Capitalism versus Socialism

[Duke87 1,070]

Originally posted by: EyeofMobius

Many workplaces I find myself at now are heavily focused on obliterating the use of "guys" in mixed company; this is no simple feat considering that this term has been in common use for quite awhile now I however find it most disagreeable because I find difficulty in an appropriate filler with a more neutral connotation; Can you comfortably refer to a mixed group of 8 year olds as "folks?"quote>

This is ridiculous. It has been proper grammar for centuries to use the masculine version of a word to describe a mixed group. And what about languages where there is no such thing as a gender-neutral word? Somehow they get along just fine without them in Spain, Italy, France, etc. Hmm...

Besides, I would argue that "guys" in the context of addressing a group (e.g., "What do you guys think of...?") is effectively gender-neutral. After all, it is perfectly acceptable to use the term that way when addressing an all-female group.

[chicah 20]

I guess my post was kind of random, in the middle of all the freedom-talk. I feel like I've already said what I mean on that in my previous post.

For the last issue, the issue of gender-neutral words. I agree that not being allowed to use the word "guys" seems overly silly. But, I do also appreciate trying to neutralize the gender-determined words in existence, or finding a female equivalent. A lot of people still say "police man" rather than "police officer", even when referring to a woman. A political party here (far right, ironically) used the word "chairman" for their leader, even though she was a woman.

The point is, we do live in a patriarchy. The gender equality has come miles in large parts of the modern democracies, but there is still a lot left to do many places. Anyways, the thing with the language is that using a word related to men as a general word puts men as the "norm". We don't even think about this. A few decades ago, an author here published a book called "Egalias D

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

About the "guys" thing.  In older English usage, a guy is a scarecrow.  Finding acceptable terms is not a problem.

For a group of 8-year olds, how about "children"? "Kids" implies thay are goats.

For an older group, one could try "people" or (gasp) "Ladies and Gentlemen" although in most gatherings this is hyperbole.

When addressing a group, casual sloppiness of speech won't win you any awards.

When a committee is at some kind of doldrums, saying something like "Alright, girls, let's get back to the problem." sometimes has a salutary effect on both the attention and the decorum of the meeting.  No reflection on the distaff side.

Someone on this board has a signature snap that pretty much defines "political correctness" for what it is.  I won't repeat that line here.  Simply this:  Political correctness is an attempt by the weak-kneed to find a way of saying something unpleasant in a pleasant way so as to avoid odium.  If you can't stand up for your position, you really are less than a wimp.

Edit:  Oh, and as an afterthought, in Italian the polite form is the feminine singlular.  This gives rise to vernacular translations like "How's she going?"

[EyeofMobius 27]

To give context to my workplace for my comments; I am involved in outdoor education and adventure tourism where my primary group are people under the age of 18 but also include seniors, families and corporate. I do a lot of paddling, high ropes and interpretive hiking with the groups.

One more note about why I feel "guys" is hard to pry away from is that the alternatives are all more condecending to listeners. I can get away with "Everyone" at times but it must be within some frame of context and can not address a group on its own. As far as condecending goes "children" is an absolute no no unless I mean it in a tone to imply a group is acting innapropriately; The older the recipient of "children" the more resentful they are of it so it can be a powerful tool but rarely a good option. In my work environment casual language is very effective in keeping the activities as tension free as I can make them because some people find it stressful enough to jump out of a window and zipline across a field but even more stressful to say they aren't comfortable enough to do the activity in front of their peers.

@ A Nonny Moose: Yes in a world where the individual voice is so highly prized as a right people do need to be prepared to defend anything they say and if your opinion is watered down to avoid getting a reaction then it is weak. Political correctness to soften language is weakening the opinions of those who use it and strengthening the opinions of the people who are making their arguements clear as daylight.

@ chicah: No arguement over the world being patriarchal and no surprise that the male populous took the book as offensive. People are way to easily offended or they take offenses way too seriously. Isn't that how we ended up with sports like fencing to settle differences between 'noblemen' who were so easily offended where it would be too counter productive to actualy kill someone in a duel. On the page of Devil's Advocate could we not be seen as denying the history of the world by politically correcting all language to eliminate the unsightly events of the past?

