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[Fenderputty]

Yet it indirectly is the root cause of the ill effects of Capitalism. At least in the Banking/monetary world.

How can something be an indirect and root cause? The cause of capitalisms ill effects, in and out of the banking world, is unchecked greed. Regulating interest rates is a tool the fed uses to control inflation. The only reason a lowering of interst rates would cause the banks to act shitty is because our checks and balances failed to keep them in check

 

[mkenyon]

The Fed setting interest rates isn't government regulation. It's monitary economic policy. The government failed to regulate the banks after the Feds created a market that encouraged people take on debt.

This is rather narrow, because the existence of The Fed is government regulation of the highest order.

 

[injurai]

This is rather narrow, because the existence of The Fed is government regulation of the highest order.

There is a difference between regulating the economy, and regulating exploitation of the economy.

 

[Fenderputty]

There is a difference between regulating the economy, and regulating exploitation of the economy.

Thank you.

 

[prag16]

This is why unbridled capitalism doesn't work. Because the alpha-capital shuts down all competition and seeks to maximize profit and minimize responsibility. For anything that you only need one set (shared) of, it should be socialized. We have never had pure capitalism in the US, and capitalism never spoke to universally unregulated system without an overarching representational government.

Who determines what we "need" though? You? The government? Who is qualified to decide which industries should and shouldn't have competition? Don't forget, competition drives down prices and increases quality.

 

[Orthogonal]

How can something be an indirect and root cause? The cause of capitalisms ill effects, in and out of the banking world, is unchecked greed. Regulating interest rates is a tool the fed uses to control inflation. The only reason a lowering of interst rates would cause the banks to act shitty is because our checks and balances failed to keep them in check

The Fed didn't just lower interest rates to encourage more debt/borrowing, but they are also the lender of last resort and serve as risk abatement for the banks which is what encourages the bad behavior.

Risk is the check on greed in markets and if you artificially remove the inherent risk in lending you get unchecked greed.

Bad banking practices was the proximate cause and one of several factors in the housing crisis, but the Fed was the root cause creating the environment for it all to happen. If there were no Fed, banks wouldn't have been able to fuel risky investments as they had. This is not deregulation, but actual regulation creating a toxic space.

 

[Giant Panda]

There is a difference between regulating the economy, and regulating exploitation of the economy.

Do you have a technical definition of the difference between the two?

 

[Oriel]

Capitalism + government regulation = Social Democracy. Make it happen America.

 

[Elfforkusu]

Very yay. Best engine for innovation and progress that we have.

But you have to be aware that it rewards businesses for acting like sociopaths (thus: all of them do that), so you need government action to make sure they stay in their lane.

 

[prag16]

There is a difference between regulating the economy, and regulating exploitation of the economy.

Semantics. Unless you plan on elaborating. The Fed never gets much scrutiny. It's finally getting more attention. Deservedly so. Fed policy (and a little farther back if you're looking for root causes, the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act) laid much of the groundwork in facilitating the misadventures of the too-big-to-fail banks.

 

[ugaboga232]

Very yay. Best engine for innovation and progress that we have.

But you have to be aware that it rewards businesses for acting like sociopaths (thus: all of them do that), so you need government action to make sure they stay in their lane.

That's government funded research. Profit motive ruins true innovation.

 

[Oriel]

This is rather narrow, because the existence of The Fed is government regulation of the highest order.

The Fed regulates monetary policy, not the banking system, financial sector or exchanges. The Fed's powers are actually quite limited compared to (theoretically) the SEC which could regulate the financial system far more aggressively if it wanted.

 

[injurai]

That's government funded research. Profit motive ruins true innovation.

You mean government funded research during war time.

 

[Bearthgar]

Capitalism... Hell yeah

 

[ugaboga232]

You mean government funded research during war time.

Military research is still research, I'm not sure what the point is. R/D in companies is very very different than basic research (i've done a bit of both).

