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my dad posted:A Pike being shot. "It's a gun, Albretch Wenzel Eusebius. A gun that shoots pikes."
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Dec 4, 2016 19:53
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Ensign Expendable posted:Dicker Max TK-3, PzKpfw IV A to C, Mediums II and III, and the Eurovision poo poo please. Any order.
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Dec 4, 2016 20:11
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MANime in the sheets posted:Wrong thread. The economic effects of conscription are entirely relevant  Speaking of, has the whole "the businessmen want war!" thing ever been actually true? My understanding was that wars were basically always damaging to an economy, even before the era where you'd have factories being shelled (or bombed, I guess) directly. spectralent fucked around with this message at 20:20 on Dec 4, 2016 |
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Dec 4, 2016 20:12
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It's one of those claims that's easy to make but not to prove or disprove conclusively. It was especially common after the First World War but there's evidence that the supposedly nefarious arms manufacturing concerns saw themselves as providers of deterrence, especially in the case of big ticket items like warships.
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Dec 4, 2016 20:24
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spectralent posted:The economic effects of conscription are entirely relevant People in the newspaper business seemed pretty intent on making the Spanish-American war happen.
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Dec 4, 2016 20:26
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I think war can be very profitable if there's no chance of the other guy coming and breaking your things at home. So, everything the major powers have been involved with since WWII, really. You can argue all day about (for example) Iraq, Halliburton, and blood for oil, etc. but it's pretty undeniable that defense companies make a killing off asymmetric warfare. Boeing makes a tidy pile of cash every time we drop a JDAM on some insurgents hiding in the mountains of Afghanistan, and said insurgents definitely aren't about to start shelling Chicago to make it unprofitable for them.
Crazycryodude fucked around with this message at 20:38 on Dec 4, 2016 |
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Dec 4, 2016 20:35
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Well What Now posted:It's one of those claims that's easy to make but not to prove or disprove conclusively. It was especially common after the First World War but there's evidence that the supposedly nefarious arms manufacturing concerns saw themselves as providers of deterrence, especially in the case of big ticket items like warships. That's true, but even then, isn't the intent that there's not a war? My gut would say that even if you're part of the MIC, your hope is that you can sell loads of neat explodey toys without actually having the side effect of prompting a war that would make everyone poorer (and probably get a lot of your factories exploded). Crazycryodude posted:I think war can be very profitable if there's no chance of the other guy coming and breaking your things at home. So, everything the major powers have been involved with since WWII, really. You can argue all day about (for example) Iraq, Halliburton, and blood for oil, etc. but it's pretty undeniable that defense companies make a killing off asymmetric warfare. Boeing makes a tidy pile of cash every time we drop a JDAM on some insurgents hiding in the mountains of Afghanistan, and said insurgents definitely aren't about to start shelling Seattle to make it unprofitable for them. Ah, excellent point. I guess the idea of continuous low-intensity war with nobody who's ever going to strike back, force things like reparations on the government that means they have to spend less, or plausibly make things a big enough conflict it starts bleeding people from other parts of the economy is pretty much an MIC wet dream. spectralent fucked around with this message at 20:38 on Dec 4, 2016 |
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Dec 4, 2016 20:35
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The secret is that lots of people in companies like Halliburton and Lockheed honestly believe they're doing the right thing for their country and the huge profits they make are a side benefit instead of the primary goal. The idea of sinister boards of directors in conference rooms planning out how they can start a war between Freedonia and Sylvania so they can sell more exploding widgets to both sides is straight bullshit on the level of your average Captain Planet episode. The reality is way more complicated and in many ways, way worse.
