[Pants-of-dog]

Actually, the science does agree with me.

The fact that you pretend that ownership of a company puts you at an economic advantage over the people who work there is not an argument. It is simply a dismissal of reality.

My bosses who owned the companies I have worked for have all been able to pay for their kids to go on skiing trips to Chile in the summer. I, on the other hand, have been unable to pay for my kids to visit Chile and visit their family because I have been living off what they pay me.

Also, you keep thinking I have all these weird positions on land ownership. I never claimed, for example, that there is no essential difference between owning land and owning a business. There are many such differences.

[Truth To Power]

Actually, the science does agree with me.

No it doesn't.

The fact that you pretend that ownership of a company puts you at an economic advantage over the people who work there is not an argument. It is simply a dismissal of reality.

I assume you forgot a negation there. And you are wrong. Unlike you, I have broad experience in the world of business, and I know that the people who do well by owning factories but not privileges -- definitely a small minority of those who do well -- do so by being exceptionally productive, not through any sort of "unfair advantage." Indeed, I have often witnessed situations where unionized workers have had an unfair advantage over the factory owner, as a result of which he is bankrupted. It happens regularly.

My bosses who owned the companies I have worked for have all been able to pay for their kids to go on skiing trips to Chile in the summer.

<sigh> You are still not engaging with the point at issue. Did they ONLY OWN FACTORIES, or did they own privileges, too? If the latter, then their wealth was due to privilege, not owning a factory.

GET IT??

I, on the other hand, have been unable to pay for my kids to visit Chile and visit their family because I have been living off what they pay me.

You have been living off what the market says your labor is worth, not just whatever your employer wishes to pay you.

Also, you keep thinking I have all these weird positions on land ownership. I never claimed, for example, that there is no essential difference between owning land and owning a business. There are many such differences.

The main one being that owning a factory is not an unjust advantage, and owning land is.

[Pants-of-dog]

Oh, I see. You are making a big deal out of my example (i.e. factory ownership) while simultaneously ignoring mymactual point: the fact that owning the means of production is leverage in terms of perpetuating and strengthening your economic position in society.

[Truth To Power]

Oh, I see. You are making a big deal out of my example (i.e. factory ownership) while simultaneously ignoring mymactual point: the fact that owning the means of production is leverage in terms of perpetuating and strengthening your economic position in society.

I am "making a big deal out of" your example because unlike what you claim is your actual point, it is the true crux of the issue. "The means of production" is just a deceitful term socialists and capitalists use to evade the fact that owning land is a privilege that confers an unjust advantage, while owning a factory is a right that confers no unjust advantage. Similarly, your use of the vague term, "leverage" rather than "privilege" is just a way of evading the difference between having an enhanced ability to contribute more to production and having an enhanced ability to take more from production without contributing to it.

[Pants-of-dog]

I am done discussing this with you.

You have not been able to show how I am wrong, and are often incapable of even addressing my actual points. Have a good day.

[SolarCross]

I am done discussing this with you.

You have not been able to show how I am wrong, and are often incapable of even addressing my actual points. Have a good day.

Dishonest as ever, pod. Just for once admit you've been repeatedly and thoroughly destroyed by TtP.

[Pants-of-dog]

And another post that does not contradict my simple description of different types of property and how they perpetuate a class system.

Thanks, SC.

[SolarCross]

And another post that does not contradict my simple description of different types of property and how they perpetuate a class system.

Thanks, SC.

You mean your infantile lie. There is no class system in commerce; in academia yes, in the military yes there are class systems, in commerce no.

[Truth To Power]

What you are seeing is the accumulation of civility. For 8000 years mankind has been under the dominion of warlords, be it tribal chiefs, kings or the military cabals of a republic, for their own sake these warlords impose order and in consequence civility becomes normal.

No, it was already normal before the warlords.

We are adapted to this situation and so we game it, our "fine sense of justice" is just our individual attempts to have what we want from the civil norms.

No. Even from infancy, we are almost as concerned with justice for others as for ourselves. It is therefore not based on narrow self-interest but on some form of inclusive fitness.

