RugbyRebels

Stom wrote:

Son of Mathonwy wrote:

Stom wrote: We live in a neo/post capitalist society, though, however you want to call it.

Back when Marx was writing, corporation tax was mainly greater than 50%. Companies were expected to invest back into the company and wages were not taxed so high. We should be going back to a similar system.

I have no problem with a company owner paying themselves a salary of £10m if the company's performance deserves it. But I do have a problem with private companies making £10bn in profit, sending it through tax havens, and only paying £5-50m in tax on that profit.

I had an idea for small businesses here, whereby a company should get tax breaks after every employee up to around 100. So small and medium sized businesses would be rewarded for creating jobs. Couple this with higher corporation tax and I think you have a much fairer system.

Capitalism isn't the problem, the current interpretation of it is the problem.

The solution is not Marxism, or anything that restricts your ability to create wealth for yourself, but a form of humanism that focuses on individuals rather than companies.

Take the British pub opening as an example. It's a form of neo-capitalism whereby Wetherspoons are benefitted over independent pubs. That should be reversed for us to live in a fair society.

I agree, (whatever we call it) capitalism is becoming more extreme, socialist elements are being reduced, inequality is increasing - this is a bad situation.

Re the owner with the massive salary, you may not have a problem with it but what purpose does it serve? Does the incentive need to be remotely as great as the unlimited* amounts available? Would it really harm the incentive to work if the maximum individual wealth was, say £10m**?

I can certainly see a case for encouraging job creation (when unemployment is a problem). I haven't given it too much thought in detail - I think I'd want to tie it to training if possible.

NB re Witherspoons vs independent pubs, there was a time when small companies (or rather companies with profit below a certain level) were taxed at a lower rate than larger ones. This has been phased out over a long time and ended in 2015. Not a good thing IMO.

I agree the current interpretation of capitalism is a big problem, but I don't necessarily believe (as you do) that the best system is a capitalist one***. You say the solution is not Marxism (do you mean communism or socialism?), but I don't think you've made the case (say, regarding my sketch of democratic communism).

And, to go back to the earlier discussion, do you now think that (some forms of) communism can function without totalitarianism?


* in that there is no explicit ceiling
** I would go lower, but let's say this number for the sake of the argument
*** although were I in charge I would modify the form of capitalism rather than scrapping it - I don't want one giant leap into the unknown

OK, I'll go in order, with a bonus at the end

The purpose of being able to command a high salary is that you built that business. You had the idea, you created it, and you probably put in a lot of work to get there. Wages are not the problem, corporations believing their only purpose is to make money for their shareholders is.

On the same theme, $10m is not that much money. If you want economic stability for life, a lovely home, the ability to take a summer holiday and a winter ski-break, the ability to eat out at the best restaurants, and the ability to basically fulfil your every desire, you probably need a salary between $3m and $100m, depending on the person. I see no problem with this. If the rich were earning $10m a year now, we'd have a damn equitable society. But they're not, because they're earning $250m+ and getting that money without working simply because they had the money to invest in the first place.

My problem with Marxism is an inability for anyone who disagrees with the premise of Marxism=Communism to give me a satisfactory explanation of what Marxism actually is.

I believe a capitalist system is better than either a Marxist or a Socialist one (depending on your definition of Socialism, of course, as that dragon has many heads) simply because, while humans are not inherently selfish, they do inherently want to better themselves. Creating a ceiling on their ability to better themselves will lead to depression, as Peterson talks about in his psychology and human behaviour stuff (much better than his politics, would you believe it from a psychologist), and backed up by many others.

On to communism without totalitarianism: if you are preventing people from making the choice to own certain items, as well as wealth, you're authoritarian already. Couple that with the system's need to sustain itself and you have totalitarianism.

In your example in particular: if someone wants to own a sports car - and I assume there is still sports to watch, else you're going to have to do a lot of explaining to a lot of people - so they can emulate, for example, Lewis Hamilton, you are preventing them from doing so.

If their desire to do so is strong enough to forgo the consequences, you will need to make an example of them. Let them go with just a slap on the wrist and more and more people will go looking for black market Mercedes. And then you have a direct threat to your system of government and economics. How are you going to deal with it?

And for the bonus, I found this guy, who has a very simplistic outline of some of what I believe in economically. I'd be interested to know whether you think what he says has any echoes of Marxism. Because, and this is a very important thing...

Outside of the main tenets of Communism and, therefore what I have seen of Marxism (please someone point me toward somewhere if his main premise changes after the Manifesto, not just the window dressing), there is not much difference between it and Capitalism in the true sense of the word.

That's my big problem with people who are against Capitalism. There seems to be a misunderstanding of what capitalism means.

Capitalism is often thought of as an economic system in which private actors own and control property in accord with their interests, and demand and supply freely set prices in markets in a way that can serve the best interests of society.

And, also, capitalism has many facets. It can take many forms. But central to them all, in my opinion, is competition. Or the absence of monopoly (https://www.businessinsider.com/monopol ... ism-2019-1)

Here's that video:

Despite the relatively small evidence base (especially from LMIC) and methodological limitations of the available studies, we report a compelling quantitative association between income inequality and depression. Even though the absolute effect size was relatively small (risk ratio of 1.19), the translation of this risk to population mental health is likely to be very large.