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

Can we agree that this has now evolved into a discussion of the foibles of our various capitalistic/socialistic takes in our governments, or should we start a new thread on a topic like First World Governments and Their Shortcomings.  I think the thread title has been beaten to death, exhumed, autopsied, and now the remains should be decently disposed of.

[Empowered One 41]

Here is my bet on what will happen with this thread: As long as there is still activity, this thread will stay open. Regardless of topic derailment.

[DocRorlach 25]

The problem with the thread's titular header is that nobody took the trouble of definition. Hence the repeated misinterpretation of captalism = west and socialism = east. And usually in 1950 terms. It would, perchance, be interesting to hear what everyone perceives these terms to mean (and on Wiki copy & paste, please).

[EyeofMobius 27]

Well I suppose I will lay my definitions here. After the Oxfor English Dictionary definitions for simplicity.

Capitalism (Noun): an ecinomic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state.

Socialism (Noun): a political and economic theory of social organizations which advocates that the means of production, distribution, and exchange should be owned or regulated by the community as a whole.

Socialism (Noun in Marxist Theory): A transitional state between the overthrow of capitalism and the realization of communism.

Those are the OED definitions.

I personally define capitalism as a governmental structure whose primary focus is economic growth and profit. I define socialism as a governmental structure whose primary focus is quality of life.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

OK, so we accept these definitions.  Now, let's get down to cases.

We pretty much agree that none of the -isms provide a complete plan that works.  We've been playing with this stuff now for a couple of hundred years after we gave up despotisms notwithstanding some 20^th century flashbacks.  If you all agree, we should be looking at where any success has been realized.  There are several examples in the world, all with warts, but working.

I think everyone knows of the main event economies.  The U.S.A., U.K., Canada, China, India, Australia, New Zealand, the Scandinavian countries and Japan are all running not too badly.  What of the others?  There is currently the Irish crisis in the E.U., but is it likely to damage this very fragile aggregation of formerly unfriendly states?  What of what may collectively be called "Indo-China"?  The Koreas?  Africa?  Russia and its former vassals?

[DocRorlach 25]

Eh, sorry, this puts me in a bit of a dither, Moose. OK, I have not lived for lon in the US, merely six years and change. On the other hand, I did spent fifteen years between Bangok & Tokyo, Bali & Bombay. The rest are the largely European years. If - in economic terms only - I were to chart the "progress" of these different regions, I'd have to say S.E.Asia and the Far East are they only places on the planet were any progress was made.

Yes, in the US and Europe we appear to have "more" of just about everything, but the truth is, it is just that: more. Between the Eisehower/Kennedy years and the Bush/Obama years, the segments of the population considered poor have only grown. The gap between the haves and the have-nots has expanded considerably.During the same period, the ranks of the have-everything have swollen. And to a lesser extend, the same thing happened in Europe.

The latter has the additional problem of being born out of animosity. There is not going to be a "United States of Europe" simply because ever since the Romans retreate back over the Alps the various tribes have baashed each other's heads in. That they don't do it anymore with axes or guns means nothing; the current weapons of choice are money, tucked-away tarrifs, and hidden subsidies. Thus there is no European economy because the disparity between North and South, East and West is simply too large.

While Asia initially took in everything that came out of the US markets, most of these countries have grown quite a bit choosy, and can now provide adequate local alternatives. Nearly all have been insistent on the preservation of local culture, and almost all (with perhaps the exceptions of Taiwan and Japan), have opted out of the free-fall, free market and are instead applying government controls far more arbitrary than the US or Europe. Of course, since, at the end of WW2, they almost all started from nearly nothing, their progress has been more noticable. And with the exception of large swaths of mainland China, most of these countries had measurable success in reducing the gaps in the classes. You ask any western marketing director today, and you'll hear how they see Asia as the only expansive markets around.

Africa you might as well forget. Nothing happens there economically speaking, and nothing will for a few centuries to come.

Russia, despite its return to muscle rhetoric, will eventually have to make u its mind into which ring it wants to throw its towel: west, i.e. Europe, or east, meaning China and the Asian Pacific Rim. For that to happen it has to reform its internal distribution network, and cease its reliance on energy exports.

None of the above takes any current or future political winds into account.

