A successful socialist economy

[Hermit]

Socialism means public ownership of means of production. Sweden is not socialist.

Communism means public ownership of means of production. Sweden is not communist.

Communism means public ownership of everything, not just the means of production. Sweden is not Socialist.

"The abolition of private property" is one of the most often used phrases for scaring the population. It seems to imply that Marx and Engels wanted to create a society in which you can't own a bed, and that the bowl of soup might be snatched from under your spoon at any time and for any reason. Nowhere did Marx or Engels even imply any such thing. When they spoke of the abolition of private property, they only ever used the phrase in the context of the means of production - factories, agricultural landholdings, money used solely to create more money and so forth. They wanted none of that privately owned. While strictly speaking personal property such as your bed, your soup, your tampon, is a subset of private property, they never concerned themselves with it in relationship to privatisation because it is not a means of production, and as such irrelevant to the relation between capital and labour.

 

[DrZoidberg]

The OP represents what I take to be Freethought. In Freethought one tries to look at issues without looking through a partclar -ism.

In the OP some try to shoehorn a country like Sweden into a dictionary definition of socialism amd the USA in old Marxist terms.

The better approach is to say Sweden is a successful system with attributes a, b, and c that differentiates from say the American system with attributes d,e,f. Therefore Sweden is bettor or worse than the American system for reasons a,b,c.

If we do nor get down to specifics it is a never ending philosophical debate on meaning.

Horse shit. The Nordic Model goes straight back to the Kanslergade Agreement, which was overtly and officially, a compromise package that included the most pressing priorities of several different parties, some of them being socialist. It constitutes a compromise between socialism and capitalism, but socialism was clearly a part of that compromise. To deny this would reflect a stunning ignorance of history.

Kanslergade Agreement - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

If you want to know who to thank for making sure that that compromise happened, you can thank Thorvald Stauning, who remains one of the most effective statesmen in European history. He is a model of statesmanship because he used compromise to create a better system than any of the parties in his government could have created by themselves. He turned his government into a united team, and that team realized that their first responsibility was toward the common people of Denmark, not toward partisan loyalties.

However, that great Danish statesman also happened to be a socialist.

View attachment 38782

But this was a feature of German socialism as well, and socialism in Eastern Europe. In these countries the unions see themselves as partners with the capitalist and the goal of the union is to enrich both parties. Its still like this in these areas.

In England, USA and France trade unions had an adversarial tradition where the goal was to bleed the capitalist as much as possible. It led to situations where capitalists were forced to enter into agreements making them uncompetitive. The American train union is the most famous example. Ensuring that a guy was hired to shuffle coal, regardless if the train was electric or not. And other craziness.

So I don't think it comes down to a single person and a single agreement.

I think it comes down to if cultures are collectivist or individualist. In collectivist cultures the social norm is to get your nose into other people's business. People naturally are more cooperative and more team players. This will influence how their unions behave.

Overall I think collectivist cultures are worse to live in, because its harder to do your own thing. The social pressure isn't to excel, it's to be good enough and normal. Which is bad for anyone not fitting into norms.

They're just less fun.

I am intensely individualistic, but that is one of the reasons why I would join a union if the only jobs available in an economy had viciously authoritarian management involved in them. If I have management that respects me and sees me as an asset that they want to keep, then that is good. I am a very hard worker, and I don't show up to work in order to play. I am very proud of my work ethic. I have had one boss, in my entire life, that wanted to play a domineering role in the relationship and who routinely treated me with bad faith, and whenever he would push me too far, I would push back, resulting in the most amazing shouting matches you ever heard. I always won because if he ever seriously crossed the line, I would just threaten to go home and leave the work to him. He always backed down when it came to that because he knew that he needed me a lot more than I needed him. Eventually, when he expected me to comply with an insanely unreasonable demand, I drove away, and he never saw me again. I'm a very cooperative sort of person, but someone that fucks with me eventually finds out why fucking with me is a bad idea.

Let's put it this way. In a situation where the owners of a firm sent out ruthless strike breakers armed with whips, chains, and clubs to break up a strike, I would be the anarchist that hurled a lit stick of dynamite at the motherfuckers and sent them to Hell.

On the other hand, if I had a good relationship with my employer, which I presently do, then I would not take any shit from a pushy labor union, either. If I felt like it was in my interests to have a direct relationship with my employer, then that is what I would want to preserve.

However, it is going to be up to me if I want to vote union or not, and if my employer started firing people over union advocacy and if people were still whispering about it, let me tell you, I'd side with the union, and I would find a way to make sure we joined.

It's a matter of which party is more likely to give me personal respect. It's not wages, and it's not even working conditions. It's respect. A lack of respect, by an employer, is the only force that would ever compel me to join a union. If an employer wants to keep me out of the union then they had better tell me that I have a right to join if I want to join. Someone that understands that I have rights automatically has a right to my loyalty.

If joining a union is down to personal politics, then that just means that where you live and for the industry you work in unions aren't necessary. People join unions because they have to to survive. Not for ideological reasons.