The car owner wants to be able to park his car without it being vandalised or plastered with parking tickets, so his "keen sense of justice" is deployed against vandals and parking wardens. The husband wants to go to work without worrying about some random stranger filling up his woman's womb with alien sperm and so his "keen sense of justice" is deployed against rapists and adulterers. The land owner wants to let out his land for rents and doesn't want those rents to go unpaid or the property vandalised and so his "keen sense of justice" is deployed against squatters, vandals and tenants who don't pay. On and on...

No, that is a kindergarten reading of anthropology. You are simply trying to pretend that the landowner's desire to rob others is morally equivalent to the car owner's desire not to be robbed.

But so far this natural sense of justice is a million different and often conflicting desires, it falls then to the governors to decide which of these desires should be the norm and protected by his force, the irrational governor may use some kooky ideology to help him decide, the rational governor will use a utilitarian criteria.

No, you are ignoring the need for a scientific explanation for why morality is universal in human society, but unknown in animals, and why most of it is quite consistent across widely varying cultures. The relevant criterion is not utilitarian but ultimately Darwinian, though in a subtle, ramified way that may be difficult to understand clearly.

Oh so you think you can find your mystical justice in our genes, well indeed in the scientific age you could hardly find it in jesus. There is an element of truth here though as social animals have a strength in numbers that does require some operating co-ordination protocols so that the rabble can be a team. This goes for the wolf pack as much as the city state though. It isn't anything different from what I am saying, and the pack leader is still the pack leader.

Leaders can't just do what they want. Their lead has to be consistent with the underlying evolutionary logic of the society. In the wolf pack, that society is a predator. But a human society is at root a producer, so the underlying logic is quite different: it can't function successfully without the accurate production incentive of property in the products of one's labor.

Human beings are animals and yes social animals, just as lions, wolves, dogs, ants, bovines, chimps, pigs, elephants and the rest..

They are all different, and have different social organizations and associated instincts appropriate to their different survival methods and competitive conditions.

Well we can be more specific as diet plays a part in morality. The lion is a carnivorous social animal, the bovine is a herbivorous social animal. Humans like chimps and pigs are omnivorous social animals and so our morality is closer to that of pigs and chimps rather than lions or cows.

Diet? Seriously? No. It is the dominant method of survival, reproduction and competition that determines morality, not diet. Our morality is closer to that of chimps only because they are genetically 99% the same as us. But it is also crucially different, as unlike human society, chimp society does not depend on accumulation of capital for its success. That is why human societies all have property in the products of labor, which no chimp society has.

There is an expense in getting into disputes, an expense of time, mental energy, money or other resources, social capital, so it is adaptive to let some things slide, go with the flow and conform where that is tolerable to save on that expense, to ask "is it worth it?". Disputes nonetheless happen and happen a lot.

But it is very clear what kind of things we are willing to let slide and what we are willing to fight over, and it has little to do with the expense of the dispute.

That is just PR gibberish.

It is clear, grammatical, and factual English. You just can't answer it.

Law is, just as I say, opinion married to force.

Disproved above.

Now you are really dreaming. A sensible arbitrator will look closely at the relevant facts but is judgement of what should be done about it is an opinion, an opinion anyone could make or unmake but for the hardy police force, knights or mob the arbitrator can call upon to make his opinion something that can not be ignored.

It is absurd to imagine that an arbitrator can just ignore what makes certain facts relevant and others not.

Ideally utility will be the ultimate criterion but force is needed to make it law, otherwise it is just an opinion. "Bad" people will ignore opinions even good opinions perhaps especially good opinions but will not ignore force, or do so at their peril.

But what makes utility useful? That's the underlying evolutionary logic you are ignoring. Evolutionary success is the ultimate criterion, because everything else ultimately loses to evolutionary success.

All you say here is complete balderdash.

It is fact.

Priests exist to make a parasitical living off of the stupid and the credulous.

Again, that is a kindergarten reading of anthropology. The near-universal historical tolerance and even respect for priests -- and the universal intolerance and enmity for mere con-men -- just proves you wrong.

