Kim Jong Un is doing quite well for himself, it's everyone else in N. Korea that's having a problem.
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Insightful)
The difference is, in the feudal, USSR, or North Korean models - there is no way to climb the pyramid. In the US - and most of Western Europe (which is capitalist in its economic models), you can climb the pyramid from the bottom to the top. It's hard, it's difficult - but it can happen.
It's that whole "equality of opportunity" versus "equality of outcome" thing. The former necessarily denies the latter. And rightfully so.
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:5, Insightful)
Social mobility is declining in America and I don't think that's a good thing at all.
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:4, Insightful)
The income disparity is exactly why it is NOT working for a lot of people.
So, you're saying that the reason a given person isn't prosperous is because someone else is? Or are you saying that even though people - even in the lowest income brackets - live better now than in any time in human history, they're not doing well because there are some people who are living better? I presume you'd be happy if we could just tear down the wealthy people so that there's no 1% to resent and hate. Of course then everyone would just hate the 2%. Or the 20%. Or anyone that spends their day doing something that provides a more comfortable lifestyle than anyone else. The only answer is government controlled wages and lifestyles so that nobody can lie awake at night worried that the guy who works twice as hard is having a better chicken for dinner than anyone else is.
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:4)
For those people, the original statement holds true- "the reason a given person isn't prosperous, is because someone else is"
But still not really true. When Boko Haram blows up a truck full of food and people starve, it's NOT because Boko Haram is eating, and because they personally have food to eat, someone else doesn't. It's because they want people to die for political/religious/tribal reasons. It's not that they're the local "rich" people and there is just enough local food to feed either them or the village that's starving. They're not eating what the village would have eaten. They're simply using threats of violence to prevent people they don't like from getting the food that's intended for them. That's not about "greed" for the food, not even close. It's about tribal or religious animosity or good old fashioned gang style intimidation. When Saddam was starving out the ethnic minorities in the southeast of Iraq, it's not because he was greedy for their food, it's because he wanted them to die.
Re:Gee, can't imagine why... (Score:4, Insightful)
“The law, in its majestic equality, forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, to beg in the streets, and to steal their bread.” - Anatole France
It's all well and good to crow about Capitalism until it's failing you utterly, and a big part of it is the way the whole system—the political and legal system in particular—favour the rich. I'd be more inclined to agree with you if bank CEOs were held responsible for their crimes against the system, or if corporations were forced to pay more than a pittance for dumping oil into the soil and waterways, and unreasonable amounts of CO2 into the air. (Indeed, the lack of accounting for environmental externalities is a huge problem with the way we run capitalism right now.)
Capitalism, as it stands, works mostly for the rich and ensures that it will increasingly work ONLY for the rich.
Same when I was young (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Same when I was young (Score:4, Insightful)
More like the young are generally on the losing end of capitalism.
No kidding, Sherlock! (Score:5, Insightful)
I can't blame them.. (Score:5, Insightful)
The people who came before them are rigging the system against them so only they and their kids who made it can benefit. The ladder has been pulled up and these young folks are starting to realize this more and more.
As the saying goes... (Score:4, Insightful)
If you're not a liberal at 20... https://quoteinvestigator.com/... [quoteinvestigator.com]
Hearts and brains. (Score:4, Informative)
Darn. You beat me by two minutes. B-b
For those not familiar with it, and who don't want to follow the link and read a page, the current version of the old saw is:
(The article linked by the parent poster tracks variants back as far as 1875 in France.)
Re:Hearts and brains. (Score:4, Insightful)
The problem is the conservatives are operating on bad science and bad economics ...
Or, at the very least, in bad faith.
Re:Hearts and brains. (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm leaning toward simply being wrong and away from being outright-evil, aside from a few specific cases of pathological psychopaths who probably also believe themselves to be the great visionaries who are doing what is necessary.
Economics sounds like bullshit when it's correct. Microeconomics shows you can escape poverty by going out, working hard, and starting a business. Macroeconomics shows jobs come from consumer demand, and opening a business in a poverty area either won't work or will take jobs away from other people in that area and cause no net-gain of jobs. Macroeconomics also shows bringing jobs back to America by closing off trade results in huge losses of American jobs as you open a factory for 50,000 workers making a good at a higher price than the 150,000,000 American workers were paying, ultimately losing shipping and retail jobs, resulting in poorer Americans overall and 90,000 jobs lost, a net 40,000 loss in American jobs.
When you work out the economics, you find that social welfare programs make the economy overall more-productive, stabilizing the consumer base and increasing revenue streams. Those higher taxes on the rich end up making the rich richer, and giving money to poor and unemployed people causes them to get jobs. If you don't work out the whole economic machine, it all looks obviously wrong.
I assume that conservatives are in general just wrong about things, not pretending they believe in bullshit economics about tax cuts and eliminating welfare.
Re:Hearts and brains. (Score:5, Interesting)
All of you here on Slashdot came from privileged backgrounds.
Really? My parents qualified for foodstamps when I was a child. I qualified for foodstamps twice as an adult. I got a college education, but I lived at home, worked a job, and paid 100% of my tuition myself (it was possible because I did it before the massive tuition inflation took hold). I didn't even get any grants. Just student loans, which took the full 10 years to pay off thanks to the DotBomb.
I know, everyone thinks that got where they are by 100% of their own efforts but if you were truly honest with yourselves, you'd realize how lucky you are.
Lucky? If I was lucky, I'd be a rockstar, live in hilltop houses, drivin' fifteen cars, and the girls would come easy and the drugs would come cheap.
Instead I live in suburbia. I have the suburban lawn and the two car garage my parents had (most of the time).
