I think another element of this is that regulation often has fixed costs more easily carried by large companies.
So the same policies liked by people who distrust capitalism can also be liked by large corporations.
This doesn’t mean the other stuff you being up is not also true, at least to a degree.
the best and only solution is to build an AI that will rule us benevolently for all time
Yup. That never goes wrong.
Can we call it SkyNet?
I share your pessimism on that. I don’t know if I’d call that “the death of capitalism”, I’d say “the death of democracy”, or “corporate capitalists captured democracy”.
Any gov’t is subject to takeover by the rich and powerful, who will use their influence to become richer and more powerful. The antidote for that in a democracy is that the large number of ordinary people vote their economic self interest. Today in the US, too many people vote because they oppose abortions and same sex marriage, or they favor/oppose guns, or they are
racists/antiracists, or …
The rich can slide their agenda in under those issues. And, people don’t understand the economic issues (how many voters can explain “step up in basis” ?), or they imagine themselves getting rich (I understand step up, it helps me a little, I hope it will help me more, I’m in favor, never mind that my little bit is trivial compared to Musk’s).
Just plain depressing.
Well, often at the expense of other countries some of whom are capitalist (but lost the game) others not as capitalist who were not fully in the game to begin with.
Capitalism works mainly because people have been wired (combo of nature and nurture) to believe that having things (life-sustaining or luxury) is better than not. In order to have things, one must earn money (or steal, which if allowed is more like anarchism). More money means more things AND living longer.
To counter this in order to make a wholesale change, it would take totalitarianism, a government forcing everyone to think a different way and to bring their children up a different way, even to change one’s innate (I think) need for survival.
Hmm, the former seems to cause the latter more so than Capitalism. See: Belarus-Poland border (exception for insurrectionists).
Seems to me that any economic system other than Capitalism and political systems supporting Capitalism devolves in “Capitalism for the few.” I.e., the ones making themselves rich off their own people.
I’m an actuary. An I a whiner or a winner?
People who win the big lottery prizes are certainly “winners”. Should we let them set gov’t policy?
In feudal societies, the people at the top are the winners. Do you like the result?
Humans are fundamentally greedy and self-serving. Capitalism just sets up a framework to allow this rule to play out to the benefit of buyers (i.e. lower prices). Any system predicated on not accepting humans are fundamentally greedy and self-serving is naive and results in Animal Farm.
I think government sets up the framework to allow this rule to play out. Capitalists are very happy with monopolies, asymmetric information, negative externalities, barriers to entry, etc.
I think we also need to distinguish between capitalism and private ownership. In Jefferson’s world of yeoman farmers and sole proprietors, there are plenty of private owners but hardly any capitalists. (I’m defining a “capitalist” as someone who provides financial capital to other people who will use it to produce capital goods.)
Really? There was no person riding their buggy around providing money pre-sowing for a fixed purchase price post-reaping? Or, Jefferson didn’t go to the big town in the Spring and find the future buyer of his crop? I honestly don’t know. Google isn’t much help. All I’m getting is “pre-1860s” about a very manual system of forward contracting in the South.
the checks and balances are doing damage to divided America. We take one steps forward two steps back every year.
How about democratic dictatorship? Do away congress. Just have the president and the SC and an election to replace the president every 4 years. The president has absolute power except over the SC and the ability to alter the democratic election process.
A good dictator is like investing in crypto. 10k% return in one year imo.
Oh dear
There were certainly bankers in Jefferson’s time. So, yeah, there were some “capitalists”. But, I don’t think the US in Jefferson’s time entirely matched his vision, either.
I can’t vouch for the accuracy, but this is from the USDA:
The 1790 census counted some 4 million Americans, 9 out of 10 of whom lived on farms
https://www.nass.usda.gov/About_NASS/History_of_Ag_Statistics/index.php
My image of those farmers is mostly self-sufficient. Save your seed from one year to the next. Eat most of what you produce. Build your own buildings. Raise your own animals for literal horsepower. Interactions with the world are through the closest small town where businesses are sole proprietors - for example the blacksmith. Probably there’s a mill. It is owned by a local, maybe richer person who could pay to build it. Maybe with a bank loan. Possibly a local co-op. But, it isn’t owned by a distant corporation. In fact, the business organization “corporation” was exceedingly rare.
I guess my point is that there were a few pure capitalists, but nothing like our current system.
Where’s the lie?
“The curious task of economics is to demonstrate to men how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.” F.A. Hayak
Were going to get what emerges no matter what anyone of us does in the here and now. I think the best thing we could do is make me emperor. Barring that I’ll stick with voluntarism, freedom of association, and markets. Centralized authorities making dictates cause more problems than they solve, even when elected.
IFYP
So true. Much like the UK in the latter half of the 19th c, the US is finding an ever ncreasing %of its GDP arising from the financial sector. THe Bank of England was the schizz nitz back then…much like the US$ today.
and we’ve talked of the favorable tax policies given capital versus labor many times. It’s not just capitalism, it’s the American version that is under stress.You don’t seem to complain about things that much. Politics has become nothing but grievances lately. No one does anything but gripe and complain. In reality no one in America is doing that bad. We way overstate the problems. There is opportunity everywhere for people to succeed and make a nice life for themselves. Let’s quit bashing it so much.
Do we? Seems we’re better than ever over a very long stretch of time. Your comment is a perception and not a reality. There is nothing that is worse now than it was 10 years ago so we aren’t taking 1 step forward and 2 steps backward. Maybe we’re taking 2 steps forward and 1 backward at times, but the argument we’re going backwards is objectively false.
