how I imagine (straw) hyper-capitalists think:
"why is poverty bad? not because we have empathy for poor people, nah, just because poor people are not being optimally productive worker bees"
"why is poverty bad? not because we have empathy for poor people, nah, just because poor people are not being optimally productive worker bees"
that said, this straw man is pretty fleshy. there are definitely plenty of bosses who don’t care about or at least don’t prioritize the misery of their poor employees, for reasons concerning their own profit. in the absence of government action or mass labor action, i’m happy this study exists.
The real problem is that a lot of people think the exact opposite.
"If I can drag others down, I can protect or increase my wealth."
The confounding factor I see here is what do we call China? They've experienced an incredible increase in wealth under their communist system but is what they have really communism? It certainly has lots of attributes of both theoretical capitalism and western capitalism as practiced mixed in with communist concepts. Whatever it is, China, for better and worse, is a very different country than it had been because in part due their hybrid economic system.
The UK, a capitalist country, does.
Private industry is really, really good at innovation (e.g. discovering new drugs and treatments) and providing optional goods and services but most people just want a basic level of service and they want a funding structure that does not misalign incentives.
For example, optional basic health insurance doesn't work because poor people will quit the insurance program while they are healthy and then only unhealthy people will stay and bear the full cost. This raises the cost for poor unhealthy people and then they quit insurance and get denied access to care. Finally only the wealthiest people will have health insurance.
Capitalism is just a tool that's used to achieve certain outcomes. It just happens to work more often that it fails. Nothing more, nothing less. If a different tool works just as fine or better then it can be used selectively in areas where it's superior. Blind faith to any tool is stupid.
Communism on the other hand tends to fail by default and because it requires external forces to make it work, it breeds authoritarianism and then everything goes bad.
Western Europe vs Eastern Europe, N Korea vs S Korea, Colombia vs Venezuela, USA vs Russia - its pretty standard that the workers in the Capitalist countries have a better quality of life than those in the Communist ones.
But it doesn't tell the whole story. Could you survive on $2 per day? The implication of this claim is that you are not in "extreme poverty" at that threshold, but I'm not sure many people would agree.
The next natural step is to ask where the line really should be drawn? For many reasonable numbers, we can see that number has been rising in the past few decades. You can set your own inputs on the linked calculator based on where you believe the poverty line should be drawn and decide for yourself.
Making some people rich doesn’t create poor people. They were poor before.
They did. It's called slavery. It's only when that finally became mostly unacceptable (remember there are still millions of enslaved persons worldwide), that they had to turn to paying them wages of a dollar a day (slavery with extra steps).
Forced work in a prison could be considered slavery depending on the reason for the arrest and the financial motives of the owner of the prison.
No, you can't, because you need to eat tonight, not tomorrow or the week after or next quarter. And you need to pay bills, your house, etc. So the labour market is not in effect free.
If anything China and the USSR turning their agrarian societies into world powers in the course of a few decades says otherwise. Whether or not the authoritarianism needed to accomplish this is worthwhile is another discussion. That said it is theoretically possible to achieve a more equal society without authoritarianism.
China did have a huge famine due to state powers making the wrong choice.
I can’t speak about wheat production but I don’t think it has much to do with bringing people out of poverty if the state is still able to provide for its citizens.
What income are they depriving them from? If they aren’t working, how could anyone deprive them of an income that doesn’t exist?
The deprivation is enforced through a large government program called "property law".
“Deprivation” is the act or process of removing. You’re claiming someone removed the income, but they haven’t done anything to create an income. There’s no income from which to deprive them because they haven’t done anything to generate an income.
> The deprivation happens through a large government program called "property law".
That doesn’t make sense, the way I understand it, property law codifies the rules around the things that people own. That’s preventing owners from being deprived. You’re asserting that laws which forbid depriving people of property are the mechanism by which they are deprived? How does that work?
"People who don't work full time should starve" is ideology, not some law of physics.
