I think you're over-complicating the issue with technical jargon. You say you're against rent; but if you're not against people accumulating property, and you are against government regulation (command economy), what's to stop owners from renting their property? — Janus
Apparently he also believes in smiling butterflies whose flapping wings cause an outbreak of lovely summer weather. An optimistic fellow. Smiling at the old woman lying in the street who just got run over by a bicycle will surely ripple out to the 24th century. — Bitter Crank
it's worth understanding exactly who they are.
— Xtrix
Brett denies being interested in the question "who they are"; he says it is your question. — Bitter Crank
The undifferentiated wealth sloshing around in the trough in 2020 has a history. You can trace the development of wealth backwards to sometime in the medieval period, probably not much before then. There are, for instance, a few companies in the world that have been in continuous existence since 1200. Some of the wealth in England goes back to grants that William the Conqueror (aka William the Bastard) made after he won the battle of Hastings in 1066. Some of the valuable land in New York City is owned by descendants of Dutch settlers before New Amsterdam became New York. Land is the original wealth. From land one can extract rent, food and fiber (like wheat and wool). England accumulated a wad of wealth by exporting fine wool to manufacturers on the continent. Later, it was coal and iron. The reason the British claimed North America was to have the land from which to extract wealth. The Germans wanted Lebensraum, and came close to getting most of Europe. Land is wealth. Nations are willing to go way out of their way to get it. — Bitter Crank
If the 1% are parasites, it is not because they have any kind of behavioural disposition of any sort: they are parasites by virtue of their occupying a structural position in society with disparity as it is. The most lovely, talented, hard-working, virtuous, kind, and giving person could belong to this class: they would still be a fucking parasite insofar as their wealth would objectively be built off the backs of others. — StreetlightX
My expectation is that the 1% are ordinary people as far as psychology goes. — Pfhorrest
The state has the monopoly on violence. But they essentially own the state. To say they're subjected to the "same laws and penalties" as anyone else is naive. Yes, according to cypto-neoliberals like you, "government is the problem," and so it's no surprise that you want to divert the focus to "bureaucrats." Very typical.
But one impression I have of people with substantial wealth is that they tend to have their radar up for threats to their social, financial, political status quo. After all, their wealth may be threatened in the event of social turmoil, or they may at least be inconvenienced. If they feel entitled to deference, they won't take inconvenience lightly. — Bitter Crank
I think the economic externalities to the rest of society is the main reason why we shouldn't allow concentrated wealth to exist, but I think it's a worthwhile additional critique. — Saphsin
Even the bad things. Because people in general are not shining bastions of morality, but will exploit a situation to their benefit when given the chance, even at someone else's expense, and then try to rationalize away why what they're doing is perfectly fine. — Pfhorrest
The state has the monopoly on violence. But they essentially own the state. T
— Xtrix
Care to back that up, or is “essentially” your get out of jail card? — Brett
The state has the monopoly on violence. But they essentially own the state. To say they're subjected to the "same laws and penalties" as anyone else is naive. Yes, according to cypto-neoliberals like you, "government is the problem," and so it's no surprise that you want to divert the focus to "bureaucrats." Very typical.
My only contention is that the so-called 1% are not your masters. Elon Musk is unable to assert any control over you, and if he did, he would be subject to legal penalty. — NOS4A2
At any rate, I become suspicious of hatred when it becomes indistinguishable from envy. — NOS4A2
The reason the so-called 1% are able to seek their advantage from those in power is because those in power give it to them. — NOS4A2
As I said earlier, my hunch would be that most are neoliberal capitalists, with a good portion Christian or otherwise secularists. — Xtrix
And we see how this propaganda tickles down to millions of people — Xtrix
As I said earlier, my hunch would be that most are neoliberal capitalists, with a good portion Christian or otherwise secularists.
— Xtrix
I agree, but that also sounds like a good description of much of the American populace as a whole. — Pfhorrest
This sounds like a good explanation for the above. — Pfhorrest
↪Xtrix
No, Bezos does not control your life and is master of no one. — NOS4A2
You willingly use his services or you do not. — NOS4A2
So it’s utter nonsense to suggest these people control anything beyond their own company and property. — NOS4A2
You have less of a say in the government than you do in the market. — NOS4A2
The technical language is necessary to properly understand the nuance of the situation, but I can try to dumb it down for you a little.
I'm not against people having some property. I am against people accumulating property, as in, property ending up more and more concentrated. I'm against that in the sense that that is a bad end. The question at hand is what means lead to that end. What is going wrong, deontologically, that is causing that bad outcome, consequentially?
I think the answer to that is government enforcement of certain kinds of contracts. People are free to let others use their property, and other people are free to give them money for that if they want, but in absence of a valid contract someone can't actually owe money for the use of someone's property or else people would be taking the law into their own hands if agreements that were made were not honoured. If they just decided to not pay, that would be legally okay, and the owner would have no recourse. As such, this would be untenable as a widespread business arrangement. Nobody would ever rent to strangers who can't be trusted and can't be legally obligated to pay them anything. — Pfhorrest
How would it be possible to create a situation where a society had no laws in place to enforce only certain kinds of contracts? — Janus
It might be possible not to enforce payment of rental of property, but then no one would rent their property. — Janus
A transition to such a state of affairs would seem to be practically impossible from where we are today without collapsing the entire system. — Janus
You seem to be just enamored with your idea; while giving no consideration to the unforeseen, indeed unforeseeable given the complexity of the system, consequences if it were to be put in place. — Janus
There are already certain kinds of contracts that are not legally valid. You can’t sell yourself into slavery, for example. — Pfhorrest
I don’t advocate just suddenly switching to my system — Pfhorrest
I have given extensive consideration to the consequences, and if we weren’t already off topic for this thread I would welcomed further questions as to how I would handle any consequent you think I haven’t considered. — Pfhorrest
Yes but contractual slavery is not an institution upon which we depend. — Janus
The idea that any individual could create a system that could foresee consequences in an economy so complex — Janus
And as I said before it is not "your idea"; you are not the first to realize that financialization of an economy inexorably leads to concentration of money in the hands of a few. — Janus
Apart from any of those considerations, anything like you suggest simply aint going to happen because people won't want ti, so why waste your limited intellectual resources on toying with such ideas? — Janus
You’re just begging the question if you’re implying that we do depend on rent and interest, i.e. there is no possible way to have a society without it.
And contractual slavery has been a common institution in the past. We got rid of it and society didn’t collapse. — Pfhorrest
That’s a just defeatist attitude. Let’s never try anything new even when everything old is failing all around us, because nobody will ever agree to try anything new.
How would we ever get anyone to consider trying some new idea without first talking about its merits? — Pfhorrest
when institutional slavery was abolished, the desperate newly free could be exploited as cheap labour. — Janus
How are you going to go about convincing all the landlords and rental companies in the world to stop legally enforcing rental payments from their customers and tenants? — Janus
The only chance would be to greatly increase people's education and understanding of the world — Janus
Just as an example, say someone wants to start a new business but doesn't have the funds; they will need to borrow money, right? Who is going to lend anyone money interest-free? — Janus
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