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Dec 4, 2016 20:38
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spectralent posted:That's true, but even then, isn't the intent that there's not a war? My gut would say that even if you're part of the MIC, your hope is that you can sell loads of neat explodey toys without actually having the side effect of prompting a war that would make everyone poorer (and probably get a lot of your factories exploded). Precisely. It's one of the oldest ideas around: Si vis pacem, para bellum. The problem is that it's also objectively wrong in a lot of cases for any number of reasons. If international relations were that logical and rational there'd be almost no wars because they aren't good for the economy except in certain freak circumstances like America in the Second World War, where because of the luck of the geographic draw we were the only major power whose infrastructure and industrial base wasn't completely bombed to bits and who didn't suffer massive civilian casualties. Well What Now fucked around with this message at 20:46 on Dec 4, 2016 |
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Dec 4, 2016 20:41
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Stairmaster posted:so which is the threads favorite: pike or shot? I'm a pikeman and I'm okay, I drink all night and I fight all day...
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Dec 4, 2016 21:11
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I don't think using WW2 as the metric for all wars is a good plan given that most wars are much smaller affairs and often fought well away from the merchants and their factories which may not even be in the same continent as the conflict. So, saying 'war is good for business' carries a lot of implications, one of which is that you personally won't be on the receiving end of it. The other assumptions are about cowardly merchants who only care about their bank accounts and would be willing to supply both sides to get rich on bloodshed going on here so there might be some disagreement about that as well. I know I've heard a couple people in the Vietnam War generation voice their thoughts on the MIC being responsible for ruinous misconduct during that war, although I obviously don't agree with that I understood what they meant when I heard it. edit: War can be good for the economy assuming that you're a third party in a war and your country has a bloated arms industry that needs to be fed to sustain itself. Ithle01 fucked around with this message at 22:24 on Dec 4, 2016 |
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Dec 4, 2016 21:46
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I still don't understand how pikemen or basically anybody not shooting anybody fight when it comes man-to-pike. You wave the pike at some other dude and hope for the best (especially when soldiers keep dropping armor)? Do you try to cut or dodge pikes to get close with your fuckoff sword? And since head only cavarly charges seem to be a myth (so much for knights) how do they do the "run" part of "hit and run"? On conspiracy chat, Lithuania got conscription reinstated last year and it has produced some bullshit. I think it's kinda stupid (rah rah professional army), but I would have gone with the draft if I had actually gotten drafted as it seemed like it would be an adventure that pounced on me: I don't have to justify joining the military because the military isn't asking! On the other hand, I was afraid of actually facing Russians, because I'd get Grom'ed or bombed the moment I stopped moving and shot the moment I started moving.
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Dec 4, 2016 21:50
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Crazycryodude posted:I think war can be very profitable if there's no chance of the other guy coming and breaking your things at home. So, everything the major powers have been involved with since WWII, really. You can argue all day about (for example) Iraq, Halliburton, and blood for oil, etc. but it's pretty undeniable that defense companies make a killing off asymmetric warfare. Boeing makes a tidy pile of cash every time we drop a JDAM on some insurgents hiding in the mountains of Afghanistan, and said insurgents definitely aren't about to start shelling Chicago to make it unprofitable for them. This ignores opportunity costs. Boeing makes money when we order a JDAM and use it to create a hole in the desert somewhere. That might be good *for Boeing*. But it's not good for the economy as a whole unless you ignore the other things we could have done with that money that could have created something more useful than a hole in the desert.
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Dec 4, 2016 21:54
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JcDent posted:I still don't understand how pikemen or basically anybody not shooting anybody fight when it comes man-to-pike.You wave the pike at some other dude and hope for the best (especially when soldiers keep dropping armor)? quote:Do you try to cut or dodge pikes to get close with your fuckoff sword? quote:And since head only cavarly charges seem to be a myth (so much for knights) how do they do the "run" part of "hit and run"? HEY GUNS fucked around with this message at 22:07 on Dec 4, 2016 |
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Dec 4, 2016 22:03
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Phanatic posted:This ignores opportunity costs. Boeing makes money when we order a JDAM and use it to create a hole in the desert somewhere. That might be good *for Boeing*. But it's not good for the economy as a whole unless you ignore the other things we could have done with that money that could have created something more useful than a hole in the desert. "The economy as a whole" has a much shittier lobbying team than your average defence contractor, though. Sorry if this sounds cynical.
