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OwlFancier
Aug 22, 2013

computer parts posted:

I think a lot of leftists would disagree that there's a continuum between the two, hence the need for revolution (or a clean break).

Did they read the book? Because Marx even says there's like, the transitional period of state ownership to redistribute wealth.

As I recall he thinks it's a bit laughable that people could seize the means of production via the processes of democracy, and I would agree that it's very impractical for a minority to do that, but I would argue that given you need mass unionization in order to seize it anyway you could probably figure out how to do it without violently killing a bunch of people and rebuilding from base principles, because it's a lot harder to say no to an organised proletariat that are willing to ignore the state apparatus for democracy in favor of more direct opposition.

But that doesn't mean that direct opposition has to take the form of indiscriminate destruction of society. I don't really know where that idea comes from given that Marx argues that it won't really help much, what will effect the "revolution" is everyone deciding to work together as mandated by the condition of their lives. The idea that a violent minority seizure of the apparatus of state, or that the general destruction of society will achieve that seems... a bit random?

OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 22:01 on Dec 23, 2015

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Seraphic Neoman
Jul 19, 2011


Venomous posted:

Relevant point for this thread in this interview with the Pirate Bay's founder. He argues that the Internet has become too centralised and tied to capital across its existence, and that there's nothing we can do at this point to ensure a free and open Internet. The way to win the war, he says, is to abolish capitalism entirely by letting it run free, which reminded me of this thread.

[snip]

Personally I'd say he's a bit too optimistic about how quickly automation will occur, but I can't know for certain. Interesting though.

Yeah this sounds accelerationist.

Look I like to smashthesystemsmashthestate as much as the next guy, but someone has realize that giving up and letting capitalism run rampant isn't the answer. We're talking about decades of misery for the non-rich, a chaotic period of reform and only a potentially better future.

quote:

There is going to be a lot of fear, lost blood, and lost lives to get to that point, but I think that’s the only positive thing I see, that we are going to have a total system collapse in the future. Hopefully as quick as possible. I would rather be 50 then be like 85 when the system is crashing.

While I sympathize with his frustration, the bolded part is him being really loving naive about how this descent will happen. This isn't something that will happen overnight. This will take decades. It will be long, agonzing and it will suck. Finding solutions during that quagmire to current-day problems will be impossible. Then we will have a collapse of capitalism which will lead to more chaos. And then what would you do? People will be focused on getting stability in the system, not improving it. At that point, they'll sacrifice even more of their freedoms for this stability. I sincerely doubt that people will come together and be rational actors long enough to "do the dew" as that one guy put it.
And forgive me, Mr. Pirate Bay person, but that's the only positive thing that can happen? You can't focus on prepping the next generation for this world or trying to fix the one we have? You of all people have a lot of clout amongst the newer generations, why don't you loving use it for something instead of being a giant pussy?

suck my woke dick
Oct 10, 2012

:siren:I CANNOT EJACULATE WITHOUT SEEING NATIVE AMERICANS BRUTALISED!:siren:

Put this cum-loving slave on ignore immediately!
protip: that's because he is a giant pussy

VitalSigns
Sep 3, 2011

Millionaire web developer supports unfettered capitalism that will condemn the poor to a miserable hell but have little impact on his own standard of living, news at 11.

Famethrowa
Oct 5, 2012

Willie Tomg posted:

No, my position for the purposes of this specific thread because y'all are gormless limpid fuckers who cannot rebut the apocalypse is that Capitalism has created an edifice that has destroyed base leftist populism. My cite for that is the last 30 years of world history. Let it create further still for only wonders portend. My cite for that is the last century.

terms like "worse" or "better" are gadflies for losers. Que sera sera, and internet posters will comment upon it I'm sure.

:lol:

I love depressed, arrogant, internet losers.

Effectronica
May 31, 2011
Fallen Rib

Famethrowa posted:

:lol:

I love depressed, arrogant, internet losers.

