A real buzzkill (seriously; the environment dudes)

[Monty3038]

Keep in mind that these are archaic and strict definitions. Compared to many other things, socialism has been so unpopular, and this has effected into poorly developed theory and such.

Central planning is but one small, yet also somewhat unnecessary attribute of socialism. Also, US has some forms of central planning anyways.



Yeah this is incredibly archaic. Any society that does that in the name of anything is doing it wrong



Not exactly sure. The best so far would probably be places like Sweden, Norway, or Finland. They have been the most consistently well run economies for the last 50ish years. I wouldn't use any nation as a good socialistic example, partly because it's so poorly understood.

Ok, so if no one has been able to build a truly socialistic society, how do we know anything about whether it will work or not? I realize we are talking theory here, but if this is prevelant and such a good idea, why has it been so hard to implement?

Here's socialism: instead of a small number of owners who reap all the profits and make all the decisions while the workers are merely variations of servants for hire, a socialistic enterprise will have some level of collective ownership and decision making processes, and they ALL have very strong profit and managerial incentives. Essentially, people who work for a corporation have ownership stake in that corporation. Instead of as many of the profits going to the guys on the very top like they're feudal lords, profits are more evenly distributed. This reflects deservedness much better too. Our current megacorp paradigm rewards executives for being helped by luck, while the people who make the products are really just mildly expensive slaves.

Ok, so people who risk the most by starting the business don't get the biggest rewards? And the fact that the company doing well, increases the salaries and amount of employees that can be hired... profits are divided among not only corporate ownership, but stockholders, employees, etc... How is creating a business where you sell a product that people want is luck? How is serving a business need luck?

I don't look at business anything like you do. If I mow a yard and get paid for it, how is that luck? If I increase my business to form a landscaping company that makes lots of money and has lots of employees, how is that luck?

A very important point, though, is that research shows that profit incentives promoting production is probably a lie. Studies have been done on examining how production changes based on stock options, and they haven't found improvements. I saw those studies a long time ago so I don't remember exactly, but I think that some of the results were that corporations with higher profit incentives actually functioned more poorly than some with lower incentives.

So, I work my butt off and get a raise... the raise is the motivation. Profit incentive is not the only motivator, I like some recognition, I like some job security, but I expect to be rewarded for better effort. Call me a greedy bastard but I don't work for free. I expect to work hard and be rewarded for the value I bring to the table.

Humans are not capitalists. Just because there are a few greedy cumstain sociopaths at the top who fuck over the competition doesn't mean that the rest of us are like that. Most humans care much more about being friendly and having a good community than doing what it takes to stand on top of a pyramid made of his kinfolk

I don't even understand this. We were having a nice discussion and you basically called capitalists cumstain sociopaths. Why? I mean seriously, wtf. I am a human and you are basically saying I'm less of a human because I want to improve my position in life while living a rewarding career and life as well. Guess I'm a cumstain on the pyramid of my kinfolk. I may have had a few beers but I can tell when the conversation goes downhill and just gets insulting.

Guess I'm just a greedy bastard who expects to work and have his work rewarded... in one way or another.



As towards the rest of your statements. I don't know how to take that, but I'll look at it tomorrow, I'm going to read through the rest of the comments.