[Ocram's Razr 964]

I personally think that it is a bad idea to have a monopoly in any sector by any entity so the government's role in business should be to remove monopolies and increase competition. When the government becomes a monopoly, it makes waste, fraud, and abuse much easier and common.

[DocRorlach 25]

By definition, every government IS a monopoly, regardless of the process by which those in it attained their position.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

I am quite in favour of government as a monopoly, but it must stick to its business and only regulate.  No trading allowed.

[DocRorlach 25]

Not available because not possible: not governmental trading = no pensions, no infrastructure, and certainly exorbitant taxes. That is just the problem: governments ought to function like business, even in terms of competitiveness. If we had more managers instead of politicians & lobbyists, we might actually have a chance to achieve a semblance of equilibrium between socialism and capitalism.

[EyeofMobius 27]

In any improved system the people doing the moving and shaking must have first hand experiential knowledge. This is one of the most lacking things in so many acceptable heirarchal structures today with government being the most significant. I don't automatically credit any politician/lobbyist/manager on having the actual issues at the heart of the solutions created since I assume that whatever they are going on about boils down to the individual image and self interest. Yes governments need business model outlets but they also need to understand better about how to solve problems. Does the person who gets appointed to be the minister of something always have a background in the job? I doubt it but they should.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

If business qualifications were necessary to be in the cabinet, what would we do with all those lawyers who get elected?  Should the Minister of Health and Welfare be a physician?  Of what degree of qualification?  What should he know about social work, since welfare is part of the portfolio?

The Attorney General is usually a highly qualified lawyer, as is, often, the Minister of Justice.  However, is the Solicitor General, who has charge of the police forces likely to be a veteran cop?

One can go on like this forever.  All these ministries have permanent staff who are supposed to have the requisite qualifications.  Governments and parties come and go, but the civil service remains.  So who is holding the leash?  Who wags the dog?  Very likely, in Canada, it is the chaps who are on the staff of the privy council office.  If this were not true, a win by the opposing party would cause a long period of chaos.  Instead the new cabinet gets a set of briefings, and not from the outgoing ministers.

By the way, Doc, there is no money in the Canada Pension Plan.  It has been bankrupt since the beginning because the goverment borrowed the contributions instead of investing them.  CPP payments come out of the general current account.  This is one of the reasons there is a panic on as the population ages.

[Ocram's Razr 964]

Yes, the government of most countries have monopolies on ruling but regulating is not a business. I am talking about monopolies in services such as healthcare, security, shops, transportation (as in no private toll roads, no private rail roads, no private taxis, no private limos, etc), education (I would not want to live in a country with bad public schools and no good private schools), pharmacies and toiletries (no private drug stores plays into healthcare), industry (the soviet union and china used to have no private factories), offices/banking/trading (nationalized businesses), agriculture (state farms instead of agricultural subsidies), and others.

[DocRorlach 25]

Sorry, LS, I utterly disagree. All essential services: i.e., communications, health care, education, and basic transportation ought to be monopolies run at cost by a central government. I saw what the opposite does during my travails & travels in the US. 50 feudal states, each with a different set of robber barons, holding the forts agains the federalis. The Greatest Nation on Earth (people-wise) has the worst infrastructure, transport, health-care, and communication in the western hemisphere. Heck, at one time I circumnavigated NYC because I could not see the road for potholes too large for my Intruder.

If indeed models are needed, look at some of the Scandinavian countries (lest I be accused of scaled narrative again). These nations are the closest thing we have to socio-capitalism. None without problems, but as even Mayor Bloomberg admitted, worth studying.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

And I tend to agree.  The public should not have to worry about where essential services are sourced.  A confusion of private sector outfits just disguises the general incompetence, while protecting the guilty from exposure.  The Scandinavians are a little too "cradle to the grave" for me, but our compromise in Canada seems to be better than having all those people worrying about "states rights".  We have one constitution, and the provinces are subject to the feds and can even be taken over in a dire emergency using the doctrine of eminent domain.  To invoke that, a province would have to be in a chaotic state.