They are mind hackers, so yes they are very interested in exploiting psychology for their advantage. Your capacity for guilt, envy, sexual desire, fear (especially of death) are all substrate for their psy-ops. As a victim of priests you will be programmed to see them as helpful saviours but that is all part of their art.

Nope. You are just ignoring the facts. Priest-parasitized societies have been more successful in inter-societal competition. Why?

I just gave you the answer, they invented a bigger albeit imaginary force, GOD! The creator and destroyer of worlds, the commander of hosts of angelic immortal warriors of terrible power. Yes that is force, an illusion of force, but yet while the illusion is believed it works just as well. And if he believes it what king could compare himself to that? His knights can die and they may flee.

Why would any king credit any of it?

He has had castles and palaces built for him maybe he even founded a town or city but God made the very world on which those feeble edifices sit. How does the king's dungeons and gaolers compare to fires of hell and eternal torment by demons more cruel and inventive than any torturer a king could find to employ?

Your answer is no answer. What makes people willing to believe such stories? Blank out.

Because the priests have god on a string, and they have painted that god as more powerful than all the kings. Well I already covered that.

But it explains nothing.

Ah now you are talking of power. If you believed that you are right and the police are wrong that will not stop them putting you in prison. You beliefs, your opinions of justice are exactly undone without power without force.

What makes people willing to apply and submit to such force?

Blank out.

I don't disagree that societies (of any species of animal) require operating protocols, morals, and that these thing are adaptive, generally. This doesn't help you though if you are trying to set your justice in our genes, they way priests set their justice in invisible, immortal sky-kings because no one's genes are exactly crying out at the injustice of land ownership...

They are crying out against injustice. They just don't understand how it is being inflicted on them.

My genes do not say to me that my landlord has stolen from me, that he owes me compensation. I own things but I do not own land (except indirectly as a tenant, which I think doesn't count with you), yet I do not feel victimised. I'd like to pay less rent, but I'd like to pay less for everything: food, electricity, consumer electronics. Id like everything cheaper, like anyone I suppose, but I don't envy my landlord for what he has. I don't feel the injustice you are saying I should feel, even after hearing you go one about it all the time. How then can land ownership be an injustice, if justice is in the genes. I shouldn't even need you to tell me to feel victimised, I should feel it without your help.

No. Our instinctive understanding is a work in progress; science has given us much better tools. We also can't tell instinctively that the rats in the attic harbor fleas that carry microorganisms that can exterminate 1/3 of the population in a couple of years. But science has told us we had better not let those rats live there. Smoked meat tastes good, dammit; but scientific understanding tells us it gives us bowel cancer. We have no natural aversion to dirty hands: our ancestors' hands were always dirty. But science tells us a doctor with dirty hands is something to be feared.

Priests were a parasitic caste that hijacked our natural morals for their own ends.

To some extent, true.

Communists and other post-religion priests also try to use "hard reason and objective fact" to sculpt their ideologies but it is not as malleable a material as the fantasy of the priests of jesus, hence why communism failed so fast.

Marx claimed a mantle of science, but any real empirical scientist could see there was nothing scientific about it. It was much closer to religion.

As will your ideology.

No, because my "ideology" is just facts.

We are the wolf pack, we are the ant hive, the bovine herd, the troop of chimps.. well we are different as they all are different from each other but yet not specially different.

Well, we are specially different from our perspective, because we have this moral capacity which they all lack, but which is of very great importance to us.

If a sociopath were a solitary carnivore there would be nothing amiss in their hierarchy of concerns. For the solitary carnivore there is no "us" only "me", and only "me" is worthy of concern. That is adaptive for the survival of a solitary carnivore, that is good. But a human sociopath isn't supposed to be a solitary carnivore he is supposed to be a social omnivore like a chimp or a pig.

Right. The sociopath's mode of social function is essentially subhuman.

[Pants-of-dog]

You mean your infantile lie.

Please note that I have made an effort to be polite to you. You obviously are not returning that level of respect.

There is no class system in commerce; in academia yes, in the military yes there are class systems, in commerce no.

And yet, the worker will almost certainly not be able to afford a business that employs hundreds, and the owner who employs hundreds will almost certainly pass that wealth to his or her children.

