@CM
"The company has to make something, or provide a service. That company does not. "
It is a fitness service: "Cycle yourself fit with Ghost".

@CM "The credits go away after 2 weeks"

So how do I save anything? How can anyone buy anything that costs more than two weeks' credits? What is the point of making anything that costs more than two weeks' credits? [Note to Central Committee: close down factories making cars. Note to self: buy shares in bicycle factory]

@Aussieboi "without reading this thread, can one tell me how price or value has anything to do with religion? "

It doesn't. The god-botherers have lost the plot.

@Self
Sell bicycles to Ghost.

@Ghost
Fancy going into business together? CM says that I am not allowed to be an accountant any more but I have done a bit of marketing too and after 10 years' living in Clogland I know my way around a bike.

@abgemacht:
"The CEOs of companies don't give a flying fuck about society; they care about money! "

Perhaps, perhaps not, but it doesn't matter either way as society makes them care about it through environmental legislation, ethical investors, consumer boycotts. Screw society and you end up paying damages, share value going down and losing sales. All of which mean less money. Personally, I think it is a rather beautiful mechanism.

Of course, in CMs brave new world there is no money so the mechanism breaks. What will make Diplomat61 Cycle Factory (home of the 'Flying Ghost' model) care about dumping our waste into the nearest river?

Really diplomat? How many people do you know would boycott a company for environmental destruction? Maybe a lot, but not enough to make a large impact. A few prospective investors may not invest in a company because of bad habits, but many will ignore them. And share value dropping? It only really affects the company in the short term.
As for fining companies: many governments don't want to bother with prosecuting corporations because the cost can get high and it is usually a waste of time. Individuals can't because of huge legal costs and the time needed. And if a company gets fined for unethical practises, it barely affects them. A company like Shell earns billions a year. If say they were caught committing unethical practises, then how much will they be fined? 20 million? Peanuts compared to what they earn.

I would love a moneyless economy, but we first have to remove relative scarcity, which is nearly impossible (at the moment).

Wow, this one has galloped on a bit overnight. That'll teach me to go to sleep!

@ Draugnar:

"You don't want to live in a shelter or gevernment funded housing, go work your ass off."

What if there's high unemployment and you can't get a job?

"While my name isn't Ebeneezer, I believe certain aspects of his view were perfectly acceptable in today's society - specifically the workhouses. 5 days labor earns one a safe, clean, and dry place to lay their head and 3 squares for seven days..."

What a rose-tinted view of history you have, Draug. The workhouses of Dickens's London were neither safe nor clean places, they were unsanitary, rat-infested prisons and the food was generally barely sufficient to sustain life.


@ Ghostmaker:

"I cannot consider it exploitation to offer him a job to do work of a nature and for payment of a size that he will accept."

Get real. Often the person has to accept, because the alternative would be destitution. In what way is that a meaningful 'choice'? That's the problem I have with most libertarians - they talk about 'freedom', but in practice their system leads only to negative freedoms. The freedom to be exploited. Give me standard of living over freedom any day of the week.

Now, returning to our hotdog stand discussion:

GHOST: "What if one of them was working serving the hotdogs, and the other was slaving away over the fire (because he was a better cook). Would it be okay if they took consideration of that and split it 60:40 in recognition that at 50:50 the server was exploiting the cook's working in less pleasant conditions?"

JAMIET99UK: "No. Perhaps the cook could be compensated in some other way, such as letting him go home 30 minutes early at the end of the day while the server (who otherwise has the easier job) has to stay behind and clean up. But no, a 60/40 split in ownership would be a step in the wrong direction."

GHOST: "So the work they do has to be made equal in order to compensate... and if this isn't feasible, the business will be shut down by the interim government?"

The point here is that if you allow one participant to own a greater share of the business than the other, you are enabling him to amass wealth. One of the principles of a communist system is that wealth should not be concentrated in the hands of a minority of individuals.

If these two wannabe hotdog operators couldn't come up with an arrangement that kept them both happy and avoided the ownership of the enterprise being unequal, then yes, that would not be a viable business under the kind of system I would envisage, and it should be shut down. But that's their fault for not coming up with a proper way of operating their business within the system.


@ Conservative Man: "I envision this system as being governmentless."

Who would administer this complex new system, if there was no government?


@abgemacht: "But, I'm not in favor of treating everyone equally. If someone can only handle working a cash register, that's perfectly fine. They should be able to afford the necessities and have enough to have some fun. Let the people with talent have the sports cars and the mansions and private islands."

Why?

@ Conservative Man: (In response to abgemacht) "That statement makes me sick. Why should only the talented get to live a good life? It's not an untalented person's fault they're untalented.