Also, this idea that some companies might suddenly develop a "viciously authoritarian management" is a caricature. A company will develop whatever management style it needs to have to survive. It's the market that decides how exploitative management needs to be.

If there's a situation where labour is trapped in a situation where salaries aren't paying enough to live off of and workers have no other options, and if governments aren't alleviating the situation, then unions are necessary. Then the market forces need union pushback to reach a sustainable market equilibrium. The labour movement was born in just this type of market. The factory towns of the UK had the lowest average life expectancy in world history. It's never been lower before or since.

 

[DrZoidberg]

As I said you can not just say 'successful socialism' without bringing in culture and history.

Denmark is a constitutional monarchy. Its success with a socialist system is probbly more about its culture and history as it is stoicalist economics.

You also have to consider the size of the population and the degree of diversity in thought. Soicialism as in Denkrk and Sweden is near impossible in the USA. We have a democrtoc republic that favors the rights and autonomy of individual states and individuals.

COTUS ruled abortion without federal legislation is up to the states. Social programs vary from state to state.

Monarchy of Denmark - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

It's worth keeping in mind that back when Scandinavian countries were autocratic monarchies, kings still ruled by consent of the people. In all old Viking countries central power is week and common people have always been included in any major decisions. We never had Louis XIV style sun kings. Any king who tried would get murdered in an instant. Nobles would often refuse to pay taxes, they didn't think the king needed, or would just ignore or change royal dictates as they saw fit. They would also raise taxes and invest in infrastructure without consulting the king. They would feel empowered to take decisions on their own. Belligerent nobles would continually drag kings into wars they reluctantly had to join. Rarely did the Swedish king manage to be the richest noble in the country.

I'm convinced this tradition has rubbed off on modern Scandinavia.

 

[SigmatheZeta]

The OP represents what I take to be Freethought. In Freethought one tries to look at issues without looking through a partclar -ism.

In the OP some try to shoehorn a country like Sweden into a dictionary definition of socialism amd the USA in old Marxist terms.

The better approach is to say Sweden is a successful system with attributes a, b, and c that differentiates from say the American system with attributes d,e,f. Therefore Sweden is bettor or worse than the American system for reasons a,b,c.

If we do nor get down to specifics it is a never ending philosophical debate on meaning.

Horse shit. The Nordic Model goes straight back to the Kanslergade Agreement, which was overtly and officially, a compromise package that included the most pressing priorities of several different parties, some of them being socialist. It constitutes a compromise between socialism and capitalism, but socialism was clearly a part of that compromise. To deny this would reflect a stunning ignorance of history.

Kanslergade Agreement - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

If you want to know who to thank for making sure that that compromise happened, you can thank Thorvald Stauning, who remains one of the most effective statesmen in European history. He is a model of statesmanship because he used compromise to create a better system than any of the parties in his government could have created by themselves. He turned his government into a united team, and that team realized that their first responsibility was toward the common people of Denmark, not toward partisan loyalties.

However, that great Danish statesman also happened to be a socialist.

View attachment 38782

But this was a feature of German socialism as well, and socialism in Eastern Europe. In these countries the unions see themselves as partners with the capitalist and the goal of the union is to enrich both parties. Its still like this in these areas.

In England, USA and France trade unions had an adversarial tradition where the goal was to bleed the capitalist as much as possible. It led to situations where capitalists were forced to enter into agreements making them uncompetitive. The American train union is the most famous example. Ensuring that a guy was hired to shuffle coal, regardless if the train was electric or not. And other craziness.

So I don't think it comes down to a single person and a single agreement.

I think it comes down to if cultures are collectivist or individualist. In collectivist cultures the social norm is to get your nose into other people's business. People naturally are more cooperative and more team players. This will influence how their unions behave.

Overall I think collectivist cultures are worse to live in, because its harder to do your own thing. The social pressure isn't to excel, it's to be good enough and normal. Which is bad for anyone not fitting into norms.

They're just less fun.

I am intensely individualistic, but that is one of the reasons why I would join a union if the only jobs available in an economy had viciously authoritarian management involved in them. If I have management that respects me and sees me as an asset that they want to keep, then that is good. I am a very hard worker, and I don't show up to work in order to play. I am very proud of my work ethic. I have had one boss, in my entire life, that wanted to play a domineering role in the relationship and who routinely treated me with bad faith, and whenever he would push me too far, I would push back, resulting in the most amazing shouting matches you ever heard. I always won because if he ever seriously crossed the line, I would just threaten to go home and leave the work to him. He always backed down when it came to that because he knew that he needed me a lot more than I needed him. Eventually, when he expected me to comply with an insanely unreasonable demand, I drove away, and he never saw me again. I'm a very cooperative sort of person, but someone that fucks with me eventually finds out why fucking with me is a bad idea.

Let's put it this way. In a situation where the owners of a firm sent out ruthless strike breakers armed with whips, chains, and clubs to break up a strike, I would be the anarchist that hurled a lit stick of dynamite at the motherfuckers and sent them to Hell.

On the other hand, if I had a good relationship with my employer, which I presently do, then I would not take any shit from a pushy labor union, either. If I felt like it was in my interests to have a direct relationship with my employer, then that is what I would want to preserve.

