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"Today's generation doesn't know how real capitalism works"
Because the "teachers" never knew.
They ONLY know what was taught to them by people who never worked in the real wold and were also taught by other teachers who didn't know.
Their books were written by "academics with NO real business experience.
We see it here all the time, when new people join and comment in ways which makes it evident that they think capitalism is the same as the crony-capitalism conducted by corrupt politicians and their big corporate donors.
And even when they say that they don't like the corrupt corporate-government cronyism, they actually want the government to have more power, control and authority over our economy. It's insane. It's like hiring the man who raped your daughter, to babysit your other children.
Small business ownership is one form of capitalism. But most small businesses go broke. More than a third of workers work for large or very large corporations. That's the capitalism I was speaking of.
Because government is corrupting our economy, especially the federal government, They write laws favorable to big corporations, and make it almost impossible for an entrepreneur to create a start-up business. Federal laws and regulations are designed to give the big corporations all the advantages.
For example. Back when Obama was president he was working with big oil to eliminate tax incentives for oil, gas and mining companies. This made Obama look like he was really trying to stick it to big oil, when in reality, those tax incentives were only available for small and independent companies. The plan was to bankrupt the little guy, so a larger market share goes to the big campaign donating corps.
There are other federal regulations that are so expansive and cumbersome to implement and comply with, that a small business would need to hire an army of tax and regulatory lawyers, and entire divisions designated to simply comply with the new regs. The billion dollar mega corps can do this and not see any shift in their profits, but start-ups cannot afford to do it. And they do not have the millions in donor money [bribes] to get the politicians to look the other way.
Again, the #1 reason capitalism is the superior economic arrangement above all others - it incorporates human nature as a core operating feature, while almost all other systems view human nature as an obstacle, problem or negative that has to be avoided, blocked, rewired, circumvented, etc.
Capitalism isn't human-nature, but at least it is more so than communism.
Capitalism cannot exist without government. The only difference between capitalism and communism is that capitalism uses dependency, bribery, and extortion to get people to work. While communism uses force alone.
Small business ownership is one form of capitalism. But most small businesses go broke. More than a third of workers work for large or very large corporations. That's the capitalism I was speaking of.
Very large corporations are just small businesses that didn’t go broke but went quite the other way.
Small business ownership is one form of capitalism. But most small businesses go broke. More than a third of workers work for large or very large corporations. That's the capitalism I was speaking of.
Very large corporations are just small businesses that didn’t go broke but went quite the other way.
A few people are always going to hit it out of the ballpark.
Why would it invalidate anything? For instance, take this quote...
"There are no morals in politics; there is only expedience. A scoundrel may be of use to us just because he is a scoundrel." - Vladimir Lenin
Is that true? Is it not true? Let's pretend that instead of Lenin saying that, it was Winston Churchill. Would that make it true? What if it was Alexander Hamilton. Would that make it true?
What about this quote by Lenin.. "Give me just one generation of youth, and I'll transform the whole world".... Or this one, "Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted."
Is that not true? And what is my purpose for saying it? Might it be as a warning to conservatives? If so, why wouldn't it be valid?
Stop being petty. It doesn't help you.
You can find truth in any sayings, from Hamlet to Himmler. I'm just going to skeptically view anyone following or quoting Lenin, Marx, Himmler, Stalin, Farrakhan, or the Robert Byrds of the world
I'm just going to skeptically view anyone following or quoting Lenin, Marx, Himmler, Stalin, Farrakhan, or the Robert Byrds of the world
Skepticism is rational. Dismissal without consideration is stupid. I listen to everyone because everyone has something to say. It doesn't mean I agree with them.
The truth is, no one actually disagrees with any of the Lenin quotes I posted. So why are they making a big deal out of it?
Better in what way? Wealth? Material standard-of-living? America being a superpower with hundreds of foreign military bases, an interventionist foreign-policy, and $1 trillion a year trade deficits? By those metrics, capitalism is clearly superior.
With that said, I think the Native-Americans were happier than us. The Amish are happier than us. Even our medieval ancestors were happier than us. Capitalism breaks apart families and communities, rewards sociopaths, turns everyone against each other, and creates a cynical materialistic moral code.
Can't agree with the medieval one. Times seemed excruciatingly tough back then if you weren't rich. But I could be wrong.
But if that's the truth, then I have a bone to pick with those who, when debating about American Slavery, love to say how happy African-Americans should be that their ancestors were brought to America as slaves, since they would still be living in mud huts if it hadn't happened...as if those mud-hut dwellers weren't perfectly happy where they were...and is further evidenced by the fact that so many died by jumping off the ship trying to swim BACK to shore.
If THAT'S true, then you might have a point about medieval peasant happiness.
Can't agree with the medieval one. Times seemed excruciatingly tough back then if you weren't rich. But I could be wrong.
But if that's the truth, then I have a bone to pick with those who, when debating about American Slavery, love to say how happy African-Americans should be that their ancestors were brought to America as slaves, since they would still be living in mud huts if it hadn't happened...as if those mud-hut dwellers weren't perfectly happy where they were...and is further evidenced by the fact that so many died by jumping off the ship trying to swim BACK to shore.
