What, exactly, is socialism? Again this discussion seems necessary.

You must be feeling particularly uneasy (about being part of the problem, by doing nothing, while enjoying your exclusive home in your capitalist paradise, and just bleating about how unfair it all is) this week, Reivs. Christmas has you thinking about the meaning of it all? Catholic guilt? Tell Auntie Crank

 

Weird comment, given capitalism requires redistribution to stabilise it.

A question for you. Why are cooperatives more productive than firms with "traditional" ownership?

 

Still no content. It was a simple economic question. What left wing economics can be used in support of your celebration of supply-side economics?

 

Or, you do the same voluntarily. With people you know will reciprocate if needed.

You know .... what the vast majority of humans have always done, and still do (except in the First World, because the Rievs and BIOs won't share).

 

Please don't fib about me, particularly as an excuse to avoid making economics comment on an economics sub-forum. Cheers!

 

State Socialism/Collectivism/Communism (or whatever you want to call it, it's all the same) cannot exist in a democracy. It can only exist under totalitarianism. Ergo, your point is moot.

PS: the armchair socialist's fantasy version, which doesn't rely entirely upon every able bodied person pulling their own weight, is not under consideration.

 

Sorry, Mate. If you're sharing your resources, I stand corrected.

 

Gosh, you haven't even tried to answer the question. You've supported supply-side economics. I have used that to inform you of your obvious right wing credentials. You've pretended otherwise. I've therefore been a good egg and asked you to refer to left wing economics that justifies your support for supply-side economics. Are you saying it doesn't exist? Wowsers!

You're no socialist. A socialist would not accept supply side economics. Your pretense is nothing new to me. We have pretend Bolsheviks that have since been funded by right wing 'libertarians'. Its all part of attempting to manipulate in support of the status quo.

 

Sure, sure.

Meantime, I answered the question fully and completely. Collectivism cannot exist in a democracy, because there will never be more than 50% voting it in. Not today, not tomorrow, and not the day after. The only way state collectivism can ever happen is under a totalitarian govt, because the PEOPLE WILL NEVER CHOOSE IT. There is no space for theory or speculation, when it cannot exist in the first place.

Anyone who claims that state collectivism can exist is either a dangerous totalitarian, bizarrely incapable of understanding human nature (and therefore, democracy), or has hidden motives. Ergo, professing belief in state socialism does not - in any way - mark that individual as a socialist/collectivist. In the case of hidden motives (probably the majority), it does the opposite. When the individual champions something which they know cannot exist, they are engaging in deceit. I maintain that this is driven by guilt, especially since it almost always comes from those most wedded to their own capitalistic comforts and individual liberties.

Then there are people like myself (and many others), actively living voluntary collectivism .. the only possible way to have socialism in a democracy.

Who is the phoney?

 

Please don't keep fibbing. Its a terrible quality. You were asked to refer to a left wing school of economic thought that supported supply-side economics (like you do). Can you just be honest and admit there isn't one?

The rest of your post is fluff only designed to avoid your open support for right wing economics. Do you think you have much to say if you're really just peddling right wing economics and pretending radical outcome?

 

A question for you. Why aren't cooperatives more plentiful , given their greater productivity?

 

Because there is a distinction between productivity and profit. The latter feeds off rent seeking behaviour in capitalism, as shown by its tendency towards market concentration.

 

That's not a sufficient answer. Cooperatives are also interested in profits and rent seeking, that is their main motivation.

 

This is an idiotic response. However, I'm happy to be proved wrong. Could you inform me how cooperatives rent seek? Perhaps a local cooperative is prepared to pollute their local water supply, just for the crack?

 

If you're this troubled by your own inaction, you can do one of two things: Stay in your armchair shouting about convenient impossibilities ...... or be the (entirely possible, but much less convenient) solution. Surely you don't want to come across like the environmental activists, who return home from protests only to book their next overseas holiday? That can't be what you want for yourself - that kind of falseness and pretence. More importantly, it can't be what you want for those who won't benefit from actions you could be taking.

