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

What percentage of South Koreans live in poverty? Have a word with yourself.

 

One liners, no content. It does seem to be a hobby of yours! Let's repeat the facts. Fact 1: Marxists have offered an explanation for discrimination (empirical superior to the Chicago School, given that's really based on monopoly power). Fact 2: Georgists cannot explain discrimination.

Now it just happens that the Marxist explanation provides an additional explanation why the labour economist will be so important for understanding economic rent. Discrimination becomes part of capital-labour conflict and, just like with classical economics, it is about bargaining power and the means to ensure underpayment/exploitation (choose your vocab according to orthodox or heterodox preference).

Why haven't you bothered to craft an understanding of the labour market?

 

1) Exactly. If we all did that, there would be no more poverty. OBVIOUSLY.

2) Yes, escaping poverty requires toil, and opportunity. The toil of self-restraint, diligence, commitment, and patience. That's the ONLY formula for escaping poverty, in fact. And it works incredibly well, hence the rise of so many migrants once they have access to those opportunities.

3) I never said it was easy. I'm the one who constantly says it's sheer and unadulterated hard work. I said escaping poverty is easy, when you're prepared to do that hard work. HUGE difference. As for migrants 'not being typical' .. that's an absurdity. Migrants range from dirt poor uneducated refugees, to wealthy professionals. The marker of success isn't the material circumstances they came from, it's their personal ethos. A determined person might remain poor in their home country due to lack of opportunities. Their determination sees them thrive once they have access to opportunity.

 

Go ahead, give it your best shot. What percentage of Asian Americans live in poverty? I'll wait.

(don't worry, we both know you won't answer - because doing so reveals the untruth of claims of discrimination, and that poverty isn't a function of poor choices. in fact it will do more than that .... since Asian Americans are actually discriminated against in education .... yet they still beat whitey).

 

Come on, I asked a question relevant to what I said. What percentage of South Koreans live in poverty? This is a specific reference to cultural effects. Why are you hiding?

 

I rest my case. You need to work harder, Reivs.

 

So you can't answer? Crikey, ask Google! The answer to "what percentage of South Koreans live in poverty" is easily found. What's important is that right wingers like you crow about culture, but its a red herring. You're really just hiding from your support for rentier capitalism. And yes, it is pathetic.

 

You could just answer my question about Asian Americans. You know .. the question you keep trying to deflect because it messes with your narrative about poverty (being imposed, rather than chosen)?

 

Some people don't support "rentier capitalism" but simply support capitalism.

 

I feel like you are the only one making any real sense in this thread. The rest are just gish galloping, trolling, or working out their own fantasy society in a “hey wouldnt this be cool?” Way.

 

Political economy is available to everyone, so it is a shame the quality of dialogue isn't more high powered. It doesn't matter if someone is a centrist, conservative or champagne socialist; there is no excuse for avoiding the key debates in order to peddle standard undeveloped soundbite.

 

If economics theory disserted from an armchair works for you, he's all yours. Meanwhile, years go by with people doing nothing.

 

I dont see carefully cited explanations as armchair.

 

And what are those sentences uttered actually DOING to change the world?

 

Sheer determination and hard work does not explain why people having to work longer and harder despite overall productivity increases. It does not explain why con artists and pseudoscientific think tanks and the people that work there gain so much more than an exceptionally hard working working class family could ever hope to achieve. It doesnt explain the fact that people like Trump were able to just skirt by with his family’s fortunes despite several bankruptcies and scams perpetuated on college aged adults. It doesnt explain why Alan Dershowitz can gain such high prestige while being a laughingstock of the legal community. I think these days are putting the protestant work ethic into an early grave. Personal anecdotes do not make for proper explanation of economic phenomena.

 

Irrelevant twaddle indeed.

 

Yes, it does. Hence the rise of Asians in the West, regardless of economic climate. As long as we remain democracies (and that keeps getting harder, thanks to the nascent fascism of Progressives), and allow our robust capitalism to remain robust, the opportunities to get ahead will remain.

It's not rocket science. If economic conditions change (wage stagnation, housing affordability, etc), then the determined person changes their approach to benefit best from the new conditions. The person who is not determined will keep doing what, under changed conditions, becomes the 'wrong thing' and wait for someone to save them.

 

That's it exactly. Nothing.

Thinking lofty thoughts, in the absence of action, is literally irrelevant twaddle.

 

Did you ever consider that people from Asia normally need to be rich enough to make the trip over here? Fascists were capitalists as well, they preserve the power of private owners. The Pinochet phenomena that the chicago boys were touting was not really a miracle as that is what the original fascists did.

 

Are you ok? You are pretending scientists need to be engineers as well, thats not how studies work.

 

Not at all. They can be lower middle class (by our standards) upon arrival, and still manage to get well ahead of their neighbours over time. Further, many started with literally nothing - late last century when SE Asian refugees were coming to the West. No education, no money, no English. All they had was their determination to take advantage of the immense opportunities they'd never had access to before. They let nothing stop them .. not 'racism', not economies, not an entirely different language and culture, nothing. And many had been massively traumatised as well - but never used that as an excuse for failure. They lived two families to a small apartment, worked around the clock, indulged no bad habits, exercised iron self-discipline, used whatever remaing free time they had to sit with their kids and ensure they were educated out of poverty. Some of those kids grew up to become doctors and lawyers. That's what determination looks like.

 

I'm guessing that made sense to you.

 

You hear that guys? No racism because Asians turned out differently! That supposedly makes sense! In prager u fantasy land. Its so nice for rich guys to pretend everyone who is suffering is at fault for their own suffering!

 

What?

This probably also makes sense to you, but I can assure you it makes none to me. Where did 'no racism' come from? What is 'prager'? Who is rich?

 

More importantly .. why does the idea of iron self-discipline and determination both you so much? It's always useful to look at our own over-reactions, if we want to get to the heart of the matter.