the fuck they dont. why would you want to keep paying for something when you could instead just have it and stop paying? — Pfhorrest

That’s a pretty bold claim. And “stop paying”? How does that work?

I didn’t want to own a home for many years. That sort of commitment just didn’t appeal. I’ve known many people who prefer to rent. Of course they don’t like how high the rent is but they pay it because they want to live in a particular area. They may not plan to live in that town or city permanently. There are many reasons for not wanting to own a home.

Corbyn and his ilk are the problem, not the answer. The working man doesn't want a zero sum, identity politics game played against the Eton-Oxbridge set, that incidentally discriminates against him because he's also white.

He won't vote for that, because - while he does want a fair days pay, affordable rent, decent public services etc, he is nonetheless a patriot. He's not an anti-capitalist, anti-western, politically correct, bleeding heart, eco commie - ashamed of his history, his gender and his skin colour. That shit isn't going to fly, and the collapse of the Labour vote in the north; the utter rejection of Corbyn in 2019, demonstrates that.

Labour needs another Blair - not another Corbyn, because the working man wants capitalism with a social conscience; not to seize the means of production. He has no such aspiration. He never has done. All that Marxian bullshit is another middle class idea of the working class interest - like political correctness. If Labour ever want power again, they need a centrist pitch - like Blair's Third Way. Not political correctness, nothing to the left of Clause IV, but a practical pitch for government that recognises the value of business, so that he can go out and earn a decent living.

That’s a pretty bold claim. And “stop paying”? How does that work? — Brett

Stop paying the way I don’t have to keep paying to use my desk because I own it already. Who would rather have to pay in perpetuity to have a desk if they could afford to pay once and then just have the desk “for free” (besides paying to buy it) forever?

I swear it’s like people are brainwashing into simply not comprehending the idea of not having to pay someone else just for the right to exist somewhere.

That sort of commitment just didn’t appeal. — Brett

What commitment? If you want to treat a purchased home like a rental and just walk away from it leaving behind all the money you spent, you can do that. But why would you want to if you could get
a lot of the money you’ve spent on housing back out? With rent you don’t have that option: your money went down a black hole, it’s not coming back.

Just picture a world where when you leave a “rental” you can get a bunch of your “rent” money back, if you want to go through that effort; or you can walk away and leave it all behind if you really have to bail in a rush. That’s what a world without rent looks like.

So in this utopian world no one would be allowed to rent because there would be nothing to rent.

Nobody would be forbidden from living in a place or letting someone live at their place or giving or receiving money, but contracts whereby someone owes money in exchange for being let use something would be unenforceable.

Consequently nobody would engage in the business of renting out for profit, and would consequently sell off their would-have-been-rental properties to the only people still buying, the would-have-been-renters, on the kinds of terms they can afford, i.e. terms comparable to renting.

So you could pay someone money to live somewhere just like you could now renting a place, but you would have means you of recouping some of that money when you move.

And new housing would continue to be built because new people would still need new housing and be willing to pay for it. They would just skip the middle man who neither built the house nor paid for it yet gets to keep the money and the house in the end.

So no enforceable contracts on paying rent for leasing a place. Consequently there would squatters, which defeats the purpose of owning and renting properties and therefore kills off the rental market. Is that it?

In theory, the market should control the capitalists. If they do something wrong (economically), the market should punish them. — synthesis

"The market" is not something that exists like a market in your local town. It's a theoretical model that explains the formation of price according to supply and demand, if certain conditions are met.

In another sense, a "market" is just a descriptive term for transactions that happen in a specific region or concerning a specific ware.

In either case all that a market can be said to control is the price and distribution of goods, but not who profits from their production, how they use those profits etc.

It would seem that the most productive form of capitalism is where resources are being used optimally, that is, the correct marriage of resources and labor. — synthesis

Who decides how to define productivity and what the optimal use of resources is? In capitalism the only systemic motive is profit, so it'll be set up to optimise for profit. The idea that by striving for profit we ultimately benefit everyone is a religious one, going back to the protestant work ethic.

