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Comment by electromagnetic | Hacker News Reader

Coming from Europe and suffering two recessions caused by US economics, all which Ayn Rand promoted I hope this crap never gets turned into a film.

The economy grows at a fair rate on average, yet Rand's aggressive-free-market capitalism basically promotes trying to grow the economy at 5000% until pop and everyone who doesn't have $500 million in the bank gets screwed over. I'm sorry, but when someone gets fired and then handed a $150 million check for losing their job, I think capitalism flat out sucks.

All the CEO's who've been fired have lost their jobs for a reason: bad business. Yet they're rewarded with more money than an average person would make in a millennium. Yet if I lost my job, I'd be given nothing.

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>Coming from Europe and suffering two recessions caused by US economics, all which Ayn Rand promoted I hope this crap never gets turned into a film.

US economics and government policy do not at all resemble the ideas that Ayn Rand promoted. These policies resemble those of Europe much more.

>I'm sorry, but when someone gets fired and then handed a $150 million check for losing their job, I think capitalism flat out sucks.

That is indeed stupid. Companies that enter into contracts with individuals on those terms do deserve to fail

Well, high-paid CEOs are one of the things laissez-faire capitalism didn't really do well. Not the salary per se, but the very caustic obsession on short/medium term profit over long term. You can't really blame regulations here: the most important one was forcing companies to disclose CEO salaries 20 years ago, and we know how that turned out (they exploded because of competition).

I'm very much in favor of Rand's ideas, but we must admit they do require a rather hard to find mix of idealism and dedication for all parties involved in order to work out. They're a good start, but far from a final solution.

You can't really blame regulations here

Well you kinda sorta can: the board has a fiduciary reponsibility to the shareholders, which is good, but the regulations and penalties in place to enforce that mean that there is an obsession with quarterly figures - it actively discourages long-term planning. No-one dares make tough choices now that will depress the share price for 2 or more quarters, they'd get class-actioned into oblivion. A vast corporation that has been public for decades can weather it. A newly public company is in a very difficult position.

I think you're sorely mistaken if you think that the economics of the US are anywhere near what Rand would consider to be Capitalism.

Have you even read her books?

Enlightened self interest doesn't work on a scale necessary for a civilization to function.

Every nation that has next to no government and every man is free to do with his life as he wishes is a giant shithole that teeters in and out of revolution. Want to see objectivism at work? Go visit Somalia or the Democratic Republic of the Congo. In those countries every man is free to pursue "... his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute." Countries full of people who are "all noble heros free to pursue their dreams". Too bad their dreams all involve mass murder and slavery to pursue personal wealth and power.

Hobbes was smarter than Rand. We have a Government to protect us from each other.

I don't think you'll find Rand objecting to a government that protects its people from physical aggression or coercion. The problem I have with most world governments (including my own), is that they try to (and fail at) protecting people from matters that the people are capable of handling themselves. In doing so, they rob people of their motivation and self satisfaction.

I understand why people would think that Rand says "you should only care about your own life and happiness". But that is bullshit. It isn't considered bad to care about and care for other people (look at Dagny and Hank/John/Francisco). What Rand is railing against is being forced to care about another person (which is what the government does to the producers by threat of coercion).

I'm a firm believer in Rand's theories, but that certainly doesn't stop me from donating my time and money to worthy causes. The important part is that my donations are made of my own FREE WILL and not forced at the barrel of a gun.

Rand wasn't an anarchocapitalist.

Very unfortunately, yes. I'm aware US economics aren't a carbon copy of what Rand wanted, because it simply doesn't work.

This comment doesn't deserve its negative rating. This is not reddit folks.

All over the Internet (even a few other forums for the highly intelligent), there are people trying to blame the recession the "unfettered capitalism" we've apparently gained over the last decade. At HN, I expect people to know better, or, at least, to only have to be taught once.

Just because you disagree with someone doesn't mean you downvote them. This is exactly the kind of attitude that fosters groupthink and drains the life out of forums.

What gets on my nerves isn't whether people like capitalism, it's whether they go around saying that the system we have now is laissez-faire capitalism, and then huge bonuses to failed executives are testament to that. I have full respect for someone who has a very clear idea of what capitalism is and argues against it nonetheless.

I downvoted electromagnetic because he distorted what Rand's actually saying. I upvoted him everywhere else in the thread, where he argues about the book, but I thought that it was worth downvoting inaccuracy.

I feel that it would be better to point out the inaccuracy, which could very well be a result of misunderstanding on electromagnetic's part. I believe downvoting should be reserved for more egregious errors (trolling, off-topic, rudeness, and so on). I think you raise a separate point than Darmani did, however. He was focusing on economic ideas and topics that are far more open to discussion as a reason for downvoting.

Okay... I'm wrong apparently, would you care to posit the 'correct answer' to the problem instead of your diatribe?

It's a valid enough point that a lack of regulation caused many of the current woes in the US, regardless of whether or not I happen to agree with it.

Hell, I'll even give you supporting evidence: Canada. Not a single bad bank.

Did Canada push its banks to give mortgages to people who could not afford them?

Actually, if you look at the history, you'll see that many in the Canadian government and the banks themselves felt that they were missing out on all the great action that US banks were able to get in on. It was the prudence of the government of the time that saved them. If it was left up to them, the banks up here would be in the same state as American banks.

To suggest however that the government somehow forced American banks to lend to people that didn't deserve it against the bank's better judgment is garbage. That doesn't explain half of the EU's current problem.

No, the one exception between Canada and the rest of the world right now is that we have tighter regulations on our banking sector.

Incidentally Bank of Montreal actually ran a profit on interest from bailing out the US' system.

A considerable amount of money spent in the US bailout of banks actually ended up in Canada, Europe and Japan due to debts the US banks had already accumulated.

Perhaps that's an indication that discussions of Ayn Rand are bound to end up like this and simply ought to be avoided on this site? :-)

I'll give you that.

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