Having said all that, I'll respond to the GGP post. People are not liberal at 25. People are what their parents were when they're 25. You get your politics from your parents as assuredly as you get your religion from them. It takes time to shuck either one of them off and learn enough to know better. Me, I'm over 40 now, and like the sibling post, my house is paid off. And I'm fairly liberal too, especially because I know damn well social services are good and useful because I used them, for a while, and if the hard-scrabble all-consequences-are-yours-alone-to-deal-with "conservative" assholes had their way, I'd have starved to death at 27. It's a stupid fucking philosophy that would result in enormous amounts of preventable tragedy, for no benefit whatsoever, and humanity has never ever pursued it, in all of history, because humans have empathy, and these sociopathic little shits should stop wishing for people to get what they deserve—they just might get theirs.
Re: As the saying goes... (Score:4, Insightful)
I make plenty and own my home mortgage-free, but too much of the country is getting the short end of the stick.
Re: As the saying goes... (Score:5, Interesting)
I was a die-hard conservative at 20. At 38, Iâ(TM)m pretty liberal.
I make plenty and own my home mortgage-free, but too much of the country is getting the short end of the stick.
I followed the same path- only less extreme. I've gone from right of centre to left of centre (stayed pretty centrist over all- even now).
I probably didn't have much of a heart at 20. I was pretty cold and rational. Getting older, being married, experiencing life, having children, I realised there is more to life than money and society matters. I gained empathy with age whereas many people get jaded and lose empathy.
Re:As the saying goes... (Score:5, Interesting)
liberalism is not about socialism. here in the USA there is lots of socialism for the government hating conservatives. Free money for farmers, unending highway construction and expansion when public transit is cheaper, socialism for rural airports with no real flights, government bailouts when property rights idiots build in flood zones in houston and then run to the government to rebuild their homes, socialism for police and prison unions and corporations via sending people to jail for minor crimes, etc.
Its not the liberals protesting legalization of marijuana. It's the conservatives and police who will see a reduction in their jobs
You know how stupid the average person is? (Score:5, Funny)
small "c" capitalism (Score:5, Insightful)
The system we have now is really corporatism. Very large, essentially immortal, companies that are able to achieve regulatory capture and get laws written for themselves.
Look at the way that the coal companies were able to get an exemption to clean water laws to blow the tops off of mountains and destroy streams and creeks. All so they could reduce labor costs. That's one hell of an externality they got out of.
small "c" capitalism is something a free society has to have, i.e. the ability to buy and sell goods in a relatively unfettered market. No you don't get to sell nuclear weapons, so there has to be some manner of regulation.
corporatism is all about shifting costs to the public and creating a bullshit concept that companies are somehow outside of morality and ethics. They want to be outside of morality and ethics but that doesn't mean we have to let them.
Re:small "c" capitalism (Score:5, Insightful)
The other thing that is really bad about our system is we largely privatize all the profits and socialize all the risk (think bailouts, or welfare money to prop up farmers over trade wars, or corporate welfare in general).
Re:small "c" capitalism (Score:4, Interesting)
Capitalism means that capital controls the means of production. Corporatism means that corporations control the capital. Corporatism is therefore simply a form of capitalism.
If you want to solve the problem of corporatism without throwing away the very real benefits of capitalism, you have to regulate corporations. They are not even strictly necessary things; everything they do could be done by co-ops, and co-ops of co-ops. And that would actually mean that the workers had a share and a say.
Capitalism is itself amoral. Humans, on the other hand, are frequently immoral. And since corporations are controlled by humans... well, you know.
confusing a free market with capitalism (Score:5, Insightful)
small "c" capitalism is something a free society has to have, i.e. the ability to buy and sell goods in a relatively unfettered market.
You're confusing a free market with capitalism, which is not the same thing. It's also a very common mistake to make given the propaganda in the US that intentionally wants us to associate "freedom" with capitalism.
Capitalism simply means private ownership and control of resources -- land, natural resources, and modern industrial means of production. Private ownership means generally speaking a person (a dictator or monarch) or a small board of directors (an oligarchy) make all the decisions about the use of resources and production. On the surface, this seems like a very fair thing -- you own it, why shouldn't you get to decide? -- but the problem with this line of thought is the scale we're talking. When a capitalist decides to clear cut a forest, that forest is now gone and even if he sells the land later, no other person gets to use that forest ever again. What if someone else wanted to create a park? Too late, capitalist decided already. What if a majority of people in the area wanted a park instead of a clear cut field? What if that forest and all those tree roots helped soak up water and prevent flooding, but now without it, surrounding neighborhoods easily flood? What if that forest held a rare species of tree or animal that could have lead to a medical discovery? Even if we needed to cut the trees down for firewood or paper or whatever, maybe we would have preferred to the wood go to local community members and not sold in China or wherever? Too late, capitalist already decided.
That's the problem with private ownership of resources and production. Most if not all resource use decisions actually impact all of us, at least community-wide if not planet-wide (as climate change is producing). And yet we are allowing monarchs and oligarchs make those decisions for our communities and nations without any input. Is that fair and just for someone else to decide things that impact your family and community without you having any say in the process whatsoever? I understand you might not always get what you want, but right now you don't even have a vote. A CEO decides and that's it, can legally do what they want (within broad confines of regulation that politicians continually cut and weaken) and completely ignore you and your family and your community. If it makes your house flood more, they don't care. If it causes environmental damage that gives you and your family lung cancer, they don't care. You don't have any say.
Socialism is the idea that resources and production should be publicly-owned and democratically managed. That's really all it is. Because of certain historical events people confuse socialism with authoritarian takeovers of those countries, but again, like the free market and capitalism, they are not the same thing. All we're talking about it more democracy, that you and your family and your community should have a vote and decide how those resources are used and that it should not be left to private decision-making behind closed doors by people who don't necessarily live in your community or even country.
