The larger problem, globally, is that capitalism as practiced today doesn’t deliver for the 99%. It just doesn’t. And worldwide, let’s face it, the .001% do whatever they want with impunity. I understand an average voter giving up on the system and voting for an extremist out of ignorance acting upon desperation.
To paraphrase the life of Brian. Other than the higher life expectancy, the increase disposable income, many countries in the world now have living standards equal to middle income countries in the west, women mortality rate have decreased. We have all kinds of social media and other technology advancements for us to complain about how they are destroying out society. Food production is so efficient (but still polluting) that we can feed such a huge amount of people in the world (we still suck at delivering it to all), more people are alive today that ever in the history of this planet (we will probably peak at around 9-10 billion), but other than that, what has capitalism (and free trade) ever done for us. https://quillette.com/2016/01/16/ho...alization-have-made-the-world-a-better-place/
We see an increasing/exploding gap in wealth between the rich and the rest in European countries. We see managers of multinationals with obscene payments. These managers are in fact what civil servants are in government institutions. They don't take risks that could destroy their own wealth, like real businessmen and women do, running their own businesses. When I see managers taking a hundred million or more a year, that's not a reward, that's theft. Managers donot take risks with their own capital, which would justify the high risk reward, they take risks with other's money. And people in Europe see that and many of them turn to populist parties in anger, because the governments for decades have been implementing policies that ate into the living standards of the working people in order to facilitate globalization and the multinationals. Managers giving themselves rewards for high profits, which were related to government tax policies and not to increased profitability from business decisions etc.
Even the people that complain about the current state of capitalism, something that lefties call 'late capitalism' do acknowledge that it has helped everyone, just not equally. Yes, the top .01 percent has done better than the top 20%, who has done better than the bottom 80%. But the improvement is relative, is not like the bottom 80, did not get any, they just did not get enough. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2019/12/road-late-capitalism/603769/ So capitalism does deliver to the 99%, it does not deliver enough or as much as the we would want, but it still delivers. So it is about adjustments to make it deliver more, not about throwing it out like the crazy lefties want. The crazy right want some other shit, racial nationalism and such, but fvck that. Now these guys actually try to argue that inventors are actually not capturing the full value of their inventions, I don't think I buy that, but we all have received great benefits from their innovations, just that it is in the way we live and not on the income we collect. Then again, many content creators have gotten very wealthy, so some people other than the innovators have received economic prosperity. Bazos is underpaid Read more at: https://www.bloombergquint.com/gadfly/-late-capitalism-not-even-close BTW, man, we sell our personal information for cheap.
@ceezmad I question your 99%, unless you start with the birth of the VOC. But that's not what's @superdave point is....if I understood him correctly.
This is the part that I took offense to. It does deliver, it has delivered a lot for the ''99%''. Sure the top .001% has received a lot more of the gains, no doubt about that, but the idea that capitalism (as practiced today) does not deliver for the 99% is fvcking crazy. It should deliver more and we need to do more transfers and protections, yes, that I agree with. But crazy fvcks like Melenchon are not the answer. Sure as a protest vote, I get it, but as a true believer of the bullshit he regurgitates, hell's no. (He is still better than La Pen, I would agree to that) Reading is overrated.
The point was the popularity of populists with European voters and the why of it. Few of those voters are interested in the history of and benefits of capitalism from before their time. They take a view/have a perception of capitalism's working in their life time, and in their life time it/this incarnation has deteriorated their lives to benefit multinationals and the pinstripe criminals.
Oh I get that, people will have crazy ideas and that is why they vote the way the do. But blaming immigrants or blaming capitalism for their problems is still bullshit. You can understand why some people would come to those conclusions and choose to vote for crazy fvcks like Le Pen of Melenchon. But it does not mean we have to agree to the crazy ideas that got them there. I did read superdaves comment as he was agreeing with the idea that capitalism has not delivered for the 99%. Perhaps that is not what superdave means, perhaps his point was that the far left people believe that, that is why they voted Melenchon.
And that is still bullshit. The capitalist system still delivers today. It is unfair and un-equal, but still the best system for creating wealth. We just need better rules to tax that wealth.
For whom does it deliver? Not for most people, that's for damned sure Creating wealth should not be the goal. It is not just "unfair and un-equal." It is grossly unfair and cruelly unequal. It favors money, no the creation of wealth, over people and their well being. "Better rules to tax that wealth" would be anti-capitalist.
