It's no biggie. The discussion is actually a pretty good one, just the difference in theoretical and practical can have a person forming two different opinions on the same topic.

I'll wait to respond Ethan once you move the thread other then to say really good response and I think it's relevant to the discussion though, because you're suggestion of socialism and freedom coexisting is a very intriguing one similar to the construct of proposed American Socialized Health Care.

If it helps you JJJ I could explain my own political philosophy before we dive back into this. What I believe as it isn't really traditional Marxism at all in terms of the goal (this is where I guess it becomes socialist as opposed to Marxist) and I tend to lean more towards Trotsky then Lenin and there's other tidbits...that are just not typical characteristics of socialism.

The only economic system we currently have that respects the individual's pursuit of his own happiness is capitalism. That is why I like it.

When you take away property rights the individual cannot see the most objective value of his work. In other words, the output of man's work is screwed around with to the point where man doesn't know his work's worth. That is not good for the individual.

Property rights and personal responsibility go hand in hand. When society says that everyone must rely on everyone else it is lying. It is telling you a false statement about humanity. The fact that we have free will is undeniable. We cannot escape our responsibility for ourselves. The society that takes away property rights attempts to, but it will never work. It will never get to the point where a man does not have to fend for himself.

Lastly, I view any attempt to distribute the wealth as materialist. The idea that one cannot succeed in a capitalist economy is false. That is because succeeding in life has nothing to do with money. Might it make life easier with money? Maybe. Will it help one achieve happiness. Never.

P.S. I know I am jumping in at a horrible time.

What gives you a right to property?

What gives you a right to anything? The fact that we all need property rights to pursue our own happiness is what gives us the right. Ultimately nothing gives anything rights. The government protects "rights," so that might relate to the question your asking. There are no "human rights" or any of that stuff. Where do they come from?

What is rational in the pursuit of man's own happiness is what makes it a right. It all starts with the base right, that man may have a right to his own life. If that right is crossed, then no one on either side will experience happiness. It is a social contract.

So all "rights" stem from this right to life. Anything that infringes on man living his own life is not a right. Of course, there is a hierarchy. There are some things that we consider rights that infringe on other so called "rights." Some rights are more important than others. That is why one needs a hierarchy.

i realize this is basically a 2-way PM conversation being broadcast publicly for whatever reason but i'm still gonna butt in for a quick comment.

i don't have a problem with wealth redistribution, if everyone is working towards the same goal...

on the other hand i have a big problem with redistributing whatever wealth i've accumulated to those who just want a free ride regardless of their justifications. which then opens up a 'big brother' can of worms because there would obviously have to be some sort of system in place to ensure people aren't just mooching off the system.


then again the best comment i've ever heard in terms of social ideals (it kind of applies to this discussion as well)

if you're in your 20s and you don't believe in some socialist utopia - you don't have much of a heart.

if you're in your 30s and you still believe in some socialist utopia - you don't have much of a brain.

so you hunted and gathered your own food, taught yourself, made clothes for yourself and built your own computer?

in the society we live in we all rely on one another whether we like it or not

But you owning property infringes on my right to own property and therefore my own pursuit of happiness no? So doesn't that mean property rights are something only attainable to the people on a certain level of that hierarchy and up? Which would mean that they're better than those below - creating classes. Which means that those with, the upper class, can oppress those without, the lower class. How can the lower class pursue their own happiness then when the upper class has created monopolies, slave wages, and given them the whole laissez-faire package?

You're completely over thinking it. His point ( I think) is more along the lines of the concept of avoiding playing to the lowest common denominator. It's nothing more then applied societal natural selection.

A society should take things\goods\people that are useful and work with them without being forced to work around those people and things that can not pull their own weight.

You see what I mean?

No, you too can own property and even his if you having something he views as equal value to the property you wish to acquire. I can say for a fact, I'd never have worked as hard as I did throughout my life without the incentive of owning property and goods to make my families life easier.

RE: Marxism\Socialism

I appreciate but do not share your perspective, I agree with Inuzuka Sksword in his assessment of the capitalism as leaving the most available for individual subjective pursuit of happiness. You and I both have the choice to own property or not, drive a vehicle or not, save or spend money, invest or hoard.

