Ahhh Captalism

jlew24asu wrote:

how so? and what does that even mean?

buying stock gives you ownership of a company.

Its a giant infomercial..

buying chicken gives you ownership of a chicken.

jlew24asu wrote:

really,

do you get voting power of the chicken?

can you elect people to run the chickens life?


again, what is your point? that we conquered the west?

Voting power? funny how an American would still believe in that when a significant majority of American's with voting power don't trust the President of their country.

Voting power to run the chicken's life? I can cut his head off, or keep it in the house as a pet, can use it to lay eggs, or make Chicken parmasian.

Do you have those options when you buy stock in Exxon?

A Stock Broker is the same as a convenience store owner selling lottey tickets. The store owner doesn't necessarily understand the probability or soundness of the purchase any more than the stock broker.

as for current "growth"? where does the additonal money go? mega million dollar compensation for the CEO that produce nothing? Mega millions to random pretty young girls to watch them sing in sexy clothes that produce nothing? Insurance companiesn that produce nothing? Lawyers that produce nothing?

really - what would growth be? people living in sky scrapers and travelling in solar powered GPC flying saucers?

the survival of our species requires our pulling back.. not plunging forward witout direction. We are depleting our planet. We have no backup plan. Our water supply for example might get diseased - perhaps on purpose but one of the billions of people living in poverty - powerless to make change any other way. What will happen to growth then? a planet full of thirsty people.

Humans will fail if we insist on perpetuating this culture of progress for the few with the right connections.

We can not grow when our motto is every man for himself. Growth being so many different things pulling in different directions. The thing we need now is to pull back, and our current society is not willing to do that. The reason they are not is because they are fed lies by those with the connections.. false assurances...

Capitalism is illogical and will be our downfall because we are afraid of each other.. we don't believe in our ability to govern

We are afraid of legislation for the good of mankind.. yet the market itself is filled with mountains of regulations and legislation...

we are a funny cult... pretty stupid and not ashamed to admit that we are incapable of making plans as a group.. The entire population has resigned to the fact that "government" is a bad thing and must be minimised.. when government is the process of making plans and working together.

we wont stop the collapse.. we will need it to step back, and we don't have the courage to do it before then.

lucylespian wrote:

This is an intersting post, because it contains a lot of ssense, esp the bits about stockbrokers not necessarily indertanding athe market, or what it is likely to do.
It also corectly points out that even big share traders don't realistically get to influence the companys they hold stock in.
Further it is tru that obscene amounts of money are spent on executives and pretty entertainers, and esp useless parasitic lawyers.
Biut tehn it all falls down, when you say capitalism is illogical. Capitalism i basically an espresison of competitiveness within a species, and that exists in every singel species. Any individual orgnism's worst enemy is another member of it's own species, because that is who is competting most direstly for available resources.
So, capitalism is not illogical, it is inevitable. How it occurs, or is expressed, however, is open to debate, and up for change. A stock market for example, is not a necessary component. Capitalism existed before the stock exchange, and will exist after.
Capitalism never really even died coompletely under Communist rule in Russia and China, it just morphed into different forms. People still bartered and traded, and looked for advantage, kept track of fear and favours, and struggled to do their best or not, just as they have always done everywhere.
My 2cents, the stock market is a flimsy house of cards, crashes every once in a while, depends on greed and belief to keep it going, lawyers are useless parasites, entertainers are a good part of our culture, but get paid way too much, so do pro sports people, fucking ridiculous.

ok, I can agree that capitalism is not illogical. I was more trying to say that as a nation we often let the marketplace decide significant things. There are many things that are of no interest to the market.

Declining resources, polution and long term preservation of things like water and air.. are of little interest to the marketplace.

in addition, starving and oppressed people are of no interest to the marketplace. and granted these things are of little interest to many people who are not oppressed or hungry...

basically individuals are of no interest to the marketplace.. the market place left unchecked will lead to something very much like a dictatorship. Once the majority of wealth is accumulated by one person - we have a dictator.

So yes, i agree that capitalism has some wonderful advantages. However, without some responsibility in areas that are not a priority of the marketplace - democracy will fall.

We are bacically believers that every individual has an equal vote .. capitalism is creating a democracy where the weight of your vote is directly proportional to your net worth.