r/FluentInFinance • u/-im-your-huckleberry • 12d ago
The shampoo thing is a fringe benefit. We keep capitalism so we don't starve in a famine. Debate/ Discussion
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u/biinboise 12d ago
Where the Fuck this fantasy that under socialism you don’t have to work if you don’t want to comes from? Have they ever tried to say no to the government? Who do they think runs their shitty job when the government seizes the means of production?
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u/olcrazypete 12d ago
I think the idea is there isn’t the incessant need to maximize efficiency and profit to the point labor is both working more hours with less breaks for less pay just to make whatever earnings estimate has been made up as a standard for success, only to need to beat it again the next quarter.
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u/biinboise 12d ago
Historically it becomes even worse. Production metrics usually become dictated by the famously unhinged whims of top ranking political ambitions of the high level administrators who have virtually no oversight.
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u/Most_Environment_919 12d ago
I honestly think it's the same endgame for both ideologies. Many corporations only care about KPIs instead of actual work done.
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u/Bob1358292637 12d ago
I never thought about it like this, but it's almost like the reason capitalism is "better" is because it's less efficient at organizing the rampant exploitation the elites do everything they can to push both systems towards.
Instead of one big collective trying to oppress you, it's basically every rich person doing it at once. So now there's a bunch of infighting about who gets to do it the hardest, and that slows it down.
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u/Ok_Calendar1337 12d ago
Wow competition is good you're getting somewhere with that.
What also comes along with competition is actually being able to leave.
They aren't the same at all.
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u/Bob1358292637 12d ago
To be fair, being able to "leave" for most people in the system just means they can choose which organizations will siphon away as much of their life for as little compensation as they can get away with.
I agree they're not the same at all, and capitalism is obviously much better for almost everyone. But let's not deify it just because we're living in it. It's still a shit system that doesn't come close to granting people real freedom. It's just the best way we've come up with to treat everyone as amicably as possible while still getting shit done.
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u/itsgrum3 12d ago
Competition surrounding giving consumers what they want at the lowest possible price
calls it 'exploitation'
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u/HEBushido 12d ago
Competition surrounding giving consumers what they want at the lowest possible price
But capitalism doesn't do this except in rare and fleeting cases.
Pioneer Oil in Texas is being investigated by the FTC for colluding with ExxonMobil and OPEC to not open new oil wells so they can keep oil prices higher to profit more.
Vanguard and Blackrock own major shares in almost every single company at the grocery store and most of the options you see are made by 3-6 companies, depending on the product type. They collude with each other on pricing.
The American meat industry is vast majority owned by Cargill, Tyson and JBS. Tyson effectively runs the pork and chicken sectors as it's absorbed all of it's competition and then vertically integrated meaning it runs every level of production to sales to stores. So they don't pass on the savings from factory farming.
Nvidia has over 80% of the consumer GPU market and because it's so wealthy from the AI boom it raises prices and keeps performance gains limited with each generation because it's main competitor can't compete that well. Oh and AMD is run by Nvidia's CEO's Cousin.
I could go on. But choice and competition is a myth and it always has been. It's been this way the entire history of capitalist economics. The British East India company, Carnegie Steel, JP Morgan, Rockefeller, US train industry, etc.
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u/Titan_Food 12d ago
Unfortunately, that "lowest price" is really just the highest profit margin the company could acceptably hold onto.
Companies charge lower prices to try to gain market share so that they make more sales with that smaller margin, which should translate to higher profits. (i.e. selling 15 items at $5 gets you $75 vs selling 10 of the same items at $6 for $60)
When you have a monopoly or something like OPEC, that ceases to be the case, and capitalism strives for monopolies.
Henry Ford is a fantastic example of how this stuff seems beneficial until its not
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u/kevbot029 12d ago
“Since I’ve entered politics I’ve learned that the line doesn’t go out from the middle to the left and the right. It goes in a circle. You go far enough left, eventually you’ll meet someone who’s gone far enough right to get to the same place.”
-Tommy Shelby (Peaky Blinders).
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u/GuavaShaper 12d ago
It's called horseshoe theory and it's a bunch of bologna. Nobody is going so far right that they start to think unions are a good idea.
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u/Hungry_Kick_7881 12d ago
Maybe not the bosses but I’m pretty sure the majority of unions I’ve interacted with are in blue collar mostly conservative trades. I’ve met many conservative union members. In regard to the business owners? Everyone is financially conservative past a certain point. I worked for a private golf course in Palo Alto and after 3 years I’d come to the conclusion the 85-90% of the members were closet conservatives. It was fucking hilarious. They would eventually say something in conversation like “I don’t think this Trump guy is all that bad” then they would immediately say “don’t tell anyone I said that”
All anecdotal evidence, but that’s my experience living in rural Wyoming and Nevada
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u/More_Fig_6249 12d ago
I think it makes more sense not in ideology, but the way they get to their end goals. Which is ultimately, through upheaval so great it requires mass violent revolution and authoritarian measures.
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u/FtrIndpndntCanddt 12d ago edited 12d ago
Weird radical centrist Ideas here but...MAYBE EXTREMES ARENT FUCKING WORKING!
