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Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

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Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby onlooker » Sun 24 May 2020, 14:26:59

Unequivically no.  This worldlwide lockdown and its aftermath will make it impossible to reboot Economies.  We have the steadly deteriorating fundamentals of Economies plagued by corruption, we have the parasitic financialization taking ever more from the productive Economy and we have the addictive  and crippling debt system and obligations further disabiling healthy economic activity. We had all this even before this emergency. Late stage Capitalism is nothing more than a parasitic economic system feeding on its  host the general productive economy.

So, the parasite must be eliminated before it kills its host. And of course we have the end of the era of cheap energy. So, in this backdrop Globalization and late stage Capitalism are obsolete.  Either the powers that be and their Corporations  change course to Command Communist Communal Economies (Resource based )  or they suck the last wealth from the productive Economies  and are left holding worthless money


 https://www.detroitnews.com/story/news/nation/2020/05/14/poll-coronavirus-enough-eat/111715302/
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby asg70 » Mon 25 May 2020, 11:35:30

onlooker wrote:Can modern Capitalism survive henceforth?, Unequivically no.
the parasite must be eliminated before it kills its host.


The first statement is a prediction. The second is a prescription. Too often prescriptions are masqueraded as predictions, which is why they always fail.

BOLD PREDICTIONS
-Billions are on the verge of starvation as the lockdown continues. (yoshua, 5/20/20)

HALL OF SHAME:
-Short welched on a bet and should be shunned.
-Frequent-flyers should not cry crocodile-tears over climate-change.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Outcast_Searcher » Mon 25 May 2020, 12:39:13

asg70 wrote:
onlooker wrote:Can modern Capitalism survive henceforth?, Unequivically no.
the parasite must be eliminated before it kills its host.


The first statement is a prediction. The second is a prescription. Too often prescriptions are masqueraded as predictions, which is why they always fail.

And as if other systems, like socialism, have no parasitic element. :roll:
Given the track record of the perma-doomer blogs, I wouldn't bet a fast crash doomer's money on their predictions.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Ayoob » Tue 26 May 2020, 02:05:04

This could be a good time to get that one last iphone, prepare to buy some solar panels and have the trees cut around you.

Capitalism will survive. You might not. There's a billion peasants in China and India who couldn't care less which boot was stamping on their faces, just wish they'd hose the dog shit out first. We're next!
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby REAL Green » Tue 26 May 2020, 06:47:04

Capitalism is not the problem humans are. Behavior is the issue especially with tech leading behavior. Many aspects of capitalism are sound like private property and price discovery. It is the corruptions of human behavior that drifts in to make modern capitalism a con game of private interest over the public good. This occurs with overshoot of population and consumption. It cannot be fixed. This is a trap so learn to live with it. You can make a difference in your local of people and place. The world is beyond fixing. Even talking about world problems gets the individual sidetracked from what is right in front of them to do.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby onlooker » Thu 28 May 2020, 14:41:55

REAL Green wrote:Capitalism is not the problem humans are. Behavior is the issue especially with tech leading behavior. Many aspects of capitalism are sound like private property and price discovery. It is the corruptions of human behavior that drifts in to make modern capitalism a con game of private interest over the public good. This occurs with overshoot of population and consumption. It cannot be fixed. This is a trap so learn to live with it. You can make a difference in your local of people and place. The world is beyond fixing. Even talking about world problems gets the individual sidetracked from what is right in front of them to do.

Yes and no. The whole money private property model is conducive to the disproportionate attaining of leverage-power for a few. It is I think safe to operate under the premise that these strictures of Capitalism inevitably allow for the amassing of wealth and ownership rights which thus affords this power to the few. Human frailties fall victim to the alluring addictive lure of power and money. Under different circumstances, people may not be so waylaid
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Shaved Monkey » Fri 29 May 2020, 05:00:25

GFC and CV19 just proves without governments propping things up Capitalism collapses
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Newfie » Sat 30 May 2020, 21:35:10

REAL Green wrote:Capitalism is not the problem humans are. Behavior is the issue especially with tech leading behavior. Many aspects of capitalism are sound like private property and price discovery. It is the corruptions of human behavior that drifts in to make modern capitalism a con game of private interest over the public good. This occurs with overshoot of population and consumption. It cannot be fixed. This is a trap so learn to live with it. You can make a difference in your local of people and place. The world is beyond fixing. Even talking about world problems gets the individual sidetracked from what is right in front of them to do.


