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[thefil]

GAF seems to be majority made up of the left, and more and more I see opinions that are fairly "radical" for recent Western history, most notably a strong aversion to capitalism. The historical consequences of low regulation free market capitalism are well-known, and I'm not looking to dispute any of them.

I am curious, however, what who have a strong distaste for capitalism think should fix/replace it. My gut feeling is that a lot of the most ardent critics of capitalism don't often express their alternative, and so this seems as good a place as any.

The way I see it, capitalism has a few major points:
+ the ability to obtain a return on capital (either though lending, investment, renting etc) without proportional labour
+ the theory that return on investment drives lending which drives growth

And the major alternatives I see are:
1) Capitalism as it exists but with more regulation and/or taxes to drive redistribution and increased social services
2) "Market socialism" somewhere between the German and Chinese models, where the government and/or takes a large active role in the economy, with major ownership in many enterprises.
3) Communism, in which the state owns the means of production (including buildings and computers, I suppose, in the modern West), and private wealth is abolished.
4) Something completely new.

So GAFers, if you strongly dislike capitalism, how would you like to see it change/be replaced?

Since it's no fair to ask without answering, I lean towards (1) but I would be OK with (2) if (1) turns out to be unviable in slow growth economies. I favour significantly increased income taxes as well as a progressive tax on total wealth, and *especially* the estate tax. In my mind, the most direct solution to inequality caused by capitalism is to disincentivize "indecent" wealth. There are obviously many problems with this, most notably cross-country tax competition. But we're talking perfect world stuff here.

 

[amar212]

Social liberalism with strong regulation of capital incomes.

And huge taxes dependant of actual profit.

And AI driven judicial system.

So, science ficition society.

 

[I H8 Memes]

Jobs dont have a future and neither does money. Post scarcity? I'm pretty sure we produce enough food and have enough water for every human being alive right now. We could easily produce enough clothing. Within 20 years we could have proper housing, education, and health services for everyone on the planet. Fucking pack animals though.

 

[thefil]

Jobs dont have a future and neither does money. Post scarcity? I'm pretty sure we produce enough food and have enough water for every human being alive right now. We could easily produce enough clothing. Within 20 years we could have proper housing, education, and health services for everyone on the planet. Fucking pack animals though.

So essentially communism + automation?

 

[John Rabbit]

Star Trek. Let's make it like Star Trek.

 

[Daeda]

Basic income + strong progressive taxation (where wages and return on investments near 100% taxation after a thresshold) seem like the way to start. The concept of the free market is fine, and there should always be systems in place that reward hard word and an investment climate.

In essence, create systems that counter act the tendency to measure value of acts solely on their (short term) profitability as this tends to cause huge long term problems such as growing income and power inequality, inceases in unemployment and even wars, climate change and other devastating consequences.

So really, a system where hard work and smart investment pays off, but does not grant unlimited power nor cause catastrophic consequences.

 

[BigBeauford]

Jobs dont have a future and neither does money. Post scarcity? I'm pretty sure we produce enough food and have enough water for every human being alive right now. We could easily produce enough clothing. Within 20 years we could have proper housing, education, and health services for everyone on the planet. Fucking pack animals though.

My question always is where does the incentive to do great things come from without reward.

 

[FlyinJ]

My question always is where does the incentive to do great things come from without reward.

The only people who will be forced to work are criminals.

So, criminals will be the great inventors of the future.

 

[GregLombardi]

Regulated capitalism, regulation based upon innovation score criteria. I.e., if a large entity (>$100 million in revenue) is innovating, it gets to profit. If it is not, it must sell its products / services at cost.

 

[andythinkpad]

One can argue the version of State Capitalism Chian and South Korea practice has been a lot more successful than traditional "Liberal Capitalism" in the last few decades.

 

[I H8 Memes]

My question always is where does the incentive to do great things come from without reward.

Sounds like a way easier problem to solve then all the problems we have now.


Vacations or first access to new technologies. Get creative. You have 7 billion answers out there to every problem.

 

[M3d10n]

My question always is where does the incentive to do great things come from without reward.

Yeah, people like Einstein and Archimedes would never made the discoveries they made without the carrot of making major profits off their discoveries.

/s

 

[Cocaloch]

The way I see it, capitalism has a few major points:
+ the use of currency used to represent potential goods and services
+ totally or mostly uncontrolled trade and pricing
+ the theory that return on investment drives lending which drives growth

Only the last of those things can really be considered core what Capitalism is, though it can feature the other two, even then it's questionable.

 

[DeathoftheEndless]

I think most of the people who hate "capitalism" really just want more socialist practices and higher taxes. There are some weirdos who want communism though.

 

[Zaru]

One can argue the version of State Capitalism Chian and South Korea practice has been a lot more successful than traditional "Liberal Capitalism" in the last few decades.