Conservative Man +1


@Tom Bombadil: "The idea that the untalented should have a shot at having sports cars and whatnot is ludicrous. The reason that talented well educated people have expensive things is pure supply and demand. 99% of citizens can work a cash register or dig graves, but only say 2% can engineer sophisticated weaponry for the military.

Without the incentive of being rich and having nice things why would I go to school for 10 years to get paid as much as someone who works a cash register? Essentially I am giving up 10 years of pay for no gain."

Wrong. Not everything is about money. What you gain is far more job satisfaction than the menial worker. Working a cash register is boring and repetitive. Digging graves is hard physical work. If you're a talented physicist or whatever, you'll find engaging in cutting-edge research projects far more satisfying than digging graves or operating a cash register.


@ Draugnar: "I work for money. Nothing else. Sure, I happen to enjoy what I do, but if I wasn't being paid, I wouldn't go in to the office. I work so that I can have the money to buy the things I want and enjoy the time I'm not at work. If that makes me greedy, then I'm a greedy sumbitch and I don't really give a fuck."

Ok Draug, let's say you are looking for work, and you end up being offered two jobs.

Job A is dirty, smelly, repetitive, unrewarding work. It pays 30 dollars per hour.
Job B is enjoyable, stimulating and very rewarding work (and not smelly or dirty). It pays 28 dollars per hour.

Are you really telling us you'd pick Job A every time?


@largeham: "as I see it, the government (in its present state) is just another tool for the ruling classes. Most politicians are from rich or powerful families, or at least have links to them. Therefore the ruling classes use the government to help them keep the lower classes down."

That's not an argument against having a government. That's an argument for having a different government.


@ Aussieboi: "without reading this thread, can one tell me how price or value has anything to do with religion?"

No. If you don't want to read the thread, you have no right to participate in the discussion.

Consumers do make choices about purchasing products based on environmental issues and this consumer awareness is growing each year, and as result corporate decisions are changing. I think that this partly stems from the affluent society we live in. The wealthier we are the more we can afford "luxuries" like buying a product because it is "good for the environment" or is made by a company which has "ethics". This process may not be occurring as quickly as some would like, but it is happening and I don't see this trend changing anytime soon.
I don't think the perception of your typical CEO as an uncaring robber baron is accurate either. Sure the "bottom line" is the major concern, and always will be, but like you or I, they too are affected by what they read in the media about social and environmental issues, and their decisions are influenced by their own, possibly even non-rational emotional responses to the zeitgeist. I see this in my own company (a multinational communications company: advertising, market research, public relations) with some of the initiatives that come from the local CEO and further up the chain. In my own companies case, we don't really have a public face that is directly affected by your average consumer (so our bottom line is not affected in the way I described above), but I think some of these initiatives are generated by CEOs, partly because of their own beliefs, but also because they want their own highly skilled employees to value their company as a worthwhile organization.
Governments do prosecute companies (maybe not as often as they should) but their have been environmental disaster that have proved very financially damaging to large corporations. The current BP disaster is a fine example. If they could roll back time I am sure they would do things differently. And I am sure this experience will change the company forever.
As I say these changes will never occur has quickly as we might like, but that is the way of all things. For any endeavour there will always be a degree of inertia to overcome.

"Get real. Often the person has to accept, because the alternative would be destitution. In what way is that a meaningful 'choice'? That's the problem I have with most libertarians - they talk about 'freedom', but in practice their system leads only to negative freedoms. The freedom to be exploited. Give me standard of living over freedom any day of the week."

That's the problem: you want to generate a system whereby people are free to be happy, not free to pursue happiness, and that kind of "right" infers responsibilities on other people which they have never accepted. Either, it is voluntary, which means you have just an altruistic capitalism, or it isn't, in which case you are effectively holding a gun to their heads and saying, "work for me".

"The point here is that if you allow one participant to own a greater share of the business than the other, you are enabling him to amass wealth. One of the principles of a communist system is that wealth should not be concentrated in the hands of a minority of individuals.

If these two wannabe hotdog operators couldn't come up with an arrangement that kept them both happy and avoided the ownership of the enterprise being unequal, then yes, that would not be a viable business under the kind of system I would envisage, and it should be shut down. But that's their fault for not coming up with a proper way of operating their business within the system."

So not only are you not getting the positive freedoms offered to hotdog customers, you are taking away the people's negative freedoms too. And how does this give anyone a better standard of living?

Some industries necessitate high skills such that an unequal division of labour is the only possible method of setting them up, technology is one such industry.