> There’s no income from which to deprive them
There is plenty. US GDP is trillions a year.
> How does that work?
Property law creates property ownership. Ownership assigned to one person is deprived from others.
“People are entitled to other people’s labor” is ideology as well. However claiming that someone has been deprived of something that never existed in the first place is just nonsense.
> There is plenty. US GDP is trillions a year.
So you’re suggesting we deprive people of their income because of your ideology?
> Property law creates property ownership.
Negative, ownership creates property law.
> Ownership assigned to one person is deprived from others.
So how do you justify assigning ownership to certain people? What gives you the right to deprive people of their income?
You make a powerful critique of capital income and inheritance law.
> So you’re suggesting we deprive people of their income because of your ideology?
You're the one advocating we systematically deprive people of income. I'm the one advocating everybody receive an income.
> Negative, ownership creates property law.
Libertarian ideology has broken your brain. Property law is a government program - it requires enforcement to exist, aka the law.
> So how do you justify assigning ownership to certain people?
The principles of egalitarianism.
You must have missed the part about entitlement to others’ labor, as inheritance is a transfer initiated by the owner of the property, and capital income is a voluntary exchange by all parties.
> You're the one advocating we systematically deprive people of income.
No, that was you who suggested that US GDP could be expropriated from its owners and redistributed to your favored recipients.
> I'm the one advocating everybody receive an income.
Yes, exactly. You’re advocating that some men with guns confiscate the income of the working class and give it to people whom you have deemed more deserving. You haven’t justified this, however.
> Property law is a government program - it requires enforcement to exist, aka the law.
Property is temporally and logically antecedent to property law.
> The principles of egalitarianism.
According to egalitarian principles, you have no such right.
> Libertarian ideology has broken your brain.
Less of this, please. Make your case on the merits or move on.
Incorrect, dead people cannot own things. Inheritance is a government program that redistributes property to rich children based on what their parents wrote on a piece of paper.
> expropriated from its owners and redistributed to your favored recipients
You are very confused. People do not own what they are taxed. When a person is taxed and the money given to eg a social security recipient, that's not violating ownership, that's enforcing ownership. That money is literally the property of the SS recipient. The law is very clear on this.
> You’re advocating that some men with guns confiscate the income of the working class and give it to people whom you have deemed more deserving.
No, that's what you're advocating, by supporting enforcement of status quo capital income laws.
> Property is temporally and logically antecedent to property law.
It isn't. You can say the statue of liberty is your property - but until that's enforced by somebody (via initiation of force or threats thereof), it is meaningless. Property is the biggest government program there is.
> According to egalitarian principles, you have no such right.
Yes I do - I'm simply enforcing my view of property rights.
That is precisely why they initiate the transfer while they are alive by making a will.
> People do not own what they are taxed. When a person is taxed and the money given to eg a social security recipient, that's not violating ownership, that's enforcing ownership. That money is literally the property of the SS recipient. The law is very clear on this.
Then it sounds like the people aren’t entitled to the income that you want them to. What’s your justification for changing the law on property?
> No, that's what you're [...].
> It isn't [...].
This is tiresome. You’re just contradicting me by insisting on your framing of the circumstances without any justification or addressing my arguments. I get it, you (apparently) don’t like it when someone has more than someone else and you want people to run around continuously taking and giving so that no one ever has much more than anyone else. Hopefully one day you can see that this amounts to people enforcing their view of property on everyone else, which is quite the hierarchy and not the least bit egalitarian. I’m sure you’re ready with a devastating rebuttal (“no u”) but the part where people own what they own and obtain through voluntary exchange, and we prohibit taking people’s stuff and rearranging it without their consent, is the one with the egalitarian social ideals imbedded into the fabric of it. Because people have to agree to things, so essentially the poorest person has the same power as the wealthiest. And obviously you can see that in no way can we make the same egalitarian observations about a system that constantly looks at what you own and decides if its “too much” or not. So this is easy to demonstrate in any kind of good faith discussion but when people just contradict you it never gets beyond the part where I say something and you contradict it, so its usually a waste of time. But I appreciate you interacting with me up to this point and please feel free to engage with the substance of my remarks at any time.