Note also, as a common misconception, that socialist theory typically distinguishes between "private property", which is private ownership of natural resources and industrial means of production, and "personal property" which is your family home. Socialists don't generally care about your family home or your toothbrush or your clothes or your car, do whatever you want at home when you're not bothering anyone. No one is going to take your house. It's about democratizing economic decisions for the big industrial questions that affect all of us, it's about making sure no one businessperson CEO can force their economic vision on you and the community, you have to all agree together democratically. You get more individual freedoms and more say-so under a democratic system -- both politic
Economy tied to Stock Market (Score:5, Insightful)
This, combined with the hollowing out of organized labor and the ever widening wealth disparity in the US has led to inevitable situation.
What would anyone expect? A heart warming embrace of a system geared to enrich and empower those who are already rich and powerful?
Re:Economy tied to Stock Market (Score:5, Insightful)
This.
It's no longer just about the quality of the product you or whether your company grew. It's about meeting financial analysts' numbers. Meet them or risk having your stock sold off. And, now with new computer algorithms trading billions of share a day, millions a second, the market is more volatile than ever before.
A butterfly flaps its wings in Bali and an EU company's stock plummets.
The Cult of Capitalism (Score:5, Interesting)
Capitalism is bad at:
No where on earth is there a purely capitalist society outside of complete anarchy (e.g. Somalia). Once a government is established, the first thing it does is socialize something: defense.
Some other things most countries socialize:
Education is a prime example of capitalism dealing poorly with long time horizons. If we took loans out to pay for our entire education, it would be 20 years before we could make the first payment. Most debt is expected to be paid off in less than 30 years.
In terms of natural resources, the value placed on them is based on the labor required to extract them. However, air requires minimal labor to extract. You do it every time you breath. Because of this, we have subconsciously, and collectively agreed that no one owns the air. It is shared by all of us as a community. It's a communist system.
In summary, capitalism is a tool in our economic system, that works along side socialism and communism to get resources to people that need them. The trick is choosing the correct tool for the task!
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Perspective is required (Score:4, Interesting)
I think Americans need to travel abroad more and get a broader perspective. :) oki, I exagerate
That is problematic.
No guns
Driving at 18, not 16
Drinking from 16 on, not 21 (even in public on a bench in a park)
Having sex from 14, not 18
Walking to school
No police sirens all day long
Working and afordable public transport
No elevstors in most houses
Food that actually tastes
Nobody likes joining a Monopoly game... (Score:5, Insightful)
... 3 hours in.
Capitalism, not Corporatism (Score:4, Insightful)
The thing I find so disheartening is how many younger Americans reject Capitalism, in favor of a form of Socialism -- without realizing that this isn't as simple as an A or B pair of options. If you want Socialism, fine .... There are many places in the world actively practicing it, and you're welcome to move there. America was created as a unique experiment in the world, creating a Democratic Republic. IMO, it's proven itself not only viable but arguably superior to many other forms of rule by central governments. I wholeheartedly believe that as a U.S. citizen, I should do everything in my power to preserve this framework.
Obviously, we have a lot of flaws, corruption and other negatives. But show me ANY government that's perfect, except on paper.
IMO, what we need to be focusing on in America is how to move forward, to PRESERVE the Democratic Republic that our Founders created and made into a reality. Corporatism is really what most people are complaining about when they say they're anti-Capitalist. Corporatism is simply a situation where big business managed to collude with government to avoid being governed fairly by it. This can be addressed and mitigated without resorting to Socialism!
America has already done too much dabbing in Socialist practices to appease various groups. Even when it creates a "workable" solution to a specific problem? It weakens our whole system of government, because it means we took an "easy way out" or shortcut, copy-catting what other countries did, rather than finding an answer that doesn't go against the principles that built what we've got here.
Perhaps the place this "battle" is most evident, today, is the healthcare debate. Single-payer or Socialized medicine is something I just can't accept, even though I accept that it's ONE solution that basically works for other countries. If we stick to our core values and principles that defined America, I think we have to conclude it's unfair to demand medical professionals all get paid a fixed salary, as dictated by Federal government. I think we have to conclude that no, healthcare is NOT a right in America. You have every right to pursue better health for yourself, obviously. But as soon as you need medical care, you're demanding the services of another person or group of people who invested many years into education and training to be good enough to perform those services. They aren't your slaves, nor do you have a right to force other American citizens to pay their fees to treat you. We DO need to stop the collusion/ Corporatism that allows big pharma to get protectionist treatment by government for exclusive rights to sell medications, and to prevent competitors in other countries from importing their offerings here as legal alternatives.
Capitalism is disappearing. (Score:5, Insightful)
What remains is a plutocratic corporate socialism sold to the masses as free market capitalism. No wonder they don't like it.
What about other ages? (Score:5, Interesting)
I am curious about how other age ranges feel about capitalism right now too.
The funny thing is that capitalism is still the best method for managing resources since the inputs and outputs are decentralized; however, once everything gets centralized like it is right now, I would have to ask if it is really capitalism or if it has morphed into something else.
TL;DR, asking today's youth about capitalism is absurd since we do not really have capitalism right now. Maybe a form of corporate fascism since companies seem to be able to buy laws with impunity.
Re:That's because... (Score:5, Insightful)
And only fifty million Chinese had to die miserably for that communist utopia!
Lets not mention that the average standard of living in China only began to improve once they began adopting capitalism or that the communist regime risks being overthrown if they hint at turning back the clock to that utopia.
Re:That's because... (Score:4, Insightful)
The Great Famine that occurred when China prohibited farm ownership (big feature of Communism), replacing (killing) all of the skilled farmers and replacing them with "The People" who had no clue how to grow food and no one left alive to teach them. All part of that Great Leap Forward!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
they haven't lived in a (real) socialist country.
Norway and Sweden have both been pretty successful at what they are doing, maybe they are better examples than China or Russia.
