No, the classical liberal or propertarian position is against colonialism — gurugeorge

Which came first Colonialism or capitalism?

How much evidence do you want me to provide about misappropriation of land and resources which already had a claim or occupancy on it?
There is Still beneficial Infrastructure in Europe was paid for by slavery. Piracy, war and colonialism led to wealth and artefacts being taken with no recompense.

Exploitation of other countries resources, politics and labour is a reoccurring theme in capitalism.

I am not sure what your original point was but you asked if I would prefer an iPhone or lump of silica implying that superior use of land justified ownership.

When there are finite resources cooperation is the only thing to prevent conflict, war and force.

I am attacking the ideologies that do not encourage stewardship of the land, fair usage and treat the world like an infinite resource and also the just world hypothesis that falsely believes reality is fair and we start from a level playing field.

Regardless of political or economic leanings I do not see a way to claim someone owns somethings which I think is actually a metaphysical claim. If there were infinite resources then we wouldn't need to worry about ownership because no one would be deprived.

My key point is advocating stewardship.

If you live on a piece of land and own some great works of art and literature it would be vandalism to destroy the land so it became unlivable and to destroy the works of art that both could be enjoyed by future generations. You can't own something after your dead.

Children don't deserve to inherit poverty or wealth.

Look at the long conflict between the Israelis and Palestinians over land. The land is being thoroughly exploited and is overpopulated. Ownership claims are being propped up by deliberately having large families to dominate the land and increase perceived claim on the land.

Even if you could get an agreement on land ownership it wouldn't justify overpopulating and unsustainably exploiting the land.

I am wondering what knowledge of History gurugeorge has.

Lets dwell on the history of the Ironically named Congo Free State "owned" by King Leopold II

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Congo_Free_State#Humanitarian_disaster

"A Congolese man looking at the severed hand and foot of his five-year-old daughter who was killed, and allegedly cannibalized, by the members of Anglo-Belgian India Rubber Company militia, 1904"



"(..)generally agree with the assessment of the 1919 Belgian government commission: roughly half the population perished during the Free State period. Hochshild points out that since the first official census by the Belgian authorities in 1924 put the population at about 10 million, these various approaches suggest a rough estimate of a total of 10 million dead.[16]:225-233"

This:-

How much evidence do you want me to provide about misappropriation of land and resources which already had a claim or occupancy on it? — Andrew4Handel

Contradicts this:-

I do not see a way to claim someone owns somethings which I think is actually a metaphysical claim. — Andrew4Handel

(My bolds) The claim of misappropriation rests on the idea that the natives were the original owners of their land.

Before you go hareing off into emotional appeals based on incidents that may or may not be based on facts, and may or may not be characteristic of colonialism and/or capitalism, please try and understand this basic philosophical point.

My key point is advocating stewardship. — Andrew4Handel

Which is fine in some circumstances. But stewardship needs a central authority to decide who gets to "steward" what when. The advantage of the system of private property is that it doesn't require that kind of central decision-making authority, it just requires everyone to follow certain abstract rules (grounded ultimately in the principle of the Golden Rule, or something like the Kantian Categorical Imperative).

(My bolds) The claim of misappropriation rests on the idea that the natives were the original owners of their land. — gurugeorge

I don't agree but I can word it differently if you like.

It can just mean to gain something in an underhand manner or by force.

It doesn't follow anyhow that if I don't own something you have equal right to it.

You seem to be making a classic mistake concerning nihilism. Moral nihilism for example says killing is neither right nor wrong so you can't justify anything under that framework, it doesn't make killing acceptable or excusable but it makes moral claims about it null.

Nihilism could entail cooperation and pragmatism. Because if you accept no one owns anything but you want to live in peace then this system would maximise your goals. Nihilism could lead to anarchy but it can't be entailed by it because it denies this kind of causal necessity.

I am not trying to justify land ownership.But if you intend to justify ownership I can point out that land is not owned or justified by the means you claim.