As well, wouldn't accumulation slow innovation/productivity through anti-competitiveness — synthesis

Yes, and this is in fact what happens unless there are other forces - like political ones - involved. Under capitalism, you don't want to innovate or be competitive. You want to have a monopoly that makes you money with no effort involved. As an economic system, it only works so long as you can keep competition alive.

I would be interested in a couple of examples. Thanks. — synthesis

There is the cooperative, where everyone owns an equal share in the company - there are some rather large and old ones around right now.

There is the "purpose company", which works like a normal company, but isn't owned by a person, but by a trust that is legally obligated to use it's resources towards a given goal. So instead of aiming for profit, you could have companies with aims like cleaning the ocean or planting trees (search engine Ecosia is an example and does the latter).

What would it take you to change your mind on the following issues:
(1) that systemic discrimination exists
(2) that a politics (BLM) wanting social programs for the worst off isn't "racism against white people"
?

the fuck they dont. why would you want to keep paying for something when you could instead just have it and stop paying? — Pfhorrest

I dare say there are a tiny number of such people. This rather reminds me of David Cameron's defense of the hugely exploitative zero-hours contracting, basically the same as Brett's argument.

????? We are talking about Marx — Maw

So you aren't aware just how close Marx is to Ricardo's labor theory of value? If the basic argument was (with Benkei) about the labor theory of value, referring to the origins here is totally reasonable. Might add that Smith had also similar view (as Ricardo et al).

not everyone wants to own a property
— Brett

the fuck they dont. — Pfhorrest

The fuck they do.

I dare say there are a tiny number of such people. — Kenosha Kid

What do you call “tiny”?

basically the same as Brett's argument. — Kenosha Kid

What exactly is my argument?

What do you call “tiny”? — Brett

Buy a dictionary.

What exactly is my argument? — Brett

Proof if proof were needed that even Brett doesn't know wtf he's talking about.

Well what are you meaning when you say “a tiny number”, it’s a reasonable question.

And you’ve referred to my argument, which as far as I can see is that not everyone wants to buy property.

So no enforceable contracts on paying rent for leasing a place. Consequently there would squatters, which defeats the purpose of owning and renting properties and therefore kills off the rental market. Is that it? — Brett

Yeah, and then in the absence of the rental market the purchase market re-adjusts to its natural state, and nothing of value is lost. Anyone who wants something functionally equivalent to rent as we have it now can have that (you pay money every month, and when you leave you leave all that money behind), and anyone who doesn't want that has a better alternative (you pay the same money every month, and when you leave you have options to recoup the money you've been spending on housing to put toward your new housing elsewhere).

What exactly is the negative consequence of owning rather than renting that you're trying to avoid? I have my suspicions but rather than just give my answers to all of them at once I'd like to know what in particular you're concerned about.

BTW sorry about the "fuck" earlier, had a stressful evening.

What exactly is the negative consequence of owning rather than renting that you're trying to avoid? — Pfhorrest

There are no negative consequences I’m trying to avoid. I was interested if, in your theory, there really was a place or system for people who didn’t want to buy. Because if the rental market died as a consequence of certain actions I was wondering how renters would fit in.

What would it take you to change your mind on the following issues:
(1) that systemic discrimination exists
(2) that a politics (BLM) wanting social programs for the worst off isn't "racism against white people"
? — fdrake

I know systematic discrimination exists. I call it political correctness, and I fucking hate it - precisely because of how it plays out in relation to politics like BLM. Here are the facts. In 2012 Obama ended the collection of data by the Bureau of Justice Statistics on the race of Arrest Related Deaths. In 2013 Black Lies Matter was formed. BLM used carefully edited cell phone footage to create a social media narrative to suggest that police were murdering black people - and no-one disputed this because of political correctness. No-one wants to get twitter mobbed and denounced as a racist - so they let it slide.