However, it is going to be up to me if I want to vote union or not, and if my employer started firing people over union advocacy and if people were still whispering about it, let me tell you, I'd side with the union, and I would find a way to make sure we joined.

It's a matter of which party is more likely to give me personal respect. It's not wages, and it's not even working conditions. It's respect. A lack of respect, by an employer, is the only force that would ever compel me to join a union. If an employer wants to keep me out of the union then they had better tell me that I have a right to join if I want to join. Someone that understands that I have rights automatically has a right to my loyalty.

If joining a union is down to personal politics, then that just means that where you live and for the industry you work in unions aren't necessary. People join unions because they have to to survive. Not for ideological reasons.

Ideology has an impact. Individualist employers are less authoritarian and less likely to demand comformity, tending to focus on the bottom line and not caring if their employees fuck each other on the clock as long as the company stays in the black. Individualist employees are likely to find a union to be more trouble than it is worth and not really worth the security.

When employers are not individualistic but the working-class tries to be individualistic, the job feels like corvee labor. When the working-class are not individualistic but employers are, I suspect that unions can be beneficial.

I feel the last might be the case in the US state of Washington, compared with the rest of the country. The industrialists there are heavily libertarian while the working-class tend to be Marxist.

Ideology plays a role in what people consider to constitute "survival." Ideology shifts people's valences and their perceptions of instrumentality.

Also, this idea that some companies might suddenly develop a "viciously authoritarian management" is a caricature. A company will develop whatever management style it needs to have to survive. It's the market that decides how exploitative management needs to be.

Conservative Baptists are deeply fearful of an assertive inferior. Ideology plays a huge role. If a conservative Baptist is put in charge and the workers do anything besides truckle at every turn, they become hysterical, and they can be quite vicious. Believe me, those konds of lowlifes can and do get into a management structure. Toward superiors, they play the role of "the lamb," and toward superiors, they play the role of "the wolf" but tell anyone that asks they are "the shepherd." They are highly twisted individuals. You cannot understand unless you see it. They are mentally ill. The economies where they have control have low life-expectancies because those in power are crazy.

If there's a situation where labour is trapped in a situation where salaries aren't paying enough to live off of and workers have no other options, and if governments aren't alleviating the situation, then unions are necessary. Then the market forces need union pushback to reach a sustainable market equilibrium. The labour movement was born in just this type of market. The factory towns of the UK had the lowest average life expectancy in world history. It's never been lower before or since.

I have a feeling that an artistic and individualistic bourgeoisie, epitomized by the Bloomsbury Group, combined with a spreading of communitarian thinking and class consciousness among the working-class might have had something to do with it.

Ideology does make a diffrence. If low life-expectancy and awful working conditions always made for unions, then they would be all over the American south. Ideology shifts valences.

One reason that many of the stronger American firms have diversity programs goes back to what I was saying. Diversity promotes individualism. So does money.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Here's a good video on why the economy of the Soviet Union didn't work. I think it's a good summary. His thesis is that USSR was fundamentally just insane. From top to bottom it was a mess. He does a good job avoiding ideology or loaded words. He just goes through the facts.

He argues that the basic flaw of the USSR was that the communists who grabbed power did so without the support of the people. They were only ever a tiny minority who were rapidly becoming unpopular. If they wanted to keep their hold on power they had to rapidly switch to authoritarian methods, modelled on Tsarist Russia. which they did. That way of ruling a country hampers innovation and growth. That would have been true even without the communist economic model. The socialism didn't help.



I am convinced that if socialist revolutions would have gotten the support of a broad coalition of people, and had the genuine support of the masses, we would have ended up with something like Sweden. It's also worth noting that the road to democracy in Scandinavia was through the socialist movement. That's what the term "social democrat" is about. It's socialists who want to set themselves apart from the socialist of USSR. I think they're still socialists.

 

[DrZoidberg]

If there's a situation where labour is trapped in a situation where salaries aren't paying enough to live off of and workers have no other options, and if governments aren't alleviating the situation, then unions are necessary. Then the market forces need union pushback to reach a sustainable market equilibrium. The labour movement was born in just this type of market. The factory towns of the UK had the lowest average life expectancy in world history. It's never been lower before or since.

I have a feeling that an artistic and individualistic bourgeoisie, epitomized by the Bloomsbury Group, combined with a spreading of communitarian thinking and class consciousness among the working-class might have had something to do with it.

Ideology does make a diffrence. If low life-expectancy and awful working conditions always made for unions, then they would be all over the American south. Ideology shifts valences.

The Bloomsbury Group sure were class conscious. They were elitist. They'd be horrified to be associated with the riff raff. And they absolutely, did NOT, want to empower the working class. They thought they were superior humans who should be the one in charge.

Modernism is one of the most misunderstood movements today. We have this evangelical glow around the Enlightenment and Enlightenment values that we forget the dark side. When Christians of that day criticized liberals for being arrogant and knowing they had all the answer, this is what they were talking about. When Thomas Khun was having a go at scientific positivism and Objectivism, this is what he was criticizing. The French Revolution, the terror, USSR, Nazism, liberal democracy, social welfare, USA... these are all the result of Enlightenment values and the belief that our fathers didn't know what they were doing, and that we know it better.

