Capitalism, Communism, or Socialism?...

[Chemgota]

I has mixed economy

[The Libertarian Republic Of Freedova]

I like capitalism with anti-monopolistic measures.

[Kubra]

You look at the countries with the highest standards of living, greatest happiness, and amounts of freedom and ask yourself how can I do that? How can we adjust our government to do the best for our citizens?

Yeah but like would you do that in 1750

[The Emerald Legion]

Whoever said "capitalism encourages innovation" for your infographs should stop drinking the kool-aid.

You should lay off the socialist kool-aid.

Capitalism, when not corrupted by Socialism and Government meddling does encourage innovation. It's half hearted socialism that causes megacorporations. Nothing else.

[UniversalCommons]

Unregulated capitalism is caused by no interference by government. There is a natural tendency for any large organization that is successful to get larger. Without anti-trust laws, there would be many more huge corporations. Also when government agencies get too big, they need to be broken into smaller units. This is done by government. If there is no interference they become giant bureaucracies.

[Free Port of Cristina]

I have been opposing the use of force to restrain peaceful, voluntary exchange. That doesn’t mean it should be understood as involving support for capitalism.

Whether this claim makes any sense at all depends, of course, on what you mean by “capitalism.” For some people, perhaps, the term just refers to free exchange. And if that’s all you intend when you talk about “capitalism,” you’re quite right that there’s no real conflict between what you’re talking about and a sensible defense of liberty.

But people very often have some other senses of the word in mind when they employ it. For instance: mainstream print and electronic media regularly use “capitalism” to refer to “the economic system we have now.” And it’s relatively common to hear “capitalism” employed as a synonym for “dominance of workplaces and society by capitalists—by the owners of substantial capital assets.” My personal understanding entail support for capitalism in neither of these senses.

To a very significant degree, the economic system we have now is one from which peaceful, voluntary exchange is absent. An interlocking web of legal and regulatory privileges benefit the wealthy and well connected at the expense of everyone else (think patents and copyrights, tariffs, restrictions on banking, occupational licensing rules, land-use restrictions, etc.). The military-industrial complex funnels unbelievable amounts of money—at gunpoint—from ordinary people’s pockets and into the bank accounts of government contractors and their cronies. Subsidies of all kinds feed a network of privileges businesses and non-profits. And the state protects titles to land taken at gunpoint or engrossed by arbitrary fiat before distribution to favored individuals and groups. In some countries, at least, the state doesn’t assert formal ownership of (most of) the means of production. But the state’s involvement at multiple levels in guaranteeing and bolstering economic privilege makes it hard to describe the economic system we have now as free. So if “capitalism” names the system we have now, anyone who favors freedom has good reason to be skeptical about capitalism.

The privileges that mark the existing economic order, whatever we call it, inure disproportionately to those with the most political influence and the greatest wealth. And the network of privileges preserved by the state tends in various ways to boost the privileges of capitalists in the workplace. As regards the workplace: state-secured privilege reduces the possibility of self-employment (by raising capital requirements and otherwise increasing costs of entry, while simultaneously reducing the resources people might be able to use to start and maintain their own businesses). It also imposes restraints on union activity that reduces workers’ capacity to bargain effectively with employers. By reducing alternatives to paid work and reducing workers’ collective bargaining opportunities, the state substantially increases employers’ leverage. In short: dominance of workplaces and of society by “capitalists” is incomprehensible in anything like its current form without attention to the state’s mischief. Again, if this is “capitalism,” proponents of freedom have no reason to embrace it.

It’s certainly conceivable that someone could argue that, while “capitalism” is frequently used for objectionable social phenomena, it is just as frequently employed for an economic system to which freedom is truly central. I am not sure either what the relevant proportions are or what weight should be attached to particular instances of using “capitalism” in one way or the other. I am quite sure, however, that the negative usage has been around for a long time (“capitalist” in the pejorative sense was employed by enthusiastic advocates of free markets in the first half of the nineteenth century) and is very common today. Indeed, all too frequently, I fear, when “capitalism” is employed in a positive sense, it’s used as a “package deal” concept that somehow means both “free exchange” and either “the status quo,” “rule by capitalists,” or both. It’s tainted. And when people in the streets of countries throughout the developing world chant out their opposition to “capitalism”—meaning, in reality, not genuine freedom but rather imperial dominance by some nations—I think it’s vital for us to be able to make clear that the system of statist oppression the protestors are naming isn’t the one advocates of freedom favor."

Many spokespersons for the political and economic elite may continue to use “capitalism” for whatever it is they say they favor. There’s no reason to emulate them. Support for free (or freed) markets is quite consistent with enthusiastic anti-capitalism."

[Byzconia]

Whoever said "capitalism encourages innovation" for your infographs should stop drinking the kool-aid.

You should lay off the socialist kool-aid.