When the rioting started, I wanted to know what the facts were - and so I looked them up. From 2003-2012, there were on average 10 million arrests per year. There were around 1000 Arrest Related Deaths per year - 42% white, 32% black. That's a 0.1% failure rate in a country where people carry guns. The police are not murdering people. In fact they are incredibly professional. But how to explain the fact that black people are 13% of the population, yet make up 32% of deaths. For that we have to look at the crime stats - and they are fucking abysmal. Black people commit massively more crime than white people. Really, it's shocking. The black 13% of the population commit more murders than the white 76% of the population. Violent crime, drugs, theft - all way above average. Put simply, black people commit more crime.

Compare this with Asians in America. Virtually zero crime rate. The top demographic in education, and the top earning demographic overall. How is it possible that Asians are doing so well if there's systematic racism? Face it - your politically correct bullshit is appeasement, and it's not good. The stereotype is well earned. It's there in the music - just listen to some racist, homophobic, sexist gangster rap - glorifying criminality and violence, that all the young black men so admire and seek to emulate. The problem is cultural - and it's never going to change until black people take personal responsibility, start to value education and aspire to a socially useful idea of success.

Because if the rental market died as a consequence of certain actions I was wondering how renters would fit in. — Brett

Would-be renters would be able to be owners instead, and just like owners now could, they could always walk away from their purchase if they don't mind losing all the money they've spent like a renter would. (But why would they want to if they could possibly avoid it?)

Government should buy up all the poor quality housing stock, demolish it - and build more and better housing on the same site, and then have a government backed rental/ownership scheme - where the money is ploughed back in to fund the purchase of poor quality housing stock, and the building of more and better housing. Self financing solution to the housing crisis!

What exactly is the negative consequence of owning rather than renting that you're trying to avoid? I have my suspicions but rather than just give my answers to all of them at once I'd like to know what in particular you're concerned about. — Pfhorrest

Well you have to pay for maintenance, so if something major breaks just after you bought, you might then not be able to easily afford the repairs. Which is worse if, say, you were only planning to stay for a few months and need to sell the property afterwards, which will not recoup the expenses for the repair.

In addition, selling a property does itself require time and money, so depending on how long you stay, this might not be worth it.

Well you have to pay for maintenance, so if something major breaks just after you bought, you might then not be able to easily afford the repairs. Which is worse if, say, you were only planning to stay for a few months and need to sell the property afterwards, which will not recoup the expenses for the repair. — Echarmion

Someone will be happy to sell you an insurance product to cover that. It could even be the same person who would otherwise have been your landlord, if they really were adding the value of spreading around that risk and would like to keep doing so.

In addition, selling a property does itself require time and money, so depending on how long you stay, this might not be worth it. — Echarmion

Just walking away and taking a total loss like you would if renting doesn’t cost anything, though.

BLM used carefully edited cell phone footage to create a social media narrative to suggest that police were murdering black people - and no-one disputed this because of political correctness. — counterpunch

Here's something I really don't understand; how have you managed to convince yourself that political correctness is systemic racism against white people, but you believe systemic racism against nonwhites can be explained entirely by its alleged targets' individual merit? This makes very little sense to me.

I can understand your feelings of persecution. I just don't think you're being persecuted like you seem to believe. To my reckoning, you're actually repeating the talking points and using the same data as right wing rags - and it's to your credit that you've actually looked up data. You should read this, which studies rates of police killings in the US while adjusting for poverty, it concludes:

In addition to confirming previously documented racial/ethnic inequalities in the United States, the analyses above identify strong socioeconomic inequalities in rates of police killings. Rates of police killings increase in tandem with census tract poverty for the overall population, and within the white, black, and Latino populations. For white people, the rate of police killings among the poorest fifth of census tracts (7.9 per million) is similar to the rate among black people in census tracts with the second-lowest poverty (i.e. the second quintile; 7.7 per million). Higher poverty among the black population accounts for a meaningful, but relatively modest, portion of the black-white gap in police killing rates. In contrast, higher census tract poverty fully explained the Latino-white gap, and the police killing rate among Latinos was lower than expected given their relatively high rates of census tract poverty

The broader judicial+law enforcement situation in the UK is similar; which is as expected, marginalised groups with less social opportunities and higher poverty face worse conditions in the street, the job interview, the workplace and the court. Poverty does a lot of the work, but it doesn't explain all the disparity; the remainder is to a large part systemic racism.