[krbe 193]

Originally posted by: DocRorlach

If indeed models are needed, look at some of the Scandinavian countries (lest I be accused of scaled narrative again). These nations are the closest thing we have to socio-capitalism. None without problems, but as even Mayor Bloomberg admitted, worth studying.quote>

Problem is, it's four different countries each doing well in different areas of government. Though, they have 24.7 million people living on living on 1.12 million square kilometres, – a little less than one tenth of the population on a little more than one tenth of the area of the US, so scale is getting better

[Duke87 1,070]

Originally posted by: DocRorlach

All essential services: i.e., communications, health care, education, and basic transportation ought to be monopolies run at cost by a central government. I saw what the opposite does during my travails & travels in the US. 50 feudal states, each with a different set of robber barons, holding the forts agains the federalis. The Greatest Nation on Earth (people-wise) has the worst infrastructure, transport, health-care, and communication in the western hemisphere. Heck, at one time I circumnavigated NYC because I could not see the road for potholes too large for my Intruder.quote>

Part of the problem, though, comes back to scale. The US is a huge country with some pretty severe regional differences in culture and way of life - which makes it pretty much impossible to effectively manage everything centrally. What works best for the people of Utah will be very different from what works for the people of Delaware. Hence why we have the whole states' rights thing. If anything, the US is overcentralized as things currently stand... and this controversy is why you have problems. If the feds would leave states alone, the states would be able to do their jobs the way they were intended to. But the feds instead go about interfering in everything and that breaks the system.

A good mental exercise is to think of the US less as a country and more as analagous to the EU: a group of member states that each run their own operation within the greater whole. And indeed, this gives you a more accurate comparison both in terms of scale and in terms of how things work. Is there one EU-wide healthcare system? One EU-wide department of transportation? Of course not, that'd be silly. Well, it'd be just as silly to have those things run US-wide.

As for why the problems exist... well, let's look at them item by item.

Infrastructure: there is a huge aversion to spending money on maintenance in this country because it's boring and doesn't win votes. It's also very convenient and easy to cut when you want funding for something shiny. Federal, state, local... it's all the same, and more or less centralization isn't going to change anything.

Transport: in general, most Americans do not place the same value on public transportation as people in other developed countries do. We love our cars. But this is a cultural issue, and so again, more or less centralization isn't going to change anything.

Healthcare: the healthcare in America is actually some of the best in the world... that is, if you look at private healthcare. Public healthcare is abysmal and so those who can't afford private healthcare are left with crap. More centralization here would certainly lead to equalization, but whether or not it would actually lead to improvement is iffier. The quality of healthcare would definitely improve for the lower rungs of society that are already on the public system, but everyone who's currently using the private system (majority of Americans) would end up worse off. Meanwhile, the general inability of our government to control costs would make everything more expensive.

Communication: I don't know of any places in the US that have problems with telecommunications services. How exactly are other countries better?

[Ocram's Razr 964]

The Internet is legally considered an information service (DATA) instead of a Telecommunications utility (Infrastructure) in the USA. When it is legally defined as what it scientifically is, The United States will have faster and cheaper Internet, like South Korea and Japan.

ETA: Also, telecommunications are virtual monopolies. There are 3 corporations (Disney and News Corp are the biggest) that control 90% of TV programming, there is only 1 cable company per region (Time Warner controlls the east, ComCast controlls the west), 2 satellite tv companies (1 high end, 1 low end), 2 home telephone companies (Quest and AT&T, though AT&T is also a cellphone company), and all of the cellular telephone companies make deals to controll pricing. If the government stepped in, it should reduce the monopolistic characteristics of telecommunication and information services/utilities. The governement should NEVER create a new telecom monopoly.

[DocRorlach 25]

Scale, shmale. The size of the country has absolutely nothing to do with anything other than its ability to build infrastructure. Since the invention of the Otto Motor everyone had the same amount of time to get theirs in order. Which in the US is largely the responsibility of the individual (i.e. feudal) states. And look what they have done with it. Road, rail, public transport - the US is pretty much on the bottom of the western pile. Communications: your socalled free enterprise (you are free to pay what demand!) has created squabbling telecoms company which spent more money sueing each other than on improving their coverage; broadband, while not as bad as Australia, is really only just coming out of the ADSL ages. Health care? I keep forgetting, that is a pinky-commy idea over there. Instead, it is so much better for the general population that the US has the second highest (after the UK) per capita in military spending.

