The basic necessities of life need to be produced. The current mode of production is capitalistic, a system which requires that people pay cash for those products. I certainly don't think a capitalist economy could function by giving away the necessities and only selling the "luxury" goods - which seems to be what you are proposing. The production and sale of necessities is the foundation of the capitalist system, the production and sale of luxury goods is parasitic upon it. Take away that foundation and the whole edifice collapses.
Having said that, no economic system is going to just give away the necessities of life - under socialism, everyone might receive the basic necessities without handing over cash, but (most) people will still have to pay for them by engaging in socially necessary labour to produce them.

I think your opinion is spot on. Thank you for the excellent reply.

The picture is mixed. It would appear that in a world of 7 billions of people, some of whom live in the developed world, a small fraction would be allowed to die for lack of access to the basic necessities of life. Most of the time, most of the world's population can tolerate that fact.

In practice most people receive the minimum necessities of life, but it isn't quite a "right", nor is the provision of basic necessities undertaken by the state itself, in many cases. Food, clothing, and shelter are usually provided by someone. There are, however people who live without shelter. They live outside on the street. If it is too cold they will freeze to death; if it is too hot they will die of heat stroke. They can also die of dehydration and starvation. Disease, of course may be fatal.

Some countries do a good job of providing the basic necessities, even exceeding the basics. At least so I have heard.

In a number of countries it is quite possible to die from lack of food or water, (adequate) clothing and shelter. In many countries people needing essential medical care find insurmountable barriers between themselves and an adequate hospital. In many countries people die from preventable disease (preventable by vaccination or medication).

You are aware that receiving the basic requirements of life (enough food, shelter, water, protection from the elements, minimal health care, etc. so that one does not die in the street or in a shelter) is a miserable and precarious existence.

The basic necessities of life need to be produced. The current mode of production is capitalistic, a system which requires that people pay cash for those products. — jkg20

True, but capitalist systems regularly produce a surplus from which the poorest can be taken care of, if the society sees fit to provide such care.

There are millions of "excess deaths" from lack of food, clean water, shelter, and medical care. (Excess deaths are above and beyond those that occur from old age, for instance, and long established stats for baseline mortality from childbirth, childhood diseases, and accidents.)

Like jkg20 is saying, most people live in a capitalistic society. And that means that nothing gets produced unless there's a substantial amount of money involved in the process, to feed the workers, maintenance of machines etc.

This holds true on both sides of the political spectrum. Capitalistic versus socialistic, they both use the monetary system as a base foundation. The false assumption that money is a natural problem solver.

Another scenario could be that we added basic necessities to the human rights. And thereby force governments around the world to feed the starving part of their demographic, while providing shelters and medicine etc through taxes. Just like we do in my country (Denmark). We pay some of the highest tax rates, this is done deliberately and with military precision. Because we know that society is best when all people thrive and are happy. People that is unable to find work or get sick, gets offered an apartment, and a subtle amount of money to live off every month. If the rest of the world could just get this simple idea into their heads, the world would most definitely be a much better place.

I would like to live in a world where people get free food and free housing because they truly need those things to live. I think it's rude to charge people money for basic necessities. Here's my list, so far (feel free to add to it), of the problems in the way of people being granted free necessities:
1) Who's going to produce the necessities and why? (farming & food storage, house building & design, water harvesting & storage, medical care, making clothes, etc.)
- My solution is to engineer ways to reduce labor. For example, houses can be built with 3D printers now, reducing the construction costs from $200,000 to $10,000. It normally takes 7 months to construct a house, but it takes less than 24 hours with a 3D printer. Here's a link to the 3D printed house (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUdnrtnjT5Q) All basic necessities should be easier to produce.
2) Capitalism relies heavily on the sales of necessities, so making necessities free could damage the economy.
...

Capitalism relies heavily on the sales of necessities, so making necessities free could damage the economy. — GreenPhilosophy

It isn't just the "sale" of necessities; capitalism is all about making a profit on all of those necessities that people... need. Eliminating profit from capitalism wouldn't just "damage" the capitalist economy, it would destroy it. That's OK by me, but be aware -- replacing one economic system for a completely different type of economy is very difficult (because the profit makers in the old economy usually don't want to just give up making money.)

So, I watched the video on the concrete house. Quite interesting. These can be built on site where the house is wanted, right? And I suppose they fill the gap between the inner layer and outer layer with some kind of binding insulation to retain heat (or resist heat from outside) and strengthen the walls.