In other words, the benefits of a certain social relationship with the means of production are useful for maintaining those benefits or strengthening them.

Hmmmm.

[Drlee]

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We now return to the TTP-POD show.

[SolarCross]

You mean your infantile lie.

Please note that I have made an effort to be polite to you. You obviously are not returning that level of respect.

Please note I do not care about whatever efforts to be polite you have made, I haven't noticed them either. Your contributions don't deserve respect, I will show you only as much respect as I must to avoid the mods annoying me. Were it not for rule 2 you would see a lot less politeness from me, which you would also deserve; if your feelings are that tender you can take some comfort in that.

There is no class system in commerce; in academia yes, in the military yes there are class systems, in commerce no.

And yet, the worker will almost certainly not be able to afford a business that employs hundreds, and the owner who employs hundreds will almost certainly pass that wealth to his or her children.

In other words, the benefits of a certain social relationship with the means of production are useful for maintaining those benefits or strengthening them.

None of which is true. There is no class system in commerce if you want a business you start one, if you are cash poor, borrow or use "sweat equity", and grow it. Fortunes in commerce can be made by anyone who wants it more sincerely than the idiots who buy lottery tickets, those fortunes can also be unmade by poor decisions or bad luck no matter how much money you had gifted to you from your parents. Selling your time to employers is as much an act of commerce as buying shares and usually more profitable. Most people prefer to be on a steady salary rather than a profit margin because it is reliable money whereas profit margins are variable and relatively risky hence why most people prefer to find an employer rather than become an employer. Without the rare few that choose to seek a profit margin rather than a salary those people who want a steady pay off would have no one to pay them! Every healthy normal person wants to accumulate resources because the laws of the universe specifically entropy make sure that they will certainly lose them also, that is survival. After than comes reproduction, which is a variant of survival actually, for this goal we have children, provide for them and pass on whatever we have left at death, the rich do this, the poor do this and everyone in between. Gifting resources to our children is half the reason for acquiring them in the first place!

What do you want? For us all to be slaves, barren or starved dead? This is your communism?

[Pants-of-dog]

Please note I do not care about whatever efforts to be polite you have made, I haven't noticed them either. Your contributions don't deserve respect, I will show you only as much respect as I must to avoid the mods annoying me. Were it not for rule 2 you would see a lot less politeness from me, which you would also deserve; if your feelings are that tender you can take some comfort in that.

Feel free to be rude. I would simply like to i for, you that I will continue to be polite to you despite your rudeness.

None of which is true.

Actually it is. Studies that look at social mobility show that the best indicator of which tax bracket you will end up in is your parent's tax bracket.

There is no class system in commerce if you want a business you start one, if you are cash poor, borrow or use "sweat equity", and grow it. Fortunes in commerce can be made by anyone who wants it more sincerely than the idiots who buy lottery tickets, those fortunes can also be unmade by poor decisions or bad luck no matter how much money you had gifted to you from your parents. Selling your time to employers is as much an act of commerce as buying shares and usually more profitable. Most people prefer to be on a steady salary rather than a profit margin because it is reliable money whereas profit margins are variable and relatively risky hence why most people prefer to find an employer rather than become an employer. Without the rare few that choose to seek a profit margin rather than a salary those people who want a steady pay off would have no one to pay them! Every healthy normal person wants to accumulate resources because the laws of the universe specifically entropy make sure that they will certainly lose them also, that is survival. After than comes reproduction, which is a variant of survival actually, for this goal we have children, provide for them and pass on whatever we have left at death, the rich do this, the poor do this and everyone in between. Gifting resources to our children is half the reason for acquiring them in the first place!

All of this "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" rhetoric does not show I am wrong.

For every person who has struck it rich through hard work, there are hundreds who have worked just as hard and were not successful. For every person who made their own fortune, there are hundreds who inherited it.

What do you want? For us all to be slaves, barren or starved dead? This is your communism?

I want a public healthcare ststem that is free at point of service.
I want clean air, clean water, and clean earth.
I want free education from pre-school through to graduate studies.
I want an end to malnutrition due to poverty.
I want homes and businesses that do not make their users sick.

