So how is globalization of capitalism good for the world?

[Syterion]

So, power encourages greed?

Then we better invent a system where noone gets any power (economic, political, social, personal or otherwise). After all, we wouldn't want to encourage greed. Zombie Pol Pot 2012? He'll make sure noone gets crap, except a bowl of rice... and they better keep their mouth shut too; we won't have any greedy people! Such a policy would commonly be referred to as "cutting off your face to spite your face".

We gotta start dis-empowering people.



ps. The argument would not be so hilariously disassembled and mocked if you took some time to understand people who have different ideas. It is possible to examine the impact of global capitalism on various aspects of development without just having a piss-on-capitalism fest.

I don't remember insulting or even having an excessively negative attitude towards capitalism. I asked a question, with some context of what I expected were typical arguments and my initial responses, of which I acknowledge not being especially well-informed. I think you thought my mentioning of greed was a sucker punch of sorts and I think you thought my clarification was insincere. If I'm wrong about your motives I'm sorry, I just don't know how else to understand your vitriol.

Anyway, the problem that I see is that capitalism very effectively denies equal opportunity. It's not that you shouldn't be allowed to have or gain power, but it should be mostly deserved and your accumulation of power shouldn't negatively impact someone else's aims to get a modicum of power. I know that there's no way of doing this, you can't prevent everyone from being negatively impacted. But it could be better.

 

[Ecofarm]

I think you thought my mentioning of greed was a sucker punch of sorts and I think you thought my clarification was insincere. If I'm wrong about your motives I'm sorry, I just don't know how else to understand your vitriol.

You're right. Then you do it again...

Anyway, the problem that I see is that capitalism very effectively denies equal opportunity. It's not that you shouldn't be allowed to have or gain power, but it should be mostly deserved and your accumulation of power shouldn't negatively impact someone else's aims to get a modicum of power. I know that there's no way of doing this, you can't prevent everyone from being negatively impacted. But it could be better.

Capitalism provides equal opportunity. Provides. Insures. You got it all backwards.

You seem to be under the impression that people do not lose and create fortunes everyday a hundred times. Perhaps only if one becomes wealthy and squandors or risks it away can they appreciate the socially mobile (almost liquid) properties of capitalism. This idea that once a person or family becomes wealthy they have it made forever is totally juvenile and, further, ignores the hundreds of rags-to-riches stories that occur in real life everyday (in the free world).

Granted, lacking decent regulations including human, civil, labor and environmental rights... it can go bad... but so does everything. Keep in mind, noone is EVER arguing for 100% unbridled capitalism free from all market regulation. Never. It's a strawman.

 

[Arwon]

Globalised capitalism basically reintroduced all the crappy bits of the 19th century version which have been fixed by 20th century regulation in the developed capitalist world (that's everything from legal protections for workers, to state guarantees of bank assets to stop bank runs, to effective laws against fraud, to countercyclical fiscal policies, to any number of social insurance schemes which improve quality of life and eliminate collective action problems).

Most of the harms of capitalism in the third world are the same sort of harms that existed in the 19th in Europe or North America, a mixture of bad state policies and lack of state capacity for effective policy-making. The challenge, then, is to bring third world capitalism into the 20th and 21st century, too, by eliminating those excesses and making capitalism there work how the classical model says it's supposed to.

 

[Syterion]

You're right. Then you do it again...

Capitalism provides equal opportunity. Provides. Insures. You got it all backwards.

You seem to be under the impression that people do not lose and create fortunes everyday a hundred times. Perhaps only if one becomes wealthy and squandors or risks it away can they appreciate the socially mobile (almost liquid) properties of capitalism. This idea that once a person or family becomes wealthy they have it made forever is totally juvenile and, further, ignores the hundreds of rags-to-riches stories that occur in real life everyday (in the free world).

Granted, lacking decent regulations including human, civil, labor and environmental rights... it can go bad... but so does everything. Keep in mind, noone is EVER arguing for 100% unbridled capitalism free from all market regulation. Never. It's a strawman.

Well I don't know about that. All the studies I've seen about social mobility in the United States show that it's very low. And the discrepancy between rich and poor is only increasing. And since in the US, money leads to the best education (private schools, private universities), which leads to the best networks, the people with the capital keep the money within their own kind.

And I think you know that those rags to riches stories are not indicative at all of real life, or are at all common. They're just excessively reported because we all love a good tale of the American Dream.

 

[Quackers]

Just to go off topic....under a socialist government and a left-leaning cultural revolutionary government for 13 years we have social mobility comparable to Dickensens victorian dystopia. Think about it. Social mobility under Thatcher was better than now.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Show me, that that is indeed the case.

 

[Quackers]

Well If your reffering to me here is some evidence of our socialist governments failings in regard to social mobility.

 

[Bill3000]

Well If your reffering to me here is some evidence of our socialist governments failings in regard to social mobility.

You haven't had a socialist government in 31 years.