If you imply resources were claimed fairly I can refute that. My point is that once you put claims on land you get into dodgy territory.

In the Congo as far as I am aware the locals were not using rubber widely however they could have been paid to harvest this resource. It wasn't just resources taken but labour.

Which is fine in some circumstances. But stewardship needs a central authority to decide who gets to "steward" what when. The advantage of the system of private property is that it doesn't require that kind of central decision-making authority, it just requires everyone to follow certain abstract rules (grounded ultimately in the principle of the Golden Rule, or something like the Kantian Categorical Imperative). — gurugeorge

It is not hard to understand stewardship without a central authority. People have historically prepared food for the winter months by preservation methods and storage and so on.

To me you can tell by looking at your environment what might become excessive exploitation.
It seems to me tribal societies with traditional methods are less prone to starvation and over population , live within there means and understand their land. Notorious famines have occurred as consider, in British India and Ireland whilst resources are being shipped elsewhere and local means of subsistence have been undermined by turning crops into cash.

Private property is far more in need of a central authority than stewardship. You need a government and army to enforce property rights and a legal system in the past there was the divine rights of kings now there is inheritance law.

Can you link me to counter evidence?

Fair and sustainable allocation of resources does not rule out rewards for innovation etc Personally I think peoples consciences should be the strongest force in them with rationality. I chose not to ruin my living space because I know when I move someone else will want to live here, I recycle everything possible out of concern for the environment because I don't see the point in ruining the environs other people will need and inherit. I don't want to have millions whilst children starve or have ten children when there is clear over population.

Bill Gates seems a good role model in some respects. Not every wealthy person is unconcerned about poverty, inequality and the environment.

It seems to me tribal societies with traditional methods are less prone to starvation and over population , live within there means and understand their land. Notorious famines have occurred as consider, in British India and Ireland whilst resources are being shipped elsewhere and local means of subsistence have been undermined by turning crops into cash.

Private property is far more in need of a central authority than stewardship. You need a government and army to enforce property rights and a legal system in the past there was the divine rights of kings now there is inheritance law.

Can you link me to counter evidence? — Andrew4Handel

How about the failure of the Marxist-Leninist experiment?

Wouldn't that be apt to say being close to "stewardship"? Quite much central authority with central planning. It's called history, you know.

And furthermore, the idea that tribal societies are less prone to starvation and over population is simply incorrect. Tribal societies with antiquated farming methods and substance farming have always been prone starvation due to bad years. Substance farming can sound something romantic, but it's totally incompatible to feed the modern world. With all it's negative sides (which I assume people here will eagerly point out), modern industrial agriculture is the solution that we don't have famines in the West.

And furthermore, the reason for the Irish famine was potatoe blight (and potatoe was the cheapest thing to cultivate with usually the biggest crops, hence it became the main food for the poor). My country (Finland) suffered one of the most latest famines ever to happen in Western Europe, and that was because of weather causes. Not because of capitalism or land ownership issues.

And the increase in affluence of the population brings population growth down. Overpopulation is a problem in the poorest countries where the simple reason for having more children is that they can work for the family and take care of you later.

Without the concept of ownership, there is no theft.

You are not depriving someone else of it, because he has no inherent right to it.

Without people creating, agreeing upon rights, there are none.

So then it just becomes a matter of being the first, or wielding the biggest stick.

It doesn't follow anyhow that if I don't own something you have equal right to it. — Andrew4Handel

Again, you are completely missing the point that there's no there there, unless there's some sort of ongoing relationship of use or control between person and thing. There's nothing there to have rights or not have rights about, unless there's an actual relationship between person and thing that you can either let be or interfere with.

Rights are not some mystical halo that stretches from a given individual or group through some kind of rights-ether across the whole known and unknown universe.

You have no right to a thing at the other side of the world that you've never seen or come into contact with, you have rights only in relation to things that you have some sort of ongoing control/use interaction with. The right to private property is simply an obligation the rest of us take on, to let you keep control of whatever you control, until and unless you do harm. Why do we do that? Because we know how horrible it is to have things taken away at random by others, and we extend to others the same consideration that we would wish for ourselves.