But of course, I foget, the US is the best darn tootin' country in the world, ain't it..?

[Empowered One 41]

Something more ontopic... -_-'

[krbe 193]

What is this guy on to? So very predictable and ridiculous. But if his education only requires a $500 investment, I can see where he's going.

[A Nonny Moose 8,262]

We all know that the machine contains a positive feed-back loop.  It will either break soon or is already broken, but is so massive that the pieces haven't all fallen to the ground yet.

The Canadian goverment has finally put up a bill to allow judges to sentence multiple murderers to consecutive life sentences rather than concurrent ones.  This means that someone like Clifford Olson could be sentenced to life with no parole review for 200 years.  Currently, the penalty for being convicted of Murder I is life with no parole review for 25 years.

The idea of parole for a person convicted of Murder in the first degree is repugnant to me, and should be repugnant to everyone.  I also abhor the expense of keeping these people incarcerated in some comfort for life without getting anything back from them.  I like the idea of a sentence that includes some form of retributave labour even if it is only breaking rocks.

Back to what a goverment should be doing.

In a multiple "state" (for want of a better word) union like the United States of America, you need the federal government to set and enforce a set of standards so that, for example, all the railroads have the same guage.  This also applies to things like a universal health care system.  The "up yours, Jack, I'm inboard" system doesn't work anymore because there are too many people who are overboard, many of them caught in the current downturn.  Something like the Canada Health Act is what is needed.  The provinces in Canada administer health care, and each has its own set of rules, all compliant with the federal act.  What the Canada Health Act did was to outlaw corporations from being the primary care giver.  There are many services that are not covered, and you can purchase supplementary insurance to cover these issues.  The Act also set out a minimum standard of care that must be given.

Some subsequent decisions by some provinces have either ramped up basic care, or in some ways impaired it without contravening the act.  For example, some years ago, the Province of Ontariio decided to limit enrollment in the universities medical schools.  Since the province controls the funding for these schools, they were able to dictate the number of people being trained as physicians.  They claimed that this was based on demographic studies of the number of physicians needed for the population.  Somewhere in there, there was a major error.  Either they did not consider the time taken to train a physician, or anticipate the needs of an aging population, or the increasing rate of population growth due to immigration, or some other serious factor.  The fact remains that up to two weeks ago, I was unable to find a family practitioner willing to take me as a patient of record since I left Toronto in the 1990 time frame, so I have effectively been without a family physician for some twenty years.  I know that I am not unique, and in fact represent the norm.  The machine is broken, folks, and everyone knows it including the provincial government.  They don't seem to know how to fix it. 

The Collge of Physicians and Surgeons who license physicians in Ontario sit on their hands while perfectly qualified immigrant physicians drive cabs.  I don't care if the physician speaks one of the official languages perfectly, but these fat cats seem to.  All I want is to be able to communicate with my doctor, even if I have to use sign language.

So, you see, that even within a "socialized medicine" system there are warts.  It is not a pinko-commie system.  It is just the usual bureaucratic nightmare.  I am somewhat gratified that those physicians who fled Canada for the U.S. on the head of the proclamation of the Canada Health Act are now caught in the same trap again, and this time have no where to run to.

[EyeofMobius 27]

From the video the guy talking makes good sense on many things but I do feel that his arguements lack support that all the pretty pictures do little to provide. I feel it is largely true that the average citizen of the world does not comprehend the extent to which we are influenced in our daily lives. When I am presented with how much effort has been put into making something that is designed to cause a specific reaction on the most subtle level I can percieve I am impressed to understand where the efforts of some of the foremeost intelligence of the world has gone.

@ Healthcare: It was broken on inception. In Jean Baudrillard's book "The Consumer Society" somewhere is an argument to explain the terminal healthcare system that evades my eyes currently. It goes something like this; The medical professions aim to extend the lifespan of the population is only creating a larger group of people at higher levels of age who are more prone to illness and malady; by increasing this group they are increasing the demand on the healthcare system which will expand to make the groups older and prone to illness larger; eventually the healthcare system will be spent having more needy people than is possible to treat and the system will collapse. It is arguable that the system has already reached this point and now we collectively hold our breath for the proverbial straw that will break the camel's back.