Instant houses can also be made by inflating a heavy balloon, anchoring it, and then spraying foam on it, followed by a layer of concrete stucco. After the stucco has hardened, openings for windows and doors can be cut into the structure.

There is an additional problem, and it's a big one. However unequal the distribution of wealth may be, and however unfair the uneven distribution of wealth may be, there are too many people in the world to provide everyone with a nice house, decent clothing, adequate food, good medical care, and so forth. Why not?

There are not enough resources available to do that for the current 7.3 billion - expected to be 9 billion before 2050. It isn't just that there isn't enough money -- there is not enough raw material, energy, unused good crop land, clean water, sewage treatment systems, hospitals, etc. to do it.

Not to throw too much ice water on your good intentions, but by the time your humane plan was put into effect (let's say it took 80 years), the world will be in very dire straits from global warming. Many coastal cities will have been ruined (that's where most people live -- along the coasts), crop production will be severely diminished, it will be too hot in much of the world to work outside all day, the weather will be far more erratic than it is now, there will not be enough petroleum left to power all this equipment, provide raw feed stock material, and power factories and farms. Fresh water will be in short supply and god only knows what old and new diseases we'll be dealing with.

In a nutshell, by the end of this century, we are going to be totally screwed.

Your heart is in the right place, but the times are going to be very, very cruel.

Is there a way around the global warming problem? Maybe. If we all stopped flying, stopped driving cars, reduced heating and lighting to a minimum, stop making, using, and disposing of any unnecessary material of any kind, all become vegans, learned to live without air conditioning and 72 degree heat in winter, and so on, we might be able to prevent the worst of the disaster. Everyone not driving, not flying, and becoming vegan is about as likely as the Blessed Virgin Mary showing up tomorrow morning to serve you breakfast in bed.

I too would like to live in such a world, and contrary to @Bitter Crank's comment, there are plenty of resources around to do this, although many of us in the so-called "developed" world will have to drop our expectations about what counts as a "nice" house. However, you are right that it cannot be done under capitalism because, as Bitter Cranck points out, the ethos of capitalism is not to produce necessities in order to meet basic needs, but to produce necessities in order to create profit: human beings are treated as means to ends, not ends in themselves. The kind of world both of us would like to live in is essentially a socialist one and, as Marx pointed out, a socialist economy can only thrive once technological progress has reached the point where basic necessities for all can be provided. Technology is sufficiently advanced now to do precisely that, the question is how to we transition from capitalism to socialism.

I certainly don't think a capitalist economy could function by giving away the necessities and only selling the "luxury" goods - which seems to be what you are proposing. The production and sale of necessities is the foundation of the capitalist system, the production and sale of luxury goods is parasitic upon it. Take away that foundation and the whole edifice collapses. — jkg20

I don't think that's quite true. And, honestly, if stopping 9 million people die for lack of food and adequate nutrition every year means I have to give up my luxuries, I guess that's just something we have to do. But it's not the case. There are countless ways we could end world hunger and each starts with at the very least strongly curtailing capitalism. 9 million dead people in the world each year, but the US alone just throws away a third of its food... capitalism is disgustingly wasteful.

The biggest challenge would involve changing people's mindsets. The two most important ways:

1) Having people realize that they must work as part of society, not for a direct monetary gain, but so that the whole system can work. People would have to see labor as a part of the greater good for themselves and everyone else as well. Ultimately it would make people happier, as studies have shown that people are more satisfied with work they do for the intrinsic value over an external reward, but it will be hard to get people to that point.

2) Getting people to accept that everyone deserves these bare necessities, regardless of education or career choice. A lot of people still think a CEO deserves a lot more than a bus driver... but if you look at the difference between their salaries in capitalist America, it doesn't make sense. There are only so many hours in a week, so much labor any person can put into a job (unless they have a time turner), so 373 times as much money for the average CEO is just preposterous.

In any case, yes, I interpret the right to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" as including the basic necessities of life.

Free food, shelter, and clothing is available in capitalist countries already. If you are starving on the street and insufficiently clothed in the US, it's not due to lack of free help; it's due to your inability to figure out how to obtain it.

It's expensive to be poor in America.

https://www.economist.com/news/united-states/21663262-why-low-income-americans-often-have-pay-more-its-expensive-be-poor
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/posteverything/wp/2018/01/25/why-it-costs-so-much-to-be-poor-in-america/?noredirect=on
https://www.brookings.edu/opinions/the-high-price-of-being-poor/
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/the-high-cost-of-being-poor/

Not only is it expensive to be poor, but because the poor have no money in the bank, every small disaster (flat tire, need new shoes, Fortune Magazine sub expired) every minor problem gets magnified. For want of a tire, the car can't run, one can't get to work... and so on.