The outrage you feel against (e.g.) colonialism depends on the very same intuition. There they were, the natives, happily using their shit, until the big bad colonialists came along and took it from them without so much as a by your leave (or so the story goes - it's largely a myth, but let's run with it for the sake of the argument).

The outrage is that some people took control of things from others without their consent. But that just is breaching the rule of private property, that just is theft. Theft is not breaching your supposed etherial "right" to things you've never seen or entered into a relationship with, it's breaking an actual thing, an actual ongoing relationship between person and thing.

Nihilism could entail cooperation and pragmatism. — Andrew4Handel

Private property is a system of co-operation and pragmatism - just one that doesn't require central direction. It's certainly not the only possible system of social order, but it's the most basic because it deals with individuals first, and individuals are the active units, the things that have hands and brains, the things that can do things, either individually or in groups.

You need a government and army to enforce property rights and a legal system in the past there was the divine rights of kings now there is inheritance law. — Andrew4Handel

That's central authority, but it's not central direction. As it happens, the question of whether central authority is necessary for governance is still open. Obviously, historically, systems of private property have developed out of the central authority of kings and governments; but (albeit more rarely), they've also arisen as spontaneous orders - e.g. the Law Merchant, the legal system of mediaeval Iceland, etc. - so it's a moot point whether the historical path that was actually taken is the only path that can be taken.

But at any rate, again you're missing a crucial distinction. If you don't have a system where the question of who gets to control what when is decided by an abstract rule that applies equally to all (whether enforced by a central authority, or as a spontaneous social order), then the only possible alternative is that someone has to ACTIVELY DECIDE who gets to control what, when. Names have to be named: Bob (or Bob's Tribe) gets to control x for A duration, Alice (or Alice's Tribe) gets to control y for B duration. IOW unless you simply want chaos, then absent a social order run on abstract principles that apply equally to all, someone or some group has to assign control/use of things directly to other human beings (whether it's done in their name, by delegates or representatives or whatever, is another issue, but also, it turns out, largely irrelevant).

But it's not just that: not only does the question of who gets to control what when have to be decided centrally, the question of what they do with what they control has also got to be decided centrally.

So where has freedom gone?

It seems to me tribal societies with traditional methods are less prone to starvation and over population , live within there means and understand their land. — Andrew4Handel

This is a fantasy, known as the fantasy of the "noble savage," and it's been a fantasy since Rousseau first popularized it among intellectuals it in the 18th century. Most tribal societies are extremely violent compared to ours, and full of continuous inter-tribal strife. Evidence that's been presented by ideologues to the contrary has invariably been found out to be bogus (e.g. cf. the foofaraw around Margaret Mead's Coming of Age in Samoa).

You've got a very distorted view of history. I don't blame you though, current State "education" systems are terrible, and they've been captured by an insane ideology that pumps its tendentious drivel into the soft heads of children from kindergarten through childhood to university, and continues reinforcing it via media and "entertainment" systems through adulthood.

Here is a book on famines under the British Empire:

"Davis argues that "Millions died, not outside the 'modern world system', but in the very process of being forcibly incorporated into its economic and political structures. They died in the golden age of Liberal Capitalism; indeed, many were murdered ... by the theological application of the sacred principles of Smith, Bentham and Mill."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Late_Victorian_Holocausts

"In part, the Great Famine may have been caused by an intense drought resulting in crop failure in the Deccan Plateau.[1] But, the regular export of grain by the colonial government; during the famine the viceroy, Lord Lytton, oversaw the export to England of a record 6.4 million hundredweight (320,000 ton) of wheat, made the region more vulnerable. However, the cultivation of alternate cash crops, in addition to the commodification of grain, played a significant role in the events."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Famine_of_1876%E2%80%9378


https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Bengal_famine_of_1770

"The famine is one of the many famines and famine-triggered epidemics that devastated the Indian subcontinent during the 18th and 19th century.[4][5][6] It is usually attributed to a combination of reasons and the policies of the British East India Company. In The Medieval History Journal Vinita Damodaran cites Mike Davies who argues that colonized territories, such as India and Ireland, were used as experiments to understand the impacts of free market economics. The results were famine and devastation for the people"

What is the origin of the need to work? Hint: it is a very simple answer.