Our findings are also consistent with our previous work demonstrating that dispositional tendencies to ruminate combined with chronic perceived promotion goal failure are associated with increased depressive symptoms (Jones, et al., 2009; Papadakis, et al., 2006).

Mikey Brown wrote:How do you prevent that becoming a system that horribly exploits people without wealth (and therefore limited options to do much about it) even if they are using their wealth for good causes?

Stom wrote:I'll put it a different way. Any communist system would not work in the world as it is today because it would harm too many people PLUS we have globalisation, so the access to goods is readily available. Prevent access to those goods and if people deem it important enough, they'll leave. And you can't expect every country to adopt the system.

That study, btw, is a jeez moment. I mean, they quite clearly say:

Despite the relatively small evidence base (especially from LMIC) and methodological limitations of the available studies, we report a compelling quantitative association between income inequality and depression. Even though the absolute effect size was relatively small (risk ratio of 1.19), the translation of this risk to population mental health is likely to be very large.

In other words: our sample size is too small to verify our assumption, but our assumption is true anyway. That's appalling science.

I just looked up my assertation and while I could not access the relevant studies, I can show you where they are linked to in another study about depression, rumination, and goal failure. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3864849/

Our findings are also consistent with our previous work demonstrating that dispositional tendencies to ruminate combined with chronic perceived promotion goal failure are associated with increased depressive symptoms (Jones, et al., 2009; Papadakis, et al., 2006).

Inequality causes goal failure for many people, as they find their path blocked. That's one of the reasons the study you linked to falls down: inequality is not the reason, hence why 1/3rd of responses showed no depressive symptoms.

You don't solve the mental health crisis by creating a more equal society, you solve the mental health crisis by giving people purpose.

In a communist system, whereby people do not have personal purpose anymore: they have no means to grow, they have no means to directly help others, and they have no means to basically advance in life, you will see a massive rise in depression despite having a more "equal" society.

The only way I can see to improve our current economic system is through humanist capitalism. Whereby it's possible for individuals to create wealth.

And, btw, I was having this discussion. After you have created enough wealth to sustain yourself in all your endeavours, the creation of wealth does not end. There are 1,000s of ways you can use wealth to help others and to achieve goals that make you feel good.

You could, for example, build a safe house for domestic violence victims, and setup a non-profit to help them get the legal help they need.

You could, for example, build housing for the homeless and poor, to provide shelter at a reasonable price, as well as mental health support to lift them off the bottom rung.

You could, for example, invest in cancer research.

The fact is, individual wealth creation is not a problem in and of itself. The way that wealth creation is treated, and the means you use to get there are.

Companies should not have their sole purpose as "making money for the shareholders". Their dual purpose is to create better products and/or services for their customers in order to create more profit that can then be reinvested to create better products...etc.,etc.,etc.

Son of Mathonwy wrote:

Stom wrote:I'll put it a different way. Any communist system would not work in the world as it is today because it would harm too many people PLUS we have globalisation, so the access to goods is readily available. Prevent access to those goods and if people deem it important enough, they'll leave. And you can't expect every country to adopt the system.

In my system, goods could and would be imported (and exported), so there would be access to these goods.

That study, btw, is a jeez moment. I mean, they quite clearly say:

Despite the relatively small evidence base (especially from LMIC) and methodological limitations of the available studies, we report a compelling quantitative association between income inequality and depression. Even though the absolute effect size was relatively small (risk ratio of 1.19), the translation of this risk to population mental health is likely to be very large.

In other words: our sample size is too small to verify our assumption, but our assumption is true anyway. That's appalling science.

How on earth do you come to this conclusion? The study says the risk ratio is 1.19 (95% CI: 1.07‐1.31), meaning depression is (on average) 19% more likely in high inequality areas compared with low inequality areas, with a 95% confidence interval of 1.07-1.31, ie the sample size is large enough to give a 95% likelihood that the ratio is between 1.07 and 1.31, ie 7%-31% greater risk.

Just Google "inequality depression" and you will find much to read on the link between the two. If you want a comprehensive read on the many negative effects of inequality, I recommend "The Spirit Level".

I just looked up my assertation and while I could not access the relevant studies, I can show you where they are linked to in another study about depression, rumination, and goal failure. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3864849/

Our findings are also consistent with our previous work demonstrating that dispositional tendencies to ruminate combined with chronic perceived promotion goal failure are associated with increased depressive symptoms (Jones, et al., 2009; Papadakis, et al., 2006).

Inequality causes goal failure for many people, as they find their path blocked. That's one of the reasons the study you linked to falls down: inequality is not the reason, hence why 1/3rd of responses showed no depressive symptoms.

You don't solve the mental health crisis by creating a more equal society, you solve the mental health crisis by giving people purpose.

You accept that inequality causes goal failure, hence inequality causes depression (or for the individual, increases risk of depression). I don't understand how you can then say that inequality is NOT the reason for the depression. You've contradicted yourself.

