Thank you capitalism

Ignorance is amusing. Wealth is created, ha!... Do you make love to your penis with those hands you type with? Wealth is not created in capitalism, but stolen. And in the case of America, it is stolen from other countries. The only reason this system seems to be working is because it uses slaves in China and steals oil from Iraq. How do you think that a businessman in America makes the world economy improve? How is he "creating" wealth by buying stocks? In a country where most production is done overseas, not much is "created" at all. America was built upon the concept of slavery, and I guess it didn't move far away from it.

 

Every country in the world, rich and poor, from Sweden to South Africa, imports from China. And if your story were true, how did we get rich before the Chinese opened their economy? And why is it that the countries that trade the LEAST with the US are the poorest? If there are no Americans to exploit them, why aren't they rich? How come nations like Korea and Japan got rich by trading with us?

Also, we pay Iraq for the oil, in fact we pay more than we used to pay Saddam. No american company owns oil fields in Iraq. So how is that stealing?

We import stuff they want to sell and export things they want to buy. We offer investment opportunities for anyone who wants to invest and we provide capital for people that need money to invest in their own countries. The same as it works for everyone.

All economies need capital. The stock market is an efficient means of allocating capital. Its that simple.

This is a 19th century economist's perspective (e.g. Marx or Lenin). Economies aren't all about factories and production anymore. You need to update your economics about 100 years.

So you think that by having the freedom to pursue your own career and getting paid for your work, you've got a lot in common with a plantation slave 300 years ago? Right.

 

First there was slavery, then there was just plain old exploitation of workers and immigrants, then a war.

False connection. The US "trades" with other capitalist countries, while stealing from other countries.

 

So I guess "stealing oil" was just sloganeering?

This is not at all convincing. For starters, it is a very US-centric view of the world. In fact countries all over the planet, some with slavery, some without, some with wars, some without, some with lots of immigrants, some with none, some who were imperialists, and some who stayed home, got rich with capitalism. In fact some countries with slavery, imperialism, wars and poor treatment of workers (i.e. the Soviet Union) remained poor.

So if we buy oil from Canada, or gold, paper, wheat, or whatever from Canada, it is trade, but if we buy the same commodity from Venezuala for exactly the same price (remember, commodities have one global price, the price of Venezualan oil is not materially different from Canadian oil), then we are exploiting Venezualans? You still haven't explained why countries we hardly trade with at all remain so poor.

By this measure so can anyone buying a lottery ticket in Mexico or trading stocks in Sri Lanka. You are not making a point.

What do I need to explain? People are working and getting paid. What do you think they are getting paid for if our country doesn't produce anything? What do Hong Kong or Singapore make? Practically nothing, they are cities, so they import 99% of what they use. Yet they are rich. There is nothing mysterious and unique about the US economy growing out of the manufacturing age.

And what is different about Chinese workers today compared to Japanese workers in the 1950s or South Koreans and Taiwanese in the 1960s and 1970s? They had "sweatshop" dominated economies too which we "exploited" yet these three countries experienced economic development faster than almost any country in history and saw living standards arise with it. Meanwhile economies closed to expoloitation and trade went nowhere.

 

"Stealing oil" was referring to how the US invaded Iraq. You can't invade a country and then call your "buying" of their resources legitimate.

Yes, but I believe that this applies more to the US than other countries.

Please name specific countries you'd like to discuss and I'll tell you.

I am not talking about random luck but investment. There is a very big difference, and if you don't believe that there is, you don't understand capitalism.

This thread is not about the US but about capitalism in general. What does "growing out of the manufacturing age" mean to you? If you don't make goods or provide services, how exactly are you helping the world? Things come into your country, but don't leave. What's that called?

I sure hope that I'm reading something wrong here and you do not actually believe that being exploited by the US is required for nations to develop? This is the same as saying that the Americans did a favour to the black slaves they imported from Africa because, on the long run, they became wealthy citizens of the USA.

 

Just because YOU wouldn't work under the conditions that third world workers do doesn't mean that they're being "exploited." If someone is willing to work for 50 cents an hour, (in most cases) it's because they consider that a good wage, not because anyone is holding a gun to their head forcing them to work.

Capitalist economies grow over time, and eventually the workers will demand more than 50 cents an hour. America and China are two different economies, and it's silly to expect the same rules to apply to the workplace in both. To expect Chinese employers to instantly start paying their workers $5.15 an hour is naive and shockingly Americentric. It would be like an American demanding a minimum wage of $50 an hour.

 

Wait, so are you telling me that you actually support Chinese children making Nike shoes?!

 

You haven't explained how invading Iraq changes in any respect the economic impact of oil purchases. Considering you say it is "one of the only reasons" capitalism seems to be working, I would think you could explain how it makes a difference. Does this mean the UK, Poland, and Italy are stealing oil too?