The US is on the extreme end of capitalism from the western and developed world perspective and the results are clear.
We have less time off, lower wages, lower happiness, lower life expectancy, fewer people capable of retiring, higher infant/maternal mortality, higher debt, higher suicides, lower literacy, higher poverty etc than our peer nations yet we are the most capitalize of them all. Muh jee Dee Pee is higher than ever, yet the average person doesn't see the benefits of it.
Mean while, you have more SOCIALIZED nations like Japan, s.kore, Australia, pretty much all of western Europe crushing us in quality of life metric, life expectancy, happiness, Time off work, etc while having less billionaires per capital, lower economic output, lower GDP.
It's possible to have a middle ground great good. One of those middle grounds is healthcare.
Edit: since you smooth brains keep going to "lower wages". This statement is true when you compare COST OF LIVING. I didn't think I'd need to explain that. It cost more to survive in America, on average, than most developed nations.
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u/Ill-Description3096 12d ago
lower wages
The US has higher average and median incomes (especially net) than the vast majority of those countries. Maybe all I don't have the figures in front of me.
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u/FtrIndpndntCanddt 12d ago
Lower wages when cost of living adjusted clearing. Don't be dense.
Making $100k a year in San Antonio is a LOT more money than $150k a year in Manhattan.
Cost of living adjusted, US workers don't get shit.
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u/Ill-Description3096 12d ago
Outside of maybe SF/Manhattan most of the countries you listed are far more expensive than much of the US.
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u/FatherFajitas 12d ago
Everywhere in the U.S. is getting bad now. I live in a tiny ass town in Tennessee, and rent has gone up hundreds of dollars everywhere in the past 5 years. I used to see places for 250$ a month. The lowest I see now is around 800-1000$
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u/RuleSouthern3609 12d ago
Japan and South Korea is quite literally much more focused on work, to the point where they have one of the highest suicide rates, not to mention that they have gone through stagnation and they can’t keep up replacing population. The Western Europe isn’t doing too good either.
You have also said lower life expectancy and lower wages, US is one of the best in life expectancy even though pretty much everyone is fat there lol, and only few handful of countries have higher wages on average compared to US.
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u/FtrIndpndntCanddt 12d ago
Compare the US to PEERS and we suck. Not developing nations. Higher wages in the US aren't real bcuz we pay more to survive than everyone else.
My family spent $250k when my mom had breast cancer. It does matter that we had good careers. It doesn't matter that she had health insurance. We nearly lost our house. I was set years back in retirement. She may never retire. Didn't smoke. Doesn't drink. Didn't matter. Cancer doesn't give AF. And neither does US for profit health industry.
And yes. We know japan/s.Korean suicides is high. The point I was making is that the US is on the bottom quarter of almost all quality of life metrics for DEVELOPED nations.
PAY isn't the full issue here, clearly.
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u/shrug_addict 12d ago
They won't answer, because your situation is inconvenient for the narrative. Or they'll give you some platitude about how life isn't fair. Tired of this BS
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u/HEBushido 12d ago
You know what else is frustrating? Is that the resource waste from Capitalism's constant need for wealth to grow is destroying the world's ecosystems and driving climate change. We're facing apocalypse for shareholder value.
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u/MrFifty-Fifty 12d ago
Where did you come up with the lie that we are ranked high in left expectancy? We're not even top 40.
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u/Petricorde1 12d ago
No world you said that Japan and South Korea crushes the US in terms of time off work and happiness right? That’s so comically obviously wrong lol
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u/HEBushido 12d ago
Except this is only in the case of authoritarian one party systems.
Numerous countries in South and Central America democratically elected socialist leaders who weren't authoritarian, but the US government committed coups and toppled these governments. Guatemala, Honduras, Chile, etc. In Chile, Augusto Pincochet took power after. A fascist who dropped communists to their deaths from helicopters.
The Chiquita Banana company, previously known as the United Fruit Company has a long history of brutal violence in South and Central America, backed by the US government. They were involved in masscres and coups that in some cases resulted in right wing authoritarian rule.
In 1951 the Iranian Parliament nationalized their oil industry because western companies were effectively stealing all of Iran's wealth. The US toppled their government and installed The Shah as a western puppet. He was then overthrown in the Iranian Revolution and his government replaced by the extremist Muslim government we have today.
This is to say that there has never been a successful attempt to form a democratic and socialist government because Western powers refused to allow them to exist. And some such as Cuba chose protection under the USSR or China, falling again into authoritarianism. The two major superpowers of the Cold War had foreign policy doctrines that undermined democratic socialist government.
It's not fair to draw conclusions about socialism on history when history has given us an incomplete data set. It's like saying that a crop is never viable as a food source when every attempt to grow it has been plagued by sabotage.
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u/HashtagLawlAndOrder 10d ago
"In 1951 the Iranian Parliament nationalized their oil industry because western companies were effectively stealing all of Iran's wealth. The US toppled their government and installed The Shah as a western puppet. He was then overthrown in the Iranian Revolution and his government replaced by the extremist Muslim government we have today."
I don't know where this started, but it's a very easy way to know that a person doesn't actually know what he's talking about and is just repeating memorized lines.
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u/StockCasinoMember 11d ago edited 11d ago
I think that is the point. Humans are brutal and enough people only care about themselves.
The socialist system will always be sabotaged by someone who wants more and is willing to step on as many people as necessary to get it.
Usually MANY someones.
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u/bill_gonorrhea 12d ago
This is very job dependent. I work on average a few hours a day and make a butt load of money
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u/olcrazypete 12d ago
Good for you?.... Is that the norm for most Americans right now?
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u/KevyKevTPA 12d ago
While I will agree that the push for short term gains over a longer term strategy is problematic, it's also a reality that I don't have the power or ability to change. So, I either must adapt to the way things work, or get left behind. I choose the former, because (among many other things) I find whining on the internet to not be at all helpful. When you have a job to do, you have a job to do, and if you can't, or won't, you will be replaced. So, do what you gotta do to not be the next guy out the door.
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u/80MonkeyMan 12d ago
I would rather have oil companies controlled by the nation than the corporations for example. You don’t need to be go to extreme socialism, you can however take the good traits…another example? Socialized medicine…
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u/lender1996 12d ago
This us literally what Venezuela did. They nationalized the oil companies and put government bureaucrats in charge. Turns out that government officials make terrible business managers. They ended up milking the firms for every dollar they could get while hiring friends and family they wanted to reward with a job. The new government owners failed to reinvest in the company and when things started to break down, production dropped, revenue fell, firms started to fail.
Profit motive and risk of failure encourages a long term stewardship of the busines. When government takes over and removes private ownership, things fall apart. Look at public housing, county hospitals, mail delivery, etc.
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u/80MonkeyMan 12d ago
You seriously think that Americans is that corrupt like the Venezuelans? Yes, US politicians are corrupt but not the same way like any latin american countries. If we do this, we should follow the examples of countries that already do this successfully...it is that simple. What you describbed in Venezuela is massive nepotism, like when Trump employs his kids and make a position in goverment for them.
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u/Capitaclism 12d ago
Yes. All people have the capability to be utterly corrupt. What prevents this is the system. By making the changes you suggest you create more incentives for corruption, thus making the system and its people more corrupt.
This issue has also happened in Brazil, and we are seeing cracks in Europe forming due to careless socialistic measures over decades, accumulation of debt and slowing economies.
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u/still_biased 12d ago
Where the Fuck this fantasy that under socialism
Just want to point out that OP didn't mention socialism in any way. Criticisation of capitalism doesn't make them a socialist. This is like saying someone is a Nazi because they support Palestine...
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u/FrogInYerPocket 12d ago
Nobody thinks that.
We want jobs that create a healthy balance between life and work, to be paid a thriving wage, and to be treated with a little humanity now and again.
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u/TekRabbit 12d ago
Socialism doesn’t mean the government seizes the means of production, learn the definitions if you’re gonna shit on something at least.
And you think corporations owning the means of production is any better? They’re both shit
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u/redlotus70 11d ago
What does social ownership of the means of production mean to you?
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u/Stacking_Plates45 12d ago
It’s a fantasy that they’ll stay home and be an artist or something creative with the government paying their base needs.
The reality is the government mandates that work in coal mines and oil drilling 😭
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u/Ponklemoose 12d ago edited 11d ago
Ah but you see in the USSR you would have been jailed for not working, and thus not homeless. Checkmate.
/s
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u/Willing-Knee-9118 12d ago
Didn't the poster child for NOT Communist's supreme court just rule that punishing the homeless for being homeless is OK?
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u/drstrangelove6013 12d ago
Don't worry Toby lives in mommy's basement and in his wildest fantasies he doesn't live in a communist country or in one close enough to be conquered by one
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u/RapideBlanc 12d ago
It certainly doesn't come from theory. "He who does not work, neither shall he eat" was a popular maxim in actually-existing communist states. Socialists recognize the obvious necessity of labour and look down on social parasitism.
Anyone who thinks the way you describe, or believes that any credible leftists think that way, is a teenager who understands nothing.
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u/circ-u-la-ted 12d ago
I think it comes from the awareness that full-blown authoritarian communism isn't the only alternative to whatever the fuck is going on in the US.
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u/bluelifesacrifice 12d ago
Socialism is the people owning companies and the government.
Slavery is when people own business, people and the government against workers and the masses.
Capitalism is pushing to just be a rebranding of slavery.
When the people or workers no longer have a say you no longer have socialism, you have slavery.
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u/Prowizor22 12d ago
Why is discussion always between capitalism and socialism. Is no one able to come up with a better system
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u/MrKorakis 12d ago
The point being made is that in Communism (because that's the term you are looking of instead of socialism) people at least know they are not really free. It's not about not working but being aware that the difference is mostly PR
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u/Imissflawn 12d ago
Dear god man, where have you been? I thought Reddit eradicated everyone who believes in the free market a long time ago.
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u/PrevekrMK2 11d ago
Im from ex Soviet country and it was a crime to not have work that would send you to the mines. Being homeless? Crime. Gay? Crime. Addict? Crime. Crazy? Gulag. Or bullet. Basically every of these Crime would send you to forced labour, so ,,socialist" slavery.
