Without Capitalism we probably wouldn’t have the smart phones of today. People voted with their wallets to direct companies like Apple and Google to indicate what they were willing to pay for and what they weren’t. In a relatively short time we’ve gone from big, clunky, expensive devices that could only make phone calls, to smart computers that can do almost anything, where the phone is often a barely used feature. In a “command economy” we’d probably just have slightly smaller devices that were still essentially portable phones, because nobody would have made the leap to “smart” stuff.
OTOH, Capitalism when it comes to health care is awful. People who could otherwise be happy, healthy, productive members of society can’t afford to pay monstrous bills so they get stick, stay sick, and sometimes die. Insurance providers hire enormous teams of people to figure out how to deny claims, and hospitals hire enormous teams of people to get insurance companies to pay for treatments. From the point of view of a society, it’s best for everybody to have access to treatment, and for everybody to kick in a little to a pool to pay for that treatment.
It’s even good to have a little mix of traditional systems where people do things the way they’ve been done for centuries. They may not be as efficient, but sometimes people start realizing they really appreciate the craftmanship. Or, there’s some disaster in the new way of doing things (say massive crop failures due to using a monoculture), and it’s good to have the traditional way as a backup.
As for totalitarianism, that’s more a political “system” rather than economic. You can have a totalitarian capitalist system, where the owners of capital own the political system too, and the people at the bottom have no say in what’s going on (you could say the US is headed in that direction). Or, you could theoretically have a fully democratic capitalist system where everybody has an equal say, regardless of how much capital they own. Similarly, you could theoretically have a fully socialist / command economy system where all capital was collectively owned and everybody has an equal say. That’s what communism was supposed to be. Or, you could have a fully autocratic command economy where the government owned everything and one person controlled the government. That’s what the USSR essentially became, or North Korea today. Today’s Russia is effectively a mixed economy under a dictator. The state owns a lot of things, in theory, with their riches flowing to Putin. But, Putin also allows some privately owned companies with privately owned capital to exist, as long as he gets paid off. It may be that this is the most likely outcome of every state. A dictator can’t be awake 24/7 and aware of everything, so they at least need to delegate some trust to other people. It’s unlikely that those people will be loyal unless they get some share of the wealth and power
Fully equal systems where nobody has more power than anybody else are essentially never seen “in the wild”. In reality there are always people who have more political power than the rest. If you remove the government entirely, you soon get warlords, not cooperation. Given that we’re constrained by humanity, the ideal system is probably one where there’s a relatively powerful state, and some hierarchy of power, but where the it doesn’t feel oppresive to most people most of the time.
From the point of view of a society, it’s best for everybody to have access to treatment, and for everybody to kick in a little to a pool to pay for that treatment.
Is 100% compatible with capitalism. Socialism is not when the government collects taxes and does things.
I just want to make sure I understand that you’re on the record for being in favor of single payer healthcare? Because your other posts seem to suggest you’d be against government “interference” with the market
The government forcing you to do certain jobs after deciding what people need. (But you imagine that you will get the nice jobs, and will get the good resources.)
You should take a trip over to Cuba, they have an amazing employment system and universal healthcare! That’s why they have lots of recycled cars and buildings that never get fixed up. Except they only spend money to fix up the fancy hotels and expensive restaurants for European tourists. Cubans aren’t allowed and can’t afford to go to nice restaurants or hotels.
So, what is the best system we have got (that doesn’t turn into totalitarianism)?
The best system seems to be a mix of many things.
Without Capitalism we probably wouldn’t have the smart phones of today. People voted with their wallets to direct companies like Apple and Google to indicate what they were willing to pay for and what they weren’t. In a relatively short time we’ve gone from big, clunky, expensive devices that could only make phone calls, to smart computers that can do almost anything, where the phone is often a barely used feature. In a “command economy” we’d probably just have slightly smaller devices that were still essentially portable phones, because nobody would have made the leap to “smart” stuff.
OTOH, Capitalism when it comes to health care is awful. People who could otherwise be happy, healthy, productive members of society can’t afford to pay monstrous bills so they get stick, stay sick, and sometimes die. Insurance providers hire enormous teams of people to figure out how to deny claims, and hospitals hire enormous teams of people to get insurance companies to pay for treatments. From the point of view of a society, it’s best for everybody to have access to treatment, and for everybody to kick in a little to a pool to pay for that treatment.
It’s even good to have a little mix of traditional systems where people do things the way they’ve been done for centuries. They may not be as efficient, but sometimes people start realizing they really appreciate the craftmanship. Or, there’s some disaster in the new way of doing things (say massive crop failures due to using a monoculture), and it’s good to have the traditional way as a backup.
As for totalitarianism, that’s more a political “system” rather than economic. You can have a totalitarian capitalist system, where the owners of capital own the political system too, and the people at the bottom have no say in what’s going on (you could say the US is headed in that direction). Or, you could theoretically have a fully democratic capitalist system where everybody has an equal say, regardless of how much capital they own. Similarly, you could theoretically have a fully socialist / command economy system where all capital was collectively owned and everybody has an equal say. That’s what communism was supposed to be. Or, you could have a fully autocratic command economy where the government owned everything and one person controlled the government. That’s what the USSR essentially became, or North Korea today. Today’s Russia is effectively a mixed economy under a dictator. The state owns a lot of things, in theory, with their riches flowing to Putin. But, Putin also allows some privately owned companies with privately owned capital to exist, as long as he gets paid off. It may be that this is the most likely outcome of every state. A dictator can’t be awake 24/7 and aware of everything, so they at least need to delegate some trust to other people. It’s unlikely that those people will be loyal unless they get some share of the wealth and power
Fully equal systems where nobody has more power than anybody else are essentially never seen “in the wild”. In reality there are always people who have more political power than the rest. If you remove the government entirely, you soon get warlords, not cooperation. Given that we’re constrained by humanity, the ideal system is probably one where there’s a relatively powerful state, and some hierarchy of power, but where the it doesn’t feel oppresive to most people most of the time.
Just making a note that this:
Is 100% compatible with capitalism. Socialism is not when the government collects taxes and does things.
I just want to make sure I understand that you’re on the record for being in favor of single payer healthcare? Because your other posts seem to suggest you’d be against government “interference” with the market
In theory, sure, it’s compatible with capitalism. In practice, unless the government forces young healthy people to pay into the pool, they won’t.
Government-paid healthcare is not socialism. Socialism and socialized costs are different things.
Not really.
Any kind of centralised authority can turn into totalitarianism if you don’t check it. It’s just how power works.
I mean that’s just my opinion. I’m not like a politics major or anything, so
The government forcing you to do certain jobs after deciding what people need. (But you imagine that you will get the nice jobs, and will get the good resources.)
Or this but with no government and no rules. (But i will be a teacher of philosophy or do programming. totally a societal need.)
Or someone will just rape and then kill You because “yay” there’s no gov and no rules ;)
Having government and rules doesn’t prevent that, so the point is a bit moot
Show me the 1st World country where everybody can get away with that.
But then the whole community will come together to punish the rapist right? Right? Guys?
Rojava and Democratic Confederalism was going pretty well until the US abandoned them to Turkey and Assad.
Totalitarian regimes are awesome I heard!
That argument is so damn tired
You should take a trip over to Cuba, they have an amazing employment system and universal healthcare! That’s why they have lots of recycled cars and buildings that never get fixed up. Except they only spend money to fix up the fancy hotels and expensive restaurants for European tourists. Cubans aren’t allowed and can’t afford to go to nice restaurants or hotels.