Re:That's because... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:That's because... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:thanks slashdot (Score:5, Insightful)
this again. Socialism =/= Communism.
Re:thanks slashdot (Score:4, Insightful)
You do realize that socialism is mainstream in Europe, right? I'm looking around and I don't see any gulags here.
Re: thanks slashdot (Score:5, Funny)
Shhhh. It's a secret to keep those dirty Americans from moving to Europe.
"Socialism is terrible. Nothing to see here. Move along. These aren't the droids you are looking for."
Re:thanks slashdot (Score:4, Informative)
but real socialism looks different. Trust me.
Ah, the No True Scotsman argument. Any ideology taken to a logical extreme is bad. This includes both capitalism and socialism. Demonizing one over another is silly, because capitalism, socialism, and communism all have high ideals at their core - and they've all been twisted beyond recognition as a means to an end. It all comes down to who is the one with power - a government, a dictator, or the people themselves. In the US, the people themselves have less power than ever, even when capitalism is what gave them the power in they used to have in the first place.
Re:thanks slashdot (Score:5, Informative)
What's the difference?
Communism: technically the government runs everything. Very autocratic- usually one party. People are responsible to the government (not the other way around). No private ownership.
Socialism: democratic- government answers to people and human rights valued.. Some private ownership but for things that are intended for the good of the public there is public ownership (such as mass transit, healthcare, public education). Socialist states try to "even out" wealth by placing progressive taxes on higher earners and taxing poorer people less. The goal is to be as egalitarian as possible and for the common man to have ownership of his future. Society protected from abuses by industry through regulation. (such as dangerous materials banned from food)
Capitalism: usually democratic but under a pure capitalistic society the democratic vote is skewed because only the rich can afford to run and get their name out. Very little public ownership to none- most things, like education, transit, healthcare privatized. Little to no redistribution of wealth- human rights may take back seat to economic drivers in a pure capitalistic society. The goal is for people to earn more by striving to be richer because wealth brings about a higher quality of life. In theory people will work harder because they want more money to live a better life. Little or no regulation of industry to protect society from things like dangerous materials in food... as it is believed consumers will stop buying unsafe things by themselves.
Most western nations (including the US) are somewhere between capitalism and socialism- which is probably for the best. Most people wouldn't fare well in a purely capitalistic society; but some capitalistic tendencies are needed for a healthy economy.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Insightful)
Also what is your definition of socialism?
That's one part of a two-part problem. The first part is that there is a concerted marketing effort by a large chunk of progressives to redefine "social democrat" to simply "socialist". I think this may be some kind of political Darwinism as people try to emulate the stadium-filling success of Bernie Sanders by cargo-culting his misuse of the word "socialism".
Then on the other side you have people who know that their ideological opponents are misusing the term, but pretend that they are in fact referring to centralized control over production. So the resulting criticism is not about Denmark, but rather Venezuela. I suspect they are doing this because it makes their opponents an easy target.
So here we are with a discussion overwhelmingly dominated by people making dishonest arguments, and apparently we've done such a poor job educating our young people that many of them are oblivious to the total sham of a discussion going on.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Interesting)
And yet, if you ask young people about this, they see that Denmark and similar countries have high living standards and rank at the top for happiness. Meanwhile in the US they see poverty, a massive gap between rich and poor, unaffordable education, unaffordable housing, unaffordable health care, and so forth. So is it any surprise that when given the poll that young people think about these issues?
Taxes are a matter of perspective. We tend to hate our relatively low taxes in the US because we see so littlle in return for our money, whereas in many high tax countries thre is a visible return of services back to the tax payers.
And also there are extremes. Denmark isn't engaged in autocratic centralized control of all facets of the economy. Yet some people spit at the word "socialism" as if it were equivalent to Stalinism or Maoism. We also don't have an extremist model of capitalism in the US either. Most modern countries are indeed a mix of some capitalist ideas and some socialist ideas. Denmark is clearly a capitalist state but it also has had social-democrat governments with strong social welfare programs - it's not 100% one way or the other.
Another problem is that "socialism" is being used by the right as an insult to apply to anything they don't like, exactly the same as the left using "fascism" to apply to anything they disagree with.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, if taxes are so important and you prefer to pay premiums for healthcare, pension and the school education of your kids, and need a gun to feel save, and several cars for your family to go around over the course of the week, then Denmark is nothing for you.
If I earn a million per year, or for funk sake only 100,000 ... I don't care if the tax is 33%, 50% or in case of fhe million, even 90%
For what would I need more than 50,000 - 100,000 disposable income?
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:4, Interesting)
One good way to partially fix the House of Representatives would be to change the way the Speaker is elected:
1. Allow Representatives to vote for ANY House member to be Speaker... by secret ballot, using a Condorcet method. No nominations, and members can't refuse if they win (otherwise, parties would just punish any representative from their party who accepted the position without their approval). Representatives can vote for as many or as few members as they like, and indicate different preferences for those they vote for (with everyone they don't vote for at all being treated as "last choice, with equal preference... so even someone who loyally supports his or her party's choice for Speaker would, at a minimum, have to vote for everyone in the party... assigning the party's choice as their #1 choice, everyone else in the party as their #2 choice, and everyone else as choice #3).
2. The top three candidates from step 1 run against each other, once again via secret ballot among House members. If one of them gets a simple majority, he/she's the new Speaker. Otherwise...
3. The top two candidates from step 2 have a run-off election (also by secret ballot). If one of them gets a simple majority, he/she's the new Speaker.
4. If, however, step 2 produces a result where the top candidate wins a plurality & the remaining two are tied, or if step 3 produces a tie, step 2 is repeated... but this time, under Condorcet rules (as per step 1).