Re "goal failure", let's think about this a little. Your chance of goal failure in increased if 1) you select more difficult goals, or 2) if your environment makes the achievement of the goals more difficult. In an unequal society, as you have said 2) is true, hence goal failure and depression is more likely. But also, if hopes are raised unrealistically, there will be more goal failure due to 1). I suggest that in my sketch of democratic communism there would be less unrealistic goals, since the people would have fewer examples of supremely successful individuals in their faces every day and because they know that becoming a multimillionaire is impossible (so it could not be a goal). So goal failure would be less likely for both 1) and 2).

In a communist system, whereby people do not have personal purpose anymore: they have no means to grow, they have no means to directly help others, and they have no means to basically advance in life, you will see a massive rise in depression despite having a more "equal" society.

The only way I can see to improve our current economic system is through humanist capitalism. Whereby it's possible for individuals to create wealth.

Wealth exists under democratic communism, it's just spread more evenly than it is in most capitalist systems. What you say about communism doesn't apply to my model - unless you can demonstrate how.

That said, humanist capitalism may well be great. I'd need to see the details of course ... but if it's a capitalism with dramatically less inequality, then that's a good start).

And, btw, I was having this discussion. After you have created enough wealth to sustain yourself in all your endeavours, the creation of wealth does not end. There are 1,000s of ways you can use wealth to help others and to achieve goals that make you feel good.

You could, for example, build a safe house for domestic violence victims, and setup a non-profit to help them get the legal help they need.

You could, for example, build housing for the homeless and poor, to provide shelter at a reasonable price, as well as mental health support to lift them off the bottom rung.

You could, for example, invest in cancer research.

The fact is, individual wealth creation is not a problem in and of itself. The way that wealth creation is treated, and the means you use to get there are.

Companies should not have their sole purpose as "making money for the shareholders". Their dual purpose is to create better products and/or services for their customers in order to create more profit that can then be reinvested to create better products...etc.,etc.,etc.

Unfortunately, we've seen that neither people nor companies give enough to charity to make a big difference. To fix the big problems, the state needs to step in.

Puja wrote:

Stom wrote:

Son of Mathonwy wrote: Stom, I think we can have this conversation but you need to read what I've said.

I've described a version of democratic communism (invented in 30 minutes so it's sketchy) but I don't see where your argument about communism being impossible without totalitarianism applies to it. In particular, nowhere does it say you are forced to buy certain things, or do certain work, or not be able to work from home (if feasible for the type of work).

Because it doesn't matter what you come up with, the central tenet is that you cannot better yourself by earning more money and therefore being able to afford better things.

So as soon as someone tries to do that, they break the system and the system has two choices: allow itself to be broken or push back. Pushing back means...well...arresting someone, or worse, for opposing the system.

Do you understand my point here?

Personally, if I were inventing a communist system, I'd go with option c) the chicken taxing excess wealth into oblivion, rather than "arresting someone, or worse". Not that I'd be in favour of that system myself, but it is perfectly possible without going into repression.

This discussion made me think of this system which I saw a few years back about a fictional sci-fi economy (in the text under the comic):

I've actually been doing a lot of thinking - on Lily's behalf - about the financial system of Florenovia. As Ellen mentioned, it's a welfare state with an asset tax, and it's very focused on rates and subscriptions. The interesting thing is that I came up with this before I was aware Patreon was even a thing, and before my Mom signed up for Netflix or for the local farming collective deal that gets her a box of fresh local produce once a week, so maybe the world's already moving in that direction. Here's how it goes:

Let's say you live in an apartment in a Florenovian city, and your rent is a thousand credits per month. That's about typical, depending on location. Now, your rent isn't charged by the month - it isn't charged at 33.3 credits per day or even 1.4 credits per hour... no, your rent is the low, low price of .000386 credits (or 386 microcreds) per second.

Now, there are some other services you need to pay for - no, not Internet access, silly! Imagine, the barbarism of forcing someone to pay for necessities like cloud access or tap water or oxygen or medical care! No, no, of course not. But there's this company, DisnMarvxar, and they've been making a lot of really good movies lately, so you want to subscribe to their channel allowing you to stream from that catalogue of movies whenever you like. That service is only ten credits per month, or 4 microcreds per second, so let's add that one to the list as well.

We'll subscribe to a few more services - a local auto-piloted go-anywhere taxi service, a gym membership, a bot-on-demand automated butler/personal assistant service, a couple of reputable charities... and now we're spending about 600 microcreds per second, or about 1555 credits per month, give or take.

Fortunately, as a citizen of Florenovia, we're entitled to a stipend simply for being alive. This stipend is fixed to certain economic indicators such as property prices, food, et cetera, and is intended to be enough for a single person to live alone in relative comfort, even if she chooses to do nothing but lie around, watch DisnMarvxar movies and masturbate all day. Right now, it's fixed at around 2000 microcreds per second. That means we've got 2000 coming in every second and 600 going out... not bad! Even if we do nothing else, our bank account is growing by 1400 microcreds every second!

Ah, but then there's that asset tax. The tax rates are also pegged to economic indicators, and right now the tax woman takes a whopping .001% out of your bank account... every second! So the two rates eventually converge until that .001% is equal to your total cash flow... and your bank account reaches equilibrium at 140 credits, which is your spending money. If you go out and buy something that's a hundred credits, your account will slowly fill back up over the course of the day.

