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I'm sorry, I just want to vent. Someone has as their signature that capitalism is unacceptable. What is your acceptable alternative? A government agent pointing a gun at your head and telling you what to do? Everything else is unacceptable. The only time capitalism is unacceptable is when people commit crimes against other people to make money and that is a corruption of capitalism not capitalism. Obviously those people need to be stopped, but if I'm not hurting someone don't you dare tell me what to do with my money! End rant.

I agree, capitalism isn't unacceptable or bad that's just socialist (or left wing?) propaganda or something like.
Socialism is quite ineffective so I believe that people, lower classes too will have a better life in a rational working economy than a shared socialist one, thats acceptable to me..
Too many people get jealous about rich people, to them rich people are rich people and like if none of them would be hardworking folk or smart businessmen.

Corruption runs hand in hand with capitalism, just as corruption runs hand in hand with centrally planned economies. It is not enough to proclaim that crime is, "a corruption of capitalism not capitalism."

The 2007-2008 financial crisis was a result of criminal activity. Sub-prime mortgages were perfectly legal. Banks slicing and dicing their mortgage assets and selling them on as derivative instruments was legal (in fact, it's a damn good strategy if debt is properly rated). Banks ceasing to participate in liquidity markets was perfectly legal.

What the financial crisis teaches us is that markets are not benevolent and they are not wise. They are certainly the most efficient mechanisms that we know for establishing price and value, but they cannot function in a fair, open and transparent manner in the absence of prudential supervision.

From my perspective, that is not an indictment of capitalism--there is no better better way to run an economy. But it is essential to recognize that capitalism is not perfect, and there will always be a role for the public sector in ensuring the provision of services that are not in anyone's direct commercial interest to provide and in providing prudential supervision to ensure the ongoing health of the rest.

too many people on these boards have no idea what socialism actually is,
all western countries have socialistic tendencies but they cannot work without a free market to support themselves.

The doctrine "It is not enough to succeed, others must fail", solidifies that aspect of competition that someone loses. Losing hurts, so not hurting someone under the rules of Capitalism is a non sequitor. Put the Pet Rock inscribed with "Win, Win" beside the pile of damp and moldy Beanie Babies for the foreclosure desperation yard sale, and try not to read the book "Real World Economics: A Post-Autistic Economics Reader" in search of more Ayn Rand offal Objectivism.

Tadzio

In China you can have capitalism and the oppressive govt. with the gun at your head at the same time. In various parts of Latin America at various times, also. You're mixing up economic systems with political systems.

Capitalism is just another term for economic freedom. Anything else must be enforced with force and therefore is slavery.

If you invest in a company and lose money, no one put a gun to your head and made you do that. If you "lose" in capitalism it is because of decisions that you made. That doesn't make capitalism bad that makes you a bad decision maker; ergo, your non sequitor argument is a non sequitor. It doesn't mean that people that make money hurt you. You chose to participate and willingly gave your money. If they conspired to steal your money, then they commited a crime and that isn't capitalism. Government forcefully taking your money or forcing you to do something that you don't want is directly hurting people and try disobeying them and see what happens to you. You'll be locked up, and/or beaten and/or dead, if you defend yourself.

And by crime I mean wrong doing, legal or not. We all know what is moral and immoral when it comes to certain things, whether or not the law acknowledges it as legal.

Oh, and I did a little research on "Real World Economics: A Post-Autistic Economics Reader" by Edward Fullbrook (a professor not a businessman). I haven't had a chance to read it, but it looks like it's a book for socialists by socialists. How dare he attach the autistic name to a book to give it the appearance of veracity.

The Chinese government is currently allowing co-operative businessmen to make a profit and get rich. This is something the government can undo at a second's notice. Property rights are not wonderfully secure in China. What that Chinese are doing is marginally better for the Chinese people than having the government run everything. The surest road to failure is to have the government run things in detail.

ruveyn

Your realistic perspective is not welcome here.

HEAR! HEAR!

/sarcasm

i know there are many people with ASD's her but does it really need to be this black and white in this mixed chaotic world of ours?

Capitalism is economic freedom for those who hold capital. While I am a fully committed capitalist, I am not so shortsighted as to pretend that capitalism provides any direct benefit to people who lack the financial capacity to participate in capital markets.

How economically free is the typical working class person? The largest single purchase that most people will make in their lives is a home. How many people can do so for cash? Virtually none. The capitalist system has grown and thrived in the last century by making credit increasingly available--so much so that no almost no person can contemplate the idea of purchasing a home without mortgage financing.

Now I'm not saying the facilitating home ownership is a bad thing in itself, but so long as you are a consumer in this society, your economic freedom is illusory.



Actually the lion's share of investment activity does not work this way. The largest single component of the investment market is pension funds. Globally there are some $30 trillion in pension funds putting this market component ahead of every other major capital block. Pensions are not voluntary investments--my employer and I are compelled to contribute, and I do not make decisions about where pension funds are invested.

Other major players in the investment market over which individual investors have little to no control are insurance, mutual funds and hedge funds. Currency reserves and sovereign funds (government capital) are, at best, indirectly controlled. The governments that nominally own the capital certainly do control their sovereign wealth, but if you subscribe to a theory of democratic sovereignty (that sovereignty derives from the people) you can readily see a disconnect.

When you look at the sum total of capital markets, how many investors directly control their investment activity? The true answer is, "virtually none." Those of us who actually have capital to invest generally entrust the bulk of that capital to others with the expectation that they will invest it on our behalf. Most people who control billions of dollars in investment capital are controlling other people's money.

Again, this is not necessarily a bad thing--buying and selling expertise is a perfectly proper commercial activity. But we should never deceive ourselves about the degree of control that we have over our own money.