Self-love is the sin of Onan.

asdf32
May 15, 2010

I lust for childrens' deaths. Ask me about how I don't care if my kids die.

Famethrowa posted:

:lol:

I love depressed, arrogant, internet losers.

You should be sympathetic though, to the first world middle class (global 80-90th income percentile). Look at how much better Chinese peasants have been doing than them economically. You can at least understand why some would want to tear the system down.


Seraphic Neoman
Jul 19, 2011


VitalSigns posted:

Millionaire web developer supports unfettered capitalism that will condemn the poor to a miserable hell but have little impact on his own standard of living, news at 11.

See I dunno about that. I get the feeling that the guy is coming from being extremely let down by his country during the whole PB debacle. You can call this view misguided, but I don't think he has this opinion because he's Richie Rich.

Willie Tomg posted:

No, my position for the purposes of this specific thread because y'all are gormless limpid fuckers who cannot rebut the apocalypse is that Capitalism has created an edifice that has destroyed base leftist populism. My cite for that is the last 30 years of world history. Let it create further still for only wonders portend. My cite for that is the last century.

terms like "worse" or "better" are gadflies for losers. Que sera sera, and internet posters will comment upon it I'm sure.


so are you like a gimmick or...?

computer parts
Nov 18, 2010

PLEASE CLAP

OwlFancier posted:

Did they read the book? Because Marx even says there's like, the transitional period of state ownership to redistribute wealth.

In fairness, there's a recurring trend of adherents of an ideology not reading the texts that their ideology is based off of.

OwlFancier
Aug 22, 2013

computer parts posted:

In fairness, there's a recurring trend of adherents of an ideology not reading the texts that their ideology is based off of.

True but the Manifesto is really short. And leftists are supposed to be smart.

VitalSigns
Sep 3, 2011

SSNeoman posted:

See I dunno about that. I get the feeling that the guy is coming from being extremely let down by his country during the whole PB debacle. You can call this view misguided, but I don't think he has this opinion because he's Richie Rich.

That explains a "this system sucks" opinion, but it doesn't explain the "so let's make it worse and let the poor die in the streets until they make the revolution for me" opinion.

Accelerationism is the domain of the lazy and the affluent. Notice who is in favor of it, it's never the guy working two jobs whose wife wouldn't ever be able to afford cancer treatment if the Medicare expansion were repealed under a Republican administration. It's always the well-off man who would be insulated or maybe even benefit from the suffering he wants to impose on the country.

Doc Hawkins
Jun 15, 2010

Dashing? But I'm not even moving!


That's because only we are educated and secure enough to be able examine the situation rationally. The working class is lucky to have us on their side, or they'd never get anything done. :smuggo:

Doorknob Slobber
Sep 10, 2006

by Fluffdaddy

Doc Hawkins posted:

That's because only we are educated and secure enough to be able examine the situation rationally. The working class is lucky to have us on their side, or they'd never get anything done. :smuggo:

lazy loving bums the working class

just make them suffer more until they JUST GET IT

Radbot
Aug 12, 2009
Probation
Can't post for 3 years!
Why be pro-accelerationism when you can be smugly against it (while doing nothing to stop it and, effectively, being an accelerationist by living a white male first world life), imo

VitalSigns
Sep 3, 2011

Well you may be right that acceleration is equal parts stupidity and sociopathy, but you're smug about it so now you lose the argument.

Admiral Bosch
Apr 19, 2007
Who is Admiral Aken Bosch, and what is that old scoundrel up to?
@OP and also the guy OP quoted

buy a gun, tell all your leftist friends and sympathizers to buy a gun, stop letting gun control win elections for the GOP, stop being such pantywaisted idjits

VitalSigns
Sep 3, 2011

Haha right. Anyone who votes Republican right now because guns will still vote Republican after that happens and the GOP runs a law and order campaign scaremongering about white-hating liberals giving inner-city thugs guns.