Capitalism, when not corrupted by Socialism and Government meddling does encourage innovation. It's half hearted socialism that causes megacorporations. Nothing else.

Tells someone to lay off socialist kool-aid and jumps right into Libertarian kool-aid.

Megacorporations happen when there aren't laws in place to stop them from happening (or they exist but aren't enforced). It makes no difference whether the economy in question is True Capitalism^TM or not. This is just ideologically tinged non-sense.

[True Refuge]

Not going to get much out of this thread with an OP text like that, are we?

Looking at the diversity of opinions and the various debates and arguments I disagree.

Well, there is that. I suppose that most people talking out of their ass about communism (particularly leftists where it is most egregious) wouldn’t be able to produce good discussion even with a stellar starter.

[The Emerald Legion]

You should lay off the socialist kool-aid.

Capitalism, when not corrupted by Socialism and Government meddling does encourage innovation. It's half hearted socialism that causes megacorporations. Nothing else.

Tells someone to lay off socialist kool-aid and jumps right into Libertarian kool-aid.

Megacorporations happen when there aren't laws in place to stop them from happening (or they exist but aren't enforced). It makes no difference whether the economy in question is True Capitalism^TM or not. This is just ideologically tinged non-sense.

In order for megacorporations to form, they require the government to step in and make certain regulations to limit capitalistic competition. Otherwise you don't get things like corporations enriching themselves using government corruption to rewrite the rules in their favor to allow them to crush competition.

[The Black Forrest]

Tells someone to lay off socialist kool-aid and jumps right into Libertarian kool-aid.

Megacorporations happen when there aren't laws in place to stop them from happening (or they exist but aren't enforced). It makes no difference whether the economy in question is True Capitalism^TM or not. This is just ideologically tinged non-sense.

In order for megacorporations to form, they require the government to step in and make certain regulations to limit capitalistic competition. Otherwise you don't get things like corporations enriching themselves using government corruption to rewrite the rules in their favor to allow them to crush competition.

Competition is a silly argument.

EVERY corporation would jump at the chance to own an industry.

[Byzconia]

In order for megacorporations to form, they require the government to step in and make certain regulations to limit capitalistic competition.

And I'm sure you have some rock solid evidence to support this.

Otherwise you don't get things like corporations enriching themselves using government corruption to rewrite the rules in their favor to allow them to crush competition.

And getting rid of the rules entirely prevents them crushing competition...how, exactly? Especially when you consider that the reason many small businesses are even able to survive in the first place is because of government support, how does removing that help competition?

And what do you think happens when the government's not the one writing the rules? Who do you think writes them then? The largest corporations with the most money. The only thing Libertarianism would accomplish in real life is replacing corporate influence over government policies with direct rule by the corporations themselves. I have zero inherent issues with the former, the latter is as idiotic as it is terrifying.

[Byzconia]

In order for megacorporations to form, they require the government to step in and make certain regulations to limit capitalistic competition. Otherwise you don't get things like corporations enriching themselves using government corruption to rewrite the rules in their favor to allow them to crush competition.

Competition is a silly argument.

EVERY corporation would jump at the chance to own an industry.

Yeah, but it weren't for that pesky old government forcing them to be corrupt, they'd all be more willing to play fair!

[Rusticus I Damianus]

Anarcho-Capitalism/Monarchism.

[Technoscience Leftwing]

* Capitalism brings with it the threat of monopolization, imperialism, wars and far-right dictatorships. At early steps, it develops the productive forces very strongly, leads to innovation and comfort. But subsequently, democracy turns into a screen, because. through parliament, the big monopolies lobby the interests of billionaires to the detriment of the interests of the majority of the population. Monopolies begin to profit not by increasing quality and convenience, but by inflating monopoly prices, adding harmful cheap surrogates to food, imposing unnecessary and heavyweight mandatory updates to software, and so on. With the overstocking of the world market, pauperism is growing even in rich countries, there are favelas of poverty next to luxury, especially in migrant areas. Then there are imperialist wars for the redistribution of sales markets, and for this dictators come to power in different countries. In the end, the costs and disadvantages begin to outweigh, and the progressive potential of capitalism dries up.
* Communism is a hypothetical society where all labor is automated, residents receive goods for free, state officials are replaced by public self-government, the police are replaced by the people's militia, there are no nations and religions. Something similar to the city of Diaspar from Arthur Clarke's book "The City and the Stars". I think it is possible, but in a very distant future.
* Socialism is a transitional period to communism, where capitalist monopolies are liquidated (socialized after the revolution, because billionaires will not voluntarily give up property), all citizens are provided with a ration of basic goods or an unconditional basic income. A struggle is being waged against clericalism and against nationalism. There is a process of drawing the progressive sections of the people into self-government, through direct democracy. But at the same time, inequality still remains: the employed receive more than the unemployed, there is a state apparatus. In the USSR and the socialist camp, they tried to build socialism, but due to the technical and cultural backwardness inherited from the agrarian past, anti-humanistic features appeared there: forced labor, ascetic regulation of culture, remnants of chauvinism, empire and xenophobia. However, this is not the last socialist attempt. With a higher technological base, the socialism of the future, I hope, will be more humane and tolerant.