That mostly depends on the starting point of the society/economy implementing it.

 

[Foffy]

Eliminate all arenas of neoliberal Capitalism.

It's this particular version that is precisely the source of the precariat classes in nations running underneath it.

 

[Mr.Mike]

One can argue the version of State Capitalism Chian and South Korea practice has been a lot more successful than traditional "Liberal Capitalism" in the last few decades.

In what ways?

It's easy to get really high growth rates when you're in a place where there still lot's of low hanging fruit you can invest in that gets you a lot of economic improvement. Building highways has better returns than upgrading to nicer highways, as an example.

http://www.pairault.fr/documents/lecture3s2009.pdf

 

[PSqueak]

How goes that quote? "Capitalism is the worst economic system ever unless you count every other" or something like that?

Basically means, it's pretty much impossible trying to coincive anything that is more "fair" than capitalism, and capitalism is not the pinacle of fairness.

 

[pantsmith]

Capitalism is interesting because it offers up a Darwinian sandbox of letting ideas and services compete for resources, and theoretically we're all better for it. But its toxic, and without regulation runs the inevitable risk of ruining *everything* (I mean, the Darwinian model of a species becoming unchecked in its eco system ends in total collapse)

Star Trek offers probably the best "utopian" civilization, with universal income, all basic needs and resources met, respect for arts and culture, and a merit based system of advancement through social service. Who knows how we get there from where we are now, though.

 

[SentientStone]

More socialist stuff... but really this is hoping the system can fix the people. Fundamentally there needs to be conditioning of people and training into a mindset that is less animalistic and greedy, one way is meditation but that has become a middle / upper-middle class hobby. 🙃

 

[darkhunger]

never mind

 

[vonStirlitz]

Hobbesian state of nature will emerge once we use up all our resources and turn on each other.

 

[finowns]

Regulated capitalism, regulation based upon innovation score criteria. I.e., if a large entity (>$100 million in revenue) is innovating, it gets to profit. If it is not, it must sell its products / services at cost.

How would that work with investors and who would decide if the firm was innovating?

 

[Hastati]

Jobs dont have a future and neither does money. Post scarcity? I'm pretty sure we produce enough food and have enough water for every human being alive right now. We could easily produce enough clothing. Within 20 years we could have proper housing, education, and health services for everyone on the planet. Fucking pack animals though.

yeah, it's really hard to imagine a future where a small number of sociopaths don't perpetuate arbitrary systems of oppression for fun and personal gain. as you say resources and the technology to counteract our growth pains aren't the issue. I can see a computer controlled government working for awhile but entropy seems to permeate every attempt at long lasting organization. maybe we should all be placed in some low metabolic cryogenic sleep and live out our lives in the matrix. or reegineer ourselves by fucking with developmental genes via whatever scary tech CRISPR gets incorporated into in the near future.

real talk I guess alternative #1 in the OP sounds okay.

 

[Hickbilly Deluxe]

Star Trek. Let's make it like Star Trek.

So a really shiny terd?

 

[Geeker]

Scandi style mix of social democracy and capitalism. Ie exploit the unparalleled allocation of resources realized by free markets to create wealth for society as a whole

 

[Kill Your Masters]

My question always is where does the incentive to do great things come from without reward.

Not all of us want to achieve something great just for money.

Doing great things is it's own reward.

Steve Jobs:

"I was worth about over $1,000,000 when I was 23 and over $10,000,000 when I was 24, and over $100,000,000 when I was 25, and it wasn't that important because I never did it for the money."

”You know, my main reaction to this money thing is that it's humorous, all the attention to it, because it's hardly the most insightful or valuable thing that's happened to me."

”Being the richest man in the cemetery doesn't matter to me ... Going to bed at night saying we've done something wonderful ... that's what matters to me."

 

[LinkAndEpona]

Hybrid capitalism, free market plus safety nets.

 

[jeenaudx]

I'd like communism but that is not happening anytime soon.

 

[Resident_UA]

I mean capitalism in purest form doesn't really exist anywhere. All countries are forms of socialism. Not even sure where to start here...

 

[smokeandmirrors]

I mean capitalism in purest form doesn't really exist anywhere. All countries are forms of socialism. Not even sure where to start here...

in which countries do the people own the means of production?

My question always is where does the incentive to do great things come from without reward.

where does the incentive for people doing charity work, creating art, contributing to open source projects or anything that they do that doesn't result in monetary gain come from?

 

[Foffy]

More socialist stuff... but really this is hoping the system can fix the people. Fundamentally there needs to be conditioning of people and training into a mindset that is less animalistic and greedy, one way is meditation but that has become a middle / upper-middle class hobby. ��

Meditation helps see through the illusions, conditions, and conditionings of dualism, which we can say Capitalism absolutely asserts as "objective reality."