 

[iamblades]

Capitalism has been the strongest force for human well-being the world over for the last couple of centuries, and at this point anyone who actually believes that a command economy(including command economy interventions into a market economy, ie. price controls) would be possible or desirable probably needs to seek out a mental health specialist. It just doesn't work, we should have learned that much from Diocletian 1700+ years ago. You need reliable and accurate price signaling to make good judgments about efficient resource allocation. Without a free market you inevitably end up with the cycles of shortage and waste that every command economy in the world has seen.

Most of the issues people cite regularly as being issues with capitalism are actually issues of corruption, which non-capitalist economies have historically had just as much if not more of than capitalist ones. Not that these aren't issues, but they are manageable issues that can be solved if we actually focus on the issues instead of trying to come up with some utopian economic system that will never be implemented that will not work.

The bottom line factor is that wherever people are able to freely trade goods and services with one another, their lives improve immensely over time. Some people see the economy as a zero sum game, that in every economic transaction there must be a winner and a loser, but the reality is that when people are free to make their own economic decisions, on average everyone benefits.

 

[smokeandmirrors]

Capitalism has been the strongest force for human well-being the world over for the last couple of centuries, and at this point anyone who actually believes that a command economy(including command economy interventions into a market economy, ie. price controls) would be possible or desirable probably needs to seek out a mental health specialist. It just doesn't work, we should have learned that much from Diocletian 1700+ years ago. You need reliable and accurate price signaling to make good judgments about efficient resource allocation. Without a free market you inevitably end up with the cycles of shortage and waste that every command economy in the world has seen.

Most of the issues people cite regularly as being issues with capitalism are actually issues of corruption, which non-capitalist economies have historically had just as much if not more of than capitalist ones.

The bottom line factor is that wherever people are able to freely trade goods and services with one another, their lives improve immensely over time. Some people see the economy as a zero sum game, that in every economic transaction there must be a winner and a loser, but the reality is that when people are free to make their own economic decisions, on average everyone benefits.

lol way to reduce any criticism or anyone elses' views as being "mentally ill".

 

[ugaboga232]

Capitalism has been the strongest force for human well-being the world over for the last couple of centuries, and at this point anyone who actually believes that a command economy(including command economy interventions into a market economy, ie. price controls) would be possible or desirable probably needs to seek out a mental health specialist. It just doesn't work, we should have learned that much from Diocletian 1700+ years ago. You need reliable and accurate price signaling to make good judgments about efficient resource allocation. Without a free market you inevitably end up with the cycles of shortage and waste that every command economy in the world has seen.

Most of the issues people cite regularly as being issues with capitalism are actually issues of corruption, which non-capitalist economies have historically had just as much if not more of than capitalist ones.

The bottom line factor is that wherever people are able to freely trade goods and services with one another, their lives improve immensely over time. Some people see the economy as a zero sum game, that in every economic transaction there must be a winner and a loser, but the reality is that when people are free to make their own economic decisions, on average everyone benefits.

You can have a free market without capitalism. And Capitalism/free market is not the best force for well-being, thats basic research generally funded with no profit motive.

 

[injurai]

Military research is still research, I'm not sure what the point is. R/D in companies is very very different than basic research (i've done a bit of both).

Alright, government funded research is very important. But it often doesn't innovate in application all that rapidly. It can't take numerous amounts of risks, it must focus very carefully on research that involves exorbitant amounts of capital to get something started. It's better at taking a few select risks that stare down oblivion.

Capitalism is very much needed for innovation that can be commoditized and reach the general populace.

 

[ugaboga232]

Alright, government funded research is very important. But it often doesn't innovate in application all that rapidly. It can't take risks, it must focus very carefully on research that involves exorbitant amounts of capital to get something started.

Capitalism is very much needed for innovation that can be commoditized and reach the general populace.

Why do we need capitalism to have commodities? Pharma, biotech, even just regular tech all owe their industries and many of their continued "innovations" are due to more research.

 

[Giant Panda]

Most of the issues people cite regularly as being issues with capitalism are actually issues of corruption, which non-capitalist economies have historically had just as much if not more of than capitalist ones. Not that these aren't issues, but they are manageable issues that can be solved if we actually focus on the issues instead of trying to come up with some utopian economic system that will never be implemented that will not work.

The bottom line factor is that wherever people are able to freely trade goods and services with one another, their lives improve immensely over time. Some people see the economy as a zero sum game, that in every economic transaction there must be a winner and a loser, but the reality is that when people are free to make their own economic decisions, on average everyone benefits.

Yup. One thing that others should remember is that in any voluntary exchange between two parties, both parties expect to benefit. Otherwise, they wouldn't agree to the exchange. So things like price controls criminalize exchanges that everyone thinks they would have benefited from.

 

[injurai]

Why do we need capitalism to have commodities? Pharma, biotech, even just regular tech all owe their industries and many of their continued "innovations" are due to more research.

The government doesn't invest in bringing down cost, or competing with itself to iterate over thousands of various iterations of a single technological application. It's good for laying the groundwork. But eventually these programs need to be nationalized, just like the telecoms were.

 

[Oriel]

That's government funded research. Profit motive ruins true innovation.

Government research doesn't drive the latest innovations in the tech sector. When Intel creates a new $1 billion fab facility that's not public money being spent. When Microsoft pump's billions into cloud computing solutions that's not the government. Did the government create the computer/tablet/phone you're using to comment on this privately established website? The above poster is right about the private sector being the best motive for research and development. Yes money and profit is nearly always the end goal. But that's how society rewards risk. If a risk pays off then the rewards can be staggering. You really think Elon Musk poured his life savings into SpaceX for humanity's sake alone? Lol, nope. Government funding will only ever goes so far.

 

[Aureon]

Yes, with :
massively progressive taxation
State solution to commons' problems (Transportation, infrastructure, water, electricity, internet, healthcare)
Criminal responsability for economic rule violations
Mandated collective bargaining
And a few other amenities.

There's things the free market does really well (Commodities&services with elastic demand) and shit that shouldn't be tampered with (monopolizable prime necessities)

Government research doesn't drive the latest innovations in the tech sector. When Intel creates a new $1 billion fab facility that's not public money being spent. When Microsoft pump's billions into cloud computing solutions that's not the government. Did the government create the computer/tablet/phone you're using to comment on this privately established website? The above poster is right about the private sector being the best motive for research and development. Yes money and profit is nearly always the end goal. But that's how society rewards risk. If a risk pays off then the rewards can be staggering. You really think Elon Musk poured his life savings into SpaceX for humanity's sake alone? Lol, nope. Government funding will only ever goes so far.

Did google go to the moon, or invent the computer, or fund the CERN?
Basic research opens up entire new fields. Corporate research does some types of research really well, but for basic research, which is research with no immediate useful prospects (Like figuring out how physics works, it's shit. No company is going to fund research that may be useful 30-50 years down the line, no matter how good the upside could be.

 

[Giant Panda]

Government research doesn't drive the latest innovations in the tech sector. When Intel creates a new $1 billion fab facility that's not public money being spent. When Microsoft pump's billions into cloud computing solutions that's not the government. Did the government create the computer/tablet/phone you're using to comment on this privately established website? The above poster is right about the private sector being the best motive for research and development. Yes money and profit is nearly always the end goal. But that's how society rewards risk. If a risk pays off then the rewards can be staggering. You really think Elon Musk poured his life savings into SpaceX for humanity's sake alone? Lol, nope. Government funding will only ever goes so far.

Government funded research has been helpful to advance science in ways that didn't have clear near-term profit making capabilities. For profit business is better at every other type of innovation.

 

[iamblades]

lol way to reduce any criticism or anyone elses' views as being "mentally ill".

What's that oft-quoted 'definition of insanity'?

Doing the same thing and expecting different results?

You can have a free market without capitalism. And Capitalism/free market is not the best force for well-being, that's basic research generally funded with no profit motive.

How are you supposed to have an accurate price signal on base resources and the means of production if they are socialized?


A very small amount of research has historically been funded with no profit motive. Even government funded research has historically been funded based on anticipation of return on that investment, and it would be foolish to do otherwise.

The British government didn't fund the Royal Society for the hell of it, they wanted the technology to spread the Empire to every corner of the globe and reap the economic benefits from doing so. and this was pre-capitalism.

 

[Demoskinos]

Bernie and supporters are not against capitalism (i.e.. market economy). They're just further toward the planned economy end on the planned economy — market economy spectrum

This. America is basically an oligarchy right now. We need more power put back in the hands of the people and not these monolithic corporations.

 

[smokeandmirrors]

What's that oft-quoted 'definition of insanity'?

Doing the same thing and expecting different results?



How are you supposed to have an accurate price signal on base resources and the means of production if they are socialized?

a) capitalism?

b) you clearly dont know what socialism is.

 

[ugaboga232]

Government research doesn't drive the latest innovations in the tech sector. When Intel creates a new $1 billion fab facility that's not public money being spent. When Microsoft pump's billions into cloud computing solutions that's not the government. Did the government create the computer/tablet/phone you're using to comment on this privately established website? The above poster is right about the private sector being the best motive for research and development. Yes money and profit is nearly always the end goal. But that's how society rewards risk. If a risk pays off then the rewards can be staggering. You really think Elon Musk poured his life savings into SpaceX for humanity's sake alone? Lol, nope. Government funding will only ever goes so far.

Fair enough, for consumer gadgetry industry does a good job. But for healthcare (which is the field im in), government research is far closer to the metal so to speak and far more important. You can still have companies and markets and commodities without capitalism. Capitalism is how profits are distributed and how labor and capital is treated, not about the existence of the market.

 

[Oriel]

You can have a free market without capitalism.

Um, no you can't. Capitalism and a free market go hand in hand. You can't have one without the other.

Here's the definition of a "free market":

"an economic system in which prices are determined by unrestricted competition between privately owned businesses."

And capitalism:

"an economic and political system in which a country's trade and industry are controlled by private owners for profit, rather than by the state."

A free market by definition <i>needs</i> private enterprise which you can't have in a capitalist system.

 

[prag16]

lol way to reduce any criticism or anyone elses' views as being "mentally ill".

Solid job latching onto the one comment and disregarding all of the valid points made.

the best force for well-being, thats basic research generally funded with no profit motive.

Citation needed.

 

[ugaboga232]

What's that oft-quoted 'definition of insanity'?

Doing the same thing and expecting different results?



How are you supposed to have an accurate price signal on base resources and the means of production if they are socialized?


A very small amount of research has historically been funded with no profit motive. Even government funded research has historically been funded based on anticipation of return on that investment, and it would be foolish to do otherwise.

The British government didn't fund the Royal Society for the hell of it, they wanted the technology to spread the Empire to every corner of the globe and reap the economic benefits from doing so. and this was pre-capitalism.

Profit motive is different from looking for the research to be useful. The price signal comes from the market not how companies are structured and paid. I agree that command economies are not going to be feasible until far better computers and economic models come out. Pretty much all NIH funding is for the welfare of humanity and not for immediate profit.

Tl;dr i think you are mixing up socialism and command economies as well as capitalism and market economies.

 

[JinjoUnchained]

It's important to distinguish between true capitalism and economic fascism. A system where economic elites manipulate the legislative process is fascist, not capitalist.

Personally I'm in favor of free market capitalism, but with a strong social safety net and no corporate welfare. That corporate welfare state is my biggest problem with American blended capitalism: it creates a moral hazard that encourages reckless greed that's ultimately paid for by the poor and middle class.