The basis of my philosophy is simple too. The more options you allow to a collective society the more people you will satisfy.

The more people that are satisfied the more that are working productivity and too their potential, the more of those you get the better society you have.

There are flaws surely but I can't imagine anyone could be unselfishly opposed to a system alloting the most options for the most people.

this is relative to the individual and how they want to handle their money and their perception of happiness.

the idea that we live in a society with 'slave wages' seems to be perpetuated by whiny kids (regardless of physical age) who want to measure their worth against their neighbors rather than against themselves and who generally act like they're entitled to an active social life as a basic human right. (yes, this is a huge generalization)

just because someone works a job doesn't mean they're entitled to a house in the burbs with a nice car in the driveway. they need to step up in their work for it, and if they can't manage to keep an apartment running then how the hell do they honestly expect to be able to keep a house running?

That's not really what I was getting at all. I didn't even say the United States was a society with slave wages. It's not and that's because of wage laws but total free marketeers (see Inuzuka Skysword) think government regulation like that is immoral and wrong. I just don't understand how they can look at sweat shops and the like and think that's a product of morality.

Coming from a life that saw an 11 year old me sleeping in an 8x8 room with two siblings while My Parents and Aunt and Uncle shared a "master" bedroom to today where I have three times as many bedrooms as occupants in my house, nothing rubs me the wrong way more then entitlement.

Sweet Shops are a product of supply and demand mixed with a twinge of greed and desperation and are horrible realities. The problem with government regulation is that the track record of the last fifty years is obscenely corrupt.

Yess because all my arguments have come from me being a whiny kid from the suburbs with a sense of entitlement.

I certainly didn't mean to imply that at all (if it's directed at me.)

I was agreeing with Dave's sentiment that entitlement is hard to stomach.

All that operates under the assumption that I have the means to own property. In a capitalist society there's always going to be an oppressed under class who can't own property and don't have the means to "pursue happiness" which is subjective; even though you guys seem to be arguing it's objective and requires the right to own wealth and property (but somehow socialism is the materialistic philosophy?)

The problem is capitalism doesn't allow the most options for most people. It provides a state of welfare for the elite and the lower classes are stuck in a society where they have to play by the rules of said elite. Capitalism requires for the institutions of society to be under the control of the few, the ones with the most wealth. Capitalism is inherently fascist.

I've never accused socialism as being materialistic, I said it's impractical and unfair.

There is no one in a capitalist society that can not advance in class, this is a FACT I will swear by. Doubting me is scoffing at years and years of first hand eye witness evidence. Explain how I went from nothing to where I am today if capitalism and democracy are inherently fascist.

To someone in my position you're argument sounds like sour grapes. You seem unwilling to give the system a try and stay resigned to your presumption of an unlevel playing field to great to overcome.

Wealthy people in America became wealthy because of their families hard work and sacrifice in the vast majority of cases. Those families made those sacrifices to ensure their children and children's children would have that advantage.

No one is holding you down or holding you back.

Here's how I know I'm right: I know hundreds of people who have left their home country to come to America, I know two (off the top of my head) who left America for greener pastures.

This might start going in circles Ethan, I respectfully disagree with a lot of your assertions and hope you find their error in your thinking as you get older. Not so that I am wrong, but so that you may have a life as blessed as mine.

Wayfarer don't bother, I won't read it anyway, you've been far to rude arrogant and in my opinion ignorant lately for me to bother with you anymore.

i don't think there's any way to get rid of the inequality in capitalism, that's just basic dialectics. everything seems to tend toward fascism, so the best system is the one that best denies its own fulfillment.

the big problem with capitalism, though, is that there isn't any force that can check the development and expansion of the system. in fact, the only way to keep it going is to make it bigger and bigger as it becomes more efficient. this is incredibly wasteful and self-destructive. the system has to invent goals as it runs out of concrete ones. it pulls us deeper and deeper into a self-destructive nightmare.

i think the only system that makes sense is an enlightened dictator. of course, anyone who's enlightened would never accept the position :P

What I mean is that we are responsible for out own choices and such. We are ultimately responsible for creating our character and achieving what we achieve. Our life is what we are worth.