The problem, of course, is that Capitalism can mix with certain dualistic aspects of religions -- primarily the three western monotheistic belief systems -- and they overlap in ways that one validates the other.

You have a separate self? The world is cut off and truly divided into isolated things. I would argue it's not shocking for a freakishly religious country like America absolutely normalizes all issues of neoliberal commodification because both depend on the same assumptions of life and its view of the individual as a standalone entity in the universe.

This is how even under secular views neoliberalism has been adopted, because the underlying illusions of dualism have not been entirely decoupled from the society. The central myths have not been seen as shams.

 

[finowns]

I think the biggest problem in our economy now is the high barriers of entry in most businesses.

 

[Mr.Mike]

Any computerized system of economic management is still gonna need someone to decide it's performance evaluation equation / normative goals. It's just a tool for potential central planners to use, not some macguffin to eliminate any possible human error or bias from economic management.

 

[Sunster]

current system is not sustainable. there will be 3 US companies in 100 years at this rate.where will all this innovation be when the wealth gap is so vast that it's literally impossible for the smartest poor person to make it?

 

[cpp_is_king]

Yeah, people like Einstein and Archimedes would never made the discoveries they made without the carrot of making major profits off their discoveries.

/s

They were scientists. You can have all the scientific research in the world, it's the productization that requires incentive.

You wouldn't have the internet, modern medicine, movies, video games, smartphones, among a whole host of others without capitalism.

 

[Kyzer]

Common misconception. America is actually a Mixed Economy, which is already the perfect idea, a mix of capitalism and socialism. The problem is that it needs to be fixed

 

[Cocaloch]

it's pretty much impossible trying to coincive anything that is more "fair" than capitalism

The weakest arguments for capitalism concern fairness. It pretty obviously is the least fair system by several metrics. The argument for capitalism is that it's been beneficial to society as a whole. There is some truth to that, and it has certainly been a positive on specific issues. The question is about how one weighs varies metrics that we can use to examine society. Fairness, both economic and political, are a point against, not for, Capitalism.

 

[M3d10n]

Some people seem to confuse the existence of currency, private property and the trade of goods and services as capitalism. Even if those are requirements for capitalism, they aren't capitalism and existed in other economic systems long before capitalism was a thing.

 

[Maztorre]

There was a time that I would have been content with at least a semblance of regulation and redistributive policies akin to moving back towards postwar social democracy, but the more I experience of late capitalism (complete alienation of workers from labour, the delusions of meritocracy among inheritors of vast wealth, the corruption that allows a man whose defining attribute is inherited wealth to hold the highest office in the world, the refusal to address climate change, the slaughter of the Middle East in order to protect "business as usual", the privatisation of public goods that were developed with public funds), the more I lean towards full socialism. These people refuse to change, and when faced with accountability they corrupt any system built to impose the slightest of regulations upon them.

 

[Resident_UA]

I think the biggest problem in our economy now is the high barriers of entry in most businesses.

What country are you talking about? Because in the US any idiot can start a business as long as he/she has a decent credit or some money saved up.

 

[BorkBork]

Kim Stanley Robinson on Post-Capitalism: (This is from 2009)

Capitalism evolved out of feudalism. Although the basis of power has changed from land to money and the system has become more mobile, the distribution of power and wealth has not changed that much. It's still a hierarchical power structure, it was not designed with ecological sustainability in mind, and it won't achieve that as it is currently constituted.

The main reason I believe capitalism is not up to the challenge is that it improperly and systemically undervalues the future. I'll give two illustrations of this. First, our commodities and our carbon burning are almost universally underpriced, so we charge less for them than they cost. When this is done deliberately to kill off an economic competitor, it's called predatory dumping; you could say that the victims of our predation are the generations to come, which are at a decided disadvantage in any competition with the present.

Second, the promise of capitalism was always that of class mobility—the idea that a working-class family could bootstrap their children into the middle class. With the right policies, over time, the whole world could do the same. There's a problem with this, though. For everyone on Earth to live at Western levels of consumption, we would need two or three Earths. Looking at it this way, capitalism has become a kind of multigenerational Ponzi scheme, in which future generations are left holding the empty bag.

You could say we are that moment now. Half of the world's people live on less than $2 a day, and yet the depletion of resources and environmental degradation mean they can never hope to rise to the level of affluent Westerners, who consume about 30 times as much in resources as they do. So this is now a false promise. The poorest three billion on Earth are being cheated if we pretend that the promise is still possible. The global population therefore exists in a kind of pyramid structure, with a horizontal line marking an adequate standard of living that is set about halfway down the pyramid.