Baudolino
Apr 1, 2010

THUNDERDOME LOSER
What if you are all wrong and capitalism is not so destructive that a complete collapse will happen. Just bad enough to ensure the majority of humans will never ever ever get to not suffer extreme want and deprivation. The system can survive that and squash the odd rebellion here and there. So far it has always managed to beat back severe opposition from the workers, from spiritual leaders and ulta-violent political movements. I think it likely that our current economic system could in fact survive almost any apocalyptic scenario where humanity does not go extinct.

OwlFancier
Aug 22, 2013

Baudolino posted:

What if you are all wrong and capitalism is not so destructive that a complete collapse will happen. Just bad enough to ensure the majority of humans will never ever ever get to not suffer extreme want and deprivation. The system can survive that and squash the odd rebellion here and there. So far it has always managed to beat back severe opposition from the workers, from spiritual leaders and ulta-violent political movements. I think it likely that our current economic system could in fact survive almost any apocalyptic scenario where humanity does not go extinct.

Nah, it's predicated by our level of technology, it came about as a result of mechanization and mechanization will likely be its end as well, it's the result of the fact that the primary need for human labour is to service machinery which replaced the labour of other humans, when that human labour can also be replaced, society will necessarily change.

As the feudal order did not stop mechanization on the basis that it brought wealth to some of the rulers, neither will capitalism.

Baudolino
Apr 1, 2010

THUNDERDOME LOSER
Ok that`s interesting. But that`s not a apocalyptic scenario at all. If you are rigth there is no need for revolution ,just let the system evolve itself peacefully into something better. Things won`t get worse it`ll actually just get better if we unleash capitalism.

But since the elite will own the machinery that will replace labour why won`t they just kill us all? To them we will just be useless mouths incapable of defending ourselves. The 1% would and could implement the final solution to the problem of class struggle.

OwlFancier
Aug 22, 2013

Baudolino posted:

Ok that`s interesting. But that`s not a apocalyptic scenario at all. If you are rigth there is no need for revolution ,just let the system evolve itself peacefully into something better. Things won`t get worse it`ll actually just get better if we unleash capitalism.

But since the elite will own the machinery that will replace labour why won`t they just kill us all? To them we will just be useless mouths incapable of defending ourselves. The 1% would and could implement the final solution to the problem of class struggle.

Well, that's the thing, the "revolution" as described by Marx & co is not necessarily murderous violent overthrow. In fact there's very little reason for that at all, an ideal form of it would be entirely bloodless because it is argued that the proletariat hold the true power, they just do not exercise it because they are not organized. Capital cannot function without Labour, so if Labour deigns to withdraw itself then Capital is powerless, because it doesn't actually do anything except tell everyone else how to live. The machinery is operated by the workers, the laws are enforced by the workers, the wars are fought by the workers. If everyone in the country said tomorrow "actually we won't be giving you any of our labour but we will keep coming to work and distributing the products of our labour as we see fit" then Capital would overnight become completely impotent. They only 'own' the machinery in the sense that they tell everyone else they own it, and Labour as a general rule will go along with this, they don't have the ability or the knowledge of how to actually use it.

Of course that is extremely unlikely because what currently organizes the proletariat is Capital, largely because everyone goes along with it out of habit. It would be very difficult to get everyone to do that. And there'd be some organizational issues with how to handle distribution of goods and stuff without it being dictated by who has money, but it doesn't really diminish the fact that the entire structure of our society is predicated on the people who make the world go round consenting to allow it to continue. And also on people being organized into Labour and Capital.

Because even ignoring the need for humans in the production chain, you also need the proletariat as a market to sell to. The whole desire of Capital is to accumulate more Capital, which it does by producing and selling to Labour, Labour necessarily being the majority of the population and the majority consumers of what is produced. If Capital shot everyone then what does it do now? It can't sell to the dead, so that would still necessitate a complete social restructuring and, I suppose, would possibly constitute a kind of backwards form of socialism, whereby the majority of the people own the means of production and distribute based on need, not wealth. On account of everyone else being dead and money/markets as a concept becoming entirely farcical.

