Then explain to me why so many people who lived in state capitalist countries preferred it. Two years after the Berlin Wall fell, over half of East Germans preferred their previous government.
I think what people forget is that a MIXED economy such as Russia has, is a possibility. Yes, they have oligarchs, but Putin keeps them reined in and apparently the sanctions got rid of a number of them! I don't mind capitalism if what people mean is small businesses and enforced regulations, but that's certainly not what we have. Our so-called capitalists are always trying to destroy small business.
The USSR and associated countries were not state capitalism, but "Communism-as-practiced", state command-economies, with socialist mechanisms of economic stimulus.
"We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us."
Mussolini's Italy & Franco's Spain were "state capitalism", right?
I've only heard state capitalism used to describe the USSR and associated economies. I would think that Italy and Spain were pure predatory capitalist economies with no restraints whatsoever. Very good question.
The Russian Federation today runs the weapons manufacturers though they are privately owned. Is this capitalism? Or is this a mixed economy where the government plays the role they are supposed to play in imposing restraints and demands upon industry? All I know is that they have quality weaponry whereas in the U.S. the MIC runs the government and we get expensive piles of junk.
Alex Krainer draws the distinction between socialist and capitalist at where the economic stimulus is added: top-down in "capitalism" and bottom-up in "socialism". That is pretty tidy.
The very corrupt Czech Republic might as well be a German state even though many Czechs hate Germans. Czechs also look down their noses at Slovaks of whom they fancy themselves superior. I was just glancing through The Rich and the Super-Rich this morning -- next on my book list -- and he speaks directly to gullible people's need to find identity through their DNA.
I find that sad and pathetic. No, you are not superior because you have a single different pronunciation of a word (Czech / Slovak). No, your blue eyes are not a sign of superiority. No, you are not better than a squirrel because you walk upright. Our species is so stupid!
Hitler took over the Czech army intact at the start of WW-2, which was bigger and better equipped than the German army. It was a big deal, often overlooked.
Czechs ("Bohemians") and Germans fled war in the 1840s-1850s to populate Yoakum, Texas, then part of Mexico, for just a little longer. I see German and Czech faces around in this area.
Wow, the Czech army was bigger than the German army?
Much of what I know about Czech Republic I learned from our Czech exchange student. He saw that after the so-called velvet revolution nothing would change as long as the authoritarian structure of schools and society remained the same (Czech schools modeled themselves on the German gymnasium).
I knew Germans settled in Texas, but not Czechs. I didn't know Germans settled in Maine, but some did whereas the German part of my family came in through Philadelphia and moved on to Ohio (two sets of whom arrived on the ship The Two Brothers out of Hamburg in the 1750s, last of my ancestors to leave Europe). Someone online told me to write what I know of my family history -- little gems such as my grandmother waiting on Clarence Darrow at the resort he liked in Iowa -- and I suppose I should.
The problem with most economic mantras is that they fail to evolve when the ground conditions suggest that they should.
If you look at 'progress', it usually involves a new sector being bought up by people who don't necessarily know anything about it. They just know it can make them a lot of money. Those people who are driven by making a lot of money pursue cartel-level profits at the expense of customers.
When this happens many times over over several 'business cycles', what you end up with is every-increasing levels of financial inequality. And sadly, what you actually see is people who have so much money that their drives should no longer be associated with getting richer, but still obsessed like pre-adolescent boys with showing that 'more wealth equals more human value'.
The problem with economic reality is that no-one has the power to make these oligarchs behave and public officials are usually at their beck and call, not representing the majority.
People rarely ask what sorts of people become JD Rockefellers, Bill Gates. They certainly aren't kindly, thoughtful, generous, giving individuals. They are extremely ruthless, self-serving, often spiteful monopolists who then try to claim after behaving like psychopaths for over a generation that by 'giving back' that they can miraculously wipe the slate clean. It's like a mass murderer 'finding god' and miraculously telling all their victims' families that 'they have repented'. Great. What about the dead who will never come back?
The thing with centralised, hierarchical societies (marxist or pseudo-capitalist) is that the characteristics required for 'leadership' are ruthlessness and self-preservation, not visioning nor spreading good will. Once you realise that the most predatory humans seek the most power, you understand that generosity in the presence of predators is a very easy way of being metaphorically 'eaten alive'. So 'leaders' become a pack of alpha-control-freaks for whom power is everything and outputs relatively little.