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Dec 4, 2016 22:06
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Edit: ^^^ Also that ^^^Phanatic posted:This ignores opportunity costs. Boeing makes money when we order a JDAM and use it to create a hole in the desert somewhere. That might be good *for Boeing*. But it's not good for the economy as a whole unless you ignore the other things we could have done with that money that could have created something more useful than a hole in the desert. Crazycryodude fucked around with this message at 22:09 on Dec 4, 2016 |
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Dec 4, 2016 22:06
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Phanatic posted:This ignores opportunity costs. Boeing makes money when we order a JDAM and use it to create a hole in the desert somewhere. That might be good *for Boeing*. But it's not good for the economy as a whole unless you ignore the other things we could have done with that money that could have created something more useful than a hole in the desert. The economy as a whole is rarely a concern for the shareholders. The only way that war is good for an economy is to be the economy that id's left standing when your competition is ruined.
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Dec 4, 2016 22:24
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Phanatic posted:This ignores opportunity costs. Boeing makes money when we order a JDAM and use it to create a hole in the desert somewhere. That might be good *for Boeing*. But it's not good for the economy as a whole unless you ignore the other things we could have done with that money that could have created something more useful than a hole in the desert. As a society, defense spending is kind of like an insurance policy, you spend the money as a hedge against the bad things that could happen if you didn't spend the money. In war itself, there's definitely a Return On Investment ( I know in the previous thread topics like "Were American battleships just a big waste of money" and "what if Britain had spent 1/3 of the money they sunk into night area bombing into Coastal Command" are all explicitly circling around ROI.) That said, Mr. Phanatic here is not wrong. Money spent on defense is always money that could have spent elsewhere. The money spent elsewhere usually gets a much better ROI for society, too: stuff like educating its citizens, health care, building infrastructure, RnD projects etc. So it (like pretty much everything in economics) is a trade-off.
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Dec 4, 2016 23:08
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WW2 was a bit of an exception if you lived in the US. Sure, there were a couple shortages of things that were being saved for the war effort, but lend/lease and the buildup for actually joining the war kept all the US's industry going. And then after the war, the way that most every other nation suffered so many more losses and devastation helped US industry to become dominant throughout the world. Wars can be great for business if they're not where you live. I feel like in the past, wars of conquest might've had a net positive on the side of the conquerors, but I don't really have any data aside from a hunch and paradox games.
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Dec 4, 2016 23:15
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Many wars of antiquity were against economic competitors so as long as you win you're better off than your foe.
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Dec 5, 2016 00:20
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HEY GAL posted:And head on cavalry charges are not a myth, the myth is that the horses are literally colliding with people. Lol no.
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Dec 5, 2016 00:40
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One thing that wars pretty much always are is inflationary. Wages and spending power rise, and productivity decreases. Obviously the extent to which this is a good or bad thing depends on the case in question.
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Dec 5, 2016 00:52
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Mr Enderby posted:One thing that wars pretty much always are is inflationary. Wages and spending power rise, and productivity decreases. Obviously the extent to which this is a good or bad thing depends on the case in question. Since when in living memory?
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Dec 5, 2016 02:31
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Grognan posted:Since when in living memory? World War II?
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Dec 5, 2016 02:37
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Nebakenezzer posted:As a society, defense spending is kind of like an insurance policy, you spend the money as a hedge against the bad things that could happen if you didn't spend the money. In war itself, there's definitely a Return On Investment ( I know in the previous thread topics like "Were American battleships just a big waste of money" and "what if Britain had spent 1/3 of the money they sunk into night area bombing into Coastal Command" are all explicitly circling around ROI.) "Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed. This world in arms is not spending money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children. The cost of one modern heavy bomber is this: a modern brick school in more than 30 cities. It is two electric power plants, each serving a town of 60,000 population. It is two fine, fully equipped hospitals. It is some fifty miles of concrete pavement. We pay for a single fighter with a half-million bushels of wheat. We pay for a single destroyer with new homes that could have housed more than 8,000 people. . . . This is not a way of life at all, in any true sense. Under the cloud of threatening war, it is humanity hanging from a cross of iron." -Dwight D. Eisenhower https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chance_for_Peace_speech
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Dec 5, 2016 04:54
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Nebakenezzer posted:So, random question: who actually thinks of themselves as villains? Just curious. hearing some of the poo poo steve bannon says leads me to believe he thinks of himself as a villain and is cool with that
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Dec 5, 2016 05:08
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my dad posted:A Pike being shot. Out a window. FastestGunAlive posted:Lol if you don't want to drive around in a cute lil light tank or tankette, hitting sick jumps off debris and hills and dunes Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't some( I want to say British?) tank commander actually ramp over a river or canyon or something?
