> I don't know, I feel as though I don't understand the question, and I'm confused as to why there has to be "enough" at some point - in the optimal situation, we'd stop producing bread once everyone who wants bread has the amount they want (barring people who want to horde it).
Totally. But what is the level of material comfort at which we do that? Is it the lifestyle of an american making $60,000/year? Is it the lifestyle of a subsistence farmer in Africa?
> The notion of growth in terms of what we can use rather than growth in terms of what is profitable is important, and I think capitalism only has the ability to chase what is profitable, in the sense that houses will be produced for assets rather than living in, and this trend only continues to get worse thanks to the nature of the commodity, a contradiction of use value and exchange value. It's true that everyone agrees with it, but only few would say that the qualitative issues are rooted in the production process of capital itself, something I believe to be the case. We either have a free society, or a society dominated by capital.
So this is an interesting distinction. Saying "we ought only produce what we want to use" is another way of saying "produce efficiently". Capitalism is extremely efficient in this regard. Capitalist businesses tend to produce exactly the quantity of goods they believe they can sell, and any surplus they produce is loss to them, so they try to minimize it as aggressively as possible. So, if "produce the exact amount you want" is what you want to achieve, I think ruthless capitalism is the system you want to have.
However, I think maybe what you mean more precisely is that capitalism also itself encourages an increase in appetite. In part through advertising, and maybe also to an extent via a culture of 'more'. Though I think I would argue that that second thing is mostly a function of the first thing combined with human nature. I think this is a real issue, and I don't have any great solution to it. Advertising is mostly deadweight loss, it's just zero-sum attrition between companies. It doesn't create any value for anyone, except in the case when it informs you of a product you want or need that you didn't know existed. This aspect of capitalism is problematic, but I guess I don't see it as an existential flaw, relative to the other benefits.
> in the sense that houses will be produced for assets rather than living in, and this trend only continues to get worse thanks to the nature of the commodity, a contradiction of use value and exchange value
This is a pretty significant misunderstanding of capitalism. Houses do not get over-produced as investment assets. The market logic of that makes no sense. An investment is only valuable if people want to buy it. The only reason houses are good investments is because actual people want to actually live in them. If people stopped wanting more houses to live in, their value as investments would decline precipitously. Capitalism is extremely efficient in this way, and this front is probably the worst you could possibly criticize it from.
> I have to admit on this point I'm a little lost myself - as to what society without capital would look like in terms of the distribution of resources, to what extent this is mathematically possible (given the information, and going beyond the ECP) and to what extent the criticism of capitalism is addressed afterwards. Whether or not market Socialism is even a Socialism at all is up for question, as is whether schemes like those imagined by Cockshott et al. are feasible in the Marxian critique.
I have kicked around a solution for this in my head that is sort of like a sovereign wealth fund. The gist of it is the state owns all the 'investable' capital, but farms out the actual investment of it to VC firms and hedge funds, just like the private markets do now for wealthy individuals. Those funds take a fee for their services, but they don't earn any of the actual return on the capital itself. However, because they take a fee that is primarily performance based, their incentives are aligned with the growth of the funds. Private citizens may invest their personal capital with the sovereign wealth fund and earn the same rate of return as everyone else. The state would avoid directing economic activity, but would end up as the primary equity owner of most businesses. Therefore, most of the surplus value produced by these entities would flow to the state (and partially back to the citizens directly, but at an equal rate).
Ideally the economy would work much the way it does now. People would still have incentives to start private businesses because they would be able to retain many of the shares for themselves. But their wealth would usually not grow wildly out of proportion to everyone else, and if it did, the state and therefore the public would also benefit fairly significantly. I haven't thought through all the details, but it seems like something that could plausibly create more equitable wealth distribution, though likely wouldn't do much for the environmental externalities.
> The working class is deprived of its labour
I'm not sure in what sense they are deprived of their labour, though? Is someone preventing them from not working? Yes, many people feel compelled to work, because it's easier than foraging for food in the forest. But that's a free choice that they're making, and that they only can make because of all of the other people who chose to collectively pursue the same thing. I'm not sure from what comes this notion that freedom means the freedom to have things given to you that other people worked to create.
> and free from the products of their own labour made with these means of production (to take what you made is declared theft, due to the mystification of means of production as provided by the capitalist rather than provided by labour)
Hrm? There's no mystery. The process works like this: You start a business and you say to me: "Hey, if you make these widgets for me in my widget factory, i'll give you $10/hour, but I keep the widgets". I may either say "sure, let's make a deal", or "No i'd rather build my own widget factory and make my own widgets, thanks". You're free to build your own widget factory any time you choose.
Now, there is one real catch there, which is access to land. Land is a unique type of capital in that it is fixed, very limited in supply, and not created by any person. This is why i'm strongly in favor of a "land value tax":
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Land_value_tax
Which attempts to address the inequity of land ownership, and I also think it should be levied against other 'land like' assets, such as intellectual property.
> How does this take into account the fact that some people, usually the ones with the most emmissions, can pay their way out of it rather comfortably?
It isn't trying to take that into account, it's trying to fix the problem. By pricing the externality, you disincentivize the behavior, and if you price it correctly, you actually pay for its own cleanup. Externalities should be priced at their cost to society. So, in theory, when you emit a unit of carbon, you pay a tax that covers the cost of remediating it.
Now, if you really want to stop a behavior, you can do other trickier things like charge even more than its cost, but then rebate the surplus evenly to the general population. This would have the effect of making the tax more progressive in practice, and is a dial you can turn to whatever level you deem appropriate.
> If I break your window (which is either extremely difficult to repair or even impossible to), I'm rightfully punished for it; I don't simply pay a fine and walk off.
That's actually exactly how it works. If you break my window, I can sue you for damages that you will have to pay. This is actually the entire premise of externality pricing. We treat the environment as the public's property. If private actors are damaging that property, they need to compensate the collective us for that harm. And the court may choose to levy both remedial and punitive damages, which can both be baked into the externality price if you desire.