You've got a very distorted view of history — gurugeorge

I am the only one presenting actual historical evidence.

What knowledge do you have of the Congo under Leopold and what explanation do you have for the ten million deaths and the chopping off of peoples hands and slave labour?

I can present tons of evidence here.

I am not idealising tribal societies, however if you see the list of famines involving mutli-millions of deaths how many can you attribute to people living primitive lifestyles and how many were alleviated by capitalism or land exploitation?

You can analyse this list for the trajectory and causes of famine.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_famines

Most tribal societies are extremely violent compared to ours, and full of continuous inter-tribal strife. — gurugeorge

I wasn't talking about violence levels but sustainability of life style and population sizes and famine.

I think our economic system is violent and destructive etc and unsustainable. Allowing people to starve under gross inequality is a form of violence. Also lets not forget the trillion pound arms industry.

Obviously there is a vast amount of information that could be studied but it seems to me that some interpretations of history are purely ideologically. How can tribal societies be more violent than two world wars, the holocaust and trans Atlantic and Arab slave trades?

None of this anyhow justifies ownership or excessive unsustainable exploitation of resources.

I am not sure how to add photos here but I can easily link to you to images of massive pollution around the world. Dying rivers, deforestation, dramatic climate change and so on.

How about the failure of the Marxist-Leninist experiment? — ssu

I don't see how stewardship entails communism or is a central plank in its doctrines.

Like I have said stewardship is a simple assessment of the impact of your activity on your environs like not defecating in the water you are going to drink from.

I don't see evidence that communist regimes took extra care to preserve their environs, more the reverse. It is not like they tried sustainable practises and failed rather the reverse.

It would be bizarre if we were the only species that could not live in a natural states and survive. Apparently we alone are culpable for an unprecedented, rapid rate of extinction in other species. I am not saying we should live in a state of nature but I don't think completely ignoring nature makes sense either.

I am happy for a multi millionaire to posses x amount of land if he or she does not destroy it or stop others accessing it when they need to. Sustainability and stewardship does not imply everyone should be equal at any cost and that resources should be all divided equally at any cost. Rather it implies that people who are best skilled to preserve and sustainably use and distribute resources would be favoured

And overall I am not advocating any system just criticising the rationale of the ideology I outlined in my opening post.

I am the only one presenting actual historical evidence. — Andrew4Handel

No, apart from the wiki list (which actually partly contradicts some of your points) you're presenting tendentious, biased, ideologically-motivated propaganda. It's a distraction. I'm not interested in getting into the weeds re. famine, I'm interested in the philosophical question you opened with.

Again, please don't misunderstand me. You seem to be a gentle, well-meaning soul who's disturbed by and concerned about suffering, and I'm not saying your analysis is entirely without merit (cf. the points I made above about how limiting options can constitute harm). What I am saying is that you are looking in the wrong direction for solutions because you are misdiagnosing the root philosophical aspects of the problem. If you are concerned about people starving, suffering, etc., private property and capitalism are your friends, not your enemies, and if you think otherwise then you've been bamboozled by ideology.

How can tribal societies be more violent than two world wars, the holocaust and trans Atlantic and Arab slave trades? — Andrew4Handel

Because there are obviously going to be more people killed for various reasons in absolute terms when there are more people. What's important is the percentages, because shifts in percentages reflect the effects of political and economic measures over time.