 

[Camikaze]

It's hard to deny that globalisation has increased economic prosperity in the world. But it has also increased inequality. So it isn't so much globalisation itself that is a problem as how it occurs in specific instances, and what government do to ensure economic prosperity is experienced by all. Pretty much the same with capitalism, although that's a lot broader.

 

[Quackers]

You haven't had a socialist government in 31 years.

It's pretty darn socialist - government spending exceeded Germany's and they're socialist. Unless you consider anything less than Eastern European states behind the Iron Cast as not socialist than it's laissez faire free market no welfare state government - but it isn't.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

Well If your reffering to me here is some evidence of our socialist governments failings in regard to social mobility.

Actually, I was looking for a comparative study of social mobility regarding the Thatcher administration and more recent governments.

 

[Arwon]

Well I don't know about that. All the studies I've seen about social mobility in the United States show that it's very low. And the discrepancy between rich and poor is only increasing. And since in the US, money leads to the best education (private schools, private universities), which leads to the best networks, the people with the capital keep the money within their own kind.

And I think you know that those rags to riches stories are not indicative at all of real life, or are at all common. They're just excessively reported because we all love a good tale of the American Dream.

This is all true, but that's an argument for better equality of opportunity, ie, a better education system. The link between parental income and offspring income in the US is higher than other rich capitalist countries, which speaks to a relative lack of equity in education across income groups.

The thing with the American education system is that there is no system. It has an extremely patchwork and variable education system which works very well in some areas and for income groups but condemns others to multi-generational poverty and disadvantage.

So, the variable between the US and countries with better social mobility is the education system and structure of the workforce, not "how much capitalism there is." Capitalist markets in no way demand an unegalitarian education system. In fact, they probably work better when everyone can to make the most of their abilities with a quality education, regardless of income, because this improves the aggregate quality of human capital in the economy. This is another example of an area in which state action is needed to make capitalism work better.

 

[Bill3000]

It's pretty darn socialist - government spending exceeded Germany's and they're socialist. Unless you consider anything less than Eastern European states behind the Iron Cast as not socialist than it's laissez faire free market no welfare state government - but it isn't.

Er, no. Labour supports pretty standard neoliberal policy; it has nothing to do with government spending. You have heard of New Labour, right?

 

[aelf]

I think a lot of what you're going to get by way of response here can be summed up by reading a few pages of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. There's probably a bit more on globalisation, which is a more modern topic, but it wouldn't be far off the mark to say that a lot of the arguments are likely to be confined to 18th-century wisdom.

Anyway, I think the root of the problem with capitalism is not that it's built on greed per se, which is evidently a contentious label. Rather, it lies with the assumptions that it makes, which are often taken for granted today.

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

I think a lot of what you're going to get by way of response here can be summed up by reading a few pages of Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations. There's probably a bit more on globalisation, which is a more modern topic, but it wouldn't be far off the mark to say that a lot of the arguments are likely to be confined to 18th-century wisdom.

And Newtonian physics is a century older. What's your point?

 

[aelf]

And Newtonian physics is a century older. What's your point?

That they have been known for some time now?

Things enter into common parlance a lot slower than they might have developed at the intellectual frontiers. I'm saying that in this case he's not going to get a lot more or better answers here than he can get by reading just part of a classic. Am I wrong?

 

[SS-18 ICBM]

I was just curious at what you were trying to imply with that paragraph.

 

[Karalysia]

Globalization is just another way to facilitate Neo-Imperialism, an attempt by the capitalist to exploit the markets, people's, and resources of developing countries.

 

[Shadylookin]

I just don't get it. I don't see how a system literally based on greed can be expected to have the interests of others at heart. I don't see how it can help the developing world at all, when in the interests of profits they actually have an incentive to pay amounts that provide no increase in quality of life.

The point of capitalism is that you don't have take the interest of other people at heart. Honestly the number of humans the average person actually cares about is probably <100 and there's 6,000,000,000 of us. In a capitalist system all you need to know is how much you're willing to pay for a good and how much you're willing to sell a good for.

I hear things like capitalism allows for the greatest innovation which increases quality of life for all. It may lead to the greatest innovation, but I don't see it benefiting anyone significantly beyond those who already have power, money, and quality of life. As far as I can tell, all globalization allows is lower priced goods for the rich, as well as allowing international corporations to control the economies of developing nations. Local business/vendors can't compete with these corporations, and they lose all autonomy.

Can someone explain? I don't understand.

Person A: is your average western consumer
Person B: is a guy living in a developing country
Company C: makes gizmos

company C wants to lower prices so they decided to outsource to person B's country.
Person B realizes that he can make a better living by working for C making gizmos. C now makes gizmos cheaper and A gets to buy cheaper gizmos.

The poorest B is now better off.

 

[aelf]

I was just curious at what you were trying to imply with that paragraph.

Well, I'll rephrase:

tl;dr version, see Wealth of Nations