Source: http://www.hussmanfunds.com/rsi/valuationforwardearnings.htm

8/16/2011 10:17:35 AM

Labor is a scarce resource. So yes, both people own scarce resources and must trade them with other humans in order to achieve a modern standard of living.

I agree they are different by degree, not in kind. One will have an easier time trading than the other. But neither one possesses a God given guarantee at success. All we can say for sure, given prior performance, is that they will both succeed and live lives far more comfortable than nature intended for them.

But, if Mankind goes crazy and perhaps through war or policy mis-management (see 20th century communism), then in the future all bets are off, one or both may die in agony.

8/16/2011 10:22:29 AM

Every single person on Earth who isn't a quadriplegic has labor. Not only that, unemployment is >9%. Labor is not a scarce resource, you're fucking retarded.

And yes, Capitalism offers a better life than outright savagery. Woop dee doo. You know what'd be even better? Workers getting to actually contribute to the decisions that allocate the goods they produce, rather than dictatorial control over it by a person who happens to own the hammers they swing.

[Edited on August 17, 2011 at 12:18 PM. Reason : .]

8/17/2011 12:14:41 PM

And you know what would be even better than that? If consumers could actually contribute to the decisions that allocate the goods they consume. Very few of us are owners. About 50% of us are workers. And 100% of us are consumers. As such, for my economic dollar, I say put consumers in charge.

8/17/2011 12:55:20 PM

Hint: If workers controlled the allocation of their production, they could direct it exactly towards what they consume or desire to consume, and get those goods at a fair price instead of paying extra to line the pockets of owners. Rather than getting ripped off for wages when they work, then getting ripped off on prices when they consume.

[Edited on August 17, 2011 at 1:22 PM. Reason : .]

8/17/2011 1:22:20 PM

Unionized industries demonstrate what workers would do if they were in charge: they jack up prices to pay themselves higher wages, making 100% of society poorer to make themselves richer. Yes, they themselves then must pay the higher prices, but they do it anyway. Only consumer sovereignty, and the lower prices it engenders, makes 100% of us better off.

Not all of us have jobs. More to the point, a tiny fraction of us work in the auto industry. As such, why should 2% of us get to be in charge and set the prices 100% of us must pay?

8/17/2011 2:12:26 PM

Non-Unionized industries demonstrate what Capitalists do when in charge: they jack up prices to pay themselves higher salaries, making 100% of society poorer to make themselves richer. Yes, they themselves then must pay the higher prices, but they do it anyway.

Not all of us own businesses. More to the point, a tiny fraction of us own the auto industry. As such, why should 0.001% of us get to be in charge and set the prices 100% of us must pay?

[Edited on August 18, 2011 at 3:07 PM. Reason : .]

8/18/2011 2:58:13 PM

Seriously, lmao that your arguments against worker-owned-production are 1000% more applicable to the model it opposes. I think you might be a closet Socialist who doesn't realize it yet.

8/18/2011 3:01:19 PM

there aren't enough for that post

8/18/2011 3:01:28 PM

Aaronburrow I have to have everyone's posts read aloud to me by text-to-voice software because your posts in particular caused my eyes to roll right out of my sockets so don't get me started on

8/18/2011 3:08:03 PM

Quote :

"Non-Unionized industries demonstrate what Capitalists do when in charge: they jack up prices to pay themselves higher salaries"

Wait, shit, you're being serious?

8/18/2011 5:18:01 PM

Quote :

"Not all of us own businesses. More to the point, a tiny fraction of us own the auto industry. As such, why should 0.001% of us get to be in charge and set the prices 100% of us must pay?"

Exactly why fascism is a bad system. Putting the industrialists in charge of regulating their own industry is just as bad as putting workers in charge. But FDR's New Deal tried to do just that with the National Recovery Act.

But, under capitalism, the industrialists don't have the right to have the police enforce prices. As such, prices are set by the marginal producer in a competitive marketplace and new marginal producers are free to enter the marketplace at will.

8/19/2011 8:23:33 AM

You guys don't seem to understand that socialism/worker control doesn't necessarily mean centralized price controls. There can still be a market to determine the prices of goods the key difference is that workers democratically dictate where profit and reinvestment go instead of a dictator-CEO. A state apparatus with common ownership is one option, but there's also workers councils, trade unionism, and syndicalism. Of course none of you care, none will confront this point either, because none of you know shit about Socialism as evidenced by repeated characterizations that make it pretty clear that all you know about it is vague propaganda you've been fed from birth. Don't let the fact that you don't know what you're talking about stop you from making more similar statements.


And Christ Loneshark can you at least pretend for a few moments that Capitalism doesn't work perfectly as planned. Your whole shtick seems to be pointing out the textbook best-case-scenarios for markets as though you've never opened an actual history book in your life. Do you really believe it operates so ideally or have you just never left whatever cave you're watching shadows in?