Socialism does not believe this. I mean socialism as in the absence of private property. Socialism teaches that we all are determined by one another.

The truth is, that generally speaking the Determinism vs. Free Will argument doesn't necessarily have an answer. What do you choose to believe though? Would you choose the idea that gives you self-esteem and worth? Would you choose the idea where no one is responsible for who they are. Determinism is not a healthy belief.

What does it mean to own? This is what I mean by socialism being driven by materialism. You see happiness in the property itself. You see it in what I have. If I have something that you want, you would see me having it and not letting you have it as an infringement on your happiness.

It is not the property that brings happiness. It is the pursuit itself. It is the work that it takes to achieve it. It is found in the passion and drive to succeed.

People in the "lower class" can still earn, work, and put passion into there work. How do you think people were able to live in such a place as a concentration camp? They found something meaningful to do. They found a meaningful task. Viktor Frankl studied the people in the camp.

Now by no means am I saying that the concentration camp was a good place. People were brutally murdered and such. However, people aren't brutally murdered in capitalism if the law is enforced. If the right to life is protected, one can find happiness whether poor or rich. As long as he may see the fruit of his work afterward, the work itself is where one finds his happiness.

If you refer to a sweat shop as people working against there will then I am completely against that. If someone agrees to work then the responsibility for that choice is forever found in them. Also, you cannot blame the amount of sweatshops today on the free market. The price for work in some places is artificially high, which necessitates that in some places it will be artificially low.

I have to go but I don't understand how you can be the sole judge of what happiness is for everyone - this is essentially what you're doing when you say capitalism is the only economic structure that allows for the pursuit of happiness. Happiness isn't objective and I certainly don't find it in work, especially not work done only to gain more capitol and advance me on some fucked up hierarchy.

It seems to me there's a huge contradiction in your beliefs. You think capitalism is the only economic structure that allows for the pursuit of happiness but you think that happiness has nothing to do with money. If you can't see the absurdity of that I don't know what to tell you.

What your missing is that you don't need to conform.

Capital equals options, you can use that money to help advance less fortunate, save it for future generations or be a miserly bastard and spend every penny on yourself. The point is options. There is only a hierarchy if you create one.

i don't think that's really true, capitalism is stuffed to the brim with protocols, ways in which one is expected to behave and present themselves which might seem completely natural if you've been raised with them but which at the same time are completely ridiculous and irrelevant, an image with little content. wearing suits as just a mundane example. as the 'system' gets more complex and increases its own functionality, it gets better as identifying individuals as functional or non-functional, and even pressures them into those roles. we assume that a certain percentage of the population will always be criminals and the system accommodates them, funded by the rest of the population. art and philosophy, which walk the functional/functionless divide start to get absorbed by advertising. as they do, they become more and more standardized and template based. basically we have assimilated non-conformist roles into the system, thereby essentially killing them. at that point the choice is conformity or crime.

Basically what CA said. Capitalism necessitates classes and I believe classes are in themselves evil. To me socialism is about eliminating the need for money, property and so on which are silly materialistic things anyway. It's about taking the burden off of everyone and doing things for the love of your brothers and sisters and for the craft of it - not for the material gain.

JJJ, you keep referring to people having 'worked', or even 'worked hard', and therefore being rewarded for such work. Surely how hard you work depends upon your ability. It might be easy for one person to do something, but incredibly hard for another. So therefore people who find a task more challenging get a bigger reward for completing it? In fact you can't really measure how hard something was for someone, you can sometimes measure the actual output, but even that might not be possible when the work which was carried out doesn't result in any physical or clearly quantifiable output.
Think about the amount of money someone is making, and then how that money relates to the actual benefit the persons work is contributing to the general populous. A person with a high salary is not necessarily working hard for it, they are just getting paid much. Similarly just because you are on a low salary doesn't mean you are making less of an effort, in fact the opposite of this is probably true.
Also, there was a point made earlier, I’m not sure by who, that when you earn more you get taxed more. Within scaled taxation, you get taxed the same amount on income to a certain level, and then get taxed the higher rate only on any moneys which exceed the limit at which the higher rate kicks in. Of course you are paying more tax, but again ask the question, ‘is what I’m getting paid for in accordance with what it is contributing to society?’