And how is it their fault that they can't follow your rules? Seriously, your set of rules just stops people from doing things, it cannot make anything else suddenly possible, by the nature of regulation.

@ Ghostmaker:

"you want to generate a system whereby people are free to be happy, not free to pursue happiness, and that kind of "right" infers responsibilities on other people which they have never accepted."

I agree with this statement. Can you show me another way to end poverty and wealth inequality? Capitalism certainly can't do it!


"So not only are you not getting the positive freedoms offered to hotdog customers, you are taking away the people's negative freedoms too."

In what way am I taking away the freedoms of the hotdog customers?

As for taking away negative freedoms, what's the problem? I'm happy to trade negative freedoms for positive ones.


"Some industries necessitate high s kills such that an unequal division of labour is the only possible method of setting them up, technology is one such industry."

Then let the state set them up.

"And how is it their fault that they can't follow your rules?"

Because the rules are clear, and it would be perfectly possible for them to follow the rules and still be able to run their hotdog stand. Therefore, if they can't adhere to that straightforward structure, it's obviously their fault.

"Seriously, your set of rules just stops people from doing things."

In this case, yes, that's correct. It is stopping them from doing things that are harmful to society - such as accruing private wealth.

"That's the problem: you want to generate a system whereby people are free to be happy, not free to pursue happiness, and that kind of "right" infers responsibilities on other people which they have never accepted."

TGM I find many of the arguments you put forward to be very compelling, just as I find many of the arguments put forward by the Austrian School of Economics to be compelling. I think many economic libertarians really believe that their philosophies promote a "greater good". That is, the pie may not be evenly divided but it is a bigger pie. Thus while their may be gap between the rich and poor, the poor are still richer than they would be under a socialist system. And generally speaking I think this is mostly true for most western nations. But I think this is only true for certain cultural conditions. To take an extreme example, I don't believe that the aboriginal inhabitants of the Andaman Islands would benefit from adopting our capitalist system tomorrow, just as the aboriginal inhabitants of the Americas did not benef from being introduced to the European way of thinking.

One point thought I would like to attempt to address is the notion, as you said, "that kind of "right infers responsibilities on other people which they have never accepted." I think you are referring to the situation where people pay taxes to support they don't necessarily agree with, such as social security, universal health-care or defense.
The notion of private property itself (which I support) is something that is forced upon people. This is not a natural right, but rather a cultural artifact. At any time people have the right to say "my forbears had no right to sell what never theirs in the first place, but rather belonged to all humanity for all time".
I support the notion of private property for purely pragmatic reasons. We have this system; it seems to be the best system we have come up with thus far; and it only works if we agree with it. But this right is constructed. The capitalist system benefits, and society benefits; but at any time society has the right (and when I say the right, I mean the ability) to re-write the rules of the agreement. Thus taxes, in whichever form they take; to support whichever endeavours undertaken; are a defacto rent for that "private property".
Thus I support the capitalist system, but not because it is moral, but rather because it is practical. If ever I thought that it was not practical I would withdraw my support. When taxes are levied by society for various program, society extends rights to pure capitalism or withdraws those rights as it sees fit, and I think this is perfectly moral.

I am a terrible writer and I have this habit of leaving out words... for example I meant to say: ""my forbears had no right to sell what *was* never theirs in the first place, but rather belonged to all humanity for all time".
I hope people can fill in the other words I left out in other part of my post.

"I agree with this statement. Can you show me another way to end poverty and wealth inequality? Capitalism certainly can't do it!"

The only way to end inequality is to kill everyone in a nuclear holocaust.

Fact-value problem... why should we be concerned by wealth inequality?

""So not only are you not getting the positive freedoms offered to hotdog customers, you are taking away the people's negative freedoms too."

In what way am I taking away the freedoms of the hotdog customers?

As for taking away negative freedoms, what's the problem? I'm happy to trade negative freedoms for positive ones."

The positive freedom to be served with hotdogs, obviously.

You don't create any freedoms by regulating, because regulating is by definition limiting options.

"In this case, yes, that's correct. It is stopping them from doing things that are harmful to society - such as accruing private wealth."

1. The two hotdog stand men can accrue wealth perfectly well as it is... why is my example any different?

2. It is *not* harmful to society to have people with wealth to save and invest.

"The notion of private property itself (which I support) is something that is forced upon people. This is not a natural right, but rather a cultural artifact. At any time people have the right to say "my forbears had no right to sell what never theirs in the first place, but rather belonged to all humanity for all time"."

I fundamentally disagree here.

First of all, nothing can be considered to 'belong to all of humanity', it just doesn't make sense. For starters, the nature of property right is not that when another human is born, you loose some property without ever choosing to, or that when another human dies, you inherit part of their land irrespective of what they want to have happen.