I want the government to take care of the poor. And put the economy to rhe service of the people instead of having all of us serve the economy.

[SolarCross]

None of which is true.

Actually it is. Studies that look at social mobility show that the best indicator of which tax bracket you will end up in is your parent's tax bracket.

Non-sequitur, that relatively rich people tend to begat relatively rich people and relatively poor people tend to begat relatively poor people in general does not indicate a class system in commerce. More than money is inherited by children from their parents: talents, knowledge, habits, social connections, expectations and aspirations are also passed on, so it is and that is just fine. All rich people had a poor ancestor if you go back far enough.. Not everyone wants to be rich, at least not seriously enough to make it happen but they can make it happen if they want. Moreover as TtP already explained to you, becoming rich comes from well paid work NOT from "owning the means of production". Working as a CEO of a big business, best selling novelist, star athlete, specialist surgeon, or top lawyer will make you rich, owning shares in a factory will not by itself. Returns on capital for passive investors are not that much it is like 5% pa after currency depreciation on average and that is for working assets like factories or shops, it can be more but it can also be less than zero! Passive assets on average lose value over time, because of entropy. The path to riches is in smart choices in work and resource deployment (and some luck) not from owning stuff. Owning stuff is the pay off for working, as a way of preserving value accrued from work (often vainly) and as a cost to enable working most effectively. Who earns the surgeon's pay, the surgeon or his scalpel? Who earns the novelists pay, the novelist or his word processor? Who earns the toilet tissue factory's pay, the employees from the CEO down to the floor sweeper or the tools they use?

There is no class system in commerce if you want a business you start one, if you are cash poor, borrow or use "sweat equity", and grow it. Fortunes in commerce can be made by anyone who wants it more sincerely than the idiots who buy lottery tickets, those fortunes can also be unmade by poor decisions or bad luck no matter how much money you had gifted to you from your parents. Selling your time to employers is as much an act of commerce as buying shares and usually more profitable. Most people prefer to be on a steady salary rather than a profit margin because it is reliable money whereas profit margins are variable and relatively risky hence why most people prefer to find an employer rather than become an employer. Without the rare few that choose to seek a profit margin rather than a salary those people who want a steady pay off would have no one to pay them! Every healthy normal person wants to accumulate resources because the laws of the universe specifically entropy make sure that they will certainly lose them also, that is survival. After than comes reproduction, which is a variant of survival actually, for this goal we have children, provide for them and pass on whatever we have left at death, the rich do this, the poor do this and everyone in between. Gifting resources to our children is half the reason for acquiring them in the first place!

All of this "pull yourself up by your bootstraps" rhetoric does not show I am wrong.

For every person who has struck it rich through hard work, there are hundreds who have worked just as hard and were not successful. For every person who made their own fortune, there are hundreds who inherited it.

It does. Also hard work is not the winning ticket, working smart is the winning ticket. I can bust a gut working hard by digging random holes out in the desert with my bare hands that no one wanted but it won't and SHOULDN'T make me anything but tired. Making the slightest of cuts with a laser to an arterial blockage in someone's brain is not hard work at all but if it saves that person's life it should result in a very, very good pay off. Work is a cost, the value of the product of that work is the pay off, the difference between the two is the profit or loss depending on which is the greater.

There is nothing wrong with parents making gifts to their children in life or on their death. There is nothing wrong with that. It is at least half the reason for trying to be successful in life in the first place. If you are mad you didn't get a fat inheritance you should blame your own parents before you blame those that did pass on a rich estate. Or better get over it, quit whining for hand outs and make your own fortune. I dare say Bill Gates children will have a fantastic good start in life, while I am practically an orphan with nothing to get from my parents even if they would give it, do I care? No, not all. I am neither jealous, envious nor angry. I am totally indifferent. You should be too.

What do you want? For us all to be slaves, barren or starved dead? This is your communism?

I want a public healthcare ststem that is free at point of service.
I want clean air, clean water, and clean earth.
I want free education from pre-school through to graduate studies.
I want an end to malnutrition due to poverty.
I want homes and businesses that do not make their users sick.