The kind of politics that limits police power, empowers social programs, and provides more security for the worst off and the worker, regardless of skin colour, benefits everyone. And it is effective, look at what happened in Glasgow when knife crime ("white on white crime" lol) was addressed as a public health issue!

The rental market is a good example where government control that sounds beneficial, like rental price limits, can worsen the situation and where a healthy free market solves the problem. But for the market to be healthy and to work, there are several important factors that have to be true: 1) ordinary working people have to have the ability to get a loan with normal interest rates to purchase a home and 2) there aren't limitations or difficulties on who can rent real estate and renting real estate is considered a safe investment.

If 1) doesn't apply, like is in many Third World countries, the end result is too few housing is built and that what is built is likely built only for the richest buyers. Others live in cramped housing and on rent. And when large segment of the population are forced to rent, then in the end of their lives they have nothing to give to the next generation. This is one important factor why many countries have lacked the essential middle class and you have countries with large populations but little wealth. That lack of widespread affluence means that there is no domestic demand to create a thriving service sector and retail sector. Few billionaires won't do it. Factor 2) is essential for the health of the market also: if the demand for rental apartments is high, the ability for even ordinary people to save by investing in a flat or two will be have a big effect on the market and will create that supply to deal with the demand. Also a "safe" rental market will attract institutional investors. They won't invest, if there's the possibility of very punitive legislation to "help" those who rent.

Well what are you meaning when you say “a tiny number”, it’s a reasonable question. — Brett

What do you mean, "reasonable"?

Who said anything about misusing "racist"? — Michael

I have. You obviously haven't been paying attention either, but that is expected of an authoritarian. They only care what they think.

I'm saying that if someone is a racist then it's acceptable to criticize them for being a racist, and that if someone is black then it's unacceptable to criticize them for being black. — Michael

Who and when on these forums has criticized someone for being black? If there hasn't been any, or the percentage is minute, then how can you argue that racism is the prevalent idea, or is even a serious problem?

Who and when on these forums have generalized whites by using terms like, "white privilege"? Lots of people in this forum. And when you disagree with them and point out the weak points of their argument, they call you a "racist".

If someone criticized a back for being black, it would be redundant to say, "racist". I mean, what do you really hope to accomplish by calling someone a racist whose racist actions are on display for everyone to see?

I've never used the term "white privilege". Others talk about it because it's a fact of life. And it is wrong that there is white privilege, but that's not to say that every white person is responsible for it. — Michael

You still seem to be focused on whites when whites are only a fraction of the world population. As I have been saying, white privilege is not a fact of life. Does that make a racist?[

People don't tend to have much control over what happens in other countries. There's nothing I can do to address racism in Japan or corruption in Russia. — Michael

What a lazy cop-out. This forum has members in many countries and this isn't the only forum on the internet. Thanks for showing everyone how truly biased and lazy you are.

Who and when on these forums have generalized whites by using terms like, "white privilege"? Lots of people in this forum. And when you disagree with them and point out the weak points of their argument, they call you a "racist". — Harry Hindu

Well either it is advantageous to be white in which case generally white people are privileged in that respect, or racism doesn't manifest itself statistically. Since racism is statistically manifest, it is generally advantageous to be white.

Why don’t you actually try and address @Harry Hindu’s post.

It's a large quantity of wrong. I addressed the part I thought most amenable to progress. If I need advice about what to address from you, I'll give you a heads up but frankly it's well outside your jurisdiction.