Rather than be owned by all of humanity, land was initially unowned. In order to establish a property right over something, firstly, one must precisely define it and delineate it from other land, and secondly must demonstrate that it is otherwise unowned. The first is why, for instance, air cannot be owned at present, but airspace could be. The second is why nobody owns distant solar systems- we cannot demonstrate that there is no intelligent life-form that already owns it etc. (never mind reach it to define it).

I also disagree on the nature of the right. I believe it to be a right which is natural and inalienable.

@Ava
"Really diplomat? How many people do you know would boycott a company for environmental destruction? Maybe a lot, but not enough to make a large impact."
Why then are companies making an effort to emphasise their fair trade credentials and environmental friendliness? I wonder how many Americans are buying from BP at the moment?

"A few prospective investors may not invest in a company because of bad habits, but many will ignore them."
Ethical investing is a growing area. There are a number of funds that are selective about which companies they invest in. Some pension funds also apply ethical criteria.

"And share value dropping? It only really affects the company in the short term."
How is that? In a perfect market a share's price would be the present value of it's future profit stream. Thus a company which consistently loses sales or incurs fines will have a lower price. Lower share prices are MUCH more important to execs with share options than the company itself.

SOrry, that was @Largeham not Ava

TGM, Imagine a very simple word inhabited by a few families existing communally where everything is shared. At some point all the families agree to cede all property to one individual, who then becomes the supreme ruler. Time passes and the rulers first son inherits that property (as is their custom). The property becomes that right. But at a later date the progeny of those original families decide their forbears made a mistake and decide by force to re-take that property and distribute equally, would that be immoral?

Wow, I go to bed and wake up to a whole page full of postings. Good discussion over all too.

@Jamiet: "Ok Draug, let's say you are looking for work, and you end up being offered two jobs.

Job A is dirty, smelly, repetitive, unrewarding work. It pays 30 dollars per hour.
Job B is enjoyable, stimulating and very rewarding work (and not smelly or dirty). It pays 28 dollars per hour."

No, I would take Job C - the one I have that pays $40 an hour doing boring bug fixes and rewrites of screwed up typical business code that, while it takes a brain, is hardly what I would call rewarding.

It's true that there is some value to be found in the rewarding (and less stinky work), and you have to evaluate each situation as it comes along. But when you start talking serious differences in money, you can start putting up with a lot more. The abopve situation (and rate) is what I am currently in. If you offered me a more enjoyable and rewarding position for $2 or $3 an hour less (assuming it paid hourly like I get paid now so I can bill at 50 or 60 hours a week like I do now), I would consider it, but if said more enjoyable and rewarding position were more than $5 an hour less or were equal money but straight salaried (no OT, just $82K per year), I would turn it down.

And on Job A versus Job B. If Job A were hourly and I could get paid for every houyr worked and I could work 50 or 60 hours a week and Job B were salaried or I would never work more than 40 hours in a week, I would seriously consider Job A, depending on other aspects of the job (who has the better benefits, closeness to home/availability of public transportation, etc.).

Wow, I knew I shouldn't have gone to sleep. Anyway, @Thucy's post on the last page: Are you telling me that people will suddenly forget that it's wrong to kill once the government goes away? Would you kill without a government? Because I sure as hell wouldn't. Who goves you your morals? Yourself and God? or the government? I say myself and God.

I have to go somewhere. I'll be back to debate in 7, 7.5 hours.

@CM - but those who would commit crimes (killing, burglary, whatever) even with a government, or those who are borderline and only hold back for fear of Johnny Law would commit those crimes without fear of consequence. You are too focused on John Smith and not on Jeffrey Dahlmer and Charles Manson. Dahlmer and Manson will still be in your society, but there will be no one to put them in check and take them off the streets.

@ Spyman: "The notion of private property itself is something that is forced upon people. This is not a natural right, but rather a cultural artifact. At any time people have the right to say "my forbears had no right to sell what was never theirs in the first place, but rather belonged to all humanity for all time"."

What an eloquent and well-made point, Spyman. Spyman +1


@ The Ghostmaker: "Fact-value problem... why should we be concerned by wealth inequality?"

We should be concerned because the presence of wealth inequality is unfair, and more to the point it is NEEDLESSLY unfair, because it is something we can change. While a single person remains in poverty, we have a duty as a society to work to eliminate that poverty. I know you do not agree with this, from previous discussions, and I know that in your view, if people are in poverty it is not your problem, but you're wrong. It is your problem as their fellow human being.

JAMIET99UK: "In what way am I taking away the freedoms of the hotdog customers?"