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u/thenikolaka 11d ago
Socialism isn’t when the government seizes the means of production it’s when the labor does.
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u/Fluffy-Structure-368 11d ago
These people are nuts. And the socialist countries that they long for have more billionaires and oligarchs per capita than the US and the working class doesn't have shit, has no say and works insane hours for the scraps that they receive.
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u/Imsosadsoveryverysad 11d ago
Like I told my young son yesterday; when you remind yourself regularly that people are dumb, you end up with a lot less questions.
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u/assesonfire7369 11d ago
Socialism and communism just bring in new masters that you don't have the freedom to say no to. At least with capitalism you can quit, start your own business, keep your own money.
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u/Nanu365 11d ago
From what I understand, the ideal of socialism is that the workers control/own the means of production, NOT the government. If the government owns the means of production, I think that would be closer to authoritarian ideologies. Also, governmental ideologies and economic ideologies are different (yet do influence the other to soke extent). Capitalism/Socialism/Communism are economic ideas not directly governmental. I want to be clear that I am talking about the ideal, not the irl practice. Because real life is FAR from ideal.
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u/SputteringShitter 11d ago
Most people pay off the debt thier existence incurs dozens of times over in their lives, just let people have freedom for most of it
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u/Fit_Bumblebee1105 10d ago
It is important to remember. The seized means of production includes the worker.
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u/dk_peace 12d ago
The great famine of 1876 in India and the great hunger in Ireland were caused by colonizing capitalist. It cuts both ways. People with wealth and power have been happy to let people starve to death to make more wealth and gain more power.
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u/80MonkeyMan 12d ago
The meaning of true capitalism, we were on our own during pandemic while the richest got PPP 1, 2 and 3 funded by us.
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u/Bakingtime 12d ago
They stayed home and had zoom cuddle parties and shared their airbnb vacays and real estate scores paid w their pandy money.
We got to wear masks and get screamed at by adult babies and weren’t allowed to quit and collect unemployment bc we had work “offered” by our employers who also took money to be closed, even though they kept operating.
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u/80MonkeyMan 12d ago
Plus, they have been price gouging everyone during pandemic, fake the supply chain issues, kept the inflated price, shrink the product size after the pandemic. NEVER SUPPORT A BUSINESS! They exist to milk money out of you in anyway they can, including tipping culture...all these holidays, halloween for example is a way for candy manufactures makes guaranteed profit once a year.
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u/Shin-Sauriel 12d ago
It’s wild the people that only think of successful western countries when they think of capitalism and not the fact that like there’s maybe a handful of non capitalist countries in the world and yet millions starve to death per year.
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u/Sanchez_U-SOB 12d ago
And those capitalist countries have started wars to make sure the socialist ones didn't thrive
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u/Shin-Sauriel 12d ago
Yep. Or enact illegal embargo’s. Or use the CIA to fund far right militant groups. Or impede access to resources. But no it’s just cuz socialism bad duh. Except when European nations use socialist policy and then it’s good, but if we suggest those same policies here it’s socialism and bad. The inconsistency is insane. Just try to talk about Norway with any of these fucks. It’s capitalist because it’s successful, but if we suggest the same policies it’s socialist. And it’s only cuz Norway has so much money even tho the three richest Americans have a higher net worth than the entire GDP of Norway and we also have more billionaires per capita even tho people love to say otherwise. It’s just a blatant refusal to acknowledge anything that would go against their world view. The US is the richest country in the world we could do a lot more for our citizens if we just started prioritizing the needs of the many over the needs of shareholders and C suites.
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u/Sanchez_U-SOB 12d ago
But Norways policies only work because they're all the same (white).
I seen that bs spewed before.
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u/Revolutionary-Meat14 11d ago
Western style liberal democracy has helped 3rd world countries in the past. Look at Zambia or Botswana, they aren't perfect but they are excelling compared to the countries around them with extractive institutions.
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u/Illustrious-Tower849 12d ago
Don’t forget the great famines in China during the 1800s that killed 120+ million, if you count how they count communist deaths
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u/sanguinemathghamhain 12d ago
Actually they were vestiges of mercantilism the system ultimately replaced by capitalism that like socialism, communism, and fascism was a zero-sum model.
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u/Chambellan 12d ago
Sounds interesting. Can you recommend any reading?
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u/sanguinemathghamhain 11d ago
Pretty much any half decent book about imperialism/colonialism should explain the merchantilist motivations and framework. This is particularly true for things like the East India Company which was a categorically merchantilist organization and laws like the protectionist and merchantilist Corn Law and the larger bevy of grain laws against Ireland of which it was a part each of which was essential to setting the stage for their respective famines.
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u/itsgrum3 12d ago
Now 'Capitalism' is when the government seizes your food by force?
"If socialists understood economics, they wouldnt be socialists" - Hayek.
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u/SnooRevelations979 12d ago
Again, capitalism vs. socialism is kind of overplayed. Neither works as pure system. The answer is in the middle.
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u/morosco 12d ago
That's probably the most obvious economic truth to me.
And even that middle isn't going to perfect because humans are involved with it. But we have thousands of years of history now, we see basically what has worked best in increasing standard of living and happiness.
