TakeAStepBack
Gold Member
- Mar 29, 2011
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False premise. There is no reason why someone can not invest their own private capital and work within contract laws to build a subway system. That's where I quit reading.
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The problem is in equating the market and society.
While there are always exceptions to the rule, the vast majority of us in this country are where we are in life based on the choices we made throughout it.
I wish there weren't folks with no intention of reasoned argument crashing this thread. For god sakes it's in "Philosophy" which you have no interest in. You're looking for "Politics" which centers around rhetoric and propaganda. Philosophy seeks to understand, unlike Sophistry, which is literally all there is to American Politics anymore.
The fact someone is poor is more likely an indication of where they were born. It's much less of an indication of how hard they work/can work. You seem to forget that there are over 300 million people in America and there are less than 200 million private sector jobs. Even if everyone supposedly sought work (like they are not doing that now!) only a few thousand people would be hired, what are the rest to do? There simply is not enough work for the amount of people in this country yet the blame seems to always lie with not working hard enough. We do not live in a meritocracy, end of story.
The problem is in equating the market and society.
It isn't a problem or even something that has to be done. The market will do the things society wants on its own without government interference and destruction.
The problem is in equating the market and society.
It isn't a problem or even something that has to be done. The market will do the things society wants on its own without government interference and destruction.
I was referring to the notion that market values and societal values are one in the same. Many liberals reject free market capitalism because they, rightly I think, see humans as worth more than their 'market value'. But the market, like government, isn't the be-all, end-all of society. The vast bulk of our interactions with each other happen outside the realm of trade, and outside the realm of government.
It isn't a problem or even something that has to be done. The market will do the things society wants on its own without government interference and destruction.
I was referring to the notion that market values and societal values are one in the same. Many liberals reject free market capitalism because they, rightly I think, see humans as worth more than their 'market value'. But the market, like government, isn't the be-all, end-all of society. The vast bulk of our interactions with each other happen outside the realm of trade, and outside the realm of government.
The problem with your criticisms, or liberals, of capitalism is that we currently do not have capitalism but corporatism and cronyism.
I agree the bulk of interactions happen outside of the government, but not outside the market.
I was referring to the notion that market values and societal values are one in the same. Many liberals reject free market capitalism because they, rightly I think, see humans as worth more than their 'market value'. But the market, like government, isn't the be-all, end-all of society. The vast bulk of our interactions with each other happen outside the realm of trade, and outside the realm of government.
The problem with your criticisms, or liberals, of capitalism is that we currently do not have capitalism but corporatism and cronyism.
I agree the bulk of interactions happen outside of the government, but not outside the market.
Maybe I'm not making my point clearly. What I'm saying is I'm sympathetic to the common liberal's rejection of the idea that human value is a market calculation. People offer value to society in ways that can't be measured in dollars.
I wish there weren't folks with no intention of reasoned argument crashing this thread. For god sakes it's in "Philosophy" which you have no interest in. You're looking for "Politics" which centers around rhetoric and propaganda. Philosophy seeks to understand, unlike Sophistry, which is literally all there is to American Politics anymore....
Interesting thread. Don't expect reasoned debate from most people online, people like Quantum use ad hominem arguments as they are naive children. Most replies have nothing to do with the content of the OP. But don't let them deter you, others may read and learn. Use trackbacks, save your links, if you stay online long enough you'll find much of the same but on the rare occasion some interest and thought.
The problem is in equating the market and society.
While there are always exceptions to the rule, the vast majority of us in this country are where we are in life based on the choices we made throughout it.
That's an opinion ^^^ and one which strikes me as absurd. We are a product of choices made to be sure, but there is not a singular cause for poverty, nor a singular cause for great success. We all know people who were born with talent, skills and abilities far above the norm, and others born with limits, some severe, some physical and some mental.
Painting with too broad a brush creates a picture which limits detail and thus practical and productive debate. It's one of my major peeves when reading posts such as the one above. There are billions of human beings on the planet today and we are all unique - to put anyone group in a box based on one data point - sex, color, ethnicity, wealth or poverty - is absurd.
As I read through these posts and threads I often read about this magical Market that can do all things. A kind of Supermarket that builds roads, bridges, tunnels, subways yet? But you know what, I never see one of this Market miracles. Where are they folks?
Slavery ended because of a war that killed a couple hundred thousand people.