'Pure capitalism' only works in very small communities for very small businesses. It works in highly diluted sectors where neither customers nor suppliers can wield significant market-controlling power.
It doesn't work when the most cost-effective way of supplying a need is through monopoly (this does occur e.g. building the Hubble Telescope, supplying daily energy needs, certain types of public transport systems, notably air traffic control). At that point, private owners would charge the earth, ripping off customers heartlessly. That's when regulation becomes necessary. Either public ownership or setting limits on supplier power.
What no-one has of course discussed is whether 'GDP growth' secures 'the greatest benefits for the greatest number' in the long-term or not. Gandhi famously said that the world needed '1 million villages', although nowadays India alone would have 1 million villages of 1000 people just to house its own population.
Villages are smaller units of self-governance often capable of self-sufficiency in water management, food production, housebuilding etc. They probably work well in warmer climes where triple glazing isn't really the highest priority for construction.
However, I've yet to come across genuine elections where the choice is between 'happy and healthy self-sufficiency for the rural masses' vs 'imposition of a free market capitalism which has contempt for tradition, sustainable ecologies and human autonomy'.
Western 'economics' is the economics of the acquisitive.
To date, it's not been challenged by 'the economics of the traditional'.
Whether or not it should be, only generations to come will know. It certainly won't be challenged seriously in that manner in my lifetime.
Well said, Rhys. (It might be reset soon, though not "challenged", perhaps.)
"Western 'economics' is the economics of the acquisitive. To date, it's not been challenged by 'the economics of the traditional'. Whether or not it should be, only generations to come will know. It certainly won't be challenged seriously in that manner in my lifetime."
Communism = State Capitalism
"State Capitalism" is "Fascism" to most people.
Totalitarianism in any form works badly and hurts lots of people.
There you have it...
There is a old saying:
A Masochist and a Sadist are together.
The Masochist says: "Beat me ... punish me... chain me to the Kitchen sink..."
The Sadist looks at him... says: "No"
Welcome to the Atrocity Exhibition
https://fritzfreud.substack.com/p/atrocity-exhibition
I'm worn out for atrocities today, but I looked.
;-(
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lYOp3F_Q8QM
Ghosts?
Days by Kirsty McColl... an old Ray Davies Song... Kinky Kinks
I am going to bed now.
This is probably my favorite artist... Wim Mertens... and one of my favorite songs...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=21IGGuBvE3k
Then explain to me why so many people who lived in state capitalist countries preferred it. Two years after the Berlin Wall fell, over half of East Germans preferred their previous government.
I think what people forget is that a MIXED economy such as Russia has, is a possibility. Yes, they have oligarchs, but Putin keeps them reined in and apparently the sanctions got rid of a number of them! I don't mind capitalism if what people mean is small businesses and enforced regulations, but that's certainly not what we have. Our so-called capitalists are always trying to destroy small business.
The USSR and associated countries were not state capitalism, but "Communism-as-practiced", state command-economies, with socialist mechanisms of economic stimulus.
"We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us."
Mussolini's Italy & Franco's Spain were "state capitalism", right?
I've only heard state capitalism used to describe the USSR and associated economies. I would think that Italy and Spain were pure predatory capitalist economies with no restraints whatsoever. Very good question.
The Russian Federation today runs the weapons manufacturers though they are privately owned. Is this capitalism? Or is this a mixed economy where the government plays the role they are supposed to play in imposing restraints and demands upon industry? All I know is that they have quality weaponry whereas in the U.S. the MIC runs the government and we get expensive piles of junk.
Alex Krainer draws the distinction between socialist and capitalist at where the economic stimulus is added: top-down in "capitalism" and bottom-up in "socialism". That is pretty tidy.
The very corrupt Czech Republic might as well be a German state even though many Czechs hate Germans. Czechs also look down their noses at Slovaks of whom they fancy themselves superior. I was just glancing through The Rich and the Super-Rich this morning -- next on my book list -- and he speaks directly to gullible people's need to find identity through their DNA.
I find that sad and pathetic. No, you are not superior because you have a single different pronunciation of a word (Czech / Slovak). No, your blue eyes are not a sign of superiority. No, you are not better than a squirrel because you walk upright. Our species is so stupid!