What Christianity has going for it is that it has worked for millennia. If we just keep doing what we always have been doing, at least it won't become dangerous. That's what conservative Christians mean when they criticize liberals. They're not against liberal values. They just question whether the liberal leaders, really know what they are doing. Since throughout history, so many liberal leaders have led us catastrophically astray.

A feature of basic human psychology is that we overvalue our own opinions and experiences. So whenever a small group of people get empowered, they will think they're special and awesome. The story of the 19th and 20th century is the story of revolutionary grand utopian ideals smashing headlong into the crass wall of reality and those in charge learning nothing. Namely, if we cherry pick data we can prove anything.

It wasn't all bad. Democracy is good. Industrialization is awesome. Modern science is the tits. But we need to acknowledge the high cost and that the world we have today is the result of evolution. The bad Enlightenment ideas having largely been abandoned today. But liberals do keep coming up with dumb ideas. Like the one below. So it's an ongoing problem.

One reason that many of the stronger American firms have diversity programs goes back to what I was saying. Diversity promotes individualism. So does money.

I don't think diversity programs promotes individualism and I don't think it promotes diversity. Intersectionalism is not about progressive values, inclusion of minorities or anything they say they are for. It's pure theatre. If anything we've just made it harder for minorities to penetrate the white boys club, since everybody else who reaches a position of power will be assumed to be tokens, and kept out of having any real influence. These token minorities are NOT treated as individuals. They're treated as representatives of a group. Their individuality has been erased. The solution is to remove all diversity programs and to let individuals do our best (if they want to) to try to see past race, sexuality, religion etc and judge people on the result of their labour. It's the only method that can actually work. If our goal, truly is to include everybody.

Just to be clear here. I am a liberal. I think equality between humans is a good in itself and is something we should strive to achieve. But just because I'm a liberal it doesn't mean I am not allowed to criticize other liberals. Me questioning certain aspect of the liberal movement does NOT make me a conservative. I don't have conservative values and I have very little in common with conservatives.

 

[steve_bank]

As I said you can not just say 'successful socialism' without bringing in culture and history.

Denmark is a constitutional monarchy. Its success with a socialist system is probbly more about its culture and history as it is stoicalist economics.

You also have to consider the size of the population and the degree of diversity in thought. Soicialism as in Denkrk and Sweden is near impossible in the USA. We have a democrtoc republic that favors the rights and autonomy of individual states and individuals.

COTUS ruled abortion without federal legislation is up to the states. Social programs vary from state to state.

Monarchy of Denmark - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

It's worth keeping in mind that back when Scandinavian countries were autocratic monarchies, kings still ruled by consent of the people. In all old Viking countries central power is week and common people have always been included in any major decisions. We never had Louis XIV style sun kings. Any king who tried would get murdered in an instant. Nobles would often refuse to pay taxes, they didn't think the king needed, or would just ignore or change royal dictates as they saw fit. They would also raise taxes and invest in infrastructure without consulting the king. They would feel empowered to take decisions on their own. Belligerent nobles would continually drag kings into wars they reluctantly had to join. Rarely did the Swedish king manage to be the richest noble in the country.

I'm convinced this tradition has rubbed off on modern Scandinavia.

Over here our political and social problems are based in our history and culture. Hyper individualism and rejection of collective behavior for the common good. Everybody has the right to go their own way at anytime regardless of consequences.

Trump repesents a lot of people. In general popular republican culture soicaism equates to not being able to do whatever you want personaly and with your money. Part of it is republcan fear mongering to maintain stasus quo.

 

[bilby]

Trump repesents a lot of people.

Hyper individualism and rejection of collective behavior for the common good

One of these things is not like the other.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Here's another good video on the economy of the Soviet Union and Russia. The Soviet economy was based on oil and gas. Almost entirely. The country basically was Venezuela. Same trajectory of it's economy. It rose and fell for the same reasons. Whenever the price of oil was high, the USSR was out crusading for communism, trying to convince the world how great they were. When the price of oil was low, then not so much.

 

[DrZoidberg]

Over here our political and social problems are based in our history and culture. Hyper individualism and rejection of collective behavior for the common good. Everybody has the right to go their own way at anytime regardless of consequences.

Trump repesents a lot of people. In general popular republican culture soicaism equates to not being able to do whatever you want personaly and with your money. Part of it is republcan fear mongering to maintain stasus quo.

But Republicans aren't wrong about that. Socialism is equated with you not being able to do whatever you want with your own money. Socialists think that the entire idea that it's possible for anyone to own anything as absurd. Which it is.

It's important to acknowledge how weird the Conservative axiom about private property is. Making private property sacred is not common sense, natural or obvious. It was born out of a British tradition to control the king. Edmund Burke made it into a coherent philosophy. These ideas gained prominence as a British reaction to the French Revolution. It turned out that this was great for the British economy. The British crown not defaulting on loans meant that people loved lending money to the British crown, which gave them more money to use. They also became sensible in their spending, because they knew they couldn't just tell their underlings they weren't paying them back (like the French and Spanish kings did). So it became entrenched in British culture and spread over the culture and spread into their colonies. The wisdom of this strategy and the great wealth it generated for the British Empire led to other kingdoms trying to copy the British model.