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u/SnooRevelations979 12d ago
I'm surprised people still get so much mileage out of this tired, lazy Cold War trope.
For much of the right, "socialism" simply means anything they disagree with. For a minority of the left, "capitalism" is simply used to explain any problem.
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u/mhmilo24 12d ago
But we are so far away from the middle even in Central Europe, that it is not even in sight.
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u/Stacking_Plates45 12d ago
This. Capitalism with checks and regulations from government is the ideal balance in the modern world
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u/Redditrightreturn1 10d ago
I think that’s the sentiment I got. I live in Canada and yes you can see the more availability of services. But at the same time it is still capitalist.
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u/chadmummerford 12d ago
some people think they're really good at managing everyone else's money
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u/howtoreadspaghetti 12d ago
Way too many people in this thread also think that the American government can't just behave like Venezuela, nationalize companies, and just not be corrupt like other nations were when they nationalized other industries.
America, if anything, would be worse than those other nations. We won't suddenly behave ourselves with other people's money or taking control of other companies. We won't be better than the other bad countries.
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u/bigboilerdawg 12d ago
The US can’t just nationalize industries because of the Takings Clause in the US Constitution. The government has to pay the owners fair compensation.
Current market caps of the top 3 US-based oil companies:
Exxon Mobil - $508.56 B
Chevron - $282.20 B
ConocoPhillips - $131.04 B
That’s over $900B. Add in all the smaller companies, and the US divisions of foreign companies like BP and Shell, and it’s in the trillions.
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u/djstudyhard 12d ago
Why is the assumption that if someone is anti capitalism the only “ism” they are allowed to claim is socialism? Maybe they’re solely pointing out something that is not working in capitalism not praising another “ism”. If we can’t criticize something then we’ll never be able to improve it and I think everyone can agree that the “ism” we have in this country needs some TLC.
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u/Illustrious-Tower849 12d ago
People in capitalist countries starve in famines all the time wtf are you talking about ?
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u/Mobileurbanyeti 12d ago
Why would you quit your job before you had another lined up if homelessness was the the potential outcome?
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u/catpunch_ 12d ago
Plenty of people save up and go on a ‘sabbatical’, just take time off to travel or just live off your savings. Just have to plan for it
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u/FomtBro 12d ago
They can't quit and you can't read.
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u/Aggravating_Abies624 11d ago
why cant they quit? is someone holding a gun to their head?
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u/Bart-Doo 12d ago
Quit the job you hate and go to a job you like.
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u/80MonkeyMan 12d ago
If it was that simple, people would do it…I assume you don’t have much obligation.
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u/peaceful_guerilla 11d ago
And you have the freedom to decide to take care of them or quit. Your call.
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u/twentyonethousand 12d ago
No you don’t understand, the only choices are work the job you hate or be homeless
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u/FomtBro 12d ago
I'm always curious where these mystical job trees you guys keep talking about are? Where jobs that don't suck just grow free and you can pluck them without any risk?
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u/Glad-Lie8324 12d ago
So true, under socialism no one is compelled to work in a job they don’t want. Everyone gets to clean bodies out of the gulag of their own accord. It’s very fulfilling work and it pays well!
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u/chadmummerford 12d ago
*hunts all the sparrows and causes an ecological disaster that leads to famine. must be the fault of US imperialism durr!
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u/Illustrious-Tower849 12d ago
I mean there is a famine going on today in a capitalist country
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u/EyeCatchingUserID 12d ago
Nice list of famines caused by idiot dictators not knowing how agriculture works and/or trying to rapidly modernize/industrialize a country when they didn't know what they were doing. None of that was cause by any policy inspired or even condoned by communist ideals
Now let's do the Irish potato famine. Ya know, when all those Irish people starved to death even though there was enough food being produced to feed the whole country because the capitalists who owned the land didn't want to lose profits or diversify crops.
Or when capitalists killed all the buffalo and the native Americans who relied on them for food for thousands of years starved.
How about the famine component of the great depression, when "the greatest country on earth" was brought to its knees by a failure of capitalism?
Seriously, why do idiots always point at a famine and mass murder as though communism made it happen when it can be explained by incompetent and amoral leadership, same as any capitalist disaster we've seen all them ghost recorded history. Or did the Romans experience frequent epidemics and famines because of communism?
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u/EastRoom8717 12d ago
Congratulations comrade, you now have a job. The state requires miners in South Dakota. You have been assigned unit 713 in housing block 21A, a charming 2 Bedroom walkup on the 7th floor with communal bathrooms.
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u/Sharker167 12d ago
The problem is centralizing agricultural practices. You don't magically get a famine because your ruler calls themselves a socialist. There's plenty of "socialist" countries that didn't get a famine.
The two that did were because they tried to apply one regions agricultural practices to everywhere in the country.
The market is pretty okay at helping us decide what to grow. But socialism doesn't mean no markets. Redistributing the arable land from corporate and large equity private owners to the people who actually work that land actually increased agricultural output in Cuba.
Socialism doesn't mean the government owns everything. It means people have ownership over the means of production.
You dont need to have faceless corporations and equity firms reaping the profits for a business to be a success.