Electing the Speaker this way wouldn't be likely to result in a Speaker who's from a party different from a majority of Representatives... but it WOULD effectively throw a monkey wrench into either Party's ability to enforce party discipline on Representatives, and quite probably result in the election of Speakers who are absolutely, positively NOT the first choice of the Party's own leadership. A Speaker who gets to be TOO heavy-handed about bringing representatives in line would be unlikely to win again, because he'd ultimately piss off too many members of his own party. By keeping the votes for Speaker secret, Representatives could freely vote against those who've pissed them off or antagonized them without fear of reprisal or punishment by the Party.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:4, Interesting)
Mostly, because Condorcet logic is really hard to explain to normal people, and even HARDER to pitch to the media as something that can be presented via soundbites and headlines. My hybrid scheme makes the first round a relatively low-key internal affair for the House of Representatives, then gives the media 3 candidates to talk about & handles the Speaker's election in a relatively straightforward (by American standards) manner beyond that.
The main benefit of using Condorcet rules for round 1, and having the entire vote for Speaker via secret ballot, is ensuring that whomever ends up winning as speaker probably WON'T be the preferred first choice of either party... and that any Speaker who pisses off too many Representatives by getting overly heavy-handed about enforcing party discipline won't be re-elected as Speaker.
There's a second reform I can think of that would severely limit the power of party leaders over individual representatives: whenever a bill is defeated, there's an immediate and automatic secret "no confidence" vote among representatives. If the Speaker loses the vote, a new Speaker is elected immediately (under the same rules as above), and the newly-elected Speaker is not bound by the previous Speaker's committee appointments or policies.
This would put a stop to Speakers who ram bills through the house with single-vote victories by putting the Speaker's position in EXTREME peril if he allows a vote to proceed without being REALLY confident of a solid victory. It might work once... or twice... but eventually, s/he's going to piss off one Representative too many, the bill will be defeated, and the Speaker will be defeated as well. Every Speaker would have to choose between loyalty to his/her party, and desire to keep being Speaker. The relative power of parties to dictate legislation would probably ebb and flow, but any party that pushed TOO hard to control its Speaker would find itself having to continually re-establish its power over new Speakers -- each of whom would be harder to control than the last.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Insightful)
Exactly. It's more a question of redistribution. I don't think many progressives (however that is defined) want a state-run economy, which really is what socialism, at least as it is traditionally defined, is about. It's been useful for conservatives and libertarians to define progressive economic ideas which are fundamentally redistributive as somehow Marxian, but they're really not.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Interesting)
That's an oversimplified description. Socialism isn't just that the government owns the means of production, but also that it is responsible for the distribution of the produced goods and services. Since that's also the much larger and more difficult part of the philosophy, it's also the part that should be discussed most thoroughly.
In essence, any government that collects taxes already has a government-owned means of production. The government produces tax income. How it then uses those taxes is the subject of endless debate, and those of us who want a bit more socialism want to see distributions that focus on the socialist philosophies. We want to see less focus on propping up private industry, and more focus on community projects. We want less subsidies for corporate expansion, and more grants for anyone to claim.
In short, the socialist influence the young people look for is for government to aim to improve life outside of work, rather than dumping resources into privately-managed companies that have primarily just increased inequality over the past few decades.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Informative)
Like roads and bridges ?
Yes. Roads and bridges are capital.
Every country in the world has a mixed economy, with some socialism, and some private production. In America, the government builds roads, bridges, and airports. North Korea has private vegetable markets. Cuba has small private restaurants (which can't hire more than 2 people).
You can go too far in either direction. North Korea and Cuba are 90% socialist, and are impoverished. Somalia has almost no government spending on roads and ports, and is also impoverished.
The "sweet spot" is about 30-40% socialism and 60-70% capitalism. That is enough for infrastructure and a social safety net, but not enough to stifle innovation and economic growth.
Not a single incident, but in aggregate? (Score:5, Informative)
While these do not meet the standard of "brutalize and murder" it is also true to say that I cannot really think of any incidents where socialism has lead to much of this either except for similar isolated incidents with the trade union movement. On the other hand, Communism has clearly caused massive suffering on this sort of scale so perhaps you are getting communism and socialism confused? The two are not the same.
Re:Not a single incident, but in aggregate? (Score:4, Insightful)
Unless everything is so entrenched in beauracracy like NASA that hardly anything gets done, there will always be mistakes.
Correct. There will be random accidents caused by human fuck-ups in either system. However, on top of this there is pressure to beat your competition leads people to take short cuts and cut costs in the capitalist system which will undoubtedly lead to most mistakes. This is a pressure that is almost completely absent from the socialist system where the tendency is to become NASA-like: completely safe but utterly boring. This is why socialism tends to be used for "boring" things like water, electricity and gas where there is little to no competition or innovation.
I'll bring this a step further: one ridiculous argument I heard for communism is that slavery would never have occured.
That really is ridiculous because in communism everyone is a slave to the state!
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Interesting)
.....or maybe there's a generation of people who don't blindly accept what they're told and question things, apply logic/reason, and think objectively.
It's quite obvious that most core ideas underlying (free market) capitalism also fail, just like socialism has in the past. That's why over the years, governments and their people stepped in to make modifications (e.g., welfare capitalism). Many existing models have pretty huge flaws. Take the US for example where capital accumulation continues indefinitely leading to higher and higher concentrations of wealth. One obvious issue here is this then shifts social power to the wealthy through governmental manipulation.
While it's true most modern day capitalistic economics work better than other models we've seen in the past, that doesn't mean it will continue indefinitely and it certainly doesn't mean we have the "be-all-end-all-model." Thinking we do is both ignorant and arrogant.