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Dec 5, 2016 10:05
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Grognan posted:Since when in living memory? Well-studied examples of wars causing rapid inflation, in living memory and restricted to the US, are WWI, WWII, Korea, and Vietnam. Of course these all have individual factors. The inflation during the Korean war was dampened down by a hawkish Fed, while in Vietnam it was increased by low taxes and growing social spending. I don't know if there were similar bumps from the Gulf, Afghanistan, and Iraq wars, but my suspicion is not. US military budget and payroll doesn't spike as much these days.
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Dec 5, 2016 11:59
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Mr Enderby posted:One thing that wars pretty much always are is inflationary. Wages and spending power rise, and productivity decreases. Obviously the extent to which this is a good or bad thing depends on the case in question. Mr Enderby posted:Well-studied examples of wars causing rapid inflation, in living memory and restricted to the US, are WWI, WWII, Korea, and Vietnam. The idea that productivity *decreased* during WWII in the US is insane to me.
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Dec 5, 2016 12:26
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Tias posted:Correct me if I'm wrong, but didn't some( I want to say British?) tank commander actually ramp over a river or canyon or something? IIRC yes, which was also how he learned he was in a mild steel pre-production tank that wasn't meant to be on the front line.
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Dec 5, 2016 12:40
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Fangz posted:The idea that productivity *decreased* during WWII in the US is insane to me. I don't have numbers one way or another, and GDP did grow quite a bit during the war years, but you have to balance the staggering output of war materiel against the staggering cut in civilian consumer goods. For example US produced about 4 million automobiles in 1941, 2 million in 1942, and then didn't produce another automobile until 1946.
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Dec 5, 2016 12:43
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The other thing is that the vast expansion of the US merchant marine fleet occurred as European merchant fleets vanished from the oceans (for obvious reasons), so the US had a period where it had relatively free reign to muscle in on trade routes.
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Dec 5, 2016 12:50
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:I don't have numbers one way or another, and GDP did grow quite a bit during the war years, but you have to balance the staggering output of war materiel against the staggering cut in civilian consumer goods. For example US produced about 4 million automobiles in 1941, 2 million in 1942, and then didn't produce another automobile until 1946. Sure, but the inflation and productivity picture isn't about military spending crowding out civilian manufacturing. You're moving the goalposts somewhat if we talk about that. Anyway, real per-capita GDP: http://i.stack.imgur.com/azSk3.png (Note the log scale on the Y-axis) EDIT: VVV Again, that's not an 'inflation reduces productivity' picture. And like my linked graph shows, actually productivity per capita rose by a LOT and stayed substantially higher than prewar levels after the war. Fangz fucked around with this message at 12:59 on Dec 5, 2016 |
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Dec 5, 2016 12:54
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Fangz posted:The idea that productivity *decreased* during WWII in the US is insane to me. It depends what you're producing, all the factories you convert over to war production stop producing their original stuff. You're also mobilizing your entire potential workforce so productivity might increase but productivity per capita might not because you're shoving people into jobs they are not as skilled in but where their sheer weight of numbers can still increase your net output of that particular product, because what matters is output of war materiel, not efficiency of production, you're not looking to turn a profit after all, you're looking to drown your enemy in tanks and bombs as quickly as possible. OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 12:58 on Dec 5, 2016 |
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Dec 5, 2016 12:56
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Fangz posted:Sure, but the inflation and productivity picture isn't about military spending crowding out civilian manufacturing. You're moving the goalposts somewhat if we talk about that I'm saying that war nerds tend to look at military production as a proxy for GDP/productivity and it isn't so, that's all. The productivity picture is absolutely effected by the split between military and civilian production. GDP per capita isn't really a great productivity measure, either. TFP is very relevant because of the relatively high unemployment rate immediately pre-war. I'm too lazy to work it out in terms of 40-45 but I think the true change in TFP was likely a lot lower than the change in GDP per capita.