 

[smokeandmirrors]

Solid job latching onto the one comment and disregarding all of the valid points made.
.

well when you label you opponents as mentally ill i will disregard anything you have to say

doubly so if they dont even know what socialism is.

 

[ugaboga232]

Solid job latching onto the one comment and disregarding all of the valid points made.



Citation needed.

RO1 grants (vast majority of biological funding) by NIH are all about curing diseases not about making the government money.

 

[Orthogonal]

well when you label you opponents as mentally ill i will disregard anything you have to say

doubly so if they dont even know what socialism is.

I think you are both operating on different definitions of Socialism.

 

[ChetWilson]

Or the prison system.
Or the wars for capitalist exploitation of resources.
Or the child labor.
Or the slaves in the middle east.
Or the human trafficking.
Or the lead poisoning.
Or the global warming.
Or the ecological disasters.
Or the famine & malnutrition.

I could continue.

What? No you couldn't. You couldn't even start.

Prison system? What % of people in the prison are there because of common law violations (direct injury to people or parties), and what % of people are in prison due to government violations (non-common law violations that upset the state, i.e. drug laws)

Capitalist wars? Excuse me? Who declares war? Governments.

Child labor? What type of romantic peasant dreams do you live in? Do you think when agriculture started thousands of years ago, boys and girls did absolutely nothing until they were adults? No, they worked. At least the ones that survived infanthood anyway. Now that children just aren't randomly dying from starvation and/or diseases due to cheap food/medicine (thx capitalism), all of a sudden kids laboring is alot more visible and suddenly becomes crime of the century.

Slaves/Human Trafficking? Slavery has been around forever, and has been done by everyone on everyone. Again, it's just more visible now because instead of just nobles having the money to buy 'services', you have many people with free resources.

Lead poisoning? More of a lack of knowledge than a capitalism specific problem. Romans had problem with lead poisoning.

Global warming? I'll summarize GW for you, hopefully in a way no one ever mentions it again. GW is basically a collection of useless people with insanely large egos who can't (aka refuse) to contribute to society in meaningful ways, decide to scare everyone else (mainly politicians) with illusionary problems so they get 'heroic' jobs to solve said fake problems. No one is considered a hero (let alone get any respect from the majority of people) for making Ketchup available dirt cheap, to everyone, everywhere.... but shit, save the world from the human extinction level event known as global warming = hero. I wish I could line up all the global warming nutcases and slap them in a row, XCX style.

Ecological disasters? When companies cause them, they can get sued, and they have to pay for damages if they are responsible. Good luck getting government to pay for damages when they cause an ecological disaster.

Famine and malnutrition? Who or what is largely responsible for world wide abject poverty going from 90% in 1812 to 20% in 2012? Its not King Karl.

 

[smokeandmirrors]

I think you are both operating on different definitions of Socialism.

I'm using this one:

Socialism is a variety of social and economic systems characterised by social ownership and democratic control of the means of production

 

[Oriel]

Did google go to the moon, or invent the computer, or fund the CERN?
Basic research opens up entire new fields. Corporate research does some types of research really well, but for basic research, which is research with no immediate useful prospects (Like figuring out how physics works, it's shit. No company is going to fund research that may be useful 30-50 years down the line, no matter how good the upside could be.

Did I say the public sector cannot/shouldn't be involved in research and development? No. In fact I constantly argue for more state spending in R&D but that doesn't deny the fact that the private sector IS the biggest contributor to R&D in the world.

Oh and it's a privately owned space company that's now making more strides in space exploration than NASA and who will likely land on Mars before big government space does so. Capitalism <i>does</i> work and no other system comes close to its effectiveness. Capitalism is as old as human civilisation itself.

 

[Giant Panda]

I'm using this one:

Workers co-ops can already exist, right? But you want to force people to use them?