For all of us, we would not be talking on this website with out it. It is not perfect and it needs to be regulated so the keys of capitalism continue to work. Capitalism is competition, so we need the government to better regulate this, so a few companies do not control some areas of the economy. Innovation, this we are doing pretty well, some companies do buy and sit on patents, so we regulations could help there, but if you do not think that innovation has not helped a lot of people, then I do not know what to say. Price setting is probably one of the best things about capitalism, I know that some people want rent control and other type of government set prices, but we have a long history about those things going horribly wrong. Yes market set prices can get out of control when supply is constrained, either by events or artificially, but the private sector setting prices has a much better track record that government set pricing. You need to create the wealth to tax it. We need to generate wealth to increase the living standards of people. This does use up lots of resources on earth, so I guess I can see the argument, that if the world was poorer we would not destroy our planet as much. But that will be hard to run on for politicians, but I can definitely see this argument. Property taxes, tax wealth already, so that is not anti-capitalist. Taxing assets means taxing non-cash items, your property taxes can be covered by your income, taxing other assets would be more complicated. It would mean having to sell some of those assets to cover the tax bill, this can be a good thing, as it would in theory mean less hording of assets in a few hands, this is one of the main reasons economist support inheritance taxes to combat inequality. Inheritance taxes are unpopular because people want to pass on their home to their children. So it is complicated for politicians to keep high property taxes, even in very progressive countries like the Scandinavians, so that is a shame. There are better ways to tax than yearly wealth taxes, but they are unpopular. Higher capital gains are unpopular since lots of upper middle class have stocks. So democrats are trapped in that the only revenue increase they can run on is taxing only the rich. Another thing these anti capitalist politicians like Melenchon rail against (and some right wingers like Trump) is global trade, they see it as rich capitalist taking their jobs to other countries. Global trade has helped with global inequality in some sense, before more wealth was concentrated in the white world of North America and Europe (Japan, Australia also included). Now the wealth is being spread out around the world, that has created anti trade sentiments in both the left and the right. Obviously saying that trade helps the world be less unequal (in terms of global balance) will not win many votes in a country, politics are nationalistic after all. Turning back the clock to less global trade and more protectionism is not the answer (we could have better trade deals with more environmental protection rules for sure). You can have high taxes and still be a capitalist country. Destroying the capitalist system is not the answer.
I agree with your larger point about contemporary global capitalism, but wondered if you're familiar with this argument that "the 99%" is really the 90% AND the 9.9%? He turned the article into a book, and it was pretty good.
I don’t remember that article but I’ve seen that theme, that the next 10% are breaking even and have a weird sense of self identification. Read the penultimate paragraph here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fred_Heineman He was briefly a member of my church before they built another Lutheran church nearer his house, and he was also my congressman for two years. I volunteered on the campaign the beat him.
Macron may lose his majority, https://www.economist.com/europe/2022/06/09/at-french-elections-macrons-majority-is-on-the-line But hey maybe all is not lost for Macron, this may help him
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/politics/...-sports-minister-to-parliament_5987393_5.html Politics 2022 Legislative Elections French legislative elections: Naturalized chambermaid beats ex-sports minister to Parliament Rachel Keke moved to France in 2000, and became the leader of a movement to defend chambermaids' rights in 2019. By Lire en français Share Rachel Keke, a former hotel chambermaid now elected to France's Assemblée Nationale, here shown campaigning in Fresnes, on June 16. THIBAULT CAMUS / AP
Macron did lose his majority and the extreme parties did well The far left did the second best, and the far right got their most seats ever. https://www.cnn.com/2022/06/19/europe/france-parliamentary-election-macron-intl/index.html https://www.yahoo.com/news/le-pen-huge-gains-french-103617168.html Macron needs around 40 seats to form a coalition, I guess his only hope would be the Republicans with 64-71 seats. https://www.lemonde.fr/en/politics/...c-breakthrough-and-left-surges_5987355_5.html
The strength shown by the far left and far right is worrisome but not unexpected. Is any country at this point immune? As someone who considers himself on the center right, I would hope the Republican' will join. But as elsewhere, they may see an appeal to populism as a way to steal some of the thunder of the French Far Right. But even that is not quite that easy. After all, LePen's economic and foreign policy stands are not that far from Mélenchon's
Beware the Ides of March, especially in the Senate! This is the 1,979th anniversary of Julius Caesar's assassination.