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Comment by nilamo | Hacker News Reader

That seems awfully defeatist and with a very negative view of the human spirit.

I can imagine the end of Capitalism, and it looks like Star Trek.

Star Trek ignores real estate. Who gets the penthouse and who gets the first floor apartment next to the noisy space port. who gets the house with the beach view and who just get views of the wall of the neighboring building.

Who does all the really shit and boring jobs. Say mining or construction. And can they just take vacation in middle of project and let it hang for a few years? It is really distorted universe where either you have automation or do not... And timeline as whole really does not work...

I guess for projects people consider themselves important this could be done via personal honor system or even just interpersonal relation - I promised my friend the launch loop will be done by equinox & he would sad if I don't hold my word.

I guess if you press the post scarcity peddal hard enough youncould solve even that - space habitats potentially give so muc living space to make these issues moot.

Yeah just let the military run everything

So all its gonna take to end capitalism is matter replicators, FTL travel, interstellar colonization, and unifying under a one world government after a decade of horrifying eugenics wars fought between genetically enhanced supermen- And after all that Picard gets to live on a nice vineyard in France while thousands of voyager doctor clones toil away in the dilithium mines

Dang, you're so right, a post-scarcity society is obviously not feasible without renacting a fictional story.

Y'all took the example, and dove right onto the wackiest parts of that example, huh? We also haven't met a continuum of godlike sycophants, so I guess space travel isn't possible for us at all yet lmao

If you're going to present Star Trek as a plausible example of what a post-scarcity, post-capitalist society looks like, it's fair to point out all of the BS behind Star Trek's portrayal. In the real world, we can't have free energy. In the real world, we can't have warp drives or replicators that can instantly and perfectly assemble anything from nothing.

And I think it's fair to point out that every vision of utopia necessarily comes at a high cost in blood and violence because you have to do something about the people who don't agree with the vision. Star Trek handwaves this away by saying humanity just "evolved" beyond their base desires and flaws and fully voluntarist socialism just works.

But without the Treknobabble and magitech, what's does the end of capitalism actually look like in a world where there are no easy solutions, and no benevolent space-elves descending from the heavens to save us from ourselves?

It's hilarious how anyone would consider a series of cheesy scifi stories by a collection of hack writers as a basis for discussion of economic systems. Regardless of technology, a post-scarcity is obviously not feasible. Sure we can make staple foods and mass manufactured products incrementally cheaper through automation. But the things that people really want as signaling mechanisms for social status will always be scarce. For example, prime real estate in geographically favorable areas.

Nothing in Star Trek even makes any sense. It's a completely artificial universe, constructed as a background for telling fun stories. From the perspective of alternative economic systems it's no different than children's fairy tales.

I am an optimist and capitalism looks like success. It's the exact opposite of defeatism.

Capitalism looks like exploited third world children in sweatshops making your t-shirts and phones.

It's easy to see an exploitative system as success as long as one is on the side that does the exploiting.

Communism looks like exploited people stripped of their history and culture in gulag building useless inefficient projects.

That's soviet communism. Yugoslav communism looked like people with high standards of living and the strongest passports in the world, free to travel wherever they wanted and celebrating their history.

>> Yugoslav communism looked like people with high standards of living

You're just making things up as you go, aren't you? More then a million Yugoslavs left the country as "Gastarbeiters" to be able to feed themselves and their families. Inflation was high and people had to convert their salaries into German marks the same day they got pay checks, otherwise the money was worthless the next day. Basic goods were unattainable. People had to smuggle coffee, bananas and jeans across the border. Of course if you were a part of the red nobility, your life was easier as you got access to special stores and got to enjoy the fruits of the labor of your fellow equals.

You should take a look at how capitalism works, I’d start with like USA, see how many kids go to bed hungry, have no health insurance, etc. then I’d go to like inner City Philly or Chicago, then South to like Jackson Mississippi, check out how great all that shit is :)

Or you can go to Zurich, take a look how capitalism looks there. And go check how socialism in North Korea works.

People are people, top rich minority always finds ways to exploit poor majority under any system.

Switzerland ….

Switzerland has mandatory universal health insurance where everyone must purchase basic coverage. The government provides premium reduction subsidies for lower-income individuals and families to ensure affordability.

The unemployment insurance system provides benefits for up to 400 days (about 18 months) for those who lose their jobs, with the amount based on previous earnings. There are also programs for job retraining and placement assistance.

Switzerland’s public pension system that provides retirement benefits starting at age 64 for women and 65 for men. It also includes survivor benefits for spouses and children.

Comprehensive coverage for people with disabilities, including rehabilitation services, vocational training, and financial support for those unable to work.

Monthly child allowances are provided to families for each child until age 16 (or 25 if in education or training). Additional birth and adoption allowances are also available.

Social Assistance via means-tested program that provides financial support for basic living needs when other social insurance benefits are insufficient. This serves as the ultimate safety net.

Mandatory coverage for all employees that covers medical costs and income replacement for work-related and non-work-related accidents.

Paid maternity leave for 14 weeks at 80% of salary, along with job protection during this period.

Switzerland’s system is notable for combining mandatory insurance schemes with income-based contributions and government subsidies to ensure broad coverage while maintaining work incentives.

So maybe not mention Switzerland… Any of the examples would be called “far-left” (or worse) in the US of A

And all it took to esablish all this was just ending up with all the treasure plundered from Holocaust ending ub being stored in the Swiss bank vaults...

we’ve been “spreading democracy” around the world since then so we should have enough too

Now compare the poor in North Korea to the “poor” in Switzerland.

Switzerland - no, America - 100%

If I had to choose between being poor in America or being poor in North Korea I'd choose NK every day of the week and twice on Sunday

Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it is the reverse.

Yeah, even how they apply technology makes no sense - they have gravity control and yet they still care about planets ? Where are large scale habitats or for the record actually any mega scale engineering projects ?

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