We also need to revisit the social contract as to what a society expects by agreeing to fall into a governmental system. It's quite obvious people aren't happy with the current social contract because most citizens are falling further and further into losing their half, so to speak. As such. they're rightfully upset. Now, we can both agree socialism isn't the answer but our current frame of capitalism isn't the answer either and it needs some changes to give people what they rightfully deserve.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Insightful)
Take the US for example where capital accumulation continues indefinitely leading to higher and higher concentrations of wealth. One obvious issue here is this then shifts social power to the wealthy through governmental manipulation.
Shifts? This presupposes that social power was ever out of the hands of the wealthy. I'm not entirely sure it was.
From ancient times to medieval times, people in power were rich and rich people were in power. They were practically inextricably linked.
In the Age of Mercantilism, rich people were so powerful they owned private armies. The Dutch West India Company managed to capture the Spanish silver fleet in 1628, stealing their entire cargo. (Among many other similar things of that era.)
In the Gilded Age in North America, a dozen men controlled the industry of the entire continent.
In the 1940s and 50s, television was such a fantastically powerful propaganda tool that Boomers were effectively controlled by a few dozen people.
Today, a handful of major websites are so influential that Congress holds hearings about it.
Control has been getting less overt and somewhat more diffuse, but it still rests with rich people. They're having to work harder to maintain it, but they are maintaining it. Tax law benefits them, not me. The courts benefit them, not me. Congress represents them, not me, except by accident.
When was this mythical time when society was controlled by anything other than rich people?
It's quite obvious people aren't happy with the current social contract because most citizens are falling further and further into losing their half, so to speak. As such, they're rightfully upset.
Rich people back through the Gilded Age knew to allow more than mere crumbs to fall from their table. Modern rich people seem to have forgotten that. They have far more medieval attitudes than we've been accustomed to for the past century and a half.
It's gotten so bad that we're no longer better off than our parents. That's when we really noticed things not going well. I personally am, but my brother isn't. Going down the list of my cousins, only one of them is doing better than his parents, because he married well. The rest are either hanging on, or doing markedly worse than their parents. Looking around my neighborhood, the number of houses with 3 and 4 and 5 cars parked at them is higher than it ever was when I was young, as Millennials either fail to launch and boomerang home, or launch much much later than was previously the norm, because they simply can't afford the real estate to move out. What I see jives with the statistics I hear about.
The Libertarian Lunatic fringe of Slashdot will be quick to point out that young Americans are being heavily propagandized at their universities about socialism and communism, so it's all their fault. I contend that universities have been propagandizing since the Communist Manifesto was published in 1848. It's gaining traction again now because capitalism is failing to make young people's lives better, for the first time in quite a while. If capitalism was working better for the masses, they would go on ignoring university propaganda just as they did for most of the last 170 years.
I'm not so sure that there's a generation of people who don't blindly accept what they're told and question, or apply logic and reason. Reading Youtube comments for an hour is enough to disabuse you of that notion. What I am sure of is there's a generation of people looking up from their empty plates and saying, "I was promised cake. Where's the cake?"
Re:Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Insightful)
You are quick to blame people without closely examining how corrupt and rotten the system become. From debtor's prison of student loans, to bank bailouts, to suppression of tech wages by no-poaching agreements and H1Bs, there is plenty reasons to be skeptical.
As to idealized version of Capitalism, that would be great, but what country has it implemented?
Re:Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Interesting)
Eh.... I'm very curious as to precisely how the poll was conducted. This is one of those things where the precise wording is important, and the subject is vulnerable to a lot of bias.
As an example, I will use my own views. I'm well aware of how poorly socialism has fared historically, but I'm also aware of how the implementation of socialist ideals has always been hindered by human corruption and greed, just as those same vices have caused inequality and suffering in capitalist societies. If I were asked whether I'd want to live under a socialist government, my response would be a resounding "no".
However, if asked whether I would be in favor of socialism as a legislative doctrine, I would have to answer "yes". I have seen significant evidence that governmental structure can actually run social services decently, if the human corruption can be adequately checked in the system design. Philosophically, I believe that we as a society should work to support the whole society, rather than seeking personal hegemony.
To borrow a phrase, capitalism is the worst system, except for everything else we've tried. There are certainly some good ideas in socialist systems, but they rely on an awful lot of trust. Capitalism assumes no trust, but brings its own collection of faults. I think an ideal system would draw on both ideologies (and others), with careful thought toward how the system can be exploited in the future.
One way that balance can be acheived is by using technology to monitor and control governmental services, filling the role that bureaucracy does today. It is much easier to design a "fair" computer than it is to ask a human to be "fair", because it's relatively straightforward to have computers explicitly ignore certain input.
That means we need to educate our children not just on civics, but on security, philosophy, history, and technology, as well.... We're doomed.
Re:Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:4, Interesting)
Competition is a powerful tool, but it requires a referee, and intelligent rules that ensures that competition continues, and that once you have a "winner", another contender can emerge and eat his lunch if he's sleeping. In many cases, we don't have that. Also, unlike sports, you have to consider the well being of the loser, which is where a government focused entirely on capitalism falls short. You want people to play the game, to play hard and ensure there's something to "win", but you don't want your losers to fall out and give up (or just plain die, when applied to real life). You need a safety net.
Young people are perhaps overreacting to the negative realities of capitalism. It is not a perfect system, it has many faults, as does socialism, as does a command economy. The overreaction is in part due to the fact that the US has reached a plateau, that geopolitics is not favoring us significantly and there is a lot less to go around, but also in part to the hard right turn reflected in both parties. We are seeing some facets of socialism that we have had for a long time, that were working amazingly well, get defunded and brutalized for an agenda that doesn't really make any sense. We're also seeing the government move away from the safety net idea that was going to enable us to be competitive globally, shoring up the weaknesses of capitalism, in favor of some very naive and misguided libertarian principles, all while ignoring the very real reality of a global economy, that will succeed no matter what we do.