But here's the important part. We treat private property as if it is sacred because it works. Not because it is actually sacred. The moment it stops working, we can stop treating private property as sacred. Copyright law is similar. We started respecting copyrights because it encouraged artists to produce more art. Great. But at some point we expanded copyright law to a point where it hampers the production of art. Now the limits on being able to use cultural and entrenched shared icons in our culture is getting in the way of artists producing art. So now we're talking about shortening copyrights. Copyright infringement isn't a crime like murder is. It's not a moral crime.

Taxes isn't stealing. That mindset is crazy. The community owns everything. That's what's natural and normal. Be happy the state allows you to keep anything.

The Russian revolution was sparked by the fact that Russian society was rigged in such a way that unless you were a noble, you were doomed to be forever poor or struggling to get by. In that situation we have a moral obligation NOT to treat private property as sacred. If we're not awarded equal opportunity in life, why would we respect the property of those more privileged than us? We shouldn't.

 

[steve_bank]

I understand wat yiu are saying, but I see a difference between philsophic l socialism and economic socialism.

Economic socialism is relationship between government and business. Philosophical wod be about private ownership.

China with a soicialist economy has prib\vate ownership and free market economics.

I garee with private ownership people are vested in marinating the property be it a car, a house, or a diswasher.It comes down to what I said at the start. Using broad categories have no meaning. What are the specifc attributes of the Swedish and Danish sytems tha nakes them successful.

How does employment security and welfare work? Health care. Taxes.

Wasn't it Henry 8th who enabled a non aristocratic middle class? He gave away Catholic property to commoners and fostered business didn't he?

Our idea of the indendent man goes back to a largely fictionalized 19th century image of the lone man fighting Indians and carving out a ranch, farm, or other enterprises.

I was watching an old rerun of the TV show Bonanza, very popular in the day. Ben Cartwright and 3 sons oversee an obscenely vast piece of land. Timber, mines, cattle, water and so on.

In one episode Ben and sons come upon people on his land. He says 'You are tespasing, get off my land and if I see you again I'll kill you'. That s the 19th century conservative view.

It is a common theme in ll the old cowboy movies. The patriarchal male defending property and family against interlopers.

The image was fosteerd by east coast pulp fiction, dime novel, writers. Newspapers and writers sensationalized and created myths about going west and getting rich.

 

[bilby]

But Republicans aren't wrong about that. Socialism is equated with you not being able to do whatever you want with your own money. Socialists think that the entire idea that it's possible for anyone to own anything as absurd. Which it is.

I dunno about ‘anything’, but it’s certainly absurd to think that there’s such a thing as ‘your own money’, unless you are a sovereign currency issuing entity.

Money is not property. It’s a score - you don’t own it, anymore than you own the points you score when playing a game. If the rules of the game say that your score goes down, that’s not an instance of the referee or umpire “stealing your own points”, it’s an instance of the rules of the game saying that your points are reduced at some time for some reason or set of reasons.

If the government decides to reduce the amount of their money in existence by removing some from your account as taxes, then that’s their prerogative. It’s their money - in an absolutely literal sense. They created it, and they can destroy it without going anywhere near your wallet, through inflation or simply by declaring it worthless. You may own the little rectangles of paper with green ink on them, but you don’t own the money it represents. That money isn’t bits of paper or metal; It’s a service provided by a government (or in the case of crypto currency, by a bunch of software engineers) to make trade easier.

Ideally, the rules and circumstances under which this occurs should be advised in advance, and should apply equally to all of the players in the economy - that is, ceteris paribus, you shouldn’t be taxed differently from your neighbours, just because they have a relative who works at the taxation department, or a friend who is a government minister.

And ideally, you should have the option to get out of the game - to move to a different country with a different currency, and play a different game with rules that you prefer.

But regardless, money isn’t the kind of thing that can be ‘yours’, in the way that a tin of beans or a roll of toilet paper can be your personal property.

 

[Elixir]

Socialists think that the entire idea that it's possible for anyone to own anything as absurd.

If that is how you define "socialists", then they are few and far between...

Which it is.

...in fact you might be the only one.

 

[Derec]

If that is how you define "socialists", then they are few and far between...

At least we are beyond the silly definition of "capitalism, but with somewhat higher taxes and more generous social programs than the US".

 

[Bomb#20]

But Republicans aren't wrong about that. Socialism is equated with you not being able to do whatever you want with your own money. Socialists think that the entire idea that it's possible for anyone to own anything as absurd. Which it is.