A society with 10,000 people of which 3,000 die violent or theoretically avoidable deaths each year is more violent and less well run than a society of 10 million people of which a million die violent or theoretically avoidable deaths each year, regardless of the fact that a million is a much larger number of dead people than 3,000.

You said

And you are not necessarily depriving someone of anything by using a resource. You may be, but only in very particular and rare circumstances. — gurugeorge

The examples I cited of food being exported from Ireland and India during famines are counter examples to this.

I am not being deprived of the use of something on the other side of the world that I'm not using, that I'm not in a natural relationship of control with — gurugeorge

The point I am making about depriving is that once you claim to own something then you are saying no one else is entitled to it. This would be fine if the world was infinite in size but because it isn't and the population has grown hugely then there is less to be owned by more people.

Even if there were less people, owning a resource can mean preventing others from accessing it, so for example you might on the only source of clean water in area.

Anyway as I showed with the Congo example often other countries and peoples are exploited to benefit someone living thousands of miles away. It is no longer the case and hasn't been for centuries that your lifestyle will have a limited impact.

I oppose the idea that we can do what we want with the earth and exploit it how we like which is really anarchy.

I am not claiming capitalism is to blame for famine but rather excessive exploitation, but that does seem to be encouraged under capitalism

If you are concerned about people starving, suffering, etc., private property and capitalism are your friends, not your enemies, and if you think otherwise then you've been bamboozled by ideology. — gurugeorge

If this was true then why are there so many, many paragraphs about exceptions that seemingly need to be imposed on what may be "done" with money? What may or may not be sold etc.? The only aspect that makes your statement somewhat true is, how Marx put it, that the burgeoise society developed a huge production-force to stay on top in the somewhat Darwinistic selection process inherent to the capitalistic mode of production. Like was said in some film by some ultra-liberal lobbyist: "corruption is the regulation of free markets". Seems this is needed: Minimum wages imposed by the state, threats to move factories somewhere cheap countered by threats to impose tarifs, protectionism vs. free trade.
What is reflected in those examples is the contradiction of capital-interest and the human society.

A society with 10,000 people of which 3,000 die violent or theoretically avoidable deaths each year is more violent and less well run than a society of 10 million people of which a million die violent or theoretically avoidable deaths each year, regardless of the fact that a million is a much larger number of dead people than 3,000. — gurugeorge

I have notice that this analysis of tribal societies is controversial in anthropology. Nevertheless I have not used tribal societies as a model for non violent societies.

I think a million deaths Over 3,000 is a more violent world. You just need to have loads more children create millions of new people each year to dilute the percentage rate of suffering. We are living in a time of excess and not just in the positive sense. Not a time of moderation.

I do appreciate your point about making innovative use of resources. But that doesn't justify excess.

I don't think ownership/private property can be logically or scientifically justified even if you would like it to exist as a thing. It is like I mentioned with moral nihilism, where killing is neither right or wrong regardless of preferences but we treat certain things as wrong because we want a stable society.

So as I see this means our claims should be weaker and more pragmatic.

Fairly expensive, but if you want to go in a blaze of glory, I think this size might be right. — Bitter Crank

220 bloody feet long!! I think I need one about 200 feet shorter. And the price is about 5 zeros too long as well.

I have heard that if you use liquid oxygen as a charcoal starter and light it with a very very very long match that the result is incandescent. So, get some liquid O, use that instead of gasoline on your funeral pyre, and the flash will be truly magnificent. — Bitter Crank

That might not be a good idea. But I do have several oxygen and acetylene bottles I could get filled and used them to get the party going. Got to think about that.

But anyway, I think I will get back to that later. I hope I have a few more years to go. Being a very healthy 65 I think that I could quite easily get to a cool 110. So I'm just gonna sleep on the problem for now. :cool:

And the increase in affluence of the population brings population growth down. Overpopulation is a problem in the poorest countries where the simple reason for having more children is that they can work for the family and take care of you later. — ssu

Overpopulation is a fairly recent problem. These countries became poorer and exploited under colonialism and inherited the colonialists religious beliefs in fertility and contraceptives etc.