I don't know what economics courses you took, but when I read about the ISMs, I didn't hear "this is the best and clear winner". What I heard is here is what it does well, here is what it does poorly. Even command economies have strength: no other ism can move and adapt as quickly, no other ism CAN be as skillfully manipulated for a purpose. But of course, the weaknesses are tremendous. It's important to understand these shades, China manipulates all of the isms masterfully, at least in comparison to literally everyone else.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:4, Insightful)
I'd argue that a purely socialist state has never really existed at all. Marx's fundamental theory was that agrarian societies were not at a level of social or economic development where his economic and political theories would even work. Both the Soviet Union and China had to literally ramp up their fundamentally agrarian economies through rapid industrialization just to get them to a point where the whole notion of collectivism, in the Marxist sense, would even be possible. And really, since most of the Communist economies ended up being labeled some variant of "Marxist-Leninist", these economies still retained a limited space for private enterprise, at least until the Cultural Revolution in China, which even most Chinese Communists now view as a horrible aberration that had more to do with Mao reasserting control of China after he'd been effectively sidelined when the full extent of the catastrophe that the Great Leap Forward in the 1950s had created.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:4, Interesting)
For instance, Sweden, Norway, and Finland are definitely socialist countries.
No they aren't. They are capitalist countries with slightly higher spending on social programs. If you call that "socialism" then the word has lost all meaning.
An American is more likely to work for the government than a Swede. The Swedish post office is privatized, and their education system is more privatized than America. They have LOWER per capita government spending on healthcare: America spends more money per person on Medicare+Medicaid+VA to cover 30% of the population than Sweden spends to cover 100%. Just because America's system is stupid and wasteful doesn't make it "less socialist".
Norway's Statoil is an example of socialism, but that is a special situation of a massive public resource owned by a small population. Very few other countries have that benefit.
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Insightful)
The system we have isn't Capitalism, it's Cronyism. Brought on because people think that Keynesian economics is somehow a good thing. Sadly this line of thinking is so prevalent on both sides of the isle, that it will never get fixed until the system collapses. Young people today have never seen Capitalism, they have only seen Cronyism and yet everybody calls it Capitalism. It isn't.
You do still see Capitalism at lower levels of society. The farmers markets, the used/antique markets etc. But those in government don't make money on these, they would rather make the big bucks working with large corporations. As a result, the large corporations get the laws passed that they want, usually at the expense of the little guy. Hence Cronyism wins the day.
Now, if we can just get young people to understand the difference...
Not real capitalism eh? (Score:5, Informative)
The system we have isn't Capitalism, it's Cronyism.
So you're saying "that's not REAL capitalism!"? :-) funny that many don't let socialists get away with making that same argument.
Can you point to a time when we *didn't* have cronyism? Because the last time we had such concentrated wealth and lack of regulation and oversight was the Gilded Age, the height of cronyism and poverty. If you're referring to economic prosperity since the world wars, that comes partly from being the major economic power left standing as well as FDR's New Deal and progressive reform that actually took very strong cues from Socialist Party demands (the Socialist Party was actually winning seats in Congress and state legislatures as a third party and that was enough to scare the establishment into giving into some of the demands). So in modern US history we've actually done the best with progressive/socialist reform and the worst under deregulated "free market" capitalism (that quickly becomes cronyism).
So why is it so wrong to point out we've never had real full socialism either and should give it a chance? Socialism is about economic democracy instead of the economic dictatorship of CEOs under capitalism, what's so wrong about democracy?
Re: Everyone knew the pump and dump was coming... (Score:5, Insightful)
The system we have isn't Capitalism, it's Cronyism. Brought on because people think that Keynesian economics is somehow a good thing. Sadly this line of thinking is so prevalent on both sides of the isle, that it will never get fixed until the system collapses. Young people today have never seen Capitalism, they have only seen Cronyism and yet everybody calls it Capitalism. It isn't.
You do still see Capitalism at lower levels of society. The farmers markets, the used/antique markets etc. But those in government don't make money on these, they would rather make the big bucks working with large corporations. As a result, the large corporations get the laws passed that they want, usually at the expense of the little guy. Hence Cronyism wins the day.
Now, if we can just get young people to understand the difference...
Cronyism or crony capitalism is capitalism in a pure form... The farmers markets et al. are examples of small market economies which scale out to be mixed economies.
The problem isn't that young people don't understand the difference, it's that you have made up your own definitions.
Successful economies are always mixed economies, combining parts of capitalism, socialism, free market libertarianism and controlled markets. There's plenty of room to argue which mix is best but pure forms of these ideas are and have always been bound for failure.
Re: Most Successful System Ever (Score:5, Insightful)
People could easily look past capitalism's iniquitous allocation of wealth when everyone's standard of living was going up and America was the freest country in the world.
Unfortunately most people's standard of living has been dropping for at least a generation. At the same time the American Gulag has become the largest in the world, filled almost entirely with persons who were coerced into "confessing".
No longer able or willing to provide freedom & prosperity, the capitalist/financialist oligarchy has lost the mandate of heaven. People are beginning to look at it more like criminal gang and less like a legitimate government.
Communism != Socialism (Score:5, Insightful)
Yeah, now they want another trial at what failed in the Eastern Europe
What failed in Eastern Europe was communism. I'm not a huge fan of socialism but it is far less extreme than communism. Europe and Canada are now somewhere on the spectrum between socialism and capitalism, trying to find a balance between allowing people the freedom to generate wealth while also ensuring that some of that wealth provides a social safety net for those less fortunate.
Re:Communism != Socialism (Score:5, Insightful)
Taxing and redistributing is not socialism - that is just a safety net, usually called social democracy. Socialism is centralized control of production, and the only places you see this in Europe are in healthcare and, in a few places, petroleum extraction - and that last one is self-limiting when the petroleum runs out. All corporations are created by government through some kind of charter, and some have a public ownership component - occasionally even a controlling interest. But it's still nothing like a philosophy of socialism - the economy is overwhelmingly driven by private sector allocation of capital.