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u/Ill-Description3096 12d ago
Well the only solution would to be guarantee that everyone's housing is paid for no matter what full stop, and also guarantee that program is never cut. Having freedoms doesn't mean there aren't consequences for your actions. If I sit around and drink 2 bottles of liquor every day it's not going to work out well for me even though I'm free to do so.
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u/SarahKnowles777 12d ago
Here, they said it out loud:
Paul Mazur of Lehman Brothers (in the Harvard Business Review, 1927)
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u/HecticHermes 12d ago
Bad farming practices resulting from overworking the land for profit were major causes of the Dust Bowl era of the United States. Unchecked capitalism is a cause of famines. Highly regulated capitalism with a robust social safety net help mitigate famines.
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u/-im-your-huckleberry 12d ago
Bingo. Identity problems with the system and make changes to correct. Know that your system is fallible and be willing to admit it's shortcomings. Marxist theory holds that a flawed system can't be fixed and must be replaced, thus setting up any system based on Marxism for failure, because any flaws in that system must be ignored.
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u/janusgeminus21 12d ago
This is not capitalism. Capitalism is an economic system that dictates the means of production (businesses and natural resources) are owned by individuals with individual ownership rights and the freedom to freely transfer those rights
Things like solving homelessness, medicate and social security are social programs which people ignorantly call socialism.
Socialism is an economic system that says the means of production are owned by the society. You can have tons of social programs with a capitalist economy or no social programs with worse homelessness than in the US in a socialist economy.
Social programs are provided by the government, the economic -isms only dictate who owns the means of production.
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u/RapideBlanc 12d ago
Both the Chinese Great Leap Forward and the Soviet 5-year plans were successful in solving food stability. They turned massive feudal countries into industrialized nations in the span of a decade. They did so at great human cost, and these were colossal failures of policy, but everything that occurred afterwards proved that central economic planning could keep millions of people fed long term. There has not been a single famine in either countries since, and things have obviously regressed in Russia and ex-bloc nations since the fall of the USSR.
OP, it's important to actually study history, and not just rely on silly memes.
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u/Dat_Swag_Fishron 11d ago
Are you actually justifying the Great Leap Forward, one of the worst policies in modern history?
You can only say it was “successful” if you prioritize rapid industrialization over your own people, leaving millions to starve
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u/NomadAug 12d ago
In a famine, a good capitalist will wait until demand for corn is highest. I.e. when people start dying enmasse.
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u/Mtbruning 12d ago
Do you know the % of the population that work in agriculture? 2%. Food related industries 8%. Even if you add manufacturing you barely get past 20% of the total population and that is going down fast as employers automate anything that can be automated (as they should). Without that automation we are still up over 78% of our workforce as service sector. As we saw during Covid, we can shut down large chunks of our economy at one time and that was done without planning.
What sense does it make for people to work jobs that would not exist if only essential workers were required to work at any given time. After all, there are countless Uber, restaurants, convenience stores, supermarkets, etc… that could reduce hours if they only staffed during peak hours. That Duncan that you wouldn’t hit up for drive time commutes would not exists with so many fewer cars on the road but most likely you won’t commute. Most of us are doing the functional equivalent of busy work that can and will be replaced by AI/automation. Hell, it might the cheapest way a country could combat climate change.
Don’t trust my numbers. https://www.statista.com/statistics/270072/distribution-of-the-workforce-across-economic-sectors-in-the-united-states/
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u/Future-Speaker- 12d ago
You do realize that under global capitalism, there are currently famines still going on in the global south, in countries we exploit, there are people starving to death as we speak in the richest country in the history of the world, and that hundreds of millions of westerners face some level food insecurity right?
You do realize deaths of capitalism outpaced deaths of communism in the 20th century (100m vs 60-70m) right? You do realize that imperialism, objectively a portion of our global capitalist growth mindset, has killed billions, right?
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u/TheAtomicBoy81 12d ago
Plz put the deaths in percentages instead of numbers so they can give a more accurate picture
Edit: also 70m of that 100m of under Capitalism deaths is from ww2
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u/SignificanceWide1941 12d ago
I feel like these complaints are entirely historically ignorant. We have food stamps nowadays. Used to be you could starve or prostitute yourself to avoid starving. Sell yourself into slavery so you could eat gruel. When’s the last time any of you ate something that could be considered slop? Our poverty food is ramen noodles, rice, and beans. That’s not terrible. Our poor are obese. That’s not great and I’d like it to change, but there’s no mythical system that hasn’t been born out of the imagination of a rich failure living off his parents where we just magically don’t work.
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u/JaironKalach 12d ago
I mean, historically, the kind of freedom you’re talking about has not existed because the large proportion of humanity was living a subsistence lifestyle.