Now, let's say this isn't enough for you, and you want more than what the stipend is paying out. Well, most manual labour, construction, transport, customer service, agriculture, and so forth is all done by robots, but fortunately, you've got a half-dozen industrial design certifications, so you're going to get a job at Toyotsubishi designing the next generation of monorails. Toyotsubishi pays you 2000 microcreds a second as long as you're employed there, which doesn't sound like much until you consider that this is in addition to the 2000 we all get simply for being alive - your total income is now 4000 microcreds per second, which means you can increase your per-second expenditures from 600 to 1000, and still have enough that your spending money at any given time is 300 credits!

So you move into a bigger place, the rent on this one is 2100 microcredits per second... and you lose your job. Oh no! Does that mean that, in only a few minutes, you're going to be evicted? Well, fortunately, like all employers, while Toyotsubishi was paying you, they were sending an additional 10% of your salary (or 200 microcreds per second) to a tax-sheltered (but also interest-sheltered) container. When Toyotsubishi fired you, the money that was being diverted into that container now comes back out at a rate equal to the original salary... meaning that if you worked for them for ten months, you still have an additional month during which you collect that 2000 microcreds per second, giving you plenty of time to either find a new job or move back to a cheaper apartment.

So what happens if you want to buy something that's worth more than your spending limit, such as a vehicle? Well, let's say you want a new car that's 12,000 credits (or 12 kilocreds), and you negotiate a pay rate of 400 microcreds per second, which means you'll have it paid off in about a year, give or take. Careful, though! Once something like a car is in your possession, a portion of its real-time blue book value is added to the assets against which you have to pay taxes!

But what happens if the person you're dealing with doesn't want to set up a leasing scheme like that - they want their money now! Well, you can set up a loan with yourself. This chick wants a grand, so I'm going to give her a thousand credits right now, and set that debt aside in a container where it stays unmolested by interest rates or taxes, and set up a payment rate towards it of 100 microcreds per second, meaning that I'll be in the black with myself in about three months.

Conversely, of course, if someone gives you a large lump sum of money - or, say, you get your birthright bid of ten megacreds that pays out once you attain your License of Financial Autonomy - you can put that into a tax and interest-sheltered container and have it dribble out to you at whatever rate you like. The containers have to be both tax and interest sheltered - anything that pays out interest would also be subject to taxes, and only the most brazen of con artists would suggest that they have some sort of fund that accumulates interest faster than taxes would erode it away.

Of course, if one is not careful with one's containers, one could find oneself drowning in a sea of self-inflicted red ink, which would warrant an investigation from government-funded Financial Consultants. Now, you may simply have fallen on hard times, in which case the FCs would be there to provide assistance, but in the event that you have chronic debt issues, you may be facing the revocation of your License of Financial Autonomy.

Education in Florenovia is focused around obtaining certifications and licenses, and there are three in particular that are considered to comprise baseline responsible adulthood - the License of Bodily Autonomy (which allows you to do such things as get tattoos, drink alcohol, or turn your sex drive on), the License of Residential Autonomy (which allows you to move out of your parents' or guardians' house), and the License of Financial Autonomy (which allows you access to your own bank account to make your own purchases). In much the same way that a self-harming drug addict might have their LBA revoked or a criminial mischief-maker might have their LRA revoked, someone who finds themselves consistently in the red would face the shame of having their LFA revoked, having all of their finances turned over to a government-provided personal accountant, and having to take remedial finance classes at the local high school.

"But Tailsteak", you say, "This economy is so focused around subscriptions and rates that one-time charges for things are almost meaningless. Why, if I gave someone ten credits, within a few hours, that transaction would be effectively undone! It's almost as if, in a post-scarcity economy where most physical work is done by robots, the focus is on services that enrich people's lives consistently, rather than one-time purchases of individual goods!"

And, of course, yes, you're correct.

Imagine you go to a fancy-schmancy restaurant. Their menu is much like a typical modern menu, and you can have a nice meal for around a hundred credits. Having just finished your meal, the robowaiter makes sure to inform you that you can purchase a membership to this restaurant for only fifty microcreds per second, which would allow you to come in and eat whenever you're in the neighbourhood... or go for the deluxe option of 100 microcreds per second, which would allow you access to the rarer wines, and would allow you to bring up to five guests at no additional charge! Which is better, in the long term, both for the restaurant and for the customer? Wouldn't you like to be able to walk into a fancy restaurant and tell your friends "Don't worry, I have a deluxe membership here, order whatever you like"?

This financial system addresses the main complaints with both capitalism and communism. The main flaw with capitalism is that the poor get poorer and the rich get richer - in Florenovia, any large static fund doesn't accumulate interest, but rather erodes over time if left alone, and the wealth redistribution ensures that as far as you fall, you can never reach the level where you lack the necessities of life. The main flaw with communism is that a lack of competition and lack of need breeds complacency and eliminates the motivation to excel - in Florenovia, one is motivated to provide value in some way to one's fellow woman if one wishes to make larger discretionary purchases, to buy a seat in government, or have a daughter. Although women are free to abstain from work - and, indeed, most do - income is also seen as tangible proof of merit, usefulness, and contribution to society.