That is not Fullbrook's term. "Post-Autistic Economics" was developed by Bernard Guerrien, a professor of economics at the Sorbonne. The informal use of "autistic" is a reference to alleged closed-mindedness and abnormal subjectivity on the part of classical and mainstream economists--and it is not without controversy. But the substantive critical thinking lying underneath the controversy is still interesting, and potentially viable.

I'm aware that there are many circumstances that I did not comment on. I was trying to avoid writing a five hundred word essay; however, this compulsion that you speak of is not capitalism unless you consider that you chose to work where you do. Then, you have weighed the decision and concluded that it was worth the risk. Unless someone has used violent force to make you work there you have made a capitalistic choice.

No one in this country, except the truly disabled, lacks the ability to participate in capitalism. If you can raise your hand, if you can communicate you can participate. You may not be able to make the amount of money that you want, but do any of us.

I disagree with the notion that economic freedom is illusory. We are only held bound by taxes and greed. A human only needs a quarter acre of land to live off of. I garden and I believe that I could live off of a much smaller lot than that. You are not accounting for the fact that we are all greedy creatures and that is why we are not free.

"i know there are many people with ASD's her but does it really need to be this black and white in this mixed chaotic world of ours?"

Sorry, my friend, but everything is black or white to me, especially when people are intruding into my freedom. You want to be a communist? You get a bunch of your buddies together and pool your income then divide it equally. Let me know how that works out for you.

Nothing in an employment relationship is even remotely capitalist. You are confusing the liberal concept of "freedom of contract" with capitalism. The two must intersect, but the former does not derive from the latter.

Capital considerations have entered employment relationships (pensions and stock options are the two most obvious elements) but these are a much more recent invention than the freedom to contract.



I didn't say, "ability," I said, "capacity." They mean very different things. The ability to raise your hand may enable you to participate--but without dollars to invest, you have no capacity to make that participation meaningful.



Oh, but I do account for greed. Greed is the central motivating element of capitalism. I invest my savings because I want more money rather than less. Capitalism is nothing less than the institutionalisation of greed by the creation of a legal framework to make the pursuit of greed somewhat fair and equitable.

You seem to be making the fundamental error of confounding liberalism with capitalism.

Liberalism is the political doctrine that sets out that all individuals should enjoy the maximum freedom--not just in commercial matters, but in all matters.

Capitalism is the application of liberalism to the activity of investment. Capitalism does not make you free to pursue any job that you are qualified for--that's liberalism. Capitalism does not make you free to buy Perrier (tm) instead of drinking tap water--that's liberalism.

Capitalism makes you free to take $100,000 of your own money, pool it with other people, and start a business. Or to give that money to someone else who is starting a business and to own a piece of the action.



That is commendably self-aware, but it severely limits your credibility as an analyst. There is no pure capitalism. There are no unregulated markets. Everything in this world lies in a shade of grey between liberalism and regulation--and neither extreme is a palatable place to live.

It is much easier to give examples in extremes. I am aware that regulation is essential to keep people from stealing other's capital. I'm a libertarian.

I believe that the problem is that there is no concrete definition of capitalism. Your choice to work for who you chose to work for is a capitalist endeavor (you want their capital, they want you to make capital for them), just as their choice to fire you to save money would be. Capitalism is liberty of the market. I believe you are confusing liberalism with liberty. Again though, the word liberalism has too many definitions to be counted. You may be right that you do not have capital until you have produced something, but it does not take much effort to produce something that someone will want.

About "the ability to participate:" that is why I qualified the statement with "no one in this country." In the U.S.A. there are many social programs that give you a chance to participate.

Is it greed to want to keep what you earn? I would say that greed is: demanding privilege to or stealing what others have earned.

But being a libertarian and being a capitalist are not one and the same thing. It is entirely possible to be a capitalist and to believe that a strong public sector is necessary both to general prosperity and to one's individual prosperity. Similarly, there are plenty of anti-capitalist libertarians out there--look at any WTO protest and you will see them in large numbers.

I think your thesis has very little to do with capitalism and a great deal to do with libertarianism (if that's the term you prefer to liberalism).



I think capitalism is fairly well understood to be an economic system in which private interests hold the means of production, and the underlying motive (indeed the only measure of success) is profit.

Capitalism is not equivalent to free markets--monopolies are capitalistic, but they are not free. Capitalism is not equivalent to free labour markets, either. There are plenty of societies built in capitalist industry in which individuals have not been free to enter the labour force in the method of their choice.

I will grant you that capitalism as it is practiced in the US enjoys features of free markets and open labour markets--but this is a product of classical liberalism; it is not a necessary feature of every capitalist system.



Which still leaves open the issue that you are not talking about capitalism anymore--you are talking about the modified capitalist system that exists in the United States--which is neither black nor white, but in that gray area in between. Certainly farther to one side of that gray, but still gray nonetheless.



Most assuredly it is greed. Greed is simply the desire to keep property for oneself. There is nothing inherent in the work that implies that a greedy person does not have the right or title to that property--simply the wish not to part with possession of it.

I make no implication that greed is, in and of itself, negative. Given that greed propels innovation, which is the engine of economic growth, I'm rather a fan of greed.

But, I also recognize that greed must be tempered. I firmly believe that I am better off paying my taxes which will go into the hands of people on welfare, and paying my unemployment insurance premiums, from which I will personally see no benefit. It is no surprise that property crime rises in direct proportion to the barriers that government puts in the way of income assistance.

which is why i said many people on these boards have absolutely no idea what socialism actually is, they replace it with comunism in their heads before they get started.
socialism works because there is a free market in many countries.