Hitler took over the Czech army intact at the start of WW-2, which was bigger and better equipped than the German army. It was a big deal, often overlooked.
Czechs ("Bohemians") and Germans fled war in the 1840s-1850s to populate Yoakum, Texas, then part of Mexico, for just a little longer. I see German and Czech faces around in this area.
Wow, the Czech army was bigger than the German army?
Much of what I know about Czech Republic I learned from our Czech exchange student. He saw that after the so-called velvet revolution nothing would change as long as the authoritarian structure of schools and society remained the same (Czech schools modeled themselves on the German gymnasium).
I knew Germans settled in Texas, but not Czechs. I didn't know Germans settled in Maine, but some did whereas the German part of my family came in through Philadelphia and moved on to Ohio (two sets of whom arrived on the ship The Two Brothers out of Hamburg in the 1750s, last of my ancestors to leave Europe). Someone online told me to write what I know of my family history -- little gems such as my grandmother waiting on Clarence Darrow at the resort he liked in Iowa -- and I suppose I should.
The problem with most economic mantras is that they fail to evolve when the ground conditions suggest that they should.
If you look at 'progress', it usually involves a new sector being bought up by people who don't necessarily know anything about it. They just know it can make them a lot of money. Those people who are driven by making a lot of money pursue cartel-level profits at the expense of customers.
When this happens many times over over several 'business cycles', what you end up with is every-increasing levels of financial inequality. And sadly, what you actually see is people who have so much money that their drives should no longer be associated with getting richer, but still obsessed like pre-adolescent boys with showing that 'more wealth equals more human value'.
The problem with economic reality is that no-one has the power to make these oligarchs behave and public officials are usually at their beck and call, not representing the majority.
People rarely ask what sorts of people become JD Rockefellers, Bill Gates. They certainly aren't kindly, thoughtful, generous, giving individuals. They are extremely ruthless, self-serving, often spiteful monopolists who then try to claim after behaving like psychopaths for over a generation that by 'giving back' that they can miraculously wipe the slate clean. It's like a mass murderer 'finding god' and miraculously telling all their victims' families that 'they have repented'. Great. What about the dead who will never come back?
The thing with centralised, hierarchical societies (marxist or pseudo-capitalist) is that the characteristics required for 'leadership' are ruthlessness and self-preservation, not visioning nor spreading good will. Once you realise that the most predatory humans seek the most power, you understand that generosity in the presence of predators is a very easy way of being metaphorically 'eaten alive'. So 'leaders' become a pack of alpha-control-freaks for whom power is everything and outputs relatively little.
'Pure capitalism' only works in very small communities for very small businesses. It works in highly diluted sectors where neither customers nor suppliers can wield significant market-controlling power.
It doesn't work when the most cost-effective way of supplying a need is through monopoly (this does occur e.g. building the Hubble Telescope, supplying daily energy needs, certain types of public transport systems, notably air traffic control). At that point, private owners would charge the earth, ripping off customers heartlessly. That's when regulation becomes necessary. Either public ownership or setting limits on supplier power.
What no-one has of course discussed is whether 'GDP growth' secures 'the greatest benefits for the greatest number' in the long-term or not. Gandhi famously said that the world needed '1 million villages', although nowadays India alone would have 1 million villages of 1000 people just to house its own population.
Villages are smaller units of self-governance often capable of self-sufficiency in water management, food production, housebuilding etc. They probably work well in warmer climes where triple glazing isn't really the highest priority for construction.
However, I've yet to come across genuine elections where the choice is between 'happy and healthy self-sufficiency for the rural masses' vs 'imposition of a free market capitalism which has contempt for tradition, sustainable ecologies and human autonomy'.
Western 'economics' is the economics of the acquisitive.
To date, it's not been challenged by 'the economics of the traditional'.
Whether or not it should be, only generations to come will know. It certainly won't be challenged seriously in that manner in my lifetime.
Well said, Rhys. (It might be reset soon, though not "challenged", perhaps.)
"Western 'economics' is the economics of the acquisitive. To date, it's not been challenged by 'the economics of the traditional'. Whether or not it should be, only generations to come will know. It certainly won't be challenged seriously in that manner in my lifetime."