I think Lily's biases are clear in this system - she's a self-starting entrepreneur who values innovation and hard work that benefits one's chosen friends and family, but she's also a bleeding-heart liberal who thinks that the disadvantaged don't necessarily deserve to starve and who likes a nice sturdy social safety net.

Anyway, I don't think all that is going to make it into the comic any time soon. I'm looking forward to seeing people's opinions about it in the forum, though.

I will note, I am not necessarily endorsing this (the theory, the comic, or the overthinking which the author has put into it), but I find the theory interesting.

Puja

Sandydragon wrote:

Puja wrote:

Stom wrote:
Because it doesn't matter what you come up with, the central tenet is that you cannot better yourself by earning more money and therefore being able to afford better things.

So as soon as someone tries to do that, they break the system and the system has two choices: allow itself to be broken or push back. Pushing back means...well...arresting someone, or worse, for opposing the system.

Do you understand my point here?

Personally, if I were inventing a communist system, I'd go with option c) the chicken taxing excess wealth into oblivion, rather than "arresting someone, or worse". Not that I'd be in favour of that system myself, but it is perfectly possible without going into repression.

This discussion made me think of this system which I saw a few years back about a fictional sci-fi economy (in the text under the comic):

I've actually been doing a lot of thinking - on Lily's behalf - about the financial system of Florenovia. As Ellen mentioned, it's a welfare state with an asset tax, and it's very focused on rates and subscriptions. The interesting thing is that I came up with this before I was aware Patreon was even a thing, and before my Mom signed up for Netflix or for the local farming collective deal that gets her a box of fresh local produce once a week, so maybe the world's already moving in that direction. Here's how it goes:

Let's say you live in an apartment in a Florenovian city, and your rent is a thousand credits per month. That's about typical, depending on location. Now, your rent isn't charged by the month - it isn't charged at 33.3 credits per day or even 1.4 credits per hour... no, your rent is the low, low price of .000386 credits (or 386 microcreds) per second.

Now, there are some other services you need to pay for - no, not Internet access, silly! Imagine, the barbarism of forcing someone to pay for necessities like cloud access or tap water or oxygen or medical care! No, no, of course not. But there's this company, DisnMarvxar, and they've been making a lot of really good movies lately, so you want to subscribe to their channel allowing you to stream from that catalogue of movies whenever you like. That service is only ten credits per month, or 4 microcreds per second, so let's add that one to the list as well.

We'll subscribe to a few more services - a local auto-piloted go-anywhere taxi service, a gym membership, a bot-on-demand automated butler/personal assistant service, a couple of reputable charities... and now we're spending about 600 microcreds per second, or about 1555 credits per month, give or take.

Fortunately, as a citizen of Florenovia, we're entitled to a stipend simply for being alive. This stipend is fixed to certain economic indicators such as property prices, food, et cetera, and is intended to be enough for a single person to live alone in relative comfort, even if she chooses to do nothing but lie around, watch DisnMarvxar movies and masturbate all day. Right now, it's fixed at around 2000 microcreds per second. That means we've got 2000 coming in every second and 600 going out... not bad! Even if we do nothing else, our bank account is growing by 1400 microcreds every second!

Ah, but then there's that asset tax. The tax rates are also pegged to economic indicators, and right now the tax woman takes a whopping .001% out of your bank account... every second! So the two rates eventually converge until that .001% is equal to your total cash flow... and your bank account reaches equilibrium at 140 credits, which is your spending money. If you go out and buy something that's a hundred credits, your account will slowly fill back up over the course of the day.

Now, let's say this isn't enough for you, and you want more than what the stipend is paying out. Well, most manual labour, construction, transport, customer service, agriculture, and so forth is all done by robots, but fortunately, you've got a half-dozen industrial design certifications, so you're going to get a job at Toyotsubishi designing the next generation of monorails. Toyotsubishi pays you 2000 microcreds a second as long as you're employed there, which doesn't sound like much until you consider that this is in addition to the 2000 we all get simply for being alive - your total income is now 4000 microcreds per second, which means you can increase your per-second expenditures from 600 to 1000, and still have enough that your spending money at any given time is 300 credits!

So you move into a bigger place, the rent on this one is 2100 microcredits per second... and you lose your job. Oh no! Does that mean that, in only a few minutes, you're going to be evicted? Well, fortunately, like all employers, while Toyotsubishi was paying you, they were sending an additional 10% of your salary (or 200 microcreds per second) to a tax-sheltered (but also interest-sheltered) container. When Toyotsubishi fired you, the money that was being diverted into that container now comes back out at a rate equal to the original salary... meaning that if you worked for them for ten months, you still have an additional month during which you collect that 2000 microcreds per second, giving you plenty of time to either find a new job or move back to a cheaper apartment.

So what happens if you want to buy something that's worth more than your spending limit, such as a vehicle? Well, let's say you want a new car that's 12,000 credits (or 12 kilocreds), and you negotiate a pay rate of 400 microcreds per second, which means you'll have it paid off in about a year, give or take. Careful, though! Once something like a car is in your possession, a portion of its real-time blue book value is added to the assets against which you have to pay taxes!