Re:Your fault (Score:5, Informative)
Learn fucking history and stop blaming the U.S. for shit socialists did, asshole.
Re:Schools (Score:5, Insightful)
This is what happens when post-modernists take over the school systems and Western Values are treated as bad instead of good.
Or young people see the generation before them loaded with debt and unable to afford to purchase a house, see a political ruling class that does not care about them, and see companies making record profits and all the money going to an increasingly smaller percentage of the population and are realizing "yep, the system's broken".
Re:The people with least life experience (Score:5, Insightful)
It makes sense younger people would be susceptible to bad ideas and in particular people that say everything should be free. Hell I'd take everything free if I believed someone it was possible. Still these people have no experience, things that are too good to be true often are. And hell at that young age people are voting democrat solely because America is a democracy and democrat sounds similar.
It makes sense that older people, who have accumulated wealth and power, continue to try and grow their wealth by simply rigging the game then decry those younger than them as "lazy" or "entitled" when they state that the game has been rigged against them. All the old people care about is "I got mine, go get yours", not realizing that there is nothing left for them to go get. Boomer's don't care that we are gutting the future of Social Security to pay for the military and tax breaks for corporations or the 1%, they have pensions. Meanwhile the rest of us have to worry about retiring to a vastly reduced Social Security benefit while relying on 401ks that are based upon a stock market with values greatly exceeding the actual worth of the companies being traded.
Re:Go fig. (Score:5, Informative)
Given the debt load of the these two latest generations, the McJob Market, and the continuing concentration of wealth towards the 0.0001% while wages continue to stagnate in the face of increasing productivity I'd say I'm right and you can go pound sand, little anon.
Re:amazing. (Score:5, Insightful)
That's because that system has been corrupted and is now pushing people back into poverty.
If you don't fix it, it will be replaced. Act accordingly.
Re:amazing. (Score:4, Insightful)
Capitalism, like a monarchy, is inherently corrupted. When you set up an amoral system that rewards screwing every one and every thing over if it means another nickel in dividends, while shielding shareholders from the companies actions, the results are a given.
Re:amazing. (Score:4, Insightful)
Let's see, the economic system that has raised more people out of poverty than any other, young people aren't sure about.
Nobody gives a fuck.
Let me repeat, nobody gives a fuck.
In the developed world, that happened to the grandparents, great-grandparents, even great-great-grandparents of today's youth. "Raising out of poverty" is the goal of the last century, not this one. If the system was still working, today's youth would see a path towards a future more prosperous than that of their parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, et al. They don't see one. They see all of the myriad new roadblocks instead. They see that they are objectively worse off than their parents. This is not a myth or a fluke or a manipulated statistic. This is the real world. Look around, asshole. Unless you live in a gated community, you'll see the evidence with your own eyes.
Nobody gives a fuck about the "raise out of poverty" talking point. That was 100 years ago, or on the other side of the world, and either way, totally irrelevant to the life experience of people answering this poll. What matters is what has that economic system done for them lately. And the answer is, failed.
Re:I'm not a "young" American nor versed in econom (Score:5, Interesting)
I feel that capitalism works well for economy building,
Correct. Capitalism serves the needs of the masses so long as you are experiencing significant growth. When the growth slows or stops, as it must if we are to avoid destruction of the biosphere upon which we depend, pure capitalism has run its course. At that point, [more] socialism is needed in order to serve the masses, who are no longer offered a share of excess.
Re:Something for nothing (Score:5, Insightful)
The problem is that everyone wants something for nothing.
No, the problem is people who recite trite phrases instead of actually looking around them.
Instead, they decide what they want the result to be (hence the trite phrase) and only look at the things around them that confirm that result.
For example, those of us who want single-payer medical care don't want "something for nothing". We believe medical care is so important that we all should all get it, and pay for it via taxes. Just like we all pay for the military, firefighters, police, roads and so on. As an added bonus, it costs less money than our current system.
How do you suppose that would translate at the college level if college were determined to be "free"?
We don't need to suppose. California already did it. For about 100 years, University of California and Cal-State schools were free for in-state students. Eventually they added some "fees", but that cost about 1 to 2 months of minimum-wage 40-hours-per-week work.
All it got California was the largest economy in the US, and created Silicon Valley. Not a bad deal.
It ended when Anti-tax Republicanism swept over the state. Now that the Boomers had their degrees, it was terrible that these freeloaders were getting free education. And, far more importantly, they decided that "taxation is theft!!!" was their new motto.
Be smart about it. Use community college (or high school) to get GE requirements done cheaply. Get a job to help offset some of the cost, don't just use the college loans to pay for 100% the cost. Use credit cards wisely and don't spend money you don't have. Don't eat out. Ramen noodles and PB&J are your friends.
And when they do all that and still look to a future of never affording a house or never being able to afford kids? Now what?
Fundamentally, the problem is productivity became decoupled from wages around 1978. Which means real wages have either stayed flat or gone far down for the vast majority of people for a very long time. Which results in "the American Dream" being out of reach of more people every year thanks to inflation. We're approaching a tipping point where something will be done about that.
Option 1, which you appear to support, is to blame the people getting screwed over by this basic economic fact and do nothing. Which will result in more people falling behind, more anger, more resentment, and eventually a violent correction. If you're lucky, you'll be able to push off the violence until after you've died of natural causes.
Option 2, which I support, is to start using the only peaceful tool available to make that correction: the government. Which means using the horrors of socialism to correct the worst problems and work to tip the economic playing field back towards the workers. You'll still be rich, just like people can still be rich in Europe. Just slightly less so. In return, your waitstaff will be able to afford to live on a 40-hour-per-week job instead of breaking out the guillotines.