If THAT'S true, then you might have a point about medieval peasant happiness.
Your skepticism is most definitely justified. Let me explain...
Are people happier today than they were in the past? Are people even happier today than they were 50 years ago? The rich love to tell a story about progress to justify their wealth. They claim that everything has gotten better so you should be thanking them, not complaining.
We're often told how the peasants worked like dogs from sun up until sundown with no time off. The truth is, they worked less than us.
Secondly, it supposes that the preeminent measure of value is in material goods. Thus a rich society must necessarily be superior to a poor one. What then of "Easterlin's paradox". Which says that beyond your basic needs, money doesn't make us happier.
I don't have any knowledge of Africa, but Alexis De Tocqueville did write a commentary on why the Native-Americans didn't want to be assimilated by the technologically-superior whites...
"Men who have once abandoned themselves to the restless and adventurous life of the hunter feel an insurmountable disgust for the constant and regular labor that tillage requires. They consider labor not merely as an evil, but as a disgrace; There is no Indian so wretched as not to retain under his hut of bark a lofty idea of his personal worth; he considers the cares of industry as degrading occupations; he compares the plowman to the ox that traces the furrow; and in each of our handicrafts he can see only the labor of slaves. Not that he is devoid of admiration for the power and intellectual greatness of the whites; but although the result of our efforts surprises him, he despises the means by which we obtain it; and while he acknowledges our ascendancy, he still believes in his own superiority. War and hunting are the only pursuits that appear to him worthy of a man."
Which begs the question, what is it that makes us happy? Is it things? Or is it people? Is this the best time in history? Or one of the worst times in history?
"Since commerce and manufacture attain their most complete development in (the great cities), their influence upon the (people) is also most clearly observable here. Here the centralization of property has reached the highest point; here the morals and customs of the good old times are most completely obliterated; here it has gone so far that the name Merry Old England conveys no meaning, for Old England itself is unknown to memory and to the tales of our grandfathers." - Freidrich Engels, Condition of the Working Class in England, 1845
"The first person who, having enclosed a plot of land, took it into his head to say this is mine and found people simple enough to believe him, was the true founder of civil society. What crimes, wars, murders, what miseries and horrors would the human race have been spared, had someone pulled up the stakes or filled in the ditch and cried out to his fellow men: 'Do not listen to this imposter. You are lost if you forget that the fruits of the earth belong to all and the earth to no one!' - Jean-Jacques Rousseau
"It is possible to live only as long as life intoxicates us; as soon as we are sober again we see that it is all a delusion, and a stupid delusion! In this, indeed, there is nothing either ludicrous or amusing; it is only cruel and stupid!" - Leo Tolstoy
"The evil was not in bread and circuses, per se, but in the willingness of the people to sell their rights as free men for full bellies and the excitement of the games which would serve to distract them from the other human hungers which bread and circuses can never appease." - Cicero
Because government is corrupting our economy, especially the federal government, They write laws favorable to big corporations, and make it almost impossible for an entrepreneur to create a start-up business. Federal laws and regulations are designed to give the big corporations all the advantages.
For example. Back when Obama was president he was working with big oil to eliminate tax incentives for oil, gas and mining companies. This made Obama look like he was really trying to stick it to big oil, when in reality, those tax incentives were only available for small and independent companies. The plan was to bankrupt the little guy, so a larger market share goes to the big campaign donating corps.
There are other federal regulations that are so expansive and cumbersome to implement and comply with, that a small business would need to hire an army of tax and regulatory lawyers, and entire divisions designated to simply comply with the new regs. The billion dollar mega corps can do this and not see any shift in their profits, but start-ups cannot afford to do it. And they do not have the millions in donor money [bribes] to get the politicians to look the other way.
"They write laws favorable to big corporations, and make it almost impossible for an entrepreneur to create a start-up business"
Don't know where you get your "information", maybe out or your arse! but,
"Small businesses in the US employ 60.6 million workers.Small businesses are very important to the economy. They create 1.6 million new jobs annually and are responsible for 60.6 million jobs across the US, which accounts for 47.1% of the total US workforce. (SBA)
"New business statistics indicate that an increasing number of people in the United States have started their own businesses over the past decade.
This is no surprise, given the US’s relatively high rating of 91.6 out of 100 by the World Bank for ease of starting a business.
So then, how many new businesses start each year?
According to the US Business Formation Statistics (BFS), the number of business applications has been on a steady rise since the start of the previous decade.
In 2010, the number of new business applications came in at 2.50 million. But as new business statistics show, in 2020, 4.38 million applications were submitted. That’s a whopping 75 percent more. It is also a 24.54 percent increase from 2019 and the biggest increase of the past decade by a mile. In comparison, the US government received 3.51 million new business applications in 2019—around 15,500 fewer than in 2018—marking a marginal 0.44 percent year-over-year increase."
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It's like hiring the man who raped your daughter, to babysit your other children.