But what happens if the person you're dealing with doesn't want to set up a leasing scheme like that - they want their money now! Well, you can set up a loan with yourself. This chick wants a grand, so I'm going to give her a thousand credits right now, and set that debt aside in a container where it stays unmolested by interest rates or taxes, and set up a payment rate towards it of 100 microcreds per second, meaning that I'll be in the black with myself in about three months.

Conversely, of course, if someone gives you a large lump sum of money - or, say, you get your birthright bid of ten megacreds that pays out once you attain your License of Financial Autonomy - you can put that into a tax and interest-sheltered container and have it dribble out to you at whatever rate you like. The containers have to be both tax and interest sheltered - anything that pays out interest would also be subject to taxes, and only the most brazen of con artists would suggest that they have some sort of fund that accumulates interest faster than taxes would erode it away.

Of course, if one is not careful with one's containers, one could find oneself drowning in a sea of self-inflicted red ink, which would warrant an investigation from government-funded Financial Consultants. Now, you may simply have fallen on hard times, in which case the FCs would be there to provide assistance, but in the event that you have chronic debt issues, you may be facing the revocation of your License of Financial Autonomy.

Education in Florenovia is focused around obtaining certifications and licenses, and there are three in particular that are considered to comprise baseline responsible adulthood - the License of Bodily Autonomy (which allows you to do such things as get tattoos, drink alcohol, or turn your sex drive on), the License of Residential Autonomy (which allows you to move out of your parents' or guardians' house), and the License of Financial Autonomy (which allows you access to your own bank account to make your own purchases). In much the same way that a self-harming drug addict might have their LBA revoked or a criminial mischief-maker might have their LRA revoked, someone who finds themselves consistently in the red would face the shame of having their LFA revoked, having all of their finances turned over to a government-provided personal accountant, and having to take remedial finance classes at the local high school.

"But Tailsteak", you say, "This economy is so focused around subscriptions and rates that one-time charges for things are almost meaningless. Why, if I gave someone ten credits, within a few hours, that transaction would be effectively undone! It's almost as if, in a post-scarcity economy where most physical work is done by robots, the focus is on services that enrich people's lives consistently, rather than one-time purchases of individual goods!"

And, of course, yes, you're correct.

Imagine you go to a fancy-schmancy restaurant. Their menu is much like a typical modern menu, and you can have a nice meal for around a hundred credits. Having just finished your meal, the robowaiter makes sure to inform you that you can purchase a membership to this restaurant for only fifty microcreds per second, which would allow you to come in and eat whenever you're in the neighbourhood... or go for the deluxe option of 100 microcreds per second, which would allow you access to the rarer wines, and would allow you to bring up to five guests at no additional charge! Which is better, in the long term, both for the restaurant and for the customer? Wouldn't you like to be able to walk into a fancy restaurant and tell your friends "Don't worry, I have a deluxe membership here, order whatever you like"?

This financial system addresses the main complaints with both capitalism and communism. The main flaw with capitalism is that the poor get poorer and the rich get richer - in Florenovia, any large static fund doesn't accumulate interest, but rather erodes over time if left alone, and the wealth redistribution ensures that as far as you fall, you can never reach the level where you lack the necessities of life. The main flaw with communism is that a lack of competition and lack of need breeds complacency and eliminates the motivation to excel - in Florenovia, one is motivated to provide value in some way to one's fellow woman if one wishes to make larger discretionary purchases, to buy a seat in government, or have a daughter. Although women are free to abstain from work - and, indeed, most do - income is also seen as tangible proof of merit, usefulness, and contribution to society.

I think Lily's biases are clear in this system - she's a self-starting entrepreneur who values innovation and hard work that benefits one's chosen friends and family, but she's also a bleeding-heart liberal who thinks that the disadvantaged don't necessarily deserve to starve and who likes a nice sturdy social safety net.

Anyway, I don't think all that is going to make it into the comic any time soon. I'm looking forward to seeing people's opinions about it in the forum, though.

I will note, I am not necessarily endorsing this (the theory, the comic, or the overthinking which the author has put into it), but I find the theory interesting.

Puja

If you tax excess wealth into oblivion then those who are wealthy will move elsewhere. Thats tax you aren't collecting and potentially businesses relocating as well. You need people to be in charge of stuff and that entails more responsibility. These people should be paid appropriately. The problem that systems which are heavily ideology based have is that advancement and adherence to the ideology are seen as the same thing so unless you parrot party slogans, you aint going anywhere. Witness the USSR where the saying when that the state pretends to pay us and we pretend to work.

I you look at the states which hit the industrial revolution first, they were ones that encouraged the accumulation of capital and didn't try to steal it from entrepreneurs beyond a reasonable level. Entrepreneurs took risks knowing that they could pocket rewards. Remove the opportunities yto acquire wealth and that risk taking disappears and we all become state employed drones, not that productive and our society doesn't advance much either.

Sandydragon wrote:Stom,

I won't quote this one is ling enough.

If you take a global view, then its absolutely likely that high earners will move to a location where they can benefit from their wealth. I would rather have 40% of something or 45% coming into the exchequer than 80-90% of nothing. Top multinationals look for where they can recruit staff and if their top staff can earn the wages they expect in a location, they will look elsewhere. Thats not being neo-liberal, its stating a market reality. There is talk on here about very high tax on the wealthy; for the record I'm referring to that not 40-45% which is our current rate of high earner income tax.