The goal of world civilization should be the creation of something more like an oval on its side, resting on the line of adequacy. This may seem to be veering the discussion away from questions of climate to questions of social justice, but it is not; the two are intimately related. It turns out that the top and bottom ends of our global social pyramid are the two sectors that are by far the most carbon intensive and environmentally destructive, the poorest by way of deforestation and topsoil loss, the richest by way of hyperconsumption. The oval resting sideways on the line of adequacy is the best social shape for the climate.

This doubling of benefits when justice and sustainability are both considered is not unique. Another example: world population growth, which stands at about 75 million people a year, needs to slow down. What stabilizes population growth best? The full exercise of women's rights. There is a direct correlation between population stabilization in nations and the degree to which women enjoy full human rights. So here is another area in which justice becomes a kind of climate change technology. Whenever we discuss climate change, these social and economic paradigm shifts must be part of the discussion.

Given this analysis, what are my suggestions?

• Believe in science.
• Believe in government, remembering always that it is of the people, by the people, and for the people, and crucial in the current situation.
• Support a really strong follow-up to the Kyoto Protocol.
• Institute carbon cap-and-trade systems.
• Impose a carbon tax designed to charge for the real costs of burning carbon.
• Follow the full ”Green New Deal" program now coming together in discussions by the Obama administration.
• Structure global economic policy to reward rapid transitions from carbon-burning to carbon-neutral technologies.
• Support the full slate of human rights everywhere, even in countries that claim such justice is not part of their tradition.
• Support global universal education as part of human-rights advocacy.
• Dispense with all magical, talismanic phrases such as ”free markets" and promote a larger systems analysis that is more empirical, without fundamentalist biases.
• Encourage all business schools to include foundational classes in ecology, environmental economics, biology, and history.
• Start programs at these same schools in postcapitalist studies.

Does the word postcapitalism look odd to you? It should, because you hardly ever see it. We have a blank spot in our vision of the future. Perhaps we think that history has somehow gone away. In fact, history is with us now more than ever, because we are at a crux in the human story. Choosing not to study a successor system to capitalism is an example of another kind of denial, an ostrich failure on the part of the field of economics and of business schools, I think, but it's really all of us together, a social aporia or fear. We have persistently ignored and devalued the future—as if our actions are not creating that future for our children, as if things never change. But everything evolves. With a catastrophe bearing down on us, we need to evolve at nearly revolutionary speed. So some study of what could improve and replace our society's current structure and systems is in order. If we don't take such steps, the consequences will be intolerable. On the other hand, successfully dealing with this situation could lead to a sustainable civilization that would be truly exciting in its human potential.

 

[finowns]

Yeah, people like Einstein and Archimedes would never made the discoveries they made without the carrot of making major profits off their discoveries.

/s

You don't think Einstein was rewarded for his discoveries?

 

[M3d10n]

They were scientists. You can have all the scientific research in the world, it's the productization that requires incentive.

You wouldn't have the internet, modern medicine, movies, video games, smartphones, among a whole host of others without capitalism.

The internet was created by the military, movies are an art form and art has existed before capitalism.

You seem to be yet another person who thinks trade = capitalism.

 

[smokeandmirrors]

They were scientists. You can have all the scientific research in the world, it's the productization that requires incentive.

You wouldn't have the internet, modern medicine, movies, video games, smartphones, among a whole host of others without capitalism.

false.

 

[Foffy]

They were scientists. You can have all the scientific research in the world, it's the productization that requires incentive.

You wouldn't have the internet, modern medicine, movies, video games, smartphones, among a whole host of others without capitalism.

The internet was largely done by DARPA, which is to say via taxpayer money. It was just given away to companies.

That's a terrible example to bring up, because it's better used as an example of what goes wrong when commodification, greed, and profit become goals in society. It exemplifies the corrosive properties of Capitalism, not its greatness.

 

[Resident_UA]

in which countries do the people own the means of production?

All the countries So far there's no country where robots own anything. Do you mean government owns means of production? Because "people owning everything" is just a random thought that some guy had more than 100 years ago and only works on paper.

 

[finowns]

What country are you talking about? Because in the US any idiot can start a business as long as he/she has a decent credit or some money saved up.

Maybe I wasn't clear. For example if you wanted to start a car company it would be very difficult to compete with the big companies.

 

[Kill Your Masters]

They were scientists. You can have all the scientific research in the world, it's the productization that requires incentive.

You wouldn't have the internet, modern medicine, movies, video games, smartphones, among a whole host of others without capitalism.

We can't say for sure as we have no alternate timeline to back up this claim.

It would be the same as me saying "without greedy pharma we would have a cure for cancer by now".

 

[smokeandmirrors]

You don't think Einstein was rewarded for his discoveries?

Einstein was a pretty strong socialist.