[Edited on August 22, 2011 at 1:15 PM. Reason : .]

8/22/2011 12:59:22 PM

I mean, the simple co-op model here in the US shows that assumptions like LS's aren't always true. Come on now. That's like assuming that people only do things out of selfishness and not altruism...hey, wait...

8/22/2011 1:05:23 PM

Quote :

"And Christ Loneshark can you at least pretend for a few moments that Capitalism doesn't work perfectly as planned."

As capitalism is unplanned, only you could pretend it did. I have no illusions. Markets only ever work just well enough to keep the participants from taking their stuff and going home. It just happens to be that working just well enough beats the hell out of anything anyone else has offered.

I tried to have that discussion with McDanger. An economy legally restricted (by men with guns) to worker owned coops in theory should suffer a firm continuance problem, as old firms die off (competition, technological progress, or internal strife) with no mechanism to replace them with new ones. Such a system would also suffer a capital/worker mismatch, as some firms employ very few workers but command billions of dollars worth of equipment while other firms employ millions but command almost no capital to speak of. He refused to address either, saying we were silly to expect him to have any idea how his ideal system would operate from such a structural standpoint.

[Edited on August 22, 2011 at 2:16 PM. Reason : .,.]

8/22/2011 2:13:59 PM

Quote :

"It just happens to be that working just well enough beats the hell out of anything anyone else has offered. "

On the other hand, the 19 other OECD countries that outperform the more Capitalist US in nearly every metric of a modern civilization, especially the Nordic/Scandinavian Socialists.

[Edited on August 22, 2011 at 2:17 PM. Reason : .]

8/22/2011 2:15:51 PM

Here's a tip, bro: don't come to TWW telling people that they don't know what socialism when you don't know what socialism is.

None of the European countries are "more socialist" than the United States. They're not socialist at all, in fact. They have less debt, less militarism, and more effective welfare programs, but they are not socialist.

8/22/2011 2:19:01 PM

You mean the other OECD countries, especially the Nordic/Scandinavian countries, which in many respects are more capitalist than the US?

[Edited on August 22, 2011 at 2:22 PM. Reason : .,.]

8/22/2011 2:19:33 PM

Yes the ones with Socialized healthcare, Socialized education, and vast welfare systems which are clearly much more Capitalist than the US.

Seriously? Are you about to make the case that Sweden/Norway/Finland are more Capitalist than the US? I doubt it, I more expect you to point to 1 or 2 eccentricities of their system like a slightly lower Corporate tax rate or something while ignoring the overall bent of their systems.

[Edited on August 22, 2011 at 2:26 PM. Reason : .]

8/22/2011 2:24:14 PM

Quote :

"None of the European countries are "more socialist" than the United States. They're not socialist at all, in fact. They have less debt, less militarism, and more effective welfare programs, but they are not socialist."

Oh okay so expanding welfare, making healthcare and education socialized universal, vastly increasing personal income taxes, and strengthening collective bargaining rights wouldn't have any bearing on where the US fits on the Capitalism/Socialism axis, huh?

8/22/2011 2:30:14 PM

Do your research. Privatized education. The government provides vouchers which parents use to buy education from privately run schools. The hospitals are also often privately owned and operated. What you call socialism is what we call government subsidized capitalism.

8/22/2011 2:31:05 PM

Not all market based systems are Capitalist you twit. You might call it Capitalist if the children of richer parents got fatter vouchers, but simply giving people vouchers and letting them choose a provider is not Capitalist at all.

[Edited on August 22, 2011 at 3:01 PM. Reason : .]

8/22/2011 3:01:26 PM

Quote :

"simply giving people vouchers and letting them choose a provider is not Capitalist at all."

What? Having people choose their own provider among private firms with separate owners and employees isn't capitalist? Then what the hell is it?

8/22/2011 3:23:22 PM

Quote :

"None of the European countries are "more socialist" than the United States. They're not socialist at all, in fact. They have less debt, less militarism, and more effective welfare programs, but they are not socialist."

wait...militarism=socialist...effective welfare=non-socialists...



I literally don't know of anyone who has ever defined socialism as defined in such a way.

Quote :

"What? Having people choose their own provider among private firms with separate owners and employees isn't capitalist? Then what the hell is it?"

Wait, by that logic...a taxpayer-supported health insurance sceme like medicare (cause you can choose whatever hospital will take you, in theory) isn't socialist.

What the hell kind of definition are you people using? One that got made-up post-Obama that I haven't read about?

What you're describing is social liberalism or social democracy or maybe Christian Democracy if you're German...political economy-wise that is.

[Edited on August 22, 2011 at 3:43 PM. Reason : x]

8/22/2011 3:39:43 PM

Quote :

"What? Having people choose their own provider among private firms with separate owners and employees isn't capitalist? Then what the hell is it?"