GHOSTMAKER: "The positive freedom to be served with hotdogs, obviously."

I'm not taking that away. You are. I have demonstrated that it would be perfectly possible for the hotdog stand to operate under my rules. The idea of a 60:40 ownership split is an unneccesary condition which YOU have introduced, not me. YOU are the one imposing conditions that result in the closure of the hotdog stand, not me.

"You don't create any freedoms by regulating, because regulating is by definition limiting options."

Fail. You CAN create positive freedoms by regulating, and they're the freedoms that really matter.


In response to Spyman, you said:

"First of all, nothing can be considered to 'belong to all of humanity', it just doesn't make sense. For starters, the nature of property right is not that when another human is born, you loose some property without ever choosing to, or that when another human dies, you inherit part of their land irrespective of what they want to have happen."

Not surprisingly, you're thinking about things in far too individualistic a way.

The point is that in Spyman's example, the land begins to all of society, collectively, as a group. The GROUP is the actor, not any individual. When one individual dies or is born, this does not change the ownership in any way, because the ownership remains held with the GROUP.


"I also disagree on the nature of the right. I believe it to be a right which is natural and inalienable."

Yes, but you're wrong. Please prove that the property right is a natural right.


@Draugnar: On 'Job A vs Job B', I think the fact that you couldn't answer my fairly simple question without fundamentally changing the terms of the scenario demonstrates the validity of my point.


@ Conservative Man: "@Thucy's post on the last page: Are you telling me that people will suddenly forget that it's wrong to kill once the government goes away? Would you kill without a government? Because I sure as hell wouldn't."

No, I wouldn't kill, you wouldn't kill, Thucy probably wouldn't either. But the point is that SOME people would steal and kill if there was nothing to stop them.

@JamieT
"I think the fact that you couldn't answer my fairly simple question without fundamentally changing the terms of the scenario demonstrates the validity of my point."

No, it demonstrates the artificiality of your point.

@Spyman
"This is not a natural right, but rather a cultural artifact."

I agree that it is a cultural artifact but it is an absolutely fundamental one. People should be able to keep the fruits of their labour.

@CM
"Are you telling me that people will suddenly forget that it's wrong to kill once the government goes away?"
No, but people still kill knowing that. Remove the risk of serious penalty and it is likely that the death rate will rise.

The problem is not the morals of the majority of people, it is the lack of morals amongst a violent minority.

@ GM

"Fact-value problem... why should we be concerned by wealth inequality?"

Because too much inequality leads to revolutions, most of which turn out to be bloodbaths which do little except change one ruling class for another? The problem with unchecked inequality of wealth is that it breeds greater instability. Eventually, too much of the pie is consumed by too few at the top, even if objectively the pie has been getting larger. At that point, people start getting stabby towards those with the big slices of pie.

Thank you Jamiet99Uk. I am actually do actually support capitalism but we are not without some common ground.
@diplomat61, I think private property is a very important artifact for the way our culture is at this time. And I think it serves a practical purpose (I am just not so sure it is *fundamental*), and people should be able to keep most of the fruits of their labour, but the tax we pay is the rent we owe for benefits we gain from living in society. I realize that pure libertarian economists would say those fees should come from the prices we agree amongst ourselves (that is for private goods produced by private entities), and I agree that this is often practical, but I think I think there are gaps in this practicality. Tax is an infringement upon private property, but it can be a just infringement, and effective for the betterment of society (just as it can be an unjust infringement and to the detriment of society).

"@ The Ghostmaker: "Fact-value problem... why should we be concerned by wealth inequality?"

We should be concerned because the presence of wealth inequality is unfair, and more to the point it is NEEDLESSLY unfair, because it is something we can change. While a single person remains in poverty, we have a duty as a society to work to eliminate that poverty. I know you do not agree with this, from previous discussions, and I know that in your view, if people are in poverty it is not your problem, but you're wrong. It is your problem as their fellow human being."

I presume you are aware of what the fact value problem actually is? Because that doesn't go any distance towards overcoming it at all.

""Fact-value problem... why should we be concerned by wealth inequality?"

Because too much inequality leads to revolutions, most of which turn out to be bloodbaths which do little except change one ruling class for another? The problem with unchecked inequality of wealth is that it breeds greater instability. Eventually, too much of the pie is consumed by too few at the top, even if objectively the pie has been getting larger. At that point, people start getting stabby towards those with the big slices of pie."

Erm... at the moment I'm arguing with a Marxist... fear of revolution is hardly a good argument since that is what Marxism says is inevitible etc.

Besides, again you aren't overcoming the fact value problem.