As for people not moving - how many people were flooding ot leave communist countries because of a better way of life in the west. They were high earners (you had to be a senior party official to achieve that) but they had aspiration which is the key ingredient. If you tax people to the hilt, refusing them the opportunity to grow their own wealth as has been suggested on here, then they will leave.

This is different to a social democracy where higher tax is paid in return for better services.

More than half of global trade and investment takes place within multinational groups.

Digby wrote:The tax avoidance isn't a capitalism thing, that's a societal/politics thing. You could have the same capital system as we have now and a very different tax system

Stom wrote:

Digby wrote:The tax avoidance isn't a capitalism thing, that's a societal/politics thing. You could have the same capital system as we have now and a very different tax system

It’s a symptom of the system. Whereby profits for your shareholders are the most important thing, not innovation and providing better service for your customers. Shown by the fact many corporations create every worsening products.

Digby wrote:

Stom wrote:

Digby wrote:The tax avoidance isn't a capitalism thing, that's a societal/politics thing. You could have the same capital system as we have now and a very different tax system

It’s a symptom of the system. Whereby profits for your shareholders are the most important thing, not innovation and providing better service for your customers. Shown by the fact many corporations create every worsening products.

I suspect people will work to their own advantage in whatever system there is, whether within the system or subverting it, that's just human nature. So much so profits for shareholders are often something companies only pretend to care about within our current system, witness all the share buybacks going on in the aviation industry in the States (not the only sector it's a terrible idea in how it's being done, but it's a particularly egregious example), that's just about securing bonus payments to senior management and frankly actively harmful to the shareholders

Stom wrote:

Son of Mathonwy wrote:Just Google "inequality depression" and you will find much to read on the link between the two. If you want a comprehensive read on the many negative effects of inequality, I recommend "The Spirit Level".

You accept that inequality causes goal failure, hence inequality causes depression (or for the individual, increases risk of depression). I don't understand how you can then say that inequality is NOT the reason for the depression. You've contradicted yourself.

Re "goal failure", let's think about this a little. Your chance of goal failure in increased if 1) you select more difficult goals, or 2) if your environment makes the achievement of the goals more difficult. In an unequal society, as you have said 2) is true, hence goal failure and depression is more likely. But also, if hopes are raised unrealistically, there will be more goal failure due to 1). I suggest that in my sketch of democratic communism there would be less unrealistic goals, since the people would have fewer examples of supremely successful individuals in their faces every day and because they know that becoming a multimillionaire is impossible (so it could not be a goal). So goal failure would be less likely for both 1) and 2).

Wealth exists under democratic communism, it's just spread more evenly than it is in most capitalist systems. What you say about communism doesn't apply to my model - unless you can demonstrate how.

That said, humanist capitalism may well be great. I'd need to see the details of course ... but if it's a capitalism with dramatically less inequality, then that's a good start).

Unfortunately, we've seen that neither people nor companies give enough to charity to make a big difference. To fix the big problems, the state needs to step in.

Inequality does not create goal failure. Inequality makes goal failure more likely. It is not the reason for the depression, it is a reason why goal failure is more likely, and therefore why depression is more likely. I don't believe you can simply target inequality of outcome and expect anything good to happen.

And, no, there is no evidence that wealth - or the equal opportunity to create wealth - can exist under "democratic communism". And it's a pointless theory anyway, as it's so far fetched as to be pretty much impossible. How would you expect to keep your economy afloat if you're basically saying:

We're a communist country, every company is owned by the state, but you can happily buy goods from any other country in the world.

All the companies will move abroad, taking their products with them, and selling them back into your country. They will take all your talent with them, as you cannot have free movement of goods and then not have free movement of people. Suddenly, you're left with a society full of people who don't want to work and can't work for big companies, with most of the country's opportunity for positive GDP lost abroad...

You've overlooked state-wide economy by focusing on social economy. You can't do that. If you want to have a communist system, you need to find a way to protect the state. If the people have a choice to buy from elsewhere, many will do so and then you'll have a lot more money flowing out of the country than you will have flowing in, unless you're an oil rich state, and then you're talking unsustainability and the potential for instability caused by outside influences - like Venezuela - because you're reliant on outside countries who do not share you system buying from you.

A system that is 100% owned one way or the other must always fight off attempts to make that 99%. We see that in America, and that's not even 100% (yet). Under Communism, the state needs to protect its ownership of companies by preventing access to privately owned companies.

Under your system, everyone would have free access to privately produced goods. That's no longer Communism, or if it is, it's Communism that's about to fall for Capitalism.

We do see that private individuals make the breakthroughs, though. When was the last time a government invented a life changing device? Who solved the ventilator crisis? Who invented a workable electric car? The list goes on. Doing good for society does not just come from giving to charity, it comes from working hard toward a goal that has the benefit of all at its heart.

Stom wrote:So, as we're all getting a bit weighed down in the Trump bashing, Boris bashing, Covid frustrations, I thought we could have a good old fashioned political debate.