> You can say the statue of liberty is your property - but until that's enforced by somebody (via initiation of force or threats thereof), it is meaningless.
Surely you can see this is not the case. Who would they be enforcing my claim of ownership against, unless someone else also claimed to own the Statue of Liberty? So we haven’t even enforced it yet, but we already have the idea of ownership. You see, there wouldn’t be anything to enforce unless we conceived of an idea of ownership. This is what it means for ownership to precede enforcement.
> I'm simply enforcing my view of property rights.
Good luck.
A will is not a transfer. The law is very clear on this. The government gets the property, then redistributes it to the rich kids via a nanny state program called "inheritance law".
> What’s your justification for changing the law on property?
To increase fairness and justice. What's your justification for not?
> this amounts to people enforcing their view of property on everyone else
Every possible political system does this, except the "grab what you can" world where there is no property at all. So why is yours "voluntary" and mine isn't.
> people own what they own and obtain through voluntary exchange
Property isn't voluntary. It is coercively enforced by the state.
> we prohibit taking people’s stuff
It's literally not their stuff. Tax law is very clear on this.
Me: This stuff rightfully belongs to A, because of egalitarianism. You: This stuff rightfully belongs to B, because it belongs to B.
You're doing a basic circular argument.
This is the thing with libertarianism - it's just pure status quo bias. "This person rightfully owns it because they own it". Nothing to do with freedom, because property is coercive, nothing to do with anti state because property is run by the state - just allegiance to existing property owners.
It’s not fair for you to decide what other people own. Its injust for you to have that much control over other’s property.
> What's your justification for not?
According to you I am changing the law, same as you. Fairness and justice.
> A will is not a transfer. The law is very clear on this.
Thats not really the case, and I’m unconcerned aboit statutes that were written by oligarchs. A will is a valid transfer.
> Every possible political system does this
You’re not in a position to decide what is and is not possible.
> Property isn't voluntary.
Yes it is.
> It is coercively enforced by the state.
So what if you (incorrectly) believe this to be the case? You can’t imagine a possible political system without coercive enforcement so you’re unable to criticize property on this basis.
> It's literally not their stuff.
In any system of fairness and justice it is.
> Me: This stuff rightfully belongs to A, because of egalitarianism. You: This stuff rightfully belongs to B, because it belongs to B.
You: This stuff rightfully belongs to A, because of egalitarianism. Me: Its not egalitarian for you to dictate what other people rightfully own. That would be a hierarchy with you at the top.
> You're doing a basic circular argument.
No, I’m applying egalitarian principles to your proposed authoritarian restructuring of society.
> This is the thing with libertarianism - it's just pure status quo bias. "This person rightfully owns it because they own it".
Who cares about libertarianism? I’m sharing the joys of egalitarianism with you. Quit trying to dictate the world to the rest of us and embrace the pluralism of egalitarianism.
> Nothing to do with freedom, because property is coercive,
But you like coercion, so to you this isn’t a problem for libertarianism.
> ...for you to dictate ... that would be a hierarchy with you at the top ... your proposed authoritarian restructuring of society ... Quit trying to dictate the world to the rest of us
Once again, you're confused on a basic level - what makes my proposed system more authoritarian than yours? You want property law enforced with one particular distribution, I want it enforced with another particular distribution. What makes my distribution authoritarian and yours not?
No, property is a social construct that humans use to denote who has exclusive rights over the disposition of a thing.
> It is literally the initiation of coercive violence on people who enter certain areas or touch certain objects (or threats thereof).
No, property is literally a social construct that humans use to denote who has exclusive rights over the disposition of a thing. Coercion comes afterwards, when people seek to enforce this norm on people who dispute it.
