It’s a pretty long interview; the quoted material above comes way down at the bottom and much of the material above it concerns her recently released book on poetry. While Paglia is certainly not an economist, I just thought it fit nicely into the discussion thus far. Particularly the idea that capitalism is Darwinian – the upside to the “non-rich” being a fostering of creativity and freedom, the downside being the lack of systemic controls (for what I’d call “ethical concerns”).
Assuming there’s some guy who likes making public services announcements.
No, the system will not regulate itself. It provides no feedback mechanism for communicating needs and wants with suppliers. That is what money and prices are for. Prices are the mechanism with which a modern economy transmits supply and demand information. It provides a feedback mechanism because higher prices encourages production of those goods.
Basically the way I see it, the two major issues with capitalism people have are coruption and distribution of wealth. Well, I think that these problems can be solved within the existing system through government oversight and a degree of socialized services that create social safety nets.
Government (in the sense we know it at any rate) is not the answer to any insufficiencies of the market economy. As any libertarian will tell you, you end up substituting the unfairnesses of the free market with the unfairnesses of unequal authority that worsens the more you centralize power (i.e., give government more power to intervene in things).
What we need is a functioning anarchy: a decision-making apparatus that does not rely on vertical hierarchies of power which can lead to a collective understanding that yes, we decided to build a bridge, we decided to do it as a suspension bridge located right here, we decided to start work on it September the 12th and so forth.
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Feel free to do a board search for other threads I’ve participated in wherein I’ve explicated my concepts of a working, functional, pragmatic anarchy.
Fridge groups tell us lots of stuff. It doesn’t mean they are correct. Government is, in fact, the answer to certain insufficiencies of the market. No one in their right mind would suggest that fire protection should be market driven. It is not, however, the answer to all market inequalities.
I certainly would not wish to cross a bridge constructed under those circumstances.
Tell that to the shareholders of Enron. Of Worldcom. Etc., etc., etc. Most libertarians are immune to the sufferings of others under unregulated capitalism. Libertarians will never have any real power until they can connect with the feelings of others on that topic.
[No offense intended. :)] So, what are we supposed to be, Borg? :dubious:
I am in favor of a government safety net, but it shouldn’t be monetary. Well, it should include some monetary considerations, but the overall effect is supposed to get people off their asses and find a job and be productive, not to be comfortable on welfare.
Long story short, I did a senior thesis on this and advocated for increased geographic mobility amongst the population. In short, because wages are sticky, housing costs vary, and because there are different degrees of inflation and costs and taxes in different regions of the country. I had argued for a large government safety net, but most of it was non-monetary. One of my major reasons is that employers will be more likely to hire, if they knew that the candidate would have sufficent means of getting there, not on their dime.
As with Marxists and their spot-on critique of capitalism, the fact that libertarians do not have a solution to the problem does not make their critique any less valid.
I hate to tell you this but Enron and Worldcom have nothing to do with “capitalism”. Why it is constantly held up as a failing of capitalism by people who know next to nothing about economics is a mystery to me. ANY economics system is succeptible to individuals who wish to circumvent the rules of that system. To then say the system is flawed after those individuals have been identified and punished does not make sense.
I’ll take fridge groups over fringe groups any day.
Okay, so it seems what we have a consensus on is that there is a problem but no one really knows the answer. Say, what’s that sign over there say? “Square one.” Huh. Whaddya know. AHunter, I will do some digging and find your previous posts regarding a functional anarchy, but as I will be away from internet access for the next week I’ll be some time in getting back to you.
Well, I have my doubts you even have a consensus that there is a problem with our current system. In addition, I’d hazard a guess that most of us think WE know the ‘answer’ to the ‘problem’. Only thing is, most of us are going to give you a different answer based on our own world views. To me the ‘problem’ (well, A problem just to give an example) is over regulation and government interference in the market, an overly complex tax system, an too many compromises in various social government agencies (like health care and education) which means we end up spending a lot and getting shit for our return on investment. My ‘answer’ (again, just to give a small example and not open a whole can of worms) might include some deregulation and privatization of certain services that are currently being pooch screwed by the government. To others it might be the exact opposite…or perhaps a different problem/answer completely.
Rather than a consensus I think you could say that over all the leaning of most in this thread is that capitalism is probably the best economic system out there…but that (one way or the other) it could use some improvement. Its a work in progress so to speak, very changable…which is probably its great strength (sort of like democracy).
Trying to get a consensus on this board is worst than herding cats however…more like attempting to herd hungry tigers while having raw meat stapled to various portions of your anatomy.
AHunter3 have you read A Voyage from Yesteryear which describes a functional anarchist system and how it might arise?
It is a science fiction book, which I have just re-read. It relies a lot on advanced technology to make it work, and there is no scarcity of resources so there is no incentive for a capitalist system, which is a means of regulating scarce resources.
Again, this morning I came across an article that may be of interest (from a couple weeks ago): In Finland’s Footsteps, subtitled If We’re So Rich and Smart, Why Aren’t We More Like Them?
I’ll leave it to the interested to read the article and discover the author’s conclusion.