Is that all there is to it? So then Single Payer Healthcare is still Capitalist?

8/22/2011 3:48:30 PM

Olaf Palme is like "WTF? I gave you social democracy and you call me a capitalist?"

8/22/2011 3:49:48 PM

Quote :

"Wait, by that logic...a taxpayer-supported health insurance sceme like medicare (cause you can choose whatever hospital will take you, in theory) isn't socialist."

Quite not. You can call it fascist. You can call it single-payer capitalism. You can call it Social Democracy. You can call it a public-private partnership. But you can't satisfy the classical definition of Socialism which is "public ownership of the means of production". If I own the hospital and can sell it or shut it down at will then it doesn't matter where I get my revenue from, my hospital is an example of capitalist private enterprise, or "private ownership of the means of production".

The government spending money does not make something socialist. If so, then no nation with a government has ever been anything but socialist, as even feudal warlords spent money. Whenever the government bought a paperclip it would classify whole industries as socialist entities. The question of capitalism vs socialism was over ownership, nothing more.

8/22/2011 4:33:58 PM

Wow, an orthodox Marxist definition of socialism from a conservative. You usually don't get something like this. Technically, you're right, but socialism has never been popularly or strictly defined by Marx. It, of course, predates Marx. I think most political scientists accept the idea of the social welfare state as socialist in nature since it is a classless system, but if you're defining based solely on the means of production, then I can see the distinction.

9/7/2011 1:30:18 PM

I've been pushing for the second one around here as people like to blame all silly statism on "socialism", and to take such examples of silliness as legitimate challenges to the separate body of theory/thought thereof.

9/7/2011 2:14:56 PM

oh look lenin looks so friendly...

9/7/2011 2:19:01 PM

Quote :

"I think most political scientists accept the idea of the social welfare state as socialist in nature since it is a classless system"

Now how can you justify this position? All the classes of marxist philosophy exist in these countries. The priests, the politicians, the capitalist owners, and the wage-slave workers. All are still there, it is just when the capitalist retires and passes his business to his children, his healthcare and retirement pension are paid for by the state.

9/7/2011 3:29:55 PM

I meant that the state doesn't make that distinction. The priest and businessman get the same access to healthcare as everyone else. More accurately, it's egalitarian, not truly socialist. I wasn't literally saying that it was completely classless. That's self-evidently not true.

(and yes, I'm in the driver's seat for this user name now)

9/8/2011 11:50:49 AM

no, it's not egalitarian. those at the top get to do whatever the fuck they want and they get the best treatment while those not at the top don't.

9/8/2011 12:57:44 PM

^^ Not quite so. The rich fly off to America for their heart transplant while the poor die on waiting lists or are refused treatment due to cost controls.

9/8/2011 1:14:22 PM

You know that I was just referring to the idea behind it. Stop being so obtuse.

9/8/2011 2:39:22 PM

http://www.forbes.com/sites/frederickallen/2011/12/21/germany-builds-twice-as-many-cars-as-the-u-s-while-paying-its-auto-workers-twice-as-much/

Quote :

" We have strong unions, we have strong social security systems, we have high wages. So, if I believed what the neo-liberals are arguing, we would have to be bankrupt, but apparently this is not the case. Despite high wages . . . despite our possibility to influence companies, the economy is working well in Germany."

12/23/2011 12:38:06 AM

It looks like the Germans have yet to succumb to the conservative viewpoint of "we're too dumb to figure things out, so we might as well give up!"

12/23/2011 12:46:50 AM

You've gotta hand it to the Germans. They've really recovered well after that whole Holocaust thing 70 years ago.

12/23/2011 3:04:09 AM

Oh look, another statistic cited with no analysis of what quality of life it represents.

12/23/2011 8:20:00 AM

Americans are fucking stupid. If you want your socialist utopia, it's going to have to be in some state. You're not going drag Alabama along with you, and you wouldn't even want to anyway.

Embrace federalism. It is your only hope.

12/23/2011 9:28:48 AM

I am curious what affect the sheer size (population and land mass) and demographic make up the United States uniquely has on different economic system setups.

[Edited on December 23, 2011 at 10:33 AM. Reason : words]

12/23/2011 10:32:27 AM

No one has pulled off single payer in a country as large and diverse as the United States. Canada did it...and they have a population of 34 million.

The United States has a huge (lolol) obesity problem made worse by poor education on fitness/nutrition. I cannot, for the life of me, figure out why anyone would want to pool resources with millions of people that simply don't give a shit about their health. Lifestyles and behaviors are extremely variable across the United States.

More generally, there's plenty of resentment in this country. Ultra-progressive secularists in Oregon despise conservatives in the South. The reverse is likely true.

