So socialism

[Farm Boy]

The superorganism is.

 

[El_Machinae]

Again, investment is spending. It has only an incidental relationship with saving.

We will always tilt on this. You need to spend savings to get investment. You're so locked into your fiat paradigm, you tilt any time someone uses language differently than your paradigm.

If you can't flit between macro policy that uses sovereign currency vs externally controlled currency vs real output, you're limiting all the conversation to a handicapped paradigm.

You can't plant crops unless you have saved corn.

We can disagree on whether there's an instinctive grasp of property rights. The ease of training something is a function of underlying instincts, and they have a genetic basis. Phobias vs snakes are easier to train than phobias to flowers because there's an instinctive component. Learning to understand speech has a genetic component or else your cat could really be listening to everything you say.

This whole "it's all trained" is why extremists inevitably apply too much useless violence.

So, broken and unproven paradigm plus the belief that it's all trained is a recipe for disaster.

You need a success story. Just prove it elsewhere

 

[Lexicus]

You need to spend savings to get investment. You're so locked into your fiat paradigm, you tilt any time someone uses language differently than your paradigm.

On the contrary, you are so locked into your classical paradigm that you literally cannot accept that it is simply wrong.

 

[El_Machinae]

Er, it's a different use of definitions.

But anyway, it's pointless arguing. You have insights I don't.

Edit: I just realized that there was a potential definition clarification, since I was talking about Norway originally. Purchase of financial assets is a savings, not an investment.

Norway has massive savings, and they have decided that savings was the best alternative storage form. They could have traded all exports in real time. Or they could have refused to export. Obviously, it's hard to say whether they would be better off today if they followed one of those alternative models.

Lex was being specific to macroeconomic policy, and was being specific about fiat. But even mmt pundits recognize that people have the urge to save, so we can look back at people's writings to say that mmt is stupid because allowing for people's desire to save is suboptimal

 

[Narz]

On the contrary, you are so locked into your classical paradigm that you literally cannot accept that it is simply wrong.

You saying something is wrong doesn't make it wrong.

I imagine the neural wiring for defending property is the same as animals defending territory or a mate. Humans are cooperative and competitive, altruistic and ruthless. Everyone is a different recipe and what comes out depends on how it's stirred (epigenetics) but as El Mac says 'it's all society/nurture' is simply a religion. And religion is usually a fear based reaction in denial of a complex reality (based on some kind of idealism, if we could all act like Jesus the lion would lay down w the lamb, if we could abolish class differences from the top down covetousness would disappear, etc)

 

[Lexicus]

Lex was being specific to macroeconomic policy, and was being specific about fiat. But even mmt pundits recognize that people have the urge to save, so we can look back at people's writings to say that mmt is stupid because allowing for people's desire to save is suboptimal

I don't know whether other MMTers think this, but my view is that desire to save would be significantly lessened after a few generations of policy that "allows for people's desire to save" in this sense. If the government would spend consistently at the level required for full employment, then the actual need to save would be substantially if not entirely reduced.

You saying something is wrong doesn't make it wrong.

That is correct, but I'm merely observing that classical economics is wrong because it is contradicted by the facts.

I imagine the neural wiring for defending property is the same as animals defending territory or a mate. Humans are cooperative and competitive, altruistic and ruthless. Everyone is a different recipe and what comes out depends on how it's stirred (epigenetics) but as El Mac says 'it's all society/nurture' is simply a religion. And religion is usually a fear based reaction in denial of a complex reality (based on some kind of idealism, if we could all act like Jesus the lion would lay down w the lamb, if we could abolish class differences from the top down covetousness would disappear, etc)

If you notice, I made an assertion about instinctive human behavior upthread. Disagreeing that a paricular behavior or thought pattern is "instinctive" is not the same as claiming there are no instincts or that humans are a complete blank slate.

In any case the argument that property is a form of territoriality is obviously false given what we know about human prehistory and human origins. Humans are not a territorial species and only began to own land a bare handful of millennia ago.

 

[Narz]

Humans are not a territorial species

Lol wut?

 

[Lexicus]

Lol wut?

We weren't even sedentary until maybe 13,000 years ago

 

[Moriarte]

Although it’s been 20 years since reading, in his main book, Marx came to a conclusion (paraphrasing) that pressure from oppressed underclasses is the force that drives the change in economical-political system. When critical mass of oppression is reached, revolution can happen, shifting distribution of resources/liberties in a society away from ruling classes, towards the working classes. This process has been objective throughout history. Through slavery, feudalism and capitalism the working classes suffered, fought, and, as a result, won more and more freedoms.

(not asking anyone specific) Do you honestly think the process, the dynamic of power leakage, let’s say, has stopped, the grinding wheel of oppression has stopped spinning, the working classes stopped dreaming for more rights, more ownership, more participation and we’re sitting here, at the summit of the welfare mountain enjoying the last political-economic system we’re going to have for the rest of eternity ahead of us? Because capitalism is beautiful? So beautiful.