I want the government to take care of the poor. And put the economy to rhe service of the people instead of having all of us serve the economy.

Whereas...
I want to choose which if any health services I patronise and I don't expect someone else to be forced to pay for me.
I am happy with the air, water and earth as it is.
I want to choose which educational services I use and don't expect someone else to be forced to pay for me.
Trade and industry have already solved that problem in the country I live in, through profit seeking enterprises like farms and supermarkets. I do hope those poor people in socialist countries starving to death because of ideological imbeciles trashing the economy for their own stupid lulz can one day be free from the cancer of socialism that causes their increasing poverty and consequent starvation. To help those people I would support military intervention as it may be the only way to save them.

I don't want the government to make people poor, they should stick to what they are good at which is running a military and providing the force to make a civil society possible. I would be happy with a total tax take amounting to 5% or so of GDP, to go to funding the military and police. Us civilians can do the rest better.

Seems we are enemies then. You want a totalitarian dystopia, I want a return to rational governance. Neither of us can have much impact on which transpires for the lands we live in, but I think time will prove my hopes the more likely to happen as I already explained to you earlier, totalitarianism had utility for governments only on the back of the rifle, now they don't need masses of warm bodies for cannon fodder to win their wars so they don't need us dependant, controlled and indoctrinated for our military potential. We can be civilians and they can leave us be providing we still pay them enough to keep their cruise missiles and AI piloted attack drones running.

[Pants-of-dog]

Non-sequitur, that relatively rich people tend to begat relatively rich people and relatively poor people tend to begat relatively poor people in general does not indicate a class system in commerce.

Yes, it does indicate that. That is pretty much the defintion of a class system.

More than money is inherited by children from their parents: talents, knowledge, habits, social connections, expectations and aspirations are also passed on, so it is and that is just fine. All rich people had a poor ancestor if you go back far enough.. Not everyone wants to be rich, at least not seriously enough to make it happen but they can make it happen if they want. Moreover as TtP already explained to you, becoming rich comes from well paid work NOT from "owning the means of production". Working as a CEO of a big business, best selling novelist, star athlete, specialist surgeon, or top lawyer will make you rich, owning shares in a factory will not by itself. Returns on capital for passive investors are not that much it is like 5% pa after currency depreciation on average and that is for working assets like factories or shops, it can be more but it can also be less than zero! Passive assets on average lose value over time, because of entropy. The path to riches is in smart choices in work and resource deployment (and some luck) not from owning stuff. Owning stuff is the pay off for working, as a way of preserving value accrued from work (often vainly) and as a cost to enable working most effectively. Who earns the surgeon's pay, the surgeon or his scalpel? Who earns the novelists pay, the novelist or his word processor? Who earns the toilet tissue factory's pay, the employees from the CEO down to the floor sweeper or the tools they use?

Use paragraph breaks when switching ideas. I am not going to parse this monstrosity into an argument.

It does. Also hard work is not the winning ticket, working smart is the winning ticket. I can bust a gut working hard by digging random holes out in the desert with my bare hands that no one wanted but it won't and SHOULDN'T make me anything but tired. Making the slightest of cuts with a laser to an arterial blockage in someone's brain is not hard work at all but if it saves that person's life it should result in a very, very good pay off. Work is a cost, the value of the product of that work is the pay off, the difference between the two is the profit or loss depending on which is the greater.

None of this contradicts what I said. Please note that the guy digging holes is almost certainly not going to make enough money to send his kids to medical school.

There is nothing wrong with parents making gifts to their children in life or on their death. There is nothing wrong with that. It is at least half the reason for trying to be successful in life in the first place. If you are mad you didn't get a fat inheritance you should blame your own parents before you blame those that did pass on a rich estate. Or better get over it, quit whining for hand outs and make your own fortune. I dare say Bill Gates children will have a fantastic good start in life, while I am practically an orphan with nothing to get from my parents even if they would give it, do I care? No, not all. I am neither jealous, envious nor angry. I am totally indifferent. You should be too.

My feelings have nothing to do with it, so I have no idea why brought them up.

Now, the fact that people pass their riches onto their children is