Real,

I don’t even think we have Capitalism anymore, Capitalisim has a strong vein of efficientlcy running through it. What we have now is Consumerism which relies on the members NOT being efficient but by using one shot throw away stuff in mass quantities.

We would be better if if we returned to Capitalism.

Better yet would be a rational mix between Capitalism and Socialism. Each has its strengths and weaknesses. I don’t believe they are mutually exclusive, they can work in concert. Making cars? Capitalism. Health care? socialism.

What we do now is neither. Just grinding out shit for the sake of grinding out shit. Makes no sense. There is no good economic model for what we are doing. So what we are doing will eventually die, and not soon enough. But I think it still has some life left in it, how long it can hang on is anyone’s guess.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby ralfy » Sat 30 May 2020, 22:09:53

The result of capitalism is consumerism.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby REAL Green » Sun 31 May 2020, 07:18:28

Newfie wrote:I don’t even think we have Capitalism anymore, Capitalisim has a strong vein of efficientlcy running through it. What we have now is Consumerism which relies on the members NOT being efficient but by using one shot throw away stuff in mass quantities.


Proper price discovery in an environment of generally accepted accounting principles with sound money is the key ingredients for efficiency. Without these the distortions over the long term destroy an economy with malinvestment. Consumerism is needed for the economies of scale if general affluence is desired in a globalized economy. There is tradeoff with consumerism. Less consumerism means less affluence physically so this decline must be made up spiritually with the metaphysical of abstract values. Today consumerism is part of the problem with too much consumption and not enough savings. This is also true of not enough abstract values grounding society in social stability. We are living beyond our means with investments without a future. It is not all bad but enough is bad that over time real damage is being done.

Newfie wrote:We would be better if if we returned to Capitalism. Better yet would be a rational mix between Capitalism and Socialism. Each has its strengths and weaknesses. I don’t believe they are mutually exclusive, they can work in concert. Making cars? Capitalism. Health care? socialism.


At this point I don't think there is an option of return in regards to getting something back. It’s gone as in growth that powered affluence for a century is done. This is not a dramatic end but more a flip of a force of dominance at a peak. We had been on an undulating plateau of growth and decline with bad investments and moral hazard eating away at healthy growth. New tech has supported healthy growth but at a cost of bad behavior so on balance has our digitization really helped? The whole system has shifted to decline with the Sino American cold war, covid demand shock, and the gradual building up of excessive debt from easing and rate repression.

I agree we need a better public/private mix with capitalism and socialism. Capitalism needs a gate keeper with some socialism but private property is a key to good investment. Communism was a failure from mediocrity and sloth from the lack of personal incentive. Modern socialism wants to offer something for nothing which is not realistic. All systems need to acknowledge decline to succeed. Something for nothing in a time of decline is digging the hole deeper.

What is mostly needed is behavioral changes. This will likely be forced on populations by destructive change instead of proactively embraced in a population untied in change. A decline process means abandonment, dysfunction, and irrational. This adaptation involves behavior change along with physical realities of less. My approach has always been you as an individual can embrace destructive change becuase don't expect society to accept it. Forced change in crisis will adapt the greater society with ugly results. Everything about modern society is growth oriented so until that narrative is destroyed it will be one failure after another leading up to an eventual new approach to decline.


Newfie wrote:What we do now is neither. Just grinding out shit for the sake of grinding out shit. Makes no sense. There is no good economic model for what we are doing. So what we are doing will eventually die, and not soon enough. But I think it still has some life left in it, how long it can hang on is anyone’s guess.