That's religious ideology. Ownership is what happens when one use of a scarce resource precludes another use. Since there isn't an unlimited supply of apples and you eating an apple causes somebody else not to eat that apple, apples are owned -- the alternative would be constant violence to grab apples from one another's hands and eat them before someone else grabs them. So the operational question is not whether anyone owns anything but whether the apples are privately owned or owned by the community as a whole. Presumably you know this, and it was specifically private ownership you were calling absurd. But the community as a whole is a monopoly. If a private apple owner denies you his apples you can make a deal with the owner of some other apples to eat one of hers. But if the community as a whole denies you its apples you're screwed and you go hungry. What you are calling absurd is competition. More than that, what you're calling absurd is separation of powers.

But here's the important part. We treat private property as if it is sacred because it works. Not because it is actually sacred. The moment it stops working, we can stop treating private property as sacred. Copyright law is similar.

Not really. Copies of ideas are not a scarce resource, and me copying something for my use doesn't preclude you copying it for your use too. Respecting private ownership of tangible stuff is something we chimps have been doing since before there were three species of us. In Britain it was one of the pillars of the Common Law. But there's no common-law copyright -- it's an invention of the Tudor kings' statutes. Back when stealing real stuff was a hanging offense, people used to copy anything they felt like. Monkey-see-monkey-do is the ancient law of our lineage; it's so basic to who we are we call it "aping".

We started respecting copyrights because it encouraged artists to produce more art.

No we didn't, at least not we in the Anglosphere Maybe in Scandinavia it was different, but we started respecting copyrights because Henry VII ordered us to -- and he didn't give a rat's ass about artists producing more art. Quite the reverse. The original purpose of copyright law was censorship. The most effective way to keep dangerous anti-Tudor pamphlets from being printed was to prohibit everyone from printing anything until they got prior approval from the King's officers -- until the King granted them a right to copy.

After printing got so widespread it grew impractical for the king's officers to read everything in advance, copyright law got a second wind of life when publishers agitated for it, in the usual traditional mercantilist modus operandi of splitting monopoly profits with the crown. Copyright law was around for about two hundred years before anybody thought of using it to help artists.

The community owns everything. That's what's natural and normal. Be happy the state allows you to keep anything.

The community owning everything is about as natural as Thomas Hobbes' war of all against all that he called the "State of Nature". These are philosophers' origin myths; they aren't anything primatologists learned from observing apes in the wild.

The Russian revolution was sparked by the fact that Russian society was rigged in such a way that unless you were a noble, you were doomed to be forever poor or struggling to get by. In that situation we have a moral obligation NOT to treat private property as sacred.

The Russian revolution was sparked by the fact that Russian soldiers kept being sent out to charge German machine guns by Russian governments that wouldn't face reality and sue for peace.

If we're not awarded equal opportunity in life, why would we respect the property of those more privileged than us? We shouldn't.

Of course we should. We will never be awarded equal opportunity in life, least of all by any government set up by the ideologues who claim we will be. We would respect the property of those more privileged than us anyway because that's the moral thing to do. It's the moral thing to do because morality is not a suicide pact. If we stop respecting the property of those more privileged than us then there will be a famine and a whole lot of us will die.

 

[DrZoidberg]

But Republicans aren't wrong about that. Socialism is equated with you not being able to do whatever you want with your own money. Socialists think that the entire idea that it's possible for anyone to own anything as absurd. Which it is.

That's religious ideology. Ownership is what happens when one use of a scarce resource precludes another use. Since there isn't an unlimited supply of apples and you eating an apple causes somebody else not to eat that apple, apples are owned -- the alternative would be constant violence to grab apples from one another's hands and eat them before someone else grabs them. So the operational question is not whether anyone owns anything but whether the apples are privately owned or owned by the community as a whole. Presumably you know this, and it was specifically private ownership you were calling absurd. But the community as a whole is a monopoly. If a private apple owner denies you his apples you can make a deal with the owner of some other apples to eat one of hers. But if the community as a whole denies you its apples you're screwed and you go hungry. What you are calling absurd is competition. More than that, what you're calling absurd is separation of powers.

I'm not saying it doesn't make sense to treat private property as sacred. What I am saying is that it isn't natural or common sensicle. It's an agreement we have made because it makes society work better. Apples grow on trees. Nature put the work in. The guy owning the tree didn't. I am aware farming apples is a job and apples don't just happen. But it's not hard to argue that any and all apples are just as much anyone's.

Socialism isn't any more natural or common sensicle. Socialism is also an agreement. It's treating everything the property of the community as a whole. That doesn't make any more or less sense than private property. These are just conventions.

My point is that you can't use ethics, ideology or common sense to figure this shit out. Any and all positions are just as valid.

But here's the important part. We treat private property as if it is sacred because it works. Not because it is actually sacred. The moment it stops working, we can stop treating private property as sacred. Copyright law is similar.

Not really. Copies of ideas are not a scarce resource, and me copying something for my use doesn't preclude you copying it for your use too. Respecting private ownership of tangible stuff is something we chimps have been doing since before there were three species of us. In Britain it was one of the pillars of the Common Law. But there's no common-law copyright -- it's an invention of the Tudor kings' statutes. Back when stealing real stuff was a hanging offense, people used to copy anything they felt like. Monkey-see-monkey-do is the ancient law of our lineage; it's so basic to who we are we call it "aping".