 

[thehypocrite]

I'm fairly sure all of that is at the feet of human nature more broadly, not capitalism specifically. Capitalism was just the late-stage enzyme that vastly scaled up the process. We've always done horrible things and any process that organizes human endeavor at a large scale will lead to similar things. It was fascism and religion before it was capitalism.

Not in my nature. There's a lot of people that don't have that shit in their nature or are motivated by greed doing great things in the world.

Yet, the whole point is that these things don't drop away with communism and socialism.

That shows how unrelated your comments about the Gulag were.

I think that all of these items were appreciably worse under the Communist regimes of the 20th century than any Western regulated Capitalist county. I mean, at least child labor, wars for exploitation of resources, slave labor, human trafficking, global warming, ecological disasters, and especially famine and malnutrition. Maybe you're right about lead poisoning though... The Western democratic capitalist societies probably had worse lead poisoning than, say, the USSR, where millions of people turned to cannibalism to feed their families.

Although even regardless I'll re-iterate my point about Capitalism from earlier that you cannot have free markets without free peoples. If people are held in slave labor or child labor, or what have you, that is by definition not a free market.

Show me this mythical unicorn called free market. You guys talk as if everyone plays on the same field with the same set of resources.


Capitalism is the system equivalent to the demagoguery arguments of the GOP telling fearful whites that at least they are better of than brown people and bootstrap.

 

[Oriel]

Government funded research has been helpful to advance science in ways that didn't have clear near-term profit making capabilities. For profit business is better at every other type of innovation.

Absolutely. There's no need for one exist without the other. People here seem to think that when it comes to R&D spending its a zero sum game where money needs to be allocated through the state and not the private sector. It can be done through both the public and private sectors. Many of the greatest breakthroughs have been thanks to private sector funding. The state didn't fund in the development of the telephone and television after all.

 

[Saucycarpdog]

Semantics. Unless you plan on elaborating. The Fed never gets much scrutiny. It's finally getting more attention. Deservedly so. Fed policy (and a little farther back if you're looking for root causes, the repeal of the Glass-Steagall Act) laid much of the groundwork in facilitating the misadventures of the too-big-to-fail banks.

Quickly want to jump into this thread and clean up a misconception. The Glass-steagall repeal had very little to do with the housing crises and recession. Glass-steagall kept commercial banks and investment banks separate from each other, nothing about it regulated banks from loaning out to bad creditors or bundling bad loans into securities and selling them on the market.

 

[ugaboga232]

What? No you couldn't. You couldn't even start.

Prison system? What % of people in the prison are there because of common law violations (direct injury to people or parties), and what % of people are in prison due to government violations (non-common law violations that upset the state, i.e. drug laws)

Capitalist wars? Excuse me? Who declares war? Governments.

Child labor? What type of romantic peasant dreams do you live in? Do you think when agriculture started thousands of years ago, boys and girls did absolutely nothing until they were adults? No, they worked. At least the ones that survived infanthood anyway. Now that children just aren't randomly dying from starvation and/or diseases due to cheap food/medicine (thx capitalism), all of a sudden kids laboring is alot more visible and suddenly becomes crime of the century.

Slaves/Human Trafficking? Slavery has been around forever, and has been done by everyone on everyone. Again, it's just more visible now because instead of just nobles having the money to buy 'services', you have many people with free resources.

Lead poisoning? More of a lack of knowledge than a capitalism specific problem. Romans had problem with lead poisoning.

Global warming? I'll summarize GW for you, hopefully in a way no one ever mentions it again. GW is basically a collection of useless people with insanely large egos who can't (aka refuse) to contribute to society in meaningful ways, decide to scare everyone else (mainly politicians) with illusionary problems so they get 'heroic' jobs to solve said fake problems. No one is considered a hero (let alone get any respect from the majority of people) for making Ketchup available dirt cheap, to everyone, everywhere.... but shit, save the world from the human extinction level event known as global warming = hero. I wish I could line up all the global warming nutcases and slap them in a row, XCX style.