PS: If you'd like to know how to be the solution, instead of remaining part of the problem .. let me know. I've been doing low impact collectivism for 20+ years, and have plenty of ideas, tips, and warnings.

 

You do like to go into personal rant mode when you're caught out

That's a shame really. I would have thought that, if someone was genuine, they'd say thank you and educate themselves on the remaining (anti-) commons that they don't understand. Why you insist on religiously following the Chicago School, despite pretending to be left wing, is of course your own business.

 

Correct. Cooperatives are simply another form of private business.

 

PM me, if you don't want to be seen asking for advice from The Enemy. I may not respond for a bit (because I often forget to check) so be patient

 

Exactly. Makes not a jot of difference whether the profit-seeking capitalist enterprise is held by shareholders, workers, a family, or one fat cat. It's all the same animal.

 

No thanks. Already understand- and reject- the Chicago School.

 

But we are not paid FOR the rights that are stripped from us and made into others' property.

False. When land is private property, everyone is stripped of their natural liberty right to use it. We buy land precisely BECAUSE it is stolen from us, just as people bought slaves precisely BECAUSE their rights to liberty had been stolen from them.

False. It is stolen every day that people's liberty rights to use it are abrogated without just compensation. You could with equal "logic" claim that a long-time slave's rights haven't been stolen for years.

It was private ownership of land without the intercession of government to rescue people from enslavement by landowners that made the Middle Ages hell.

Which do you think resembles the Middle ages more: countries with established private ownership of land without government intercession to rescue people from enslavement by landowners, like Pakistan, Paraguay, the Philippines, Guatemala, Bangladesh, El Salvador, etc., or countries where land is not privately owned, like Hong Kong and China?

 

More absurd and disingenuous nonsense from you. Every resident citizen gets the same compensation anyway, whether they pretend to want any particular parcel or not, because they are all being deprived of all the exclusively held parcels.

 

We pay the wrong party, and in an inefficient way.

Like the seller of a slave....

There is nothing egalitarian about some people owning other people's rights to liberty, whether that ownership is in the form of slave deeds or land deeds.

But only landowners get to take the right money in return for no contribution.

Just as no government, legal, or institutional obstructions prevented any slave from exercising his option to purchase his right to liberty from his owner. The very necessity to purchase one's right to liberty is proof that the obstruction exists.

Right, because bananas have to be produced by labor, and he is paying for them to be produced: they WOULDN'T BE THERE if he wasn't paying for them. Land, by contrast, was always there, ready to use, with no help from the owner or any previous owner, and it WOULD BE THERE ANYWAY, READY TO USE, WITHOUT the owner. So what is the owner contributing in return for the payment, exactly....?

You just blankly refuse to know the fact that the bananas would not be there if the grocer weren't paying those who produce them, while the land WOULD still be there, ready to use, without any payment to the landowner. I get it. You have to refuse to know that fact because you have already realized that it proves your beliefs are false and evil.

False.

That is an absurd fabrication. They transform unjust taxation and land tenure systems into just ones.

That is the exact, diametric opposite of the truth. It is private landowning that is medieval.

 

You'd pay the community that provided the exclusive tenure and made the land valuable, rather than paying a greedy, privileged parasite for doing nothing. So instead of paying taxes and land rent, you'd only pay land rent, and instead of pocketing land rent in return for nothing, landowners would have to earn money. That is why you hate justice, and oppose if with such maniacal ferocity.;

 

To the land administration office. The revenue would be spent for the purposes and benefit of the public that creates the land's value, rather than being stolen by greedy, privileged, parasitic landowners. It's the same as the difference between paying $2 to a thief for a loaf of bread stolen from the bakery and paying $2 to the baker for the same loaf of bread. It looks -- to an ignorant and/or disingenuous child -- like the cost of the bread is the same either way, but that just proves how superficial a child's understanding is. The baker still has to make a living, so you'll be charged more for other things. Paying the baker for the bread cuts out the parasitic thief, just as paying the land administration for land cuts out the parasitic landowner. You know this, which is why you oppose justice in taxation and land tenure with such maniacal ferocity.