Of course that assumes we invent self-sustaining and constructing murderbots before we invent robots which cause mass unemployment generally, which is possible but perhaps unlikely. Once Labour is replaced by machinery very thoroughly, you run into the aforementioned problem of wage-labour not making a whole lot of sense any more because nobody's being paid to work because there's nothing for them to do, and if nobody's being paid, they're not buying things.

The primary argument against accelerationism however is not that there's something wrong with allowing capitalism to progress, because that will happen whatever you do,the argumens against it are that it tends to focus on simply destroying society rather than accelerating the inevitable changes. And further, destroying existing society will not cause people to organize better and seize control.

What accelerates the march of capitalism is still what is described by Marx, mechanization. I don't imagine it's quite has he envisaged it but it's right in the manifesto, that eventually Capital will replace Labour so completely that the conditions of Labour's existence will necessitate a change in social organization. Simply pulling things like social security or abolishing the government don't advance that at all, they just make living conditions worse, but there is no need to change society because of that, it would merely be very unpleasant to live in for Labour. Society worked just fine with absolutely abysmal working conditions for hundreds of years. But if Labour is no longer paid to work, then Capital cannot function as it currently does either because it cannot make money without a market. The most accelerationist things in the world would probably either be the development of fusion power or the advancement of robotics and computing.

OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 03:13 on Dec 26, 2015

asdf32
May 15, 2010

I lust for childrens' deaths. Ask me about how I don't care if my kids die.

OwlFancier posted:

Because even ignoring the need for humans in the production chain, you also need the proletariat as a market to sell to. The whole desire of Capital is to accumulate more Capital, which it does by producing and selling to Labour, Labour necessarily being the majority of the population and the majority consumers of what is produced.

Not really and this is basically a weird myth that gets propagated by both sides of the ideological spectrum.

Capitalism sells to people with money and doesn't care who has the money. If small proportion of rich people have all the money then they're the consumers and that's fine from capitalism's perspective.

Consider that on a global scale right now capitalism is completely happy to sideline billions of people by leaving them with minimal participation in the global economy. It is possible for that to grow, if the circumstances are right (luckily they have not been).

The real life check on increasing inequality in the face of mechanization is Democracy, clearly not capitalism.

ronya
Nov 8, 2010

I'm the normal one.

You hate ridden fucks will regret your words when you eventually grow up.

Peace.

OwlFancier posted:

Well, that's the thing, the "revolution" as described by Marx & co is not necessarily murderous violent overthrow. In fact there's very little reason for that at all, an ideal form of it would be entirely bloodless because it is argued that the proletariat hold the true power, they just do not exercise it because they are not organized. Capital cannot function without Labour, so if Labour deigns to withdraw itself then Capital is powerless, because it doesn't actually do anything except tell everyone else how to live. The machinery is operated by the workers, the laws are enforced by the workers, the wars are fought by the workers. If everyone in the country said tomorrow "actually we won't be giving you any of our labour but we will keep coming to work and distributing the products of our labour as we see fit" then Capital would overnight become completely impotent. They only 'own' the machinery in the sense that they tell everyone else they own it, and Labour as a general rule will go along with this, they don't have the ability or the knowledge of how to actually use it.

Of course that is extremely unlikely because what currently organizes the proletariat is Capital, largely because everyone goes along with it out of habit. It would be very difficult to get everyone to do that. And there'd be some organizational issues with how to handle distribution of goods and stuff without it being dictated by who has money, but it doesn't really diminish the fact that the entire structure of our society is predicated on the people who make the world go round consenting to allow it to continue. And also on people being organized into Labour and Capital.

Because even ignoring the need for humans in the production chain, you also need the proletariat as a market to sell to. The whole desire of Capital is to accumulate more Capital, which it does by producing and selling to Labour, Labour necessarily being the majority of the population and the majority consumers of what is produced. If Capital shot everyone then what does it do now? It can't sell to the dead, so that would still necessitate a complete social restructuring and, I suppose, would possibly constitute a kind of backwards form of socialism, whereby the majority of the people own the means of production and distribute based on need, not wealth. On account of everyone else being dead and money/markets as a concept becoming entirely farcical.