I'm all for socialism and wealth redistribution (of course) and that's based on different things, but most importantly because it works so well in the country I live in. However, I can see problems in America. There are of course the problems relating to how your government has spent tax-payers money. It's used to fuel wars and recently billions and billions of money has gone into the private sector to save failing companies because the economic system was failing, a crisis that has serious repercussions also in Norway although we didn't fare as bad as countries like Iceland.

However, another potential problem is a possible positive feedback feeding the rightist way of minimal government thinking. It seems a lot of people in the USA are unhappy with the government, so they don't want to give it money or for it to gain power. They vote for changes that takes control and power from the government which in turn makes the government less capable of dealing with the sort of problems a government should be able to deal with .. which again feeds back to people's malcontent with it.

I think in order to be a socialist in America, you have to be able to see not what America is, but what it can be. JJJ doesn't want to pay taxes for repairing roads because the government does a crap job at it now, but Ethan can obviously imagine a more socialist America where the government does fix potholes and people do get their tax-money back in the form of safe environments for their children, good and free education, care for the elderly and those who are sick and so on.

I feel like in Norway, tax-money does come back to you that way and the system works. That makes it easy to support the same kind of thinking and politics for America although my words may weigh less being a foreigner and all .. ;)

edit :

Of course another problem with capitalism and democracy that I also could have mentioned is that with the inequity of wealth and the formation of extreme class differences in society, you create a nation which is run by the upper crust - people who can't relate to the everyday life of the lower classes of which they govern. Then you have a government in which the interests of all the nations people are not represented, at least not by the right numbers.

The ideal classless social democracy society would not have this problem of course.

It's great when someone gets it. I hope I'm not misrepresenting anyone's view here but Tore you put it perfectly in the third paragraph.

That's exactly how I feel and how I believe Ethan and those of a similar viewpoint feel.

I trust the individual more then the government. If American government was as efficient and productive with tax revenue as Scandinavian government I'd be likely to buy into to the concept of larger government. However I've watched a consistent downward trend in that era during my lifetime.


Small exception with this. Obviously we don't not have an ideal democratic society going here, but I still believe it's possible to overcome our inadequacies and thrive within this system. As I conceded to Ethan, there is no denying the class system and the lack of relate-ability between politicians and the working middle\lower-middle class. However I certainly don't think the interests of the lower class are neglected, it's more difficult to move up then it is to stay up, but there are numerous avenues for a responsible hard working and skilled individual to achieve higher finical class status while maintaining the perspective and identity they've always had.

When a nation is comprised of some many people spread out so far from so many different ethnic, religious and ancestral backgrounds I don't know that it's possible to create and ideal situation for everyone. So my feeling has always been lets work from common ground. Reduce as many restrictions as we can that divide people, and impose as few prerequisites on people as is necessary. The less invasive a government is the less it alienates it's people.

If I understand correctly, you argue that the interests of the lower classes are looked after because some of the lower class people rise up and become part of the upper crust. They can then govern with their humble beginnings in mind. It probably does happen and I think it's good and also probably an important political strategy for those who can - promote your humble beginnings so that you can gain popularity with the lower class people who feel they can relate to you.

It probably does help quite a bit, but it's still not a system where the lowest social classes fare well enough so that they are well represented in the governing bodies. Politicians here are not always from the higher levels of society. Some of them are students, some of them are fishermen, plumbers or even race car drivers. They come from all kinds of places and careers and aside from then relating well to the people they're supposed to govern, I think it generally fits better with the idea of a democracy.

edit :

Almost forgot to reply to your point about different peoples in society. I agree it can be a really big problem in a society, perhaps especially because it can create an "us and them" mentality with people where they really feel like different groups in a nation rather than parts of a whole. One group of people can then be governed by another group of people whom they see as "them" and not "us". It's a huge problem to tackle and at least I think having a sort of basic culture which does not discriminate or divide people is perhaps the first place to start. The separation of church and state for example - it makes sense that muslims will feel slightly alienated in a country where christian values and teachings are represented everywhere, in politics, education, health care.

