[ExI] socialism

[Dan TheBookMan]

On Feb 24, 2019, at 8:18 PM, Stuart LaForge <avant at sollegro.com> wrote:
> 
> It is my observation that neither capitalism nor socialism is capable of managing the markets of the 21st century. As people have pointed out in the past, pure socialism is unproductive and inevitably runs out of other people's wealth to redistribute. And as the wealth gap increases, pure unregulated capitalism will likely run out of consumers able to afford the goods and services that the market has to offer.
> 
> Simply put, this is because while robots make great workers, they make very poor customers. So in accumulating wealth and denying social spending in the process of ensuring that that they are the last to starve, the rich have nonetheless ensured that they will eventually starve.
> 
> Now more than ever in our history, capitalists and socialists need to sit down with each other and stitch together the best welfare state that a robust healthy market economy can afford. And by welfare, I mean welfare for everybody and not just subsidies for factory farmers and oil companies.
> 
> Unfortunately, these days capitalists and socialists and more likely to punch each other at Trump rallies than have a meaningful conversation with one another.

Folks at Trump rallies are not champions of free markets. I think it should be painfully obviously from Trump’s campaign rhetoric and from his actual policies that Trump is not and has never been a proponent of free markets. (Of course, to be fair, his positions tend to shift depending on caprice, but the one thing he tends to always stand against is free markets. One need only look at his trade policy. Or his immigration policy. And look at his business career too: never one to not look for some government help via eminent domain or subsidies. Never one also to disrespect others’ property rights when it served his financial success.)

> But ultimately no matter how passionate the proponents, both of their ideologies are obsolete. Both socialism and capitalism are outdated socioeconomic pardigms because we are in uncharted technological territory right now.
> 
> Economists like von Mises and Marx that died over a century ago have very little to say that is relevant regarding the effect of the Internet, robotics, AI, life-extension and other H plus tech on the economy. So we as a society need to shelve those outdated ideas and come up with a sustainable economic model that fits the modern reality we find ourselves living in because we are running out of time and the political divisiveness threatens to kill us all.

I disagree. Now more than ever I would hope for others here to see its promoting individual freedom and autonomy for everyone that should be the focus. The divisiveness you’re seeing is mostly different cliques of statism fighting it out. And, to be sure, I actually don’t think most people in the US even understand philosophical or ideological differences. My perception is most people tend to line up with various teams (red or blue?) and at best take a laundry list approach... And one must be fearful of unity simply to avoid disagreements. That can lead to suppression of all rival views. That’s surely not the future you’re aiming at, is it?

Regards,

Dan
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