Of course that assumes we invent self-sustaining and constructing murderbots before we invent robots which cause mass unemployment generally, which is possible but perhaps unlikely. Once Labour is replaced by machinery very thoroughly, you run into the aforementioned problem of wage-labour not making a whole lot of sense any more because nobody's being paid to work because there's nothing for them to do, and if nobody's being paid, they're not buying things.

The primary argument against accelerationism however is not that there's something wrong with allowing capitalism to progress, because that will happen whatever you do,the argumens against it are that it tends to focus on simply destroying society rather than accelerating the inevitable changes. And further, destroying existing society will not cause people to organize better and seize control.

What accelerates the march of capitalism is still what is described by Marx, mechanization. I don't imagine it's quite has he envisaged it but it's right in the manifesto, that eventually Capital will replace Labour so completely that the conditions of Labour's existence will necessitate a change in social organization. Simply pulling things like social security or abolishing the government don't advance that at all, they just make living conditions worse, but there is no need to change society because of that, it would merely be very unpleasant to live in for Labour. Society worked just fine with absolutely abysmal working conditions for hundreds of years. But if Labour is no longer paid to work, then Capital cannot function as it currently does either because it cannot make money without a market. The most accelerationist things in the world would probably either be the development of fusion power or the advancement of robotics and computing.

putting aside the Singularityesque/Pikettyesque increasing-substitution-of-labour-by-capital idea...

a large chunk of capital is now stored in the form of "human capital" - the kind of capital that derives its value through improving the productivity of labour, is costly to invest in, and depreciates like any other capital, but unlike normal capital, is possessed by only one person and is hence inalienable and non-expropriable. In a typical developed country, assessing human capital stocks in the same way that physical capital stocks are estimated generally puts national human capital at higher than national physical capital stocks

I underscore that this is true right now, and has been true of the developed world for a while already: a large share of the modern world's wealth is produced by means of production involving highly skilled individuals as a tiny share of the national labour force, rather than labour-intensive light industry. Automation serves to make a handful of engineers with 30+ years of educational investment in their personal human capital ever more productive, rather than making several hundred thousand semi-skilled individuals with high school education ever more productive.

This is a good time to reflect upon this graph:

ronya fucked around with this message at 03:51 on Dec 26, 2015

ronya
Nov 8, 2010

I'm the normal one.

You hate ridden fucks will regret your words when you eventually grow up.

Peace.

asdf32 posted:

Capitalism sells to people with money and doesn't care who has the money. If small proportion of rich people have all the money then they're the consumers and that's fine from capitalism's perspective...

This is indeed the mainstream assessment. Here is some decent 2012 discussion (from a heterodox perspective). FWIW I think the mainstream has it, and the underconsumption-trap thesis does not look pretty three years on.

OwlFancier
Aug 22, 2013

asdf32 posted:

Not really and this is basically a weird myth that gets propagated by both sides of the ideological spectrum.

Capitalism sells to people with money and doesn't care who has the money. If small proportion of rich people have all the money then they're the consumers and that's fine from capitalism's perspective.

Consider that on a global scale right now capitalism is completely happy to sideline billions of people by leaving them with minimal participation in the global economy. It is possible for that to grow, if the circumstances are right (luckily they have not been).

The real life check on increasing inequality in the face of mechanization is Democracy, clearly not capitalism.

People don't buy for no reason, if a small proprortion of rich people have all the money then they probably still don't have very much to buy. If you're hypothesizing that money may eventually be completely irrelevant for the majority of people and exist primarily for trade between the directors of massive mechanized production lines then I guess that's possible but seems unlikely. Again you still have other humans in there and they need to either be surviving somehow or non-existent.