I am grateful to be in Canada with a healthcare system that will most likely keep me from death by trauma or deadly infections but when it comes to treating anything not immediately life threatening I find the medical system to be an absolute failure. Through my employment required levels of first-aid training I have in effect become my own doctor and the only purpose the doctor actually serves is to fill out a perscription when I need antibiotics or when I require a legally recognized physical assessment.

@Security, Communications, Transportation, et all: It is all now set up to feed our consumption. 'Socialism' or 'Capitalism' it matters not but we are now set up to rely on consumption as a society. In my ideal socitey of a socialist styled one the government would produce everything we currently today deem as being an everyday common need type commodity. The population would make less money but have no taxation thereby leaving the money we do make to be spent on personal satisfaction. The society would need to value experiental commodities to be of a higher value than material commodities.

I will finish this post with two of my favourite quotes on consumption:

"There's nothing more American tourists like than stuff they can get at home" Stephen Colbert

"A house is just a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get more stuff. " Georg Carlin

[Ocram's Razr 964]

I think that just a logo or the transcript would be much better than what seems to be the first images that showed up in Google Image Search. I would keep the graphs and have them up for longer.

[Duke87 1,070]

Originally posted by: DocRorlach

Scale, shmale. The size of the country has absolutely nothing to do with anything other than its ability to build infrastructure. Since the invention of the Otto Motor everyone had the same amount of time to get theirs in order. Which in the US is largely the responsibility of the individual (i.e. feudal) states. And look what they have done with it. Road, rail, public transport - the US is pretty much on the bottom of the western pile.quote>

You are correct in your assessment that American infrastructure is often lacking... however I don't think the way our government is set up is necessarily to blame for that. The biggest problem is cultural: America is the capital of NIMBYism and BANANAism. A great many infrastructure capital improvement projects are killed or scaled back due to public opposition. On the maintenance side... again, it doesn't get funding because it isn't sexy and thus doesn't win votes. A political problem, yes, but it's the same regardless of what level of government it occurs on.

Communications: your socalled free enterprise (you are free to pay what demand!) has created squabbling telecoms company which spent more money sueing each other than on improving their coverage;quote>

They do squabble, yes, but I'm not seeing a coverage problem. My phone works just fine. My internet works just fine. My cable TV works just fine. And I've never heard of anyone having a lack of access to such services due to lack of availability.

broadband, while not as bad as Australia, is really only just coming out of the ADSL ages.quote>

Let's not forget that much of the US has a considerably lower population density than you can find in most of Europe. It's to be expected that infrastructure technology upgrades will take longer to reach all the rural areas.

Health care? I keep forgetting, that is a pinky-commy idea over there. Instead, it is so much better for the general population that the US has the second highest (after the UK) per capita in military spending.quote>

Which can be viewed from two sides. Is the problem that we're spending too much? Or is it that everyone else isn't pulling their weight?

[DocRorlach 25]

While the basic "conclusions" the narrator draws are correct (especially the medical hamster mill, i.e. too many people living for too long endin up usng too many of the limited resources), what the pretty video omits is an alternative. He advocates the ostrich protocol: shut the door, ignore it all. Close to impossible, and certainly counterproductive.

Both capitalims (as advertised) and socialism (as theorized) are currently in limbo. If history is anything to go by, reformations come at an increasingly faster rate. Culturally, the big western one produced the schisms of the churches in the 16th century, which had been predated by the rise of Christianity some 800 years earlier. The next reformation came in the late 18th and early 19th century, in some areas with expedient force: France, the fall of the British Empire, the birth of the US. less than 300 years had past. And within a little more than a 100 years two world wars ensured the next, painful "reformation". Given the laws of series, the next one should happen before mid-Century, and will probably even more violent than the last: absence of the two current primary resources (petroleum, drinking water) is likely to go hand-in-hand with a global collapse of the market place. No government, East or West, will survive that unless it resorts to absolutism. It will certainly be a culling of all classes. Add to that the ongoing "reformation" Islam is currently undergoing, and you got the "nice" and "very predictable" future tha video failed to point out. Except that there might not be any doors to hide behind.

Edit: Duke, we just "cross-posted", but it's rather late (early) here in dense London, so @ill send the riposte on the morrow..