Homeless given luxury condos in Brooklyn

[Narz]

Basically, natural resource richness does not correlate with long term high standards of living.

Good luck fueling your home & automobile without natural resources.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Good luck fueling your home & automobile without natural resources.

You can import the natural resources and raw materials from other countries. Basically, let them do the dirty (literally) work of extracting them, and the socioeconomic ills that come with being a country with greatly desired natural resources.

 

[Narz]

You can import the natural resources and raw materials from other countries. Basically, let them do the dirty (literally) work of extracting them, and the socioeconomic ills that come with being a country with greatly desired natural resources.

Exactly, similarly, I'm sure, to how conservatives & libertarians acquire their narcotics/hookers/etc.

If all is well in their neighborhood/country, as far as their concerned the system is working. The consequences of their actions on locations beyond their line of sight are irrelevant.

 

[lovett]

Good luck fueling your home & automobile without natural resources.

Did you.......Did you read the....

Oh nevermind.

 

[Narz]

Oh nevermind.

That's how I felt about your post.

 

[aelf]

All you said were reasons why it is hard to reform poor institutions, not why poor institutions were there in the first place.

lol wut. Who cares why the institutions were poor to begin with here? Maybe it's because of colonialism? It doesn't matter. People are interested in development, and that means whether poor institutions can be reformed. The fact that they are difficult to reform because of poverty means poverty is a contributing factor towards poor institutions.

In particular, poor institutions were not caused by poverty, and they are not tied together.

There's no need to argue facts. If you want to deny that poverty contributes to poor institutions, then, well, whatever. It's just a case of putting your head in the sand and denying what many economists also acknowledge. I've no interest in trying to convince a stubborn hack of a fact.

There is no reason to say poor institutions cannot be removed from the poor countries, or that the poor countries cannot become richer in such a way, which was your original proposition.

Proposition? You make this sound like a sophisticated discussion when you've done your best to sabotage it by adopting suspect logic and denying facts. Is it any surprise that I don't treat it as such?

Government is a powerful force, yes, but it also has the potential to cause a lot more problems than profit motive. Ideally, politicians' motive should be balanced with ethical considerations and a sense of solidarity with your fellowmen, but these very sentiments are undermined because politicians have always, always been corrupt. Even after you think you have removed the profit motive, the politicians began to wield the power of distribution instead, and they used it in a much more sinister way.

So you just parroted pretty much what I said but changed the subject matter, as if that proves anything.

Besides, did I not talk about the political process?

Pick a crime done by a capitalist, and I can find a crime done by a government that is ten times worse. Why is it that you only have a problem with capitalists, but not governments?

lol wut.

Yet the less free capitalists are, the more likely the government is able to wield a disproportionate influence to interfere with the people's lives. Lock up all capitalists, you end up with Soviet Union. How did political process help the people there?

Yeah, sure, let's give up on the political process and just give capitalists free rein, coz the government is teh evil and capitalists are much better.

You cannot think of governments as a panacea for all. No matter how you set up your political process, your government is going to make stupid mistakes, including being influenced by capitalists. A government is necessary to limit the power of capitalists, but the government itself must also be limited. That's the whole point behind America's Bill of Rights.

So? The government is limited by the political process, which includes the drafting of bills. So what's your point again?

I have no further comment on that.

I feel sad for people who try to sound serious but say idiotic things.

This is where you got it wrong. Capitalism is not about capital. If it is, it would be no different from authoritarianism. The limitations to capital, through laws against, say, murder, is as important a part of capitalism as the protection of private capital. In a functioning capitalist society, a capitalist would not be able to destroy his competition except through offering better products and lower prices, if he is both forbidden from say killing his competitor, and unable to influence the government to kill his competitor, because the government is forbidden from that also. In much of the poorer parts of the world, it is the second case that is the most problematic.

So capitalism just means free market in your books? Well, that's wrong, but whatever. You can insist that the sky is purple too.

In any case, capitalism exists side-by-side with authoritarianism in China, so it's certainly not about liberty. Shall I just chalk this up to the head-in-the-sand syndrome as well?

Your mistake is to think the second case can be solved by limiting the capitalists. It can't. Capitalists are not the only source of wrongdoings of the government. The government itself is very well capable of that. Can you argue that the economic plight in Zimbabwe was because of capitalists influencing the government? Or that the warlords in Somalia waged wars on the advices of capitalists? Or that the Great Leap Forward was because of capitalist roaders?

So your reply to me is to blame the government for all great evils? So, how much hackery do you intend to display?

Capitalism as an ideology started as a movement against the absolute powers of the state and the church. It's not meant to simply replace the state with the capitalist class. It's meant to offer freedom to everyone regardless of their birth, through limiting any kind of coercion. It simply sees the government as the biggest source of coercion. It doesn't mean that a limited government cannot be of good or that the government must be abolished. The anarcho-capitalists are mistaken on this aspect as much as Karl Marx himself was mistaken. If you actually read classical liberals, you will find that their idea of capitalism is not what you are attacking. It may not be arcane knowledge, but apparently it's not one that you have grasped.