Globalism has gone too far but when has any system not gone through a cycle with eventual extremes? The web of life cycles with growing complexity breaking down into succession. We the people just hit our time on earth when everything was peaking and now shifting into a new paradigm. I call it a paradigm becuase of the power of this transformation is a meta-key so to speak.

Look around you with the planet and the web of life and you see the succession to less complexity from a destabilizing climate and ecological decline. We are seeing localized failures of ecosystems as a result. This will be a process over time but the process has speeded up as threasholds have been breached. The human system is shifting also with economic issues and social dysfunction. This is compounded by irrational policy. This is global and the interconnectedness makes it that much more a trap. Good policy that might be employed by a nation is stymied by global reality of flows of capital and markets.

This is a trap of carbon too. Peak oil dynamics and carbon emissions are an ongoing concern that can be mitigated somewhat by renewables but honest science points to no fixes in a transition. The world is going to be turned upside down but over time.

You as an individual can embrace decline personally and get ahead of the process but society is fated to tear itself apart. Much of this individual response is behavioral becuase your approach to decline is the key to lowering the destructive effects and finding your niche in the process. If you are in a bad place get out. If you can't then make arrangements. Accept you are trapped and quit making it worse. That is my take on this for what it is worth. I have been living this life now for 15 years with ups and downs of enlightenment. I was too radical in the beginning but now more in acceptance and sober in constructive change. This does not mean I transcended the process just that I am not fighting the process as much. I am still trapped and you still must battle against the entropic decay. It is just if you accept decay then you can better mitigate it by not making more decay by your own actions.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Newfie » Sun 31 May 2020, 09:01:33

RealGREEN,
An excellent post. I don’t think I disagree with any part of it. I feel you better explained some of my thoughts while also expanding The conversation.

Thankyou.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Ibon » Sun 31 May 2020, 15:33:07

REAL Green wrote:

You as an individual can embrace decline personally and get ahead of the process but society is fated to tear itself apart. Much of this individual response is behavioral because your approach to decline is the key to lowering the destructive effects and finding your niche in the process. If you are in a bad place get out. If you can't then make arrangements. Accept you are trapped and quit making it worse. That is my take on this for what it is worth. I have been living this life now for 15 years with ups and downs of enlightenment. I was too radical in the beginning but now more in acceptance and sober in constructive change. This does not mean I transcended the process just that I am not fighting the process as much. I am still trapped and you still must battle against the entropic decay. It is just if you accept decay then you can better mitigate it by not making more decay by your own actions.


Alot of us baby boomers in our later years can resign to the acceptance of this entropic decay and some of us can even transcend the process as you say in order to not feel trapped or fight it. We experienced the tail end of a long period of ascendancy, a peak and now this descent. For baby boomers this somewhat parallels ones life, ones own decline matches the beginning of a long decline of entropic delay as you state.

I had a long talk with my daughter yesterday and we actually were discussing this very point of accepting the reality of this century unfolding with a series of instabilities that may not let up. She is a millennial with a long life head if she lives a normal lifespan so it is something else entirely for her generation. Our conversation was exactly what is her niche in all of this.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Plantagenet » Sun 31 May 2020, 16:22:46

I don't think the problem is capitalism....I think the problem is too many people.

It doesn't matter what the economic or political system is. When there are too many people there is too much consumerism, too much resource consumption, too much pollution and too much carbon production, resulting in too much impact on the earth and climate.

And as bad as the problems are in the US, they are much worse in 3rd world countries like India or Egypt or Brazil or Indonesia. Just walking down the street in a third world country is like something from Soylent Green---you have to part the crowd and push through and step over vendors and beggars sitting on the sidewalk.

Of course as Montequest often pointed out, nature has a way of fixing the overpopulation problem in animal populations.

I find it very interesting the way the Wuhan virus most efficiently attacks people living in crowded, urban situations.....perhaps this virus is showing us how nature will "fix" capitalism and overpopulation and overconsumption....one of these days there will be too much disease and medical systems will be overwhelmed and collapse and we'll see what a really bad pandemic can do.

