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Comment by tibbetts | Hacker News Reader

It matters, and it might be ok if the wealthy were being nice about it. Unfortunately a very active subset seems to be bringing back feudalism. In the 20s-70s rich people were conveniently afraid of communist revolution and thus inclined to distributed gains. Without another credible threat of global revolution I don’t know how this gets fixed. Of course, communism did have downsides for the people who actually lived under it.

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I basically agree with your first sentence. Specifically, I don't believe capitalism itself is the root problem, but rather something like a deficit in social cohesion. No sense that we're fellow humans collectively struggling towards a better society. That sense doesn't necessarily imply a communist implementation. It could mean something as simple as an ethos in which those who are better off try to help others up. I couldn't begin to address how that might come about, and I'm as wary as anyone about trying to use a State to do it. Because the State never actually turns out to be the People, except in the naive or fanciful abstract.

Capitalism works fine, the only 'flaw' I think it has is that excessive capital can compound way too fast.

If you have $10m, and you invest that really really really well, you might be making 10 to 30% on that capital. Maybe more if you're an entrepreneur investing strategically. That's fine.

But let's say you're worth $1bn, and you compound at 10% per year.. you're making money hand over fist. Add smart use of debt to that, and that's probably too much rent seeking to be healthy.

Basically, once you pass a few 100 million, I think it gets really unfair. Below.. it doesn't really matter. No one will live in poverty because someone owns $100m -- it's meaningless in the grand scheme of things. But wealth is a snowball that doesn't grow fast enough on the low end, and too fast on the high end.

The only way to fix that would probably be a global wealth tax, but I don't see that happening anytime soon.

"downsides"

Largest understatement I've seen in a while.

Between Mao and Stalin alone you're probably talking 50-100MM deaths. That's one hell of a downside.

I assure you, capitalism has killed more people than that. We just don't call them victims of capitalism.

At least in Capitalism you are allowed to talk about your suffering. In the communist utopias of the 20th century, speaking of your suffering or trying to alleviate it was a capital offence.

I'd really like to see your accounting to see if it's apples to apples, because the 50-100M is not counting people who died due to proxy wars, or anything like that, just people who lived directly under communist governments, and died directly because of communist policies that lead to things like mass starvation, and in many cases, because of literal death squads.

It's surprising that people already seem to be forgetting how incredibly horrible communism was when implemented.

We're going to need more than assurances to see your point.

You can assure me all you'd like, but it's data that I find compelling. Many of the deaths in Maoist China were of starvation, a direct consequence of Mao's crackpot policies. Venezuela is a striking modern example of the same phenomenon.

If you can find an example of a government's commitment to free markets directly resulting in the starvation of tens of millions of people your argument would be much more credible.

EDIT: This is re: the comment below. We've reached HN's maximum allowable comment depth.

"Nice about it"? What should they do, hand it out to people?

Pay their taxes without whining or trying to take over the government. Don’t try to discredit science to protect your wealth. Consider the social costs of their investments. Engage in substantial philanthropy.

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