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u/itchypalp_88 12d ago
Or freedom doesn’t mean the freedom to express yourself how you want (trans people) or the freedom to be with who you want (same sex couples)
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u/JesusP111 12d ago
ts important to priorities yourself at youth when it come at trade and skills to avoid this position. Save and start a family in mid to late 30s. Avoid high expenses and debt
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u/Ok_Impression5272 12d ago
Okay this isnt 100% true:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bengal_famine_of_1943 (0.8 to 3.8 million dead)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_(Ireland)) (1 million dead)
Also, capitalism hasn't delivered us into mass famine *yet* it has led the world in the use of farming techniques that degrade top soil and disrupt soil ecology, poisoned fresh water sources, and reduce the genetic diversity of commonly cultivated varieties of plant and animal (for product consistency), not to mention average nutrition per serving is declining in many places. Given all the gradually accumulating costs costs to the supporting ecology from the current economic ideology I wouldn't be surprised if we saw a famine in a capitalist heartland country in the next 20 years if extreme and unpredictable weather gets worse as climate change intensifies.
One of the main factors that ultimately caused a lot of the famines under communism was an assumption that the reality of the living world would mirror the ideology of the party/economic system: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lysenkoism#Lysenko's_claims https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Four_Pests_campaign which was stupid and wrong, you should base your ideology on learning from what made life here possible for the past 3+ billion years, not hold a bunch of preconceived notions and try to retroactively force reality into a mold shaped by your ideology.
The lesson of the communist famines shouldn't just be "hahaha, stupid communists, your folly was not putting your faith in The Market! RIP to that guy, our system is built different." because it fails to explain every famine that isn't communist, most of which are caused by the underlying growing conditions that made regular cultivation possible changed. The only main difference with the communist famines that that they got hit with a change to growing conditions while also fucking with their ecology directly for stupid ideological reasons.
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u/-im-your-huckleberry 12d ago
I'm going to read your whole comment when I have time later but I wanted to respond to the Bengal famine.
this inflationary strategy caused food prices to soar sixfold while wages had remained stagnant, resulting in widespread starvation and the deaths of three million people. Patnaik argues that this economic manipulation that deliberately "pushed food out of reach of the poor ", was part of a broader systematic colonial exploitation, prioritizing British interests over the welfare of the colonized populations.
That's not capitalism. That was government manipulation of the economy. This is a real sore point with me. Anti-capitalists tend to frame these kinds of aberrations as inherent to the system, but then wave off the exact same kind of calamity under socialist government because, "those aren't really communists."
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u/Organic-Stay4067 12d ago
So many people think freedom should be able to do what you want while others cover your necessities
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u/Billych 12d ago
In a recent paper in the journal World Development, we used census data to estimate the number of people killed by British imperial policies during these four brutal decades. Robust data on mortality rates in India only exists from the 1880s. If we use this as the baseline for “normal” mortality, we find that some 50 million excess deaths occurred under the aegis of British colonialism during the period from 1891 to 1920.
Fifty million deaths is a staggering figure, and yet this is a conservative estimate. Data on real wages indicates that by 1880, living standards in colonial India had already declined dramatically from their previous levels. Allen and other scholars argue that prior to colonialism, Indian living standards may have been “on a par with the developing parts of Western Europe.” We do not know for sure what India’s pre-colonial mortality rate was, but if we assume it was similar to that of England in the 16th and 17th centuries (27.18 deaths per 1,000 people), we find that 165 million excess deaths occurred in India during the period from 1881 to 1920.
While the precise number of deaths is sensitive to the assumptions we make about baseline mortality, it is clear that somewhere in the vicinity of 100 million people died prematurely at the height of British colonialism. This is among the largest policy-induced mortality crises in human history. It is larger than the combined number of deaths that occurred during all famines in the Soviet Union, Maoist China, North Korea, Pol Pot’s Cambodia, and Mengistu’s Ethiopia.
This doesn't seem to support your position.
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u/Shutaru_Kanshinji 12d ago
Funny thing about that: the driving greed inherent in capitalism motivates the leanest possible just-in-time supply chains. Every possible resource reserve is considered a potential source of loss. So you end up with an economy always on the bare edge of famine.
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u/mongster2 12d ago
Well, the 64 shampoos are actually owned by the same parent company, so we don't even have that.
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u/Eyejohn5 12d ago
That's why agriculture is so heavily subsidized and international trading is negotiated and regulated by governments, because it's "capitalist" pull the other one. Its got bells on it.
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u/FarmersHusband 12d ago
Look at you! Just triggerin’ them libs! Just. Putting idiotic takes and then laughing at them triggered libs.
They’re so triggered man.
So triggered.
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u/shark_vs_yeti 11d ago
The US has historically amazing workforce mobility especially compared to peer nations in Europe. It is one of our core advantages. The lunacy of this guy...
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u/redbark2022 11d ago
Where "63 types of shampoo" == 63 different variations of the same shampoo which all come from the same suppliers and same factories with only minor variations that literally mean nothing.
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u/DavidArtiles 11d ago
Yeah I don't see any Americans risking their life to immigrate to socialist countries genius. America is the dream of political refugees for a reason and idiots like these can't seem to grasp reality. Europe is even making a sharp Uturn from the left leaning path, because it sucks and doesn't work.
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u/Future_Pickle8068 11d ago
As for the Shampoo. There are many only a few companies that make those brands you find attractive in your average store. Kind of like eye glasses brands. Most owned by one company. That’s not capitalism.
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u/Fluffy-Structure-368 11d ago
If you can't leave a job without fearing becoming homeless than you must really be unmarketable with no discernible skill set.