It is ironic that the western countries which consume the most of the earth resources become complacent about their luxury and can boast of responsible breeding. It is not clear that all these others people can conceivably share our lifestyle and consume the same amount of resources.

The examples I cited of food being exported from Ireland and India during famines are counter examples to this. — Andrew4Handel

No, they are examples of "particular and rare circumstances." Vast, vast amounts of commerce have been going on successfully for the past few centuries under capitalism, supporting an ever-increasing populationin absolute terms, and not just supporting it at subsistence level, but always incrementally more and more in fairly comfortable lifestyles.

An increasing global population, living in incrementally improving comfort,directly contradicts your point. If capitalism and private property were peculiarly conducive to famine, we would have already reverted to a tribal situation. And it would actually also be more violent in percentage terms (since tribal society is more violent in percentage terms, and more prone to famine, diebacks as a result of natural disasters, etc.).

Again, related to the other point, the thing to focus on is percentages. When you say:-

I think a million deaths Over 3,000 is a more violent world. — Andrew4Handel

That's true in a sense - yes, there is more violence in absolute terms, but that's just what you'd expect when there's more people, even if the political arrangements were idyllic in your terms, and the number of deaths was relatively small, and remained at the same percentage as the population increased, the world would still be "more violent" in the sense you're using here.

owning a resource can mean preventing others from accessing it,. — Andrew4Handel

Yes, that's exactly the point I've been making: CAN. But not invariably, not inevitably, and actually only rarely. The rule of private property is subject to the harm proviso or harm condition. The limit of private property is where ownership could be construed as limiting others options in a harmful way. Harm justifies interference, and it's the only thing that justifies interference. IOW while private property is an absolute principle, there's plenty of room for reasonable people to disagree on what constitutes the condition, harm, under given circumstances (it's not always obvious).

Again, it's really quite simple: allow others to keep control of whatever they're controlling, until and unless they cede control to you voluntarily, or until you can justify interference with their control on the basis that they're doing harm in some way. That's it, that's the rule of several property in a nutshell, and it already covers all the things you're concerned about, without any need for centralized control of society. It's not perfect, market failure does occasionally occur, but it's the best we can do short of having a benevolent AI with perfect information and perfect oversight, to order us around.

Minimum wages imposed by the state — Heiko

Minimum wages cause unemployment, they are entirely counter-productive. Most especially, they prevent young people from getting a foot on the ladder of economic progress. They are usually supported by entrenched interests, such as unions.

This is paralleled at the other end of the scale by various forms of corporate welfare. In reality, all legislation that goes against laissez-faire is the product of collusion between big business and the state, or between organized labour and the state, in both cases purely for the purpose of maintaining those interests in their entrenched positions, as against the interests of society as a whole (for corporations especially, maintaining their market share against competitors - the very last thing big business is interested in is a genuinely free market, which is why big business heavily supports Left-wing parties and institutions financially; the more people believe in the fiction that the State can and ought to control the economy, the more levers banking and big business have to influence the State, it's a complete con-game).

The idea that fiat law related to economic matters benefits society as a whole is totally bogus, propaganda for useful idiots. It's politicians buying the votes of the ignorant with promises they cannot possibly keep, at the behest of special interests.

The end result isn't robbing Peter to pay Paul, it's robbing Peter to pay Peter - IOW a useless churning that's a leech on the economy and the main reason we can't have nice things.

As Frederic Bastiat said: "the State is that great fiction whereby everybody seeks to live at the expense of everybody else." ;)

the contradiction of capital-interest and the human society — Heiko

Which has yet to be demonstrated, for all the reams of Marxian twaddle that have been written.

Minimum wages cause unemployment — gurugeorge

No, unemployment is caused either by people not trying to get employed or by firms not employing them. You have to be deep into some ideological thoughts/justifications to come to other conclusions. What hinders them is the potential loss of profit. And now say that unemployment - this - is not caused by "capitalism".