So what if a resource is scarce? Your logic is backwards. A resources scarceness doesn't magically make it property rights natural or obvious. I agree that it's a good idea to figure out some sort of system regarding scarce resources, so we prevent each other from murdering each other over it. But what system that is, is less obvious.

In countries with high income inequality and the poor aren't protected, murder rates are high. Using taxes to alleviate the situation for the poorest, saves lives. Since less people are murdered. That is a perfectly fine way to reason, and isn't inherently immoral or arguing for the legalisation of theft.

We started respecting copyrights because it encouraged artists to produce more art.

No we didn't, at least not we in the Anglosphere Maybe in Scandinavia it was different, but we started respecting copyrights because Henry VII ordered us to -- and he didn't give a rat's ass about artists producing more art. Quite the reverse. The original purpose of copyright law was censorship. The most effective way to keep dangerous anti-Tudor pamphlets from being printed was to prohibit everyone from printing anything until they got prior approval from the King's officers -- until the King granted them a right to copy.

After printing got so widespread it grew impractical for the king's officers to read everything in advance, copyright law got a second wind of life when publishers agitated for it, in the usual traditional mercantilist modus operandi of splitting monopoly profits with the crown. Copyright law was around for about two hundred years before anybody thought of using it to help artists.

True. But I was thinking about modern copyrights. The copyrights we did put into place to encourage the production of mass printed art.

The Russian revolution was sparked by the fact that Russian society was rigged in such a way that unless you were a noble, you were doomed to be forever poor or struggling to get by. In that situation we have a moral obligation NOT to treat private property as sacred.

The Russian revolution was sparked by the fact that Russian soldiers kept being sent out to charge German machine guns by Russian governments that wouldn't face reality and sue for peace.

I think you are confusing the symptom with the cause

If we're not awarded equal opportunity in life, why would we respect the property of those more privileged than us? We shouldn't.

Of course we should. We will never be awarded equal opportunity in life, least of all by any government set up by the ideologues who claim we will be. We would respect the property of those more privileged than us anyway because that's the moral thing to do. It's the moral thing to do because morality is not a suicide pact. If we stop respecting the property of those more privileged than us then there will be a famine and a whole lot of us will die.

Again.. you are arguing for it because it is in our best interest and that it's been proven, in the long run, that it's a smart thing to do. What I am saying is that there may be instances when it isn't true.

You are making an absolute statement where free market capitalism is ALWAYS good. No matter the situation. I am saying that there may be instances where it isn't.

 

[steve_bank]

Another twist I stumbled on while looking at something else.

From the gospels I never saw how Chistians can be capitalist.

Christian socialism - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Christian socialism is a religious and political philosophy that blends Christianity and socialism, endorsing left-wing politics and socialist economics on the basis of the Bible and the teachings of Jesus. Many Christian socialists believe capitalism to be idolatrous and rooted in the sin of greed.[1] Christian socialists identify the cause of social inequality to be the greed that they associate with capitalism.[1] Christian socialism became a major movement in the United Kingdom beginning in the 19th century. The Christian Socialist Movement, known as Christians on the Left since 2013, is one formal group,[1][2] as well as a faction of the Labour Party.[3][4]

According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, socialism is a "social and economic doctrine that calls for public rather than private ownership or control of property and natural resources. According to the socialist view, individuals do not live or work in isolation but live in cooperation with one another. Furthermore, everything that people produce is in some sense a social product, and everyone who contributes to the production of a good is entitled to a share in it. Society as a whole, therefore, should own or at least control property for the benefit of all its members. [...] Early Christian communities also practised the sharing of goods and labour, a simple form of socialism subsequently followed in certain forms of monasticism. Several monastic orders continue these practices today".[5] The Christian socialist Hutterites believed in strict adherence to biblical principles, "church discipline" and practised a form of communism. The Hutterites "established in their communities a rigorous system of Ordnungen, which were codes of rules and regulations that governed all aspects of life and ensured a unified perspective. As an economic system, Christian communism was attractive to many of the peasants who supported social revolution in sixteenth century central Europe" such as the German Peasants' War and "Friedrich Engels thus came to view Anabaptists as proto-Communists".[6]

Other earlier figures are also viewed as Christian socialists, such as the 19th-century writers Frederick Denison Maurice[2] (The Kingdom of Christ, 1838), John Malcolm Forbes Ludlow[2] (The Christian Socialist, 1850), John Ruskin (Unto This Last, 1862), Charles Kingsley[2] (The Water-Babies, 1863), Thomas Hughes (Tom Brown's Schooldays, 1857), Frederick James Furnivall (co-creator of the Oxford English Dictionary), Adin Ballou (Practical Christian Socialism, 1854), and Francis Bellamy (a Baptist minister and the author of the United States' Pledge of Allegiance).

 

[DrZoidberg]

Another twist I stumbled on while looking at something else.

From the gospels I never saw how Chistians can be capitalist.