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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Ibon » Sun 31 May 2020, 16:34:02

Plantagenet wrote:
It doesn't matter what the economic or political system is. When there are too many people there is too much consumerism, too much resource consumption, too much pollution and too much carbon production, resulting in too much impact on the earth and climate.


This is correct. Added to that authoritarianism increases as a direct result of over population regardless of the economic or political system. Overpopulation leads to social instability leads to authoritarianism.

It is a management of people problem.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Ayoob » Sun 31 May 2020, 17:33:37

What's up with MQ these days?
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby evilgenius » Mon 01 Jun 2020, 15:41:22

REAL Green wrote:Capitalism is not the problem humans are. Behavior is the issue especially with tech leading behavior. Many aspects of capitalism are sound like private property and price discovery. It is the corruptions of human behavior that drifts in to make modern capitalism a con game of private interest over the public good. This occurs with overshoot of population and consumption. It cannot be fixed. This is a trap so learn to live with it. You can make a difference in your local of people and place. The world is beyond fixing. Even talking about world problems gets the individual sidetracked from what is right in front of them to do.

I think many of the issues we have in today's world have arisen because price discovery is broken in subtle ways. When corporations can lobby Congress to effectively suppress wages, then a recipe for wealth inequality is put into place. Eventually, homogenization of the culture suffers, we lose the common things which have always given us reasons to adhere to what we call our culture. Among those who don't suffer from wealth inequality, there is almost a total lack of understanding. People lack sympathy. It looks like they put themselves first, like privilege. They think that hard work is what turned their attempts into success. They believe in the labor theory of value, which is supposed to be something only communists believe in. They don't realize that the success born from hard work actually is success that comes with a whole lot more owed to randomness than they think. Because they don't acknowledge the role of randomness, they can't sympathize with those who aren't as well off. The only 'guarantees' are the ones put into law. And those laws are not working to boost the working class.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Newfie » Mon 01 Jun 2020, 16:57:55

Ibon said:

It is a management of people problem.


Seems so obvious. But then to others it’s not.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby REAL Green » Mon 01 Jun 2020, 17:45:08

Newfie wrote:Ibon said:

It is a management of people problem.


Seems so obvious. But then to others it’s not.


The biggest challenge in business is people management. Proper scale makes people management easier but instead scale is going bigger.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Outcast_Searcher » Fri 05 Jun 2020, 16:44:42

REAL Green wrote:
Newfie wrote:Ibon said:

It is a management of people problem.


Seems so obvious. But then to others it’s not.


The biggest challenge in business is people management. Proper scale makes people management easier but instead scale is going bigger.

In my experience, remote work doesn't make management better, and in fact likely makes it worse. Early on in my career, I was pumped by how much my managerment seemed to UNDERSTAND my contribution, and REWARD me for it.

By the end (2007), management had had NARY a clue re actual technical contribution, for quite a few years, and was all about rewarding smiling and seeming positive at meetings, which was a total turn-off for the technicians.

When business is primarily driven by "cost cutting", GOOD LUCK getting that trend to improve.

Disclosure: My company was IBM, which IMO, Lou Gerstner, and the idea of cutting costs, and to hell with the employees, basically ruined IBM from spring 1993 on. Of course, since that became "the thing" with large business, that's the new culture, so I don't expect "experts" to agree.

Like I was told: "We can hire 7 Indians for what we pay you". Yeah, but if they poorly communicate -- GOOD LUCK, getting complex technical projects completed efficiently and on time. IMO, I was right more often than not, yet I left in disgust in mid 2007, over how the place was managed.

From my reading (like "White-Collar Sweatshop: The Deterioration of Work and Its Rewards in Corporate America"), I had PLENTY of white collar employees in the US as peers, experiencing similar things.
Given the track record of the perma-doomer blogs, I wouldn't bet a fast crash doomer's money on their predictions.
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Re: Can modern  Capitalism survive henceforth?

Unread postby Shaved Monkey » Sat 06 Jun 2020, 21:40:52

Capitalism will always survive because greed is hard wired,people love bling, sociopaths make the rules and can afford the biggest guns.
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