I didn't mean that minimum wages are the sole cause of unemployment, just that they do cause unemployment when implemented.

The reason is obvious: if you make labour cost more than it's worth, the demand for it will be less. Employers will simply not employ people at the higher rate - they will use substitutes, re-organize the business, employ more automation, etc.

Some labour just isn't worth very much - the labour of young, inexperienced people, the labour of relatively stupid people, the labour of immigrants who can't speak the language, etc., etc. But in a free market such people will be employed at the not-very-great value of their labour. However, if their labour is artificially priced higher than its value to employers, they won't be employed at all.

That's handy for entrenched union interests, who don't want the competition (IOW they don't want new blood getting on the bottom rung of the employment ladder, gaining skills and work experience, and eventually competing with them), but it's a miserable deal for those who now have no job prospects at all.

Another example of the maxim: "The road to hell is paved with good intentions."

I didn't mean that minimum wages are the sole cause of unemployment, just that they do cause unemployment when implemented. — gurugeorge

And I meant there cannot ever be another cause of unemployment but the two mentioned.

The reason is obvious: if you make labour cost more than it's worth, the demand for it will be less. Employers will simply not employ people at the higher rate - they will use substitutes, re-organize the business, employ more automation, etc. — gurugeorge

Which underlines the above statement.

Some labour just isn't worth very much - the labour of young, inexperienced people, the labour of relatively stupid people, the labour of immigrants who can't speak the language, etc., etc. But in a free market such people will be employed at the not-very-great value of their labour. However, if their labour is artificially priced higher than its value to employers, they won't be employed at all. — gurugeorge

How would you define what the labour is worth?

That's handy for entrenched union interests, who don't want the competition (IOW they don't want new blood getting on the bottom rung of the employment ladder, gaining skills and work experience, and eventually competing with them), but it's a miserable deal for those who now have no job prospects at all. — gurugeorge

But the unions do not make the decisions to employ or not, do they?

...it's the extreme that is the problem. — Pattern-chaser

Agreed. We need to be working at reducing the extremes. We might call a solution "socialism at the extremes, and capitalism in the middle".

SOCIALISM: The top 20% percent should be more heavily taxed with the funds redirected towards creating education and job opportunities for the lowest 20%.

CAPITALISM: For the middle 60% things should work much as they already do, so that everybody has an incentive to produce and improve their situation.

The overall goal should be to create a middle class society.

And now here's the catch. On a global scale, we are the top 20%. On a global scale the "middle class" would likely be a lifestyle unacceptable to most of us. Pointing being, heavily taxing the rich sounds great, until we realize that we are the rich.

Pointing being, heavily taxing the rich sounds great, until we realize that we are the rich. — Jake

Yes, I rather think that's why this issue has never been satisfactorily addressed, because those who have the power to do so are those who would lose out the most. A thorny problem.... :chin: :yikes:

Hi PatternChaser, nice to meet you.

Just read your profile. Wow, we have a lot in common. I particularly enjoyed your favorite quote.

To further respond, I think what's happening is that progress is shoving everybody closer together so that the boundary between "their problems" and "our problems" is being steadily erased.

As example, in most Western cities at least, the sewer system is provided not just to the rich neighborhoods, but the poor neighborhoods too, out of the realization that when it comes to communicable disease we are all in this together.

This evolving mindset would likely solve the problem over the long run, but there's a pretty good chance we won't make it to the long run.

And I meant there cannot ever be another cause of unemployment but the two mentioned. — Heiko

This is silly semantic quibbling. It's legitimate in ordinary language, to call a government policy the cause of a statistical trend, even though everyone knows perfectly well that the efficient/necessary causes involved are the millions of individual decisions that go to make up the trend. Newspaper/media articles and scientific papers do it all the time.

How would you define what the labour is worth? — Heiko

I don't have to define it, the employers do. They are the ones who have to weigh up the costs and benefits to them, of employing such people.