Christian socialism - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Christian socialism is a religious and political philosophy that blends Christianity and socialism, endorsing left-wing politics and socialist economics on the basis of the Bible and the teachings of Jesus. Many Christian socialists believe capitalism to be idolatrous and rooted in the sin of greed.[1] Christian socialists identify the cause of social inequality to be the greed that they associate with capitalism.[1] Christian socialism became a major movement in the United Kingdom beginning in the 19th century. The Christian Socialist Movement, known as Christians on the Left since 2013, is one formal group,[1][2] as well as a faction of the Labour Party.[3][4]

According to the Encyclopedia Britannica, socialism is a "social and economic doctrine that calls for public rather than private ownership or control of property and natural resources. According to the socialist view, individuals do not live or work in isolation but live in cooperation with one another. Furthermore, everything that people produce is in some sense a social product, and everyone who contributes to the production of a good is entitled to a share in it. Society as a whole, therefore, should own or at least control property for the benefit of all its members. [...] Early Christian communities also practised the sharing of goods and labour, a simple form of socialism subsequently followed in certain forms of monasticism. Several monastic orders continue these practices today".[5] The Christian socialist Hutterites believed in strict adherence to biblical principles, "church discipline" and practised a form of communism. The Hutterites "established in their communities a rigorous system of Ordnungen, which were codes of rules and regulations that governed all aspects of life and ensured a unified perspective. As an economic system, Christian communism was attractive to many of the peasants who supported social revolution in sixteenth century central Europe" such as the German Peasants' War and "Friedrich Engels thus came to view Anabaptists as proto-Communists".[6]

Other earlier figures are also viewed as Christian socialists, such as the 19th-century writers Frederick Denison Maurice[2] (The Kingdom of Christ, 1838), John Malcolm Forbes Ludlow[2] (The Christian Socialist, 1850), John Ruskin (Unto This Last, 1862), Charles Kingsley[2] (The Water-Babies, 1863), Thomas Hughes (Tom Brown's Schooldays, 1857), Frederick James Furnivall (co-creator of the Oxford English Dictionary), Adin Ballou (Practical Christian Socialism, 1854), and Francis Bellamy (a Baptist minister and the author of the United States' Pledge of Allegiance).

It's more interesting than that. The socialist movement was started as mass meetings with the communist agitator acting as a priest. The communist manifesto became a sacred text, and treated as the Bible. Socialist organisations systematically replaced church functions with secular equivalents.

Communism is totally based on Christian teachings and the Bible. To an high degree.

This is evolution. Its what people knew. If they wanted to start a mass movement they needed to base it on something they knew already.

It can also be argued that Calvinism is the source of what later became the Terror in France and later Communism in USSR and China. Calvin's attempt was that, for once, people should take all of the Bible seriously.

Its very interesting how Christian conservatives have such a problem with socialism. They are very similar in their outlook

 

[bilby]

Its very interesting how Christian conservatives have such a problem with socialism. They are very similar in their outlook

That’s usually what causes the worst violence. Just look at Northern Ireland, or the Iran/Iraq wars.

There’s an old joke about a man hurrying home near the Falls Road in Belfast just after curfew, in the midst of The Troubles. A paramilitary wearing a balaclava drags him into an alley, and puts a knife to his throat.

“Are you a Catholic, or a Protestant?”

Thinking fast, the man says “Actually, I am Jewish”

“I see”, says his assailant. “Are you a Catholic Jew, or a Protestant Jew?”

…

Being slightly different is lethally dangerous. Being very different isn’t a problem. As long as you don’t take sides between the two apparently indistinguishable belligerents.

 

[steve_bank]

Israel I believe was ffounded as socialist. The kibbutz.

In the 70s on campus I listened to an Israeli recruiting students to summer on a kibbutz.

It had a amenities like a swimming pool. It had a car pool if you needed to go somewhere. Private residences and a common dining hall. The problem was pictures of people walking around with assault rifles.

In the 90s there was a 'back to the kibbutz' movement as a reaction to problems with the Israeli economy.

Kibbutz - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

A kibbutz (Hebrew: קִבּוּץ / קיבוץ‎, lit. "gathering, clustering"; plural: kibbutzim קִבּוּצִים‎ / קיבוצים‎) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1909, was Degania.[1] Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economic branches, including industrial plants and high-tech enterprises.[2] Kibbutzim began as utopian communities, a combination of socialism and Zionism.[3] In recent decades, some kibbutzim have been privatized and changes have been made in the communal lifestyle. A member of a kibbutz is called a kibbutznik (Hebrew: קִבּוּצְנִיק / קיבוצניק‎; plural kibbutznikim or kibbutzniks).

In 2010, there were 270 kibbutzim in Israel with population of 126,000.[4] Their factories and farms account for 9% of Israel's industrial output, worth US$8 billion, and 40% of its agricultural output, worth over US$1.7 billion.[5] Some kibbutzim had also developed substantial high-tech and military industries. For example, in 2010, Kibbutz Sasa, containing some 200 members, generated US$850 million in annual revenue from its military-plastics industry.[6]

Currently the kibbutzim are organised in the secular Kibbutz Movement with some 230 kibbutzim, the Religious Kibbutz Movement with 16 kibbutzim and the much smaller religious Poalei Agudat Yisrael with two kibbutzim, all part of the wider communal settlement movement.