Here's something I really don't understand; how have you managed to convince yourself that political correctness is systemic racism against white people, but you believe systemic racism against nonwhites can be explained entirely by its alleged targets' individual merit? This makes very little sense to me. — fdrake

The same explanation applies. The systematic racism of political correctness is a consequence of the individualism and cowardice of white people; that they don't have a collectivist sense of identity, less yet racial identity, and individually, fall victim to left wing ideologues who seek to make them ashamed of their history and skin colour - not least to justify mass immigration. In fact, white people should be proud of the massive contributions they have made to the world. They invented damn near everything - from the scientific and industrial revolutions, to modern democratic governance, rule of law, medical science, the steam engine, the internal combustion engine, flight, radio, television, computers, the internet and so on and on.

I can understand your feelings of persecution. I just don't think you're being persecuted like you seem to believe. To my reckoning, you're actually repeating the talking points and using the same data as right wing rags - and it's to your credit that you've actually looked up data. You should read this, which studies rates of police killings in the US while adjusting for poverty, — fdrake

Oh, for goodness sake - stop adjusting for this and that, and take some fucking responsibility. There are plenty of poor white people. They don't commit murder at 6 times the national average.

The kind of politics that limits police power, empowers social programs, and provides more security for the worst off and the worker, regardless of skin colour... — fdrake

But it's not regardless of skin colour is it? It's black people to the front of the queue, followed by women and homosexuals, and you straight white males - who should be ashamed of yourselves, to the back. I'll give you a for instance.

Stormzy is a black British rapper - and he created scholarships to Cambridge exclusively for black students. Everyone approved. Giving back to his community! What a guy! Some years later Sir Brian Thwaites - originally from a white working class background, sought to create scholarships exclusively for white working class boys like him, and was denounced as racist. The money was rejected by the schools in fear of a politically correct backlash. The telling fact is, that white working class boys are now the lowest performing demographic in schools - but they can't get any help ...because that would be racist.

Political correctness is an hypocrisy. It simultaneously stereotypes people by race, and criminalises stereotyping people by race. It doesn't even make sense in its own terms, less yet make sense of the world.

Oh, for goodness sake - stop adjusting for this and that, and take some fucking responsibility. There are plenty of poor white people. — counterpunch

I don't think you know what "adjusting" means. In a statistical analysis of data - in this case police killings, there are lots of confounding variables. In this case, crime rates are higher in poor neighbourhoods, and poor neighbourhoods are more likely to contain more nonwhites. You need to "adjust" for the economic causes of police killings since they're causally related to demographic disparities in police killings - systemic racism.

What you've made is an emotional appeal, and I can see it as persuasive if you feel you are under attack. And your civil liberties and equality of opportunity are under attack; just not by working class civil rights activists and their working class allies. If you live in the UK, your civil liberties are being eroded by Bojo and his possy of gammon faced clowns.

It isn't the "politically correct" left who've turned the NHS from the European gold standard of healthcare to the shitshow that it is, it's those clowns you're currently supporting through your rhetoric. Stop trying to shit on the only people who have your back.

The same explanation applies. The systematic racism of political correctness is a consequence of the individualism and cowardice of white people; that they don't have a collectivist sense of identity, less yet racial identity, and individually, fall victim to left wing ideologues who seek to make them ashamed of their history and skin colour - not least to justify mass immigration. — counterpunch

In your estimation, do the wealthy nations that struggle with the problem of mass migration also exploit the countries that the immigrants are coming from?

In fact, white people should be proud of the massive contributions they have made to the world. They invented damn near everything - from the scientific and industrial revolutions, to modern democratic governance, rule of law, medical science, the steam engine, the internal combustion engine, flight, radio, television, computers, the internet and so on and on. — counterpunch

I don't really get that notion of pride. I don't contribute to my own whiteness, so it doesn't seem to be something I could be proud of. If I wanted to be proud of, say, past inventions, I'd at least have to consider my conduct to be in some way a continuation of the inventors ethos / methods.

Like you can be proud of furthering the development of science in the tradition of past scientists, but I don't get where skin colour enters into it.

And in case you want to reply "well why are black people allowed to be proud of their blackness", I'll just concede for the sake of discussion that the same problem applies.