Or, maybe, the thousands of years old dynamic continues; and, as a result of aforementioned pressure, that never, for a second, stopped, socialist systems begin popping up. We end up in a socialist world, just like we ended up in capitalist world once, then pressure will lead us to the next most suitable, energy-efficient formation. Communism, anarchy, whatever.

It’s interesting to me to know how You see this. From reading history, looking around, I see socialism slowly making an entrance during last 200 years. Billions of people today, more than ever, in absolute or proportion, live in countries, which experiment w/socialism with various degrees of success. I suppose some people see it the other way - socialism discrediting itself, slowly dying off in favour of revitalising the older formation.

 

[Narz]

We weren't even sedentary until maybe 13,000 years ago

Nothing to do w being nomadic, so are chimps and they're tribal and territorial. Early humans were likely far more so (your #1 cause of death as a male was interpersonal violence).

If you've ever been in a school cafeteria, on a bus (or even a car, 'shotgun!'), or basically anywhere humans congregate you can see it.

Obviously we have to repress it in artificial human society (especially big cities) but it's a very obvious feature of humans. Think of pretty much every sport, board game even, it's a contest over territory (including civ of course)

Even here in this strange virtual space the territory is the ideas and cliques form to argue over intellectual territory.

 

[Birdjaguar]

@innonimatu Collectivism seems to ignore the variety of human needs, especially at later stages of life. State mandated "production" (of services and products) is not able to meet the variety of demand humans desire. Your system will always curtail peoples' wants to those planned by the State. Person A will want to retire to a quiet life in the country after 40 years in the city; Person B will want to take 2 $10,000 vacations a year in distant places. Person C will want to move to be with grandchildren. Now multiply that by a few million other options. The state has a record of being able to meet collective needs (keep the trains running on time) but but fails miserably at meeting individual needs. It is those individual needs that increase the happiness of people and families.

Personal savings are similar to corporate investments but just happen on a different scale. by not consuming now I hope to put off that consumption until later when I can better enjoy it or will need it. Should delaying such consumption earn a saver any reward? (interest) Is there a risk to the saver's delay? (inflation) Is there a cost to the saver? (penalty) Does your system allow private companies? If so, can they save for some future need? Scaled up from personal savers. Where do such savings sit? Do I keep the $10 not spent under my mattress? Does the state just not give it to me? Where does a company keep its money not spent?

Maybe your system does away with money altogether. I don't know. You talk a lot at the macro level, but people don't live at the macro level. They live at the micro level where each transaction is important to them. Can you describe how your collectivism works at the individual level? I work in some factory or service run by the state. How do I plan and pay for the 300 person wedding in Cancun for my daughter? How many different kinds of cars will be available for me to buy? Do I get a benefit from consuming less than average? I could go on. Your socialism is like a big puzzle that you have put all the pieces together, but when that is done, there is no picture. It's blank. The pieces all fit but....

My response to inno on the previous page.

 

[Birdjaguar]

We will always tilt on this. You need to spend savings to get investment. You're so locked into your fiat paradigm, you tilt any time someone uses language differently than your paradigm.

If you can't flit between macro policy that uses sovereign currency vs externally controlled currency vs real output, you're limiting all the conversation to a handicapped paradigm.

You can't plant crops unless you have saved corn.

We can disagree on whether there's an instinctive grasp of property rights. The ease of training something is a function of underlying instincts, and they have a genetic basis. Phobias vs snakes are easier to train than phobias to flowers because there's an instinctive component. Learning to understand speech has a genetic component or else your cat could really be listening to everything you say.

This whole "it's all trained" is why extremists inevitably apply too much useless violence.

So, broken and unproven paradigm plus the belief that it's all trained is a recipe for disaster.

You need a success story. Just prove it elsewhere

Both ownership and sharing are built into what we are. It is clearly seen in personal history and evolutionary history. Property rights are just one step further along the ownership path. Family and community are just other steps on the sharing path. Those paths can be quite entangled.

 

[Lexicus]

your #1 cause of death as a male was interpersonal violence

Where did you encounter this idea? At best we do not have the evidence to support this claim but I would go further and say it is almost certainly false.

If you've ever been in a school cafeteria, on a bus (or even a car, 'shotgun!'), or basically anywhere humans congregate you can see it.

Obviously we have to repress it in artificial human society (especially big cities) but it's a very obvious feature of humans. Think of pretty much every sport, board game even, it's a contest over territory (including civ of course)

Even here in this strange virtual space the territory is the ideas and cliques form to argue over intellectual territory.

All you're showing here is that if you assume humans are territorial in the first place you can interpret virtually any human behavior in terms of territoriality. Doing some cursory research on this question it is striking how circular the basic argument appears to be: we know that property rights are an evolution of territory because humans are territorial, and we know that humans are territorial because of property.

Anyway, i read through the wikipedia article on animal territoriality and having done so it seems obvious to me that humans do not exhibit the behaviors that define territoriality.

 

[Farm Boy]

Fear of outsiders. Competition for mates. Aggressive competition for food when scarce?

What apes are you looking at?

 

[Gorbles]

Fear of outsiders. Competition for mates. Aggressive competition for food when scarce?

What apes are you looking at?

We also share a large genetic overlap with cows, and that's three ticks for cows there. Does that make us cows? Or bulls, I guess, if we're going to get picky over it.

 

[El_Machinae]

In some ways, imo, the argument about investing the savings from labor is kinda moot. The socialist forces are pretty slow from where I am, and Automation-Induced Unemployment is such a looming crisis.

So, the idea that I can be tempted to reduce savings because of a safety net is theoretical, given that my major risk is that my savings are more likely to become valueless during AIU.

But, even though I say this explicitly, I'm not tempted at all to reduce my savings in the interim

 

[Farm Boy]

We have more in common with cows and bulls than not. I don't see how that isn't obvious. And yes, they have circumstances in which they are exceedingly territorial.

 

[TheMeInTeam]

In some ways, imo, the argument about investing the savings from labor is kinda moot. The socialist forces are pretty slow from where I am, and Automation-Induced Unemployment is such a looming crisis.

my timetable for that crisis moved up a bit after seeing gpt write papers better than most college students can, and machine learning beat pros at fairly sophisticated games despite incomplete information. you don't need to be comparable or better than top pros in irl vocations to displace...nearly the entire labor force in a particular one. you probably don't even need to be above average, considering the cost of running a machine for the tasks. machines don't eat, sleep, ask for wage increases over time, retire, or need training nearly as frequently etc. they require maintenance, but not to the extent of people.

there's going to be a problem. i don't think automation improvements in near-term can manage post-scarcity, but they can price people out of jobs. the implication of no social programs at all is that most of us posting here starve, or perhaps the next generation starves instead if the implementation is slow. it will take time to switch everything into automation, there are start-up costs for that...but sooner or later it happens, and then what?

i don't think a mere "everyone works fewer hours" gets there either, since expertise required will be a smaller % of labor pool than in the past too. as if everyone today suddenly had 70 iq or something. i suspect the owners of the automated capital will make some concessions so they don't get piled on by millions to billions of unemployable people, and so that there's something to do with the stuff the machines make etc. but it probably won't be as nice as would be "ideal".

 

[Gorbles]

We have more in common with cows and bulls than not. I don't see how that isn't obvious. And yes, they have circumstances in which they are exceedingly territorial.

I'm assuming I don't need to tell you the long list of things we don't have in common with cows, but the main overlap is really just genetics (and uh being a mammal with a vertebrae, I guess). That's kind the point. We have a lot in common with cats, too, but we also have a lot that's different.

If we're going to say "anything exhibiting three rather generalised sets of behaviour means they're all territorial in the same way", I'm gonna raise an eyebrow. We even have a branched concept for humans that (however valid it is, I haven't done the research) is very different to how it manifests in animals. The studies we have are overwhelmingly done r.e. animals (primarily birds, according to that source), and not humans, and you'd think that'd be a shoe-in if we were so similar.

I have a layer of skin and flesh underneath, with bones throughout. This doesn't make me analogous to a marshmallow on a stick. Picking and choosing behaviour because it reinforces what we think of humanity is good and well as an opinion, but it's not exactly proof of anything.

 

[Birdjaguar]

Although it’s been 20 years since reading, in his main book, Marx came to a conclusion (paraphrasing) that pressure from oppressed underclasses is the force that drives the change in economical-political system. When critical mass of oppression is reached, revolution can happen, shifting distribution of resources/liberties in a society away from ruling classes, towards the working classes. This process has been objective throughout history. Through slavery, feudalism and capitalism the working classes suffered, fought, and, as a result, won more and more freedoms.

(not asking anyone specific) Do you honestly think the process, the dynamic of power leakage, let’s say, has stopped, the grinding wheel of oppression has stopped spinning, the working classes stopped dreaming for more rights, more ownership, more participation and we’re sitting here, at the summit of the welfare mountain enjoying the last political-economic system we’re going to have for the rest of eternity ahead of us? Because capitalism is beautiful? So beautiful.

Or, maybe, the thousands of years old dynamic continues; and, as a result of aforementioned pressure, that never, for a second, stopped, socialist systems begin popping up. We end up in a socialist world, just like we ended up in capitalist world once, then pressure will lead us to the next most suitable, energy-efficient formation. Communism, anarchy, whatever.

It’s interesting to me to know how You see this. From reading history, looking around, I see socialism slowly making an entrance during last 200 years. Billions of people today, more than ever, in absolute or proportion, live in countries, which experiment w/socialism with various degrees of success. I suppose some people see it the other way - socialism discrediting itself, slowly dying off in favour of revitalising the older formation.

Yes some folks might well be making those assumptions about economic progression and that economic systems have progressive nature and are evolving from what happened in ancient cities through capitalism to socialism and beyond. Market based economies and private property ownership have existed throughout history just like communalism and sharing economies. What has changed significantly is local economies have gone from being just local to regional, to "national" to global and with each change the dynamics of how the local economy functions has changed. The next step I see is a global economy that is fully integrated rather than a bunch of interconnected "local economies. When? " Applying old economic nomenclature, thinking and expectations to the future is like fighting a current war as if it just like the last one 50 years ago. You will lose.