It is true that Capital has not yet permeated 100% of the possible markets and that is why it's still here, but it will always seek to grow.

ronya posted:

putting aside the Singularityesque/Pikettyesque increasing-substitution-of-labour-by-capital idea...

a large chunk of capital is now stored in the form of "human capital" - the kind of capital that derives its value through improving the productivity of labour, is costly to invest in, and depreciates like any other capital, but unlike normal capital, is possessed by only one person and is hence inalienable and non-expropriable. In a typical developed country, assessing human capital stocks in the same way that physical capital stocks are estimated generally puts national human capital at higher than national physical capital stocks

I underscore that this is true right now, and has been true of the developed world for a while already: a large share of the modern world's wealth is produced by means of production involving highly skilled individuals as a tiny share of the national labour force, rather than labour-intensive light industry. Automation serves to make a handful of engineers with 30+ years of educational investment in their personal human capital ever more productive, rather than making several hundred thousand semi-skilled individuals with high school education ever more productive.

This is a good time to reflect upon this graph:



Which would seem to substantiate my suggestion. Automation does not make people more productive, it makes people less relevant. The point is that automation initially moved people from being skilled to unskilled labour, and will eventually move people from being unskilled labour to being redundant, as it already is. And once that happens you need to figure out what to do with the people who are left over. You can try shifting them into service work as we see nowadays but that has its problems too, and suggests further that Capital is built on the idea of constant growth, which would seem to be necessarily unsustainable under a constant social structure.

ronya
Nov 8, 2010

I'm the normal one.

You hate ridden fucks will regret your words when you eventually grow up.

Peace.
My point was on human capital, which makes a select group of people more relevant and the larger group of people less relevant, rather than automation per se.

Capital is not built on full employment and constant growth; rather, the politics of developed welfare states are built on full employment and constant growth, as a legacy from the golden era of social democracy. If you consider the developing world, however, you can readily observe that neighbourhoods or even whole cities can exist at a developed-world quality of life (with a degree of social insurance for the relatively poor amongst the ingroup), with the rural and suburban poor outgroup existing at subsistence. That's crony capitalism red in tooth and claw, if you like.

Maoist Pussy
Feb 12, 2014

by Lowtax

OwlFancier posted:

True but the Manifesto is really short. And leftists are supposed to be smart.

Leftists are smart in the same way that vegans are healthy. ie, an improvement only over not paying any attention whatsoever.

computer parts
Nov 18, 2010

PLEASE CLAP

Maoist Pussy posted:

Leftists are smart in the same way that vegans are healthy. ie, an improvement only over not paying any attention whatsoever.

And even then, it's usually just propaganda. After all, the ideal leftist is a unionized prole, not an ivory tower intellectual.

Dead Cosmonaut
Nov 14, 2015

by FactsAreUseless
Don't expect D&D to know much about leftism. They're too self absorbed in their liberal Fukuyamaist "western civilization has reached its end point and there no other political alternative other than milquetoast reform".

Somfin
Oct 25, 2010

In my🦚 experience🛠️ the big things🌑 don't teach you anything🤷‍♀️.

Nap Ghost

Dead Cosmonaut posted:

Don't expect D&D to know much about leftism. They're too self absorbed in their liberal Fukuyamaist "western civilization has reached its end point and there no other political alternative other than milquetoast reform".

Tell me more about the Something Awful hiveminds, I'm intrigued and you seem to speak with some authority on them.

lllllllllllllllllll
Feb 28, 2010

Now the scene's lighting is perfect!

Rodatose posted:

Accelerationism relies on the narcissistic belief that, if things got worse, people who were uninformed of systemic problems would come to see the same objective truth you see, because it's so obvious.
"Maybe things need to go really bad before they can improve." - Something an idiot German citizen could have said on 30.1.1933.

suck my woke dick
Oct 10, 2012

:siren:I CANNOT EJACULATE WITHOUT SEEING NATIVE AMERICANS BRUTALISED!:siren:

Put this cum-loving slave on ignore immediately!

lllllllllllllllllll posted:

"Maybe things need to go really bad before they can improve." - Something an idiot German citizen could have said on 30.1.1933.