All true. People work long hours because that is part of the business plan of the capitalist-- we work extra time to produce their profit. If we were not working for profit, or to perpetuate markets (like the market for SUVs, jumbo Airbus and Boeing passenger planes, etc.) then we all wouldn't have to work nearly as long.

CEOs get paid way too much is a truism -- like the sky is blue. The rich are a parasite class.

Not only is it expensive to be poor, but because the poor have no money in the bank, every small disaster (flat tire, need new shoes, Fortune Magazine sub expired) every minor problem gets magnified. For want of a tire, the car can't run, one can't get to work... and so on. — Bitter Crank

Yes! The whole system is rigged against the working class.
Which is one of the main points of the articles I linked to :)

For a more literary version of what capitalism is like for poor people trying to get just a little bit ahead, see The Jungle by Upton Sinclair.

Have you read George Orwell's Road to Wigan Pier or Down and Out in Paris and London? Both are about Orwell's experience of British and French poverty in the 1930s. Excellent.

Detroit is a pit of poverty, and it seems like a mystery. Once the auto industry got going (in the first decade of the 20th century) it boomed. It boomed even more during WWII. It boomed for just a little while after the Second World War, then the tide turned, rather suddenly. Why?

According to Sugrue's The Origins of the Urban Crisis: Race and Inequality in Postwar Detroit, a key reason was that Ford and General Motors wanted to diversify geographically, relocate in rural areas of the midwest and south, and automate. They wanted to do all this largely as a bitter reaction to organized labor's successes before and during WWII. The unions (like the UAW) became cocky and intrusive in management issues, and the execs found this emotionally and economically intolerable.

So they moved many of their operations, taking with them hundreds of allied businesses (like spark plug plants, crankshaft grinders, ball bearing plants, etc.) and many, many jobs. Workers with seniority, good skills, and personal mobility moved, the rest were just screwed, left high and dry, The tax base started to wither away, social needs snowballed, the gap between municipal spending and income widened, and by the 1970s, Detroit was going down the drain.

Before I started reading about MoTown, I thought all this started in the 70s or 80s. But the destruction of Detroit started in the late 50s. GM and Ford didn't give a rat's ass about the destruction they caused by seeking to weaken the leverage of organized labor.

True, but capitalist systems regularly produce a surplus from which the poorest can be taken care of, if the society sees fit to provide such care.

I think the issue is that whilst society is mired in capitalism, seeing fit to disperse the surplus freely is not a coherent option. Under capitalism the surplus is the source of profit. Disperse the surplus freely: no profit. No profit: no capitalism.

↪NKBJ
Have you read George Orwell's Road to Wigan Pier or Down and Out in Paris and London? Both are about Orwell's experience of British and French poverty in the 1930s. Excellent.

Orwell was an exceptional writer and human being. Another work in the same spirit by another writer (although this time fictional) is The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists by Robert Tressell.

Denmark is indeed often pointed to as a model working state. I'm interested though: I've been reading recently that there may be structural problems with the model that are being exposed in the current context (e.g. https://www.humanityinaction.org/knowledgebase/59-the-danish-illusion-the-gap-between-principle-and-practice-in-the-danish-welfare-system ). As you are someone who lives in Denmark, what is your first hand experience of this?

I didn't express myself clearly. Here's the do-over: "Industrialized systems produce agricultural surpluses and are generally rich enough that governments, NGOs, and individuals feel they can afford to donate food, clothing, and shelter to unfortunate people who, for various reasons, are food insecure, not adequately clothed, and unhoused."

The problem, of course, is that this sort of good generosity is a short-term fix that does nothing to change the structural problems that produce foodless, shoeless, and homeless people in the first place.

I mentioned above this book by Sugrue about Detroit. Detroit is pretty much a hopeless case at this point, but the thing that really made me sit up and take notice was Sugrue's description of how early and how fast the events that destroyed Detroit took place. "Peak Detroit" was in 1950, and 10 years later Detroit was well on its way to immiseration.

It isn't the case that nobody noticed what was happening. Economists working for the United Auto Workers Union in the early '50s recognized structural changes early on that pointed toward Detroit getting the royal shaft. Detroit's Wayne State University demographers analyzed data from the 1950s and in 1962 concluded that Detroit was doomed. The early estimations of disaster turned out to be spot on.