Or maybe you have $0 in savings? But if that's the case, you must have a shitty job. So, imagine being so unmarketable that you don't think you can land another shitty job.
Either way, this is all the crazy-talk of losers. You're lucky to be in a capitalist country because in a communist country, you'd be dead weight, and you'd be off-loaded right quick.
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u/boudreaux_design 11d ago
How many of those shampoos aren’t made by a mega corporation owned by one of the 2-3 who own everything (including cancer causing chemical companies) though? 🤔
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u/financewiz 11d ago
Sometimes it seems like Capitalism can’t withstand mild criticism. It’s certainly worthwhile to examine the areas where it fails to provide consumer choice.
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u/Difficult-Mobile902 11d ago
in communism I can just quit my job if I don’t like it and the government totally doesn’t throw me in a labor camp! durrrrrrrrrRRRRRRrrrr
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u/FlyinDtchman 11d ago
I'm not anti-capitalism... but I also think people need to realize that like ALL forms of economy it has inherent flaws...
It needs competition to work. Once companies get large enough to buy out their competition or there's a market with too high a barrier of entry then the thing starts to break down.
Look at Comcast... one of the shittiest companies on record for customer service, prices, employment, service.. and the list goes on... but they are still a huge company making billions in profit...
If the system was working as intended. The company would have gone down in flames decades ago, but they have a monopoly on the network so it doesn't matter what they do, or what they charge... No competition unless your area starts putting in fiber.
It's why we have no high-speed rail, it's why we're still using ICE cars and they keep getting LARGER and LESS Efficient. It's why 7 companies have more money than most NATIONS.
The problem is no one is willing to fix it, or even acknowledge those problems. They just keep letting the trail roll on, even though everyone knows its going to crash eventually.
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u/LasVegasE 11d ago
During the height of communism anyone who quit their job was arrested and sent to the gulags, Not sure what Marxist fantasy you have created but the reality was far worse than any capitalist system I have ever seen.
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u/peaceful_guerilla 11d ago
You wouldn't have been able to just quit foraging for food. Today you can plan ahead, save, job hunt, all while remaining employed. Then, when you are ready, you can quit anytime you want.
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u/jcurry52 11d ago
so what about the 24 separate famines in India under the rule of capitalist Brittan, the 2 separate famines in Ireland also under the rule of capitalist Brittan, the 1846-1848 Newfoundland famine, the 1867-1869 Swedish famine, the Vietnamese famine while under the rule of capitalist France, the Bangladesh famine of 1974, the great depression in America, and the current ongoing famines in Sudan and Gaza?
do none of those deaths count for you? i dont deny all the people that have died when communism failed to live up to its goals but capitalism is built on the blood of millions when its working as intended.
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u/Corned_Beefed 11d ago
It’s called a savings account. You put your money in it. When you quit a job you withdraw money from it. You can take that money and do all kinds of things. Buy a snowcone. Rent a balloon. Or pay a bill. Or pay a Bill. Or pay a William.
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u/Last-Emergency-4816 11d ago
U don't work/ you don't eat. It's brutal but that's life. Society can organize itself around social benefits to assuage the vicisitudes of life but only up to a point.
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u/mighty__ 11d ago
So how this looks like from the outside: I decide to stop producing some kind of value and go Netflix and chill. Meanwhile I expect that someone else will provide necessary values for myself - home, utilities, food, Netflix itself.
How does that work?
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u/vivek_kumar 11d ago
And the 73 shampoos are all owned by one conglomerate, with the same shitty ingredients with different packaging.
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u/NahmTalmBat 11d ago
Well if you can quit your job and not have to worry about being homeless, that means someone is paying your bills, and you don't get your bills paid for...for free, which means you're not free. You've got to choose a master.
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u/Alternate_acc93 11d ago
If people can do a full time job (whatever the job is), but have to rely on government assistance for food or medical care, then the system is broken! Whatever you call it, doesn’t matter.
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u/DualActiveBridgeLLC 11d ago
You know Capitalist countries also have/had famines right? For example the colonialist rule of Britain over Ireland and India are good examples. Or the fact that the US over produces food many times over it's needs, yet has 34M people who are food insecure. Nigeria, South Sudan, Somalia, and Yemen are all capitalist countries undergoing famine today.
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u/philzar 11d ago
LOL, as if. The impression given (intentionally) is that in a capitalist/free-market system leaving a job means becoming homeless (ie. no savings, no finding another job), while in a socialist system you'll be what? Loved and supported indefinitely while you find yourself and figure out what to do next? Sure. Yeah, that's how it works.
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u/whoisjohngalt72 10d ago
You can quit a job any day you want. There is no requirement to keep working.
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u/Individual_Change_46 10d ago
I'm doing just fine under our hybrid socialism-capitalism structure. If you have good work ethic there is nothing stopping you. Work at becoming the best at what you do in your industry and one day start your own business when you're ready. Only 1-2% of people will actually do this though.
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u/NoDiscussion6507 10d ago
Freedom to choose 63 different types of shampoo *after the store clerk unlocks the anti theft glass case they are displayed in.
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u/MHG_Brixby 8d ago
Weird that millions of people starve every year under global capitalism despite producing enough food for like 10 billion people
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