Post 1945 things did indeed improve :smuggo:

VitalSigns
Sep 3, 2011

I'm voting for the Kaiser's war on France so the old order will destroy itself and my socialist paradise will arise like a phoenix from the ashes to redeem mankind.

Mc Do Well
Aug 2, 2008

by FactsAreUseless

VitalSigns posted:

I'm voting for the Kaiser's war on France so the old order will destroy itself and my socialist paradise will arise like a phoenix from the ashes to redeem mankind.

World Wars 1 & 2 made the USSR a world power and justified a united Europe so you wouldn't be wrong.

Just the individual making that statement probably wouldn't live to see it happen.

asdf32
May 15, 2010

I lust for childrens' deaths. Ask me about how I don't care if my kids die.

OwlFancier posted:

People don't buy for no reason, if a small proprortion of rich people have all the money then they probably still don't have very much to buy. If you're hypothesizing that money may eventually be completely irrelevant for the majority of people and exist primarily for trade between the directors of massive mechanized production lines then I guess that's possible but seems unlikely. Again you still have other humans in there and they need to either be surviving somehow or non-existent.

It is true that Capital has not yet permeated 100% of the possible markets and that is why it's still here, but it will always seek to grow.

Consider that if I'm a rich oligarch factory owner there are two scenarios. 1) I want more stuff in which case I'll produce it myself or engage another factory owner in trade or 2) I don't want more stuff in which case I'll do nothing.

Under no circumstance does it benefit me to give you a dollar just so you'll have demand at my factory. If you have productive capacity of course I might, but if you don't, capitalism will happily sideline you (which is basically Ronya's point about human capital).

Of course I'm talking here from a purely capitalist perspective. Real life states have entirely different incentives where a higher value is placed on equality and employment.
[/quote]

ronya posted:

This is indeed the mainstream assessment. Here is some decent 2012 discussion (from a heterodox perspective). FWIW I think the mainstream has it, and the underconsumption-trap thesis does not look pretty three years on.

Thanks for the link, do you care to expand on this in terms of what was at stake in your opinion? I had accepted that the economy was reasonably robust in the face of varying savings rates and that even if, say, the U.S. savings rate increased because of increased inequality it would still leave us well below like rapidly growing China.

OwlFancier
Aug 22, 2013

asdf32 posted:

Consider that if I'm a rich oligarch factory owner there are two scenarios. 1) I want more stuff in which case I'll produce it myself or engage another factory owner in trade or 2) I don't want more stuff in which case I'll do nothing.

Under no circumstance does it benefit me to give you a dollar just so you'll have demand at my factory. If you have productive capacity of course I might, but if you don't, capitalism will happily sideline you (which is basically Ronya's point about human capital).

Of course I'm talking here from a purely capitalist perspective. Real life states have entirely different incentives where a higher value is placed on equality and employment.

But the conditions of you being a rich oligarch factory owner are based on your capital having meaning.

If it can't command labour then it doesn't. If capital existed only for trade between rich oligarch factory owners then what is everyone else doing? Currently we all use capital to some degree and its primary social function is to keep the majority of society engaged with, and under the control of, people who dispense it.

You can't have a society where a tiny fraction of people have literally all the money and use it for trade between each other and everyone else does not use money or interact in any way with the people who own the means of production.

You're suggesting that we could end up with a scenario whereby the entire industrial output of the planet would become completely disconnected from 99% of the human population and would exist entirely for making things solely for the use of the 1% who own that industry. No buildings, no food production, no energy or cars or anything. That's absurd.

asdf32
May 15, 2010

I lust for childrens' deaths. Ask me about how I don't care if my kids die.

OwlFancier posted:

But the conditions of you being a rich oligarch factory owner are based on your capital having meaning.

If it can't command labour then it doesn't. If capital existed only for trade between rich oligarch factory owners then what is everyone else doing? Currently we all use capital to some degree and its primary social function is to keep the majority of society engaged with, and under the control of, people who dispense it.