> Once again, you're confused on a basic level - what makes my proposed system more authoritarian than yours?
The hierarchical nature of the relations. Your system has people who have the power to grant and confiscate all the property in society. Since property is the right to determine the disposition of a thing, your system results in the ruling class exerting property rights over everything.
> You want property law enforced with one particular distribution
False. I am not specifying the distribution that is enforced.
> I want it enforced with another particular distribution. What makes my distribution authoritarian and yours not?
You’re choosing the distribution that is enforced, whereas I’m advocating for a distribution that is collectively decided absent coercion. My distribution is the emergent result of repeated interaction under egalitarian social norms. Your distribution is a hierarchical imposition of your preferred distribution.
Me: "Water is wet" You: "No, water is a type of matter. Wetness comes afterwards, when people touch it."
You are being so pedantic and incoherent that you're "not even wrong".
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Not_even_wrong
You're wasting both your and my time here if you cannot accept basic, obvious realities like the fact that property requires enforcement.
You: “water is hot because boiling it requires heating it up” Me: “there is water at many temperatures and not all of it is boiling”
> You are being so pedantic and incoherent that you're "not even wrong".
I’m sorry you think its pedantry to examine the literal facts of the issue under discussion. However there is a big difference between the idea of property and the means one chooses to enforce property norms on people who do not subscribe to them, and if you don’t see this (or fail to comprehend the significance) then I can understand why you’re confused.
> You're wasting both your and my time here if you cannot accept basic, obvious realities like the fact that property requires enforcement.
You’re wasting both your and my time here if you’re unable to question things you have taken for granted. If it’s so basic and obvious then demonstrate it, rather than arguing by assertion.
Give a single concrete example.
That is, I'm pretty sure that on some level you operate as if private property is both normal and right, no matter what your theory says...
If you don't work then where do you expect your food to come from? I don't work full time and I don't starve so please keep the petty details out.
But on a serious note, the command economy of the Soviet Union did surprisingly well despite its profound number of flaws.
Literacy rates, economic output, educational levels, scientific output etc was significantly improved in Soviet times, relative to the Czar area which after all was capitalist.
This all happened despite the fact that:
1. They had a bloody and destructive revolution. 2. Their country got laid to ruins by the German invasion. 3. They had to rebuild the country after WWII with most of the healthiest and youngest members of society dead. Yet they pulled that off surprisingly well.
Yes if you compare Soviet growth to a number of other countries it was not always stellar, but considering that these countries had not received the same kind of devastating blows, it was still quite remarkable.
China is another good example. India and China had the same GDP per capita in the 1940s. China had a destructive Japanese invasion and then a bloody civil war. Then Mao did the crazy cultural revolution setting them back even more.
Despite all this China has 3x the GDP per capita of India. All despite the fact that India had democracy, private property and capitalist enterprises in this whole period.
Even today almost all key industries in China are fully or partially owned by the state. Such as construction, energy, banking etc. Yes China has lots of private enterprise as well. But they got growing rapidly long before these dominated the economy.
No, economy has pulled as many people out of poverty as China, and they did that with what can best be described as hybrid system. The Chinese economic miracle had been ongoing for many years before private property was actually made legal in China.
NOTE: I am not advocating these kinds of system as they are dictatorships. But I think they are worth pondering before people push the truthism that capitalism is so superior as an economic system and that alternatives cannot perform. The evidence seems to suggest that other systems can work and perhaps the best systems are hybrid systems.
This is a recent phenomenon that started in the 90s. China was essentially flat until 1993 (that's when India and China's GDP per capita started diverging).
Remember that article about a feed processing company in India not getting a permit to build a factory because he has to rezone land because all land in India is zoned for agriculture by default? The problem wasn't the bureaucracy. It was the corruption. The founder had to go to 14 different offices and one third of them didn't even process his forms because he refused to pay bribes. He had the bribe money but he refused out of principle and that heavily delays the start of the company.