I've been listening to some more Peterson again. Whatever your thoughts on him, he is very well read and intelligent enough to pull out some very interesting points from what he has read.

He is constantly talking about Marxism and how dangerous it is. Which led me down 2 separate rabbit holes.

1) What actually is socialism
2) What the hell is the Intellectual Dark Web, and why would anyone want to associate themselves with Ben Shapiro?

I had always simply considered socialism as a system whereby the means of production, et al, is regulated by the people. That's something I'm generally for.

But I hadn't considered it as a tool for Communism. Which is very odd, as you'd think they'd teach that in A-level Politics.

Put simply, is socialism simply a tool to take a capitalist society to a communist society?

If we believe that, then socialism is no means of government. But then, what does that leave us with on "right vs left"?

Should we strive for social equality? Or should we strive for equality of opportunity? And what does that look like?

And on the Intellectual Dark Web, Peterson, and others: I feel it is their responsibility to couch their views so they are obviously not extreme. Right now, I feel like Peterson likes his newfound fame and fortune too much to edit his language. The idea of free speech is vital, but that has to come with acceptance of the consequences.

Without that, free speech is just a shield to hide behind.

The use of anyone who speaks out against perceived injustice by "the left" as a far-right tool is ridiculous. I personally do not consider Peterson, or many of those labelled the intellectual dark web, as pseudo-facist (except the aforementioned Shapiro). Listening to what they have to say, they seem to be intellectuals who value balance. Every day they are persecuted against by people purporting to be far-left, so of course they're going to fight back against that.

What does anyone else think?

Son of Mathonwy wrote:Maybe Peterson is one of those "do what I say, not what I do" kind of visionaries:

https://newrepublic.com/article/156829/ ... n-peterson

Stom wrote:

Son of Mathonwy wrote:Maybe Peterson is one of those "do what I say, not what I do" kind of visionaries:

https://newrepublic.com/article/156829/ ... n-peterson

Peterson has an ego the size of Jupiter. That constant high of an intellectual selling out packed stadia around the world almost every day of the year fed this and led to him doing just that. Meanwhile, his meddling in politics raised his profile even higher, so he focused more and more on a subject in which he isn't an expert (though one that is related to his subject area in a way that I am extremely interested in, though more on the sociological side than the psychological), leading him to polarise opinion even more, getting more column inches, and feeding his ego even more.

I also wouldn't call him a visionary. He just articulated old concepts clearly and with considerable relevance to the modern world. He'd be the first to admit that everyone has flaws. When you combine his psychology with the teachings of personal responsibility from respected and absolutely visionary coaches like Brooke Castillo, you get a very powerful combination that can enhance your own personal development considerably.

Just take his politics with a grain of salt. He's slightly more knowledgable than we are, most likely, but it's far from his area of expertise. If you simply extrapolate his teachings on personal empowerment to politics, you get a very good message of what good government could look like. If you take it to the extreme, you get shifted into areas you shouldn't go.

Son of Mathonwy wrote:

Stom wrote:

Son of Mathonwy wrote:Maybe Peterson is one of those "do what I say, not what I do" kind of visionaries:

https://newrepublic.com/article/156829/ ... n-peterson

Peterson has an ego the size of Jupiter. That constant high of an intellectual selling out packed stadia around the world almost every day of the year fed this and led to him doing just that. Meanwhile, his meddling in politics raised his profile even higher, so he focused more and more on a subject in which he isn't an expert (though one that is related to his subject area in a way that I am extremely interested in, though more on the sociological side than the psychological), leading him to polarise opinion even more, getting more column inches, and feeding his ego even more.

I also wouldn't call him a visionary. He just articulated old concepts clearly and with considerable relevance to the modern world. He'd be the first to admit that everyone has flaws. When you combine his psychology with the teachings of personal responsibility from respected and absolutely visionary coaches like Brooke Castillo, you get a very powerful combination that can enhance your own personal development considerably.

Just take his politics with a grain of salt. He's slightly more knowledgable than we are, most likely, but it's far from his area of expertise. If you simply extrapolate his teachings on personal empowerment to politics, you get a very good message of what good government could look like. If you take it to the extreme, you get shifted into areas you shouldn't go.

He might be the first to admit that everyone else has flaws, but he's not the kind to admit to them himself (let alone the first).

He's an effective speaker but I wouldn't trust his dogmatic, pityless approach an inch. Who knows, there may be something useful in something he's said (you are much more familiar with his work than I am), but he seems devoid of empathy and proud of it. So not my cup of tea.

Son of Mathonwy wrote:Maybe Peterson is one of those "do what I say, not what I do" kind of visionaries:

https://newrepublic.com/article/156829/ ... n-peterson

cashead wrote:

Son of Mathonwy wrote:Maybe Peterson is one of those "do what I say, not what I do" kind of visionaries:

https://newrepublic.com/article/156829/ ... n-peterson

Nathan Robinson pretty much nicely sums up what I feel about Peterson to begin with.

https://www.currentaffairs.org/2018/03/ ... we-deserve


He only rose to prominence to begin with because he had a meltdown over pronouns, and lied about the amendment to section 318 of the Human Rights Bill, which includes gender identity.