This is utter nonsense.

Scarcity is the reason we need capitalism. It's precisely why communism cannot work, because there isn't enough to distribute "according to his need", once this need becomes more than simply food and shelter.

But it is not a reason why poor countries have to be poor. Scarcity simply means we actually need ways to distribute products instead of letting everyone "take all your can". It means not everyone can have a jet or eat caviar every day. It doesn't mean we do not have enough resources to feed and keep warm everyone

But the US is a capitalist country. Those countries with a very large number of extremely poor are not capitalist. Don't confuse authoritarianism with capitalism.

I'm sorry, but all this is utter bunk. And there's no reason for me reply to you in a substantive way if all that you post are either nonsense or plain hackery. It would be a waste of time.

You would do well to find out more about how things actually are.

 

[Aegis]

I didn't see the very poor outnumber the middle class in the US (yet), I said the very poor outnumber the middle class worldwide. Unless you consider living on $2 a day middle class.

I agree with that, however the point of our embranglement is that you feel those poor people in the world are a direct result of people being rich elsewhere because of capitalism, which is erroneous as has already been explained multiple times by multiple people.

 

[mrt144]

I agree with that, however the point of our embranglement is that you feel those poor people in the world are a direct result of people being rich elsewhere because of capitalism, which is erroneous as has already been explained multiple times by multiple people.

I think this should be asked more directly;

Do rich people cause poor people?

 

[MobBoss]

I think this should be asked more directly;

Do rich people cause poor people?

I thought rich people tended to employ people....thus providing jobs for the poor.

 

[mrt144]

I thought rich people tended to employ people....thus providing jobs for the poor.

That's one side of the coin. This goes all the way to the fundamental discussion of whether workers are treated fairly from the perspective of profit distribution and usually depends on what you consider more important to profit and added value; labor or capital.

I don't really think it's as diametric as that, but to go to your point, I don't think it's that admirable that one person employs another person. Their motivation isn't altruistic redemption for gilded success.

 

[MobBoss]

I don't really think it's as diametric as that, but to go to your point, I don't think it's that admirable that one person employs another person.

If you dont like one person employing another, whats your alternate plan to that then?

 

[LucyDuke]

If you dont like one person employing another, whats your alternate plan to that then?

Where'd he say he didn't like it?

 

[mrt144]

If you dont like one person employing another, whats your alternate plan to that then?

I like people being employed, I just don't attribute it to anything more than profit chasing (same thing when people are laid off). It's not like we should be celebrating a rich person employing a poor person as being some kind of morally good action.

 

[Aegis]

I like people being employed, I just don't attribute it to anything more than profit chasing (same thing when people are laid off). It's not like we should be celebrating a rich person employing a poor person as being some kind of morally good action.

If we're discussing whether or not the rich cause people to be poor, isn't the motive beside the point?

 

[MobBoss]

Where'd he say he didn't like it?

If someone finds something thats not admirable, I dont equate that with liking it. Just how I understood the phrase.

I like people being employed, I just don't attribute it to anything more than profit chasing (same thing when people are laid off). It's not like we should be celebrating a rich person employing a poor person as being some kind of morally good action.

Got it. However, I think providing jobs and employing people a good action...not sure morality enters into the equation. In fact, I am sure Obama would wish more rich people would create jobs and hire people these days...

As to your 'celebrating' comment....well we kind of do that as well. They are called 'tax incentives'....

 

[mrt144]

If we're discussing whether or not the rich cause people to be poor, isn't the motive beside the point?

Yeah, the motive doesn't matter so much. If we ask this another way; In the absence of rich people, who would employ the poor? And we already have the answer; the entrepreneur class who doesn't have substantial capital or market power in wages.

 

[LucyDuke]

If someone finds something thats not admirable, I dont equate that with liking it. Just how I understood the phrase.

I don't think that taking a crap in the morning is admirable. Do I need to give you an alternate plan to that?

 

[MobBoss]

I don't think that taking a crap in the morning is admirable. Do I need to give you an alternate plan to that?

My suggestion is that you should wake up first, then try it.

Might be more to your liking.

 

[Aegis]

I don't think that taking a crap in the morning is admirable. Do I need to give you an alternate plan to that?

You do if you poop money and that money is used to pay thousands of people for their work.

 

[mrt144]

If someone finds something thats not admirable, I dont equate that with liking it. Just how I understood the phrase.



Got it. However, I think providing jobs and employing people a good action...not sure morality enters into the equation. In fact, I am sure Obama would wish more rich people would create jobs and hire people these days...

As to your 'celebrating' comment....well we kind of do that as well. They are called 'tax incentives'....

Even though there are tax incentives, I disagree with them completely, both in ideals and impact.

And even though Obama wishes for a top-down solution, it's like pushing on a string right now.