I'm sure many christians won't agree, but it's obviously not about christianity, just about creating a society which is more open basically.

.. And then there are other things you'd have to do to tackle it as well of course - such as getting the different groups represented in the different governing bodies.

The Hindenburg perhaps?

Wealth distribution makes astronauts as well paid as grave diggers as I understand it.

The rammifications would be horrific.

i don't quite understand what's so horrific about that scenario, since astronauts do basically nothing all day and contribute absolutely nothing to society, while grave diggers provide a very needed service.

i suppose the grave diggers would get angry?
or the astronauts?

I think this is a bit black and white .. Norway is considered a socialist country, but it doesn't mean everybody makes the same. It just means people who make more are taxed more and people who make less are taxed less. Also the private sector has less influence in areas like education and health care. There's still the possibility of climbing up some career ladder to get better pay, but there's less difference between winners and losers in society.

Maybe winners don't need palaces, huge gardens and the most expensive private jets and maybe the losers don't need to go starving without any kind of health care.

Lil Wayne spent $150000 to put diamonds in his mouth which is over three times the amount your average United States citizen makes per year. See what I did there?

It looks good on paper, but I would like to see how the human greed factor plays into this. I don't think humans would be able to execute this plan. Basic emotions prevent it (greed, jealousy, hate, love). The only thing you would do by trying to change the system is piss a different group of people off.

Are you referring to wealth redistribution? Because it has worked and does work...

Not in America it hasn't. You really think you're just going to take everything away from rich people and give it to the poor? This isn't Robin Hood, it doesn't just work like that. You can't just take the hard working peoples money and give it to homeless people(we do that enough with welfare), it goes against everything America was founded upon. It's easy to get caught in the hype, or in your sympathy for the poor. But this system flat out would not fly in America.

p.s. When you say it works? Who does it work for? It doesn't work for everyone. Who are you speaking for?

I don't even know if I want to bother having a discussion with you if you're going to say all rich people are hardworking and all welfare goes to homeless people.

As I wrote earlier, the system works just fine here and there's not really much to complain about at all.

Not saying that at all. Just stating the basic idea of your wealth sharing plan. That is essentially how it would work, while not all rich people work hard, in fact, most don't. Alot of upper/middle class people work very hard, while alot of lower class people don't work at all. It's hard to explain this without using blanket statements, and I apologize for using the one before. But where in this plan is the incentive to work? Maybe I'm blind but I'm just not seeing it. The way I see it, America has moved in this direction in the last 20 years (Tax breaks and financial aid for the lower class) and the situation has only gotten worse for us. So how is distributing the wealth further going to fix or even assist in fixing the economic crisis we are in?

I do hope we can find something that works. If it is the 'magic system' everyone here seems to think it is, then I hope the US will be open-minded enough to adopt it. But, frankly, I just don't see that happening.

It may not be driectly responsible, but you think its helping?

Learn American history. We've had welfare since Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Thomas Jefferson, you know that obscure politician from Virginia, advocated a progressive tax system. I'm not even going to argue these kind of points with you since you clearly have no idea what you're talking about. The economic downturn was caused by Welfare? Give me a break. I'm also not going to bother with your sweeping generalizations about all classes because they're inaccurate. Did you know families in the lower class have to have two incomes to stay afloat - and they're still in the lower class? But how can that be if most don't work!?

I've already stated somewhere in here that I believe in democracy and democracy is where the policies and institutions of society are under popular rule. Capitalism is a system where the institutions, and by extensions the policies since they can buy out much of the political system, are under control of the few, the Marxist bourgeois of the corporate elites and war profiteers and so on. That's why early I described extreme capitalism as fascist, because it is. It creates monopolies and treats the under classes like crap, miring them where they are with poor education and poor wages. I think classes are by their very nature undemocratic and evil and create a society of extreme inequity where one is in poverty and the other is completely materialistic.

By having a taxation system that favors the rich you're only making that class difference more extreme. A progressive tax would make that extreme difference more minimal and also ensure that a society's wealth would benefit the society, as opposed to a handful at the top. But it's that amoral system which you argue so strongly for. The one that gave people slavery and ensures some people are going to die because they can't afford to live.