Ecological disasters? When companies cause them, they can get sued, and they have to pay for damages if they are responsible. Good luck getting government to pay for damages when they cause an ecological disaster.

Famine and malnutrition? Who or what is largely responsible for world wide abject poverty going from 90% in 1812 to 20% in 2012? Its not King Karl.

Have you heard of US fruit company/dole?

 

[RobotNinjaHornets]

Workers co-ops can already exist, right? But you want to force people to use them?

Why should one person benefit more from the work of an organisation just because they happen to own it?

On a related note, private rent: why should someone be able to indefinitely get a profit from something that they had enough money to be able to own in the first place, while someone who is almost definitely poorer has to spend their money to be able to live somewhere? Like, how is that at all fair?

 

[Oriel]

Fair enough, for consumer gadgetry industry does a good job. But for healthcare (which is the field im in), government research is far closer to the metal so to speak and far more important. You can still have companies and markets and commodities without capitalism. Capitalism is how profits are distributed and how labor and capital is treated, not about the existence of the market.

You mention healthcare but I'm sure you'd understand how difficult it would be if the government owned the patents on drugs for patients and all medicines manufactured by a single nationalised pharma corp. Same with medical devices like imagining equipment. Would a government owned company be able to develop the high precision scanners and MRI's that Phillips come up with? I'm not so sure.

A lot of the innovations that come from breakthrough's in new patient threatments are thanks to a combination of public spending and private sector initiative in getting their drugs to market first.

 

[iamblades]

Profit motive is different from looking for the research to be useful. The price signal comes from the market not how companies are structured and paid. I agree that command economies are not going to be feasible until far better computers and economic models come out. Pretty much all NIH funding is for the welfare of humanity and not for immediate profit.

Tl;dr i think you are mixing up socialism and command economies as well as capitalism and market economies.

Only in terms of time scale really. Even then Bell Labs is responsible for just about as much of the basic research that has made the world what it is today as the government has been. Private companies can and do research without a pure P&L justification.

No I am not confusing anything. The existence of 'social democracies' that use capitalist economies with high taxation has really nothing to do with the definition of socialism. The economy is still wholly capitalist, because even most of the hardcore left wing have long realized that it is really the only workable economic system.

Occasionally you will have a sector of the economy that is largely socialized, like the NHS in the UK, with all the attendant issues of a command economy present, but that is relatively rare.

 

[smokeandmirrors]

Global warming? I'll summarize GW for you, hopefully in a way no one ever mentions it again. GW is basically a collection of useless people with insanely large egos who can't (aka refuse) to contribute to society in meaningful ways, decide to scare everyone else (mainly politicians) with illusionary problems so they get 'heroic' jobs to solve said fake problems. No one is considered a hero (let alone get any respect from the majority of people) for making Ketchup available dirt cheap, to everyone, everywhere.... but shit, save the world from the human extinction level event known as global warming = hero. I wish I could line up all the global warming nutcases and slap them in a row, XCX style..

You are ridiculously and profoundly ignorant.

 

[Elfforkusu]

That's government funded research. Profit motive ruins true innovation.

Complete nonsense. Bell labs? Xerox park? Google?

Just off the top of my head. Government didn't invent this shit.


It is true that the two greatest (IMO) scientific endeavors were government projects: the Manhattan Project and Mercury/Gemini/Apollo.

But those had more or less a blank check and a clear goal. Most of the time in science and engineering, you don't know what you're striving for.

 

[injurai]

That shows how unrelated your comments about the Gulag were.

Hardly. People act as if communism doesn't have it's own flavor of exploitation. It's not the labor paradise that people think it is.

Complete nonsense. Bell labs? Xerox park? Google?

Just off the top of my head. Government didn't invent this shit.

Yup. Ford. Hughes Aircraft Co. IBM. Tesla. SpaceX.

The government relies on companies that innovate to the turn of the market economy. The don't just contract out anywhere. Private diversified capital is absolutely necessary, even behind government research.