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Dec 5, 2016 13:24
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KYOON GRIFFEY JR posted:I'm saying that war nerds tend to look at military production as a proxy for GDP/productivity and it isn't so, that's all. The productivity picture is absolutely effected by the split between military and civilian production. Look, I'm just saying the original poster says 'wars increase inflation, which decreases productivity', and there's zero evidence provided for that. Generally speaking the link between inflation and productivity is hella weak (I might well go further and call it 'total supply side bullshit' if I was feeling more pugnacious), and I know of at least some theory that inflation is actually *positively* correlated with productivity in many cases. If wars lead to reduction of production (not productivity, production) in some sectors it would not be via nominal wage increases. Fangz fucked around with this message at 13:35 on Dec 5, 2016 |
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Dec 5, 2016 13:32
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Fangz posted:Look, I'm just saying the original poster says 'wars increase inflation, which decreases productivity', and there's zero evidence provided for that. Generally speaking the link between inflation and productivity is hella weak (I might well go further and call it 'total supply side bullshit' if I was feeling more pugnacious), and I know of at least some theory that inflation is actually *positively* correlated with productivity in many cases. If wars lead to reduction of production (not productivity, production) in some sectors it would not be via nominal wage increases. That's not what I'm saying. I agree with you that inflation doesn't normally hurt productivity. Wars increase the amount of money in the economy, and reduce the availability of labour and goods. Result is inflation. The hit to productivity (with is a result of higher employment) is part of the cause, not the effect.
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Dec 5, 2016 14:16
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Wars do increase inflation; because in a fiat-currency economy all the government spending increases the money supply. Then you have suddenly well paid full employment for everyone (at least in the big wars of the 20th century.) which is also inflationary. The Allies, the United States especially, managed to fight these effects thanks to smart economic management. This was the whole idea behind war bonds: take money out of circulation by making it an investment. They also straight out managed/controlled their economies, and I think they were very successful in this because the populations really really wanted to work together to murder fascists. What happens in an economy where metal money is used is an interesting question. It seems to me War might be highly deflationary since the sovereign might 1) tax the poo poo out of everyone to get all the cash-money they can get, and 2) then spend that money on weapons and troops. I know Britain went through some periods where the economy essentially didn't have any money in a quite literal sense because the sovereign had abscond with the lot of it.
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Dec 5, 2016 14:25
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Nebakenezzer posted:Wars do increase inflation; because in a fiat-currency economy all the government spending increases the money supply. Then you have suddenly well paid full employment for everyone (at least in the big wars of the 20th century.) which is also inflationary. The Allies, the United States especially, managed to fight these effects thanks to smart economic management. This was the whole idea behind war bonds: take money out of circulation by making it an investment. They also straight out managed/controlled their economies, and I think they were very successful in this because the populations really really wanted to work together to murder fascists. It's an interesting question to consider how the 16th/17th century European economy would have handled the potential deflation without all the gold and silver from the new world. Fewer wars? More? I dunno.
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Dec 5, 2016 15:01
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P-Mack posted:It's an interesting question to consider how the 16th/17th century European economy would have handled the potential deflation without all the gold and silver from the new world. Fewer wars? More? I dunno. From watching the Extra Credits series on the History of Money I think they would've figured out some form of paper currency a lot sooner and switched to it (For the war's duration and then switch back to gold/silver soon after that).
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