That it totally unconvincing. You aren't showing any cause and effect.

Trade flows with most of sub saharan africa are minute. Trade with the socialist world was (and is, for what's left of it) minute.

That's why I said people trade stocks in Sri Lanka. Rich and poor countries have people trading stocks, there is no difference.

Money leaves. We are paying for these imports. You are still looking for physical objects - we are not bartering bear skins for spices. This is a service economy.

I think its more that you are hoping I am saying that, because it doesn't remotely resemble anything I said. You are the one calling everybody exploited, not me. I'm saying that the process you call exploitation seems to have brought many countries wealth and prosperity. How is that exploitation? If South Korea was exploited and North Korea wasn't, then why did wealth and living standards in South Korea improve so spectacularly?

 

It is still exploitation even if those being exploited are too stupid to figure out they are being exploited.

How does Mexico work into your view of capitalism? The divide in Mexico of rich and poor has widened as foreign investiment grows, how do you explain the the divide has in the USA has been growing for decades? Not even the richest country on Earth (USA) can seem to get capitalism to work in democratic fashion!

 

There is nothing stupid about working for the market wage. Only those with virtually no understanding of economics believe that we can simply declare the minimum wage in Mexico to be $14 an hour and solve poverty. We are not buying goods or services from Mexicans at prices different from those charged by their trading partners in poor countries or that Mexicans are charging each other. We are not making up the prices. Why are wages lower in Greece than France? Why are they lower in Lithuania than Portugal? Are people in Greece dumber than the french? Are they being exploited? Are they being exploited if the buyer is from Ireland but not from Algeria?

For freak's sake this idiotic oversimplification of economics into convenient left wing bullshit is a joke.

 

Seeing an American citizen say something like that finally allows me to understand how Bush was re-elected.

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/6621523/ is an example. Just search for Iraq+Oil on google and I'm sure you'll be enlightened.

Alright. Now note that the countries you selected have been for many generations poor countries. Why would you blame not trading with the US for the poverty and lack of development? And what of countries like Iraq, that the US did trade with? http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5050.html?

Yes, but I am talking about people whose main income comes from stocks and other business ventures. Those people are very rarely poor.

What service would that be?

So you are saying that what I call 'exploitation' of china, you call 'progress'? An the SK/NK argument is null and void for several reasons. First of all, South Korea is not being exploited by the US but is in fact a very rich capitalist society. As for North Korea, it is being expolited by its own leaders and is under a state of dictatorship by a madman. Why on earth would you make such a comparisson?

P.S

Sorry I can't say more, but I don't come to these forums to argue about politics and economy. Arguing on the internet is quite stupid to begin with.

 

Yes.

 

If they don't like their present job, they can find another one somewhere else. They aren't going to find much better wages elsewhere in their area, unless they have a certain skill. Most comparable jobs pay comparable wages in the third world, just like they do in America.

I offer to pay you 50 cents in exchange for one hour of your labor. If you accept my offer, it is because you feel the 50 cents is worth as much or more than an hour of your time, and I feel that an hour of your time is worth as much or more than 50 cents. If you feel you're being exploited, you're perfectly free to refuse my offer.

Who cares what the divide is? Isn't actual poverty the issue here? Even lower-class Americans are significantly better off than they were several decades ago. Same with Mexicans.

 

Yes, orphans in china can refuse to work. They are free people. They have the choice: work or die of starvation. "Work for us or die", isn't this slavery?

 

Not unless the company is holding a gun to their head forcing them to work. They have the right to work at any job they can find, so they don't have to work for that particular company if they don't want to.

What do you propose instead? That the companies suddenly start paying every employee $5.15 an hour? That the companies suddenly stop operating in the region altogether, leaving only one choice in that dichotomy you posed above?

 

Yet these companies use terrorism to prevent unionization of the work force like Coke in Colombia thus most don't bother striking and go right into violent rebellion.

But when the party is over and the industrial world runs out of oil, the divide is going to be a huge issue since after peak oil the economy will have to shrink meaning we have to give up wealth and if the divide is a indication then fat cats will want to keep their all their wealth even means throwing the rest of the us into hopeless poverty.

So we can overthrow the aristrocrats now or after peakoil.

 

Yes, a single incident in a single nation of company-sponsored terrorism is obviously a fair representation of the labor conditions of 4 billion people...

I've already explained this in many threads, so I won't bother to post it in full again here. Suffice it to say that civilization is not headed for another Dark Age just because oil will eventually run out.

 

Then you do no understand the current industrial world.

 

And you do not understand the concept of technological advancement.

 

Fusion is the only technology that can save us and are you going to tell me not only are we going to get Fusion to work but be able to switch to Fusion before peak oil forces the world to de-industrilize the hard way.