I just don't get the desire to have a unified, powerful federal government. Why? Everything that can be done on the federal level, with the exception of interstate disputes and national defense, can be done more effectively on the state level. Progressives just need to understand that and fucking deal with it. When we vest all this power in the federal government, the negative externalities are much worse than anything "good" that comes out of it.

[Edited on December 23, 2011 at 10:53 AM. Reason : ]

12/23/2011 10:44:34 AM

I think things like healthcare and education can and should be implemented at the state level. Creating competition for social programs would help find the most effective and efficient systems.

Thinks like unions and environmental protection, however, should be able to work on the national level. Otherwise, you have a race to the bottom scenario such as the one described in the article about Germany. Pretty much the way Texas has been courting jobs by creating conditions most favorable to corporations. It might help Texas but it hurts the country as a whole.

Would it be better to have a constitutionally weak federal government or a strong federal government that was able to make objective decisions with regards to its own power? Is that even possible?

12/23/2011 5:42:48 PM

Its not possible, human history proves that time and again. The natural progression is for people to walk like sheep into more control, and for those in power to seize that control. Despite our idealism, freedom is not the natural order of humanity, slavery and oppression is.

[Edited on December 23, 2011 at 6:19 PM. Reason : .]

12/23/2011 6:17:27 PM

So it's too hard so it's not even worth trying?

12/23/2011 6:29:12 PM

forgive my cynicism

12/23/2011 6:34:09 PM

Quote :

"I think things like healthcare and education can and should be implemented at the state level. Creating competition for social programs would help find the most effective and efficient systems."

Yeah, that way we can see what works and doesn't. When we do stuff at the federal level, it doesn't matter how disastrous the effects of the policy are, it's likely to stick around by default.

Quote :

"Thinks like unions and environmental protection, however, should be able to work on the national level. Otherwise, you have a race to the bottom scenario such as the one described in the article about Germany. Pretty much the way Texas has been courting jobs by creating conditions most favorable to corporations. It might help Texas but it hurts the country as a whole. "

I agree on environmental protections, since that likely deals with inter-state disputes. Unions...I'm not sure how the federal government gets involved there. The federal government is influenced heavily by powerful unions, and I don't know that it's better for the average American.

I wouldn't say it's not worth trying to protect rights, we just have to be careful about how we go about doing it. Like I mentioned, when a federal law gets passed, it's more than likely there to stay. There has to be political will to repeal a law, and usually that doesn't happen.

Decentralized government is best, as it tends to be the most democratic. A town government is much more likely to represent the interests of the people in that town than the federal government would be. Plus, if the town/state really oversteps its bounds, people can leave. The states/cities are effectively competing for tax revenue/population.

[Edited on December 23, 2011 at 6:38 PM. Reason : ]

12/23/2011 6:35:25 PM

Quote :

"I agree on environmental protections, since that likely deals with inter-state disputes. Unions...I'm not sure how the federal government gets involved there. The federal government is influenced heavily by powerful unions, and I don't know that it's better for the average American."

The government is influenced by a lot of things. I don't necessarily think that an organization representing thousands and perhaps millions of Americans should be shunned simply because they represent labor interests. To me, that seems like an effective tool of democracy. The only problem is when the money people pour into special interests like unions overtakes the objective decision-making of our elected officials. That's supposed to be a problem that is resolved through elections, but it's being reinforced on a widespread systemic level. Removing the power of special interest money should be one of the main goals in the next decade.

I agree with pretty much everything else you said though. I think there are very specific and limited roles which only the federal government is equipped to deal with and everything else should be left to the states. Unfortunately, quite a few of those roles were unforeseeable at the time the Constitution and Bill of Rights were written and we've done quite a shit job at amending them since.

12/23/2011 7:05:10 PM

i kind of want socialism

the ability to be a lazy motherfucker all day and not give a shit about working and still keep all the health benefits and free food and money rolling in seems enticing on a few levels.

all this 'merit based society' bullshit needs to go. we are all equal and we all deserve everything whenever we want.

12/23/2011 10:13:19 PM

Quote :

"The United States has a huge (lolol) obesity problem made worse by poor education on fitness/nutrition. I cannot, for the life of me, figure out why anyone would want to pool resources with millions of people that simply don't give a shit about their health. Lifestyles and behaviors are extremely variable across the United States."

In most of the data I've seen obesity is a small cost of the whole pie in terms of American healthcare. I've seen numbers as low as 1%. Your comment illuminates a really scary thing about health care in the future. Imagine there isn't single payer and companies can deny someone for high risk/preexisting conditions. In a few years gene sequencing for a individual will be cheap enough to detect all sorts of high risk genetic factors. I imagine soon enough we will have whole family lines denied health insurance because of a particular genetic trait. Why should I or anyone have to pay for any of them?

12/27/2011 4:16:24 PM