[Phobos Drilling and Manufacturing]

Here’s my ranking

Capitalism- good, but can lead to exploitation
Socialism- good, but even easier to exploit
Communism- Pipe dream
Market socialism- Interesting concept, could maybe work
Mixed economy- Based
Ted Kazynski Monke route- Omega based (ironically)

[Train mountain]

how about logic in the service of universal consideration, instead of ideological excuses?
political pundits will probably still call that socialism. which is their problem. it does not need to be ours.
and in this context at least, doesn't make it a bad word either.
(that last is because when i was growing up, anything that didn't worship the dollar was t'evil, which of course was bullpuckie.
maybe just where i was. europe, western europe in particular, seemed from where i was to have the better sense)
what i'm looking at is the civilizations of some indiginous soverignties, that were as advanced as any anywhere else,
though being less warlike, were insufficiently preparied for the invasions which have come to define our world today.)

so really, the best ideology is to put no ideology ahead of the quality of life for every living thing.
while of course realizing, there will always be potential attackers who are offended by not pretending the same things about the unknown as themselves.

as for little green pieces of paper, they incentiveise a lot of things most people would not prefer to live without, some even knowing their real cost,
bet we need not forget, it is not the little green pieces of paper, that are unhappy.

[Valles Marineris Mining co]

TBH this explains everything perfectly
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=HGtmO4L8pLw

[Shes]

Capitilism

[Bayerischer Nationalstaat]

https://www.nationstates.net/nation=bay ... id=1902640

I feel like with what is wrote here alone shows my views.

[Irona]

Capitalism allocates resources based on profit - not on need, or outcome, or even efficiency.

The consequence of that is obvious in the world around us. Vast numbers of people are completely alienated from the society around them because they aren’t doing work that meets their needs mentally or rewards them with a livable wage. The social outcomes are deeply damaging because poor behaviour, whether it is underinvestment in long term infrastructure or environmental shortcuts, is rewarded if it results in profit. And to cap it all off, capitalism has created enormous resource inefficiency’s to the extent that we basically have a waste economy - for instance products are produced with the aim of breaking within a short time span to result in increased profit.

For a long time we’ve been able to stomach capitalism because it has grown the pie. The issue is that now we’re reaching the point of environmental disaster where there just isn’t enough left to exploit without collapse. Capitalism just doesn’t have the inbuilt incentivises to allocate the resources to address an issue that doesn’t deliver short term profits.

[Urine Town]

For the “Mixed Economy” option, can we just exclude fascists from this forum and only focus on economic moderate users (like Chemgota)

While I consider fascists to be far right and not just economic centrist authoritarians, there is still an argument to be held that Italy under Mussolini, as well as the Nazis conducted a mixed economy.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy ... d%20States.

[Valles Marineris Mining co]

For the “Mixed Economy” option, can we just exclude fascists from this forum and only focus on economic moderate users (like Chemgota)

While I consider fascists to be far right and not just economic centrist authoritarians, there is still an argument to be held that Italy under Mussolini, as well as the Nazis conducted a mixed economy.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy ... d%20States.

Or social democracy?

[Urine Town]

For the “Mixed Economy” option, can we just exclude fascists from this forum and only focus on economic moderate users (like Chemgota)

While I consider fascists to be far right and not just economic centrist authoritarians, there is still an argument to be held that Italy under Mussolini, as well as the Nazis conducted a mixed economy.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy ... d%20States.

Or social democracy?

Social democracy mixed economy users are more than welcome here. It is the fascists who claim to want a mixed economy that I don’t want on this forum

[Valles Marineris Mining co]

Or social democracy?

Social democracy mixed economy users are more than welcome here. It is the fascists who claim to want a mixed economy that I don’t want on this forum

I don’t quite understand market socialism. Can somebody explain it to me? I know socialism is the govt owns the means of production and businesses, but private/personal property still exists, what is market socialism?

[Settentrionalia]

Social democracy mixed economy users are more than welcome here. It is the fascists who claim to want a mixed economy that I don’t want on this forum

I don’t quite understand market socialism. Can somebody explain it to me? I know socialism is the govt owns the means of production and businesses, but private/personal property still exists, what is market socialism?

Market socialism if I remember correctly is a very moderated form of socialism in which the economic system is public property, and is directed through a semi-capitalistic market,

So basically the property is still technically of the state but the government allows for a lot of autonomy to its owners

I am not an expert on this specific ideology though so I might be wrong