camberiu
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Did Trump save Venezuela?
- Thread starter jeff1234
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True they are social democracies. A wide social umbrella but capitalism flourishes.
Socialism has been practiced in about every country for about 100+ years (don't have a closed mind and focus too much on labels). Tax on on corporate profits is a form of socialism and so is regulation. Socialism is any economic system where the businesses are collectively owned. The details of how this is achieved varies depending on ideology. In current countries, the collective exercises ownership over businesses via taxation and regulations. Both of these things cause a reduction of private property rights towards collective property rights. Thus, it is on the spectrum of socialism.
Socialism is an authoritarian economic ideology by it's nature. Me, personally, I agree with it to some extent. It is necessary to redistribute profits. The cycle of money is similar to the other cycles found everywhere including nature. It is a looped system. If the money only goes from the lower to the upper, then the it breaks down the system and eventually everyone becomes harmed (what happens to the assets of let's say mcdonalds when there are no clients to sell to? They go to $0.). Similarly, if there are no potential customers, there is no reason to produce and innovate on production methods, so societal riches fall.
It should be studied further what exactly is the level needed to sustain the cycle. In some times, when labor had enough bargaining power, it may have reached that level without any taxes to redistribute. However, in the current time, it is likely that redistribution is needed to keep the economy vibrant.
When socialism fails is when the redistribution hits an extreme where all the money goes from the top to the bottom and thus it kills the incentive of the highest productive people to stop producing. This reduces societies total production, which results in impoverishment for anyone.
People are too concerned with loaded terms like capitalism and socialism. The important terms is the cycle of money needs to be maintained. The entrepreneurs need an economic incentive to work and they need a customer base to sell the fruits of their labor to. Too much socialism and they have no incentive due to taxes / redistribution. Too little socialism and eventually they have no customer base and without a customer base again they have no incentives.
The economic game is basically a game meant to inspire these special 0.1% of society that are responsible for civilization. The game needs to be balanced to keep these people working.
Socialism is an authoritarian economic ideology by it's nature. Me, personally, I agree with it to some extent. It is necessary to redistribute profits. The cycle of money is similar to the other cycles found everywhere including nature. It is a looped system. If the money only goes from the lower to the upper, then the it breaks down the system and eventually everyone becomes harmed (what happens to the assets of let's say mcdonalds when there are no clients to sell to? They go to $0.). Similarly, if there are no potential customers, there is no reason to produce and innovate on production methods, so societal riches fall.
It should be studied further what exactly is the level needed to sustain the cycle. In some times, when labor had enough bargaining power, it may have reached that level without any taxes to redistribute. However, in the current time, it is likely that redistribution is needed to keep the economy vibrant.
When socialism fails is when the redistribution hits an extreme where all the money goes from the top to the bottom and thus it kills the incentive of the highest productive people to stop producing. This reduces societies total production, which results in impoverishment for anyone.
People are too concerned with loaded terms like capitalism and socialism. The important terms is the cycle of money needs to be maintained. The entrepreneurs need an economic incentive to work and they need a customer base to sell the fruits of their labor to. Too much socialism and they have no incentive due to taxes / redistribution. Too little socialism and eventually they have no customer base and without a customer base again they have no incentives.
The economic game is basically a game meant to inspire these special 0.1% of society that are responsible for civilization. The game needs to be balanced to keep these people working.
I keep thinking that maybe the US (my homeland, but I did not vote for you-know-who) should do something about Central America so that people there do not have to flee violence. But then I recall what happened many years ago when we intervened there. However, while we should certainly learn from History I think that its lessons don't come easily. Maybe the lesson to be learned from previous US intervention in Central America is not that no country should ever intervene in another country, but to be very careful about the reasons and execution of the intervention.
Bob
I'd say that while only 0.1% of society makes it into history books, all people who work contribute to civilization.
camberiu
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“the pretense of knowledge”—the idea that anyone could know enough to engineer a society successfully.
The core pillar behind any non-interventionist foreign policy is the humility to accept that we do not know what is best for others.
If Trump were to "intervene" in Central America (or Venezuela) would you suport him? And just what could the US do? How do you change centuries of political and social culture? Those who flee because of poverty and violence have given up. They see no hope in their countries but they believe that in the US they will have a much better life. If that were not true they wouldn't be taking huge risks to cross the border into the US. Ironically they consider being exploited by Americans who take advantage of very cheap labor without any obligation to give benefits is better than what they have at home.
That seems to be an argument against leadership. Pretentious, pompous, asses most of them may be, but it seems to me that in general societies need leaders. Would you argue that the world would be a better place if the US had had the humility not to intervene in WWII? I am a great fan of humility but not when it is used as an excuse for inaction. But it is good to know that you will have the humility not to tell me that non-intervention is always best.
Bob
I could never support Trump. I would probably support the right kind of intervention. For example make foreign aid (most of which probably ends up in the pockets of corrupt officials and politicians) dependent on a reduction in violence. If you are a politician or official who is in a position to reduce violence and violence is not going down refuse visas to the individual and his immediate relatives. I sure don't know but maybe actions such as those would bring about some improvement.
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