Capital has meaning in terms of how much it can directly produce for me or in terms of how much it can produce for me to trade with others. That's the meaning of value in a market economy. If only a handful of other rich oligarchs have things worth trading for so be it. I can't increase the size of my mansion or yacht by trading with anyone else, so I won't.

Labor doesn't have any inherent value which is why it really is possible under the right scenario for its value to decline to near zero.

The reason society is as equal as it is today is because most of us still have productive value.

quote:

You can't have a society where a tiny fraction of people have literally all the money and use it for trade between each other and everyone else does not use money or interact in any way with the people who own the means of production.

You're suggesting that we could end up with a scenario whereby the entire industrial output of the planet would become completely disconnected from 99% of the human population and would exist entirely for making things solely for the use of the 1% who own that industry. No buildings, no food production, no energy or cars or anything. That's absurd.

Yes you can and that world is on display today. As Ronya already pointed out, we have cities where the core is filled with the rich, and the outskirts are barely subsistence slums. The people on the outskirts don't have [much] human or physical capital, so they're left out. It's simple, and it could theoretically get worse.

OwlFancier
Aug 22, 2013

The conditions of labour could certainly get worse but at the point where labour is completely irrelevant then you end up with lots of people with nothing to do and no means to live.

While there is plenty of poverty in the world the majority of people in the west, at least, are absolutely not subsistence workers, they are directly integrated with the greater production chain. They work to facilitate the growth of Capital and in return they receive a greatly diminished portion of that which is then, for the most part, given directly back to Capital in exchange for the means to live.

What you are suggesting is very different from that, complete social segregation. You might not rub elbows with the wealthy now but you are socially integrated with them in the sense that they dictate the conditions of your life through Capital.

If you no longer work for money and no longer buy things then you are truly subsistent, or possibly dead. And the role of Capital in society would be very different because it would not have control over people's lives in that scenario. If you don't need it to live and you don't offer it anything then it's irrelevant.

That's the point, you're not suggesting a mere reduction in quality of life, you're suggesting a complete break from the means of living as it has existed for the last several centuries. That necessitates a significant social change.

The increasing replacement of menial workers with automation is not infinitely sustainable, because either everyone needs to become much more skilled or you need something to cater for the majority unemployed, or you need a lot of people to die, resulting in the survivors being the ones skilled enough to be employable. Whatever happens, the social structure of a majority of low-skilled employees can't continue along with increased automation.

OwlFancier fucked around with this message at 18:24 on Dec 26, 2015

asdf32
May 15, 2010

I lust for childrens' deaths. Ask me about how I don't care if my kids die.
Well to be clear again I'm talking strictly in terms of incentives that are internal to the market and capitalism. Here I would outright reject the notion that capital is a control tool. It's not, it's simply a tool with value dictated by what it's able to produce (which is the universal definition of value, including for labor).

The point is that economically, the market never benefits by employing anything or anyone which doesn't produce value (in terms of overall GDP or from the perspective of a hypothetical wealthy elite), a path unskilled labor may be on. People are currently integrated with the wealthy and society as a whole because they have productive value.


In terms of real life society, I completely agree that it's unsustainable. But that's because real life society has a set of incentives that are completely parallel to the market.


EDIT: Oh and also to be clear there are reasons why a more equal society will be a more productive one because spreading wealth generally increases health, and education which directly increases productivity. Though the point is that market incentives won't seek this outcome on their own.

asdf32 fucked around with this message at 19:08 on Dec 26, 2015

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Wheeee
Mar 11, 2001

When a tree grows, it is soft and pliable. But when it's dry and hard, it dies.

Hardness and strength are death's companions. Flexibility and softness are the embodiment of life.

That which has become hard shall not triumph.

Even the relatively young demographic of this forum, Gen X and Millennial, isn't going to live to see anything but a shittier version of what we have today, making the entire discussion more or less irrelevant.

Just vote Trump so you can watch him tell Assad that he's fired as American boots hit the ground for the next phase of the endless war.

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