The problem with charity is that places like Detroit or the south side of Chicago or parts of England or Paris or thousands of places elsewhere in the world are beyond being helped by charitable donations of personal surplus. IF there is any solution that can or will happen (or won't), it would involve extensive structural changes, and then were talking about revolution.

@jkg20 I think the increase in poverty and homelessness, is the direct consequence of changes in the social policy laws that we've had over the recent years. The liberal parties have been preaching individualism and hung excluded and vulnerable citizens out in public debates and portrayed them as being lazy and a burden to national economy, as opposed to good citizens struggling to get a foothold in society. This is a very dangerous distinction to make. The debate has since then been thoroughly discussed, as liberal forces tried to overhype their own political agenda with this individualistic nonsense. In spite of this debate, the impact has been so huge and has led to changes in policy, that has been extremely unfortunate for people who struggle to exist in this country.

The major change we've had that contributed to this rise in poverty, was a law that forced people on welfare into an ultimatum to either find a job or get an education (education is provided by the government). So if you couldn't find a job which most people on welfare for good reasons can't, or couldn't begin an education because of mental health issues, social problems or drug abuse. All these people that could not meet the terms within this ultimatum, was denied their welfare checks and thrown onto the streets. Roughly 55.000 people. I'm one of them. Although i've been lucky to be in the right place where good social workers has helped me to get the basic necessities. It's brutal times to be in the system these days, i've grown up with both my parents who was also on welfare, so i struggle with my social heritage.

I'm not going to make this a political talk, but to throw people on the streets and into poverty in the name of individualism, is in my opinion disgusting. The liberals that put this into effect, are a menace to society and their own people.

Do i think that it should be a fundamental right to have our basic needs met? Yes i do! As nature originally intended.

Just to clarify, is your "liberal" basically what we in America call "libertarian"? Here "liberals" are the ones in favor of social programs and helping out people.

@NKBJ Yes, libertarianism, gone wrong. Blinded by their own individualistic goodness and greatness.

or should it be people’s right to receive [from society] what they need to survive — GreenPhilosophy

I think rights devolve ultimately to force, often acknowledged as the "best interests of the community." A long time ago, after working for the trial period of 60 days, or whatever it was, I was called in for a review and notice of my raise. At the time it was minimum wage of about $3/hour. I did my homework. I argued to the young woman in HR that it was clear to me that a true living wage (then) was around $17/hour. I got the regular 25 cents/hour raise, or ten dollars per week.

I think most folks, almost everyone, gets the same treatment, being financially exploited and abused. At the time I was completely ignorant of this and only figured it out on my own after it was way too late to materially change my financial fate (unless my lottery ticket comes in).

My argument is that society put me in the position I'm in, society can therefore help meet my needs. The alternative is another French Revolution. It could happen; maybe it's inevitable - likely not in my lifetime.

As to those in need having a right to assistance, I answer yes.

As nature originally intended. — jm0

Nature intended for our basic needs to be met? Nonsense. 1) nature has no intentions 2) nature seems to be content that animals starve, freeze, don't find mates, etc. 3) our survival has never been guaranteed by nature or anyone/anything else.

I think that if someone brought functional plans for a perfect government to the table, then people would be happy to change to this new perfect government. In my ideal government, everybody would get free necessities.

'Rights' are, surely, what you are strong enough to get, so yes, we should all have the right to basic necessities. Are we strong enough to overcome the full-time brainwashing that works against it though?

@GreenPhilosophy, I think any answers to your inquiry may differ depending on context.

In a civilized society, things may be sort of complex, but most look after their citizens.
Actually, this might be a good measure of how well-developed such societies are.

I don't think you can demand that another individual provides for you as such.
(Surely you don't "blame" nature for suffering? The universe is largely indifferent to our troubles.)


Hey @jm0, a fellow Dane, who knew. :)

our survival has never been guaranteed by nature or anyone/anything else.

I didn't say that.

Let me explain.
All living organisms get the food that they have the ability to get. Otherwise they wouldn't be living organisms right? That's what living organisms do. So in this manner, nature has provided us with the ability to extract what we need from the natural environment to survive and thrive ie. basic necessities. No guarantees, just the ability to obtain them. The problems begin to arise whenever we enter the realm of human civilisation, where nobody has equal access and odds of obtaining these sought after necessities. That's what we are discussing. Or at least, that's my point of view.

So yes i believe that if nature had intentions, it would originally had intended for our species to have equal access to basic necessities.

@jorndoe Hello there :D Not only a small country, but a small world as well.

jorndoe Hello there :D Not only a small country, but a small world as well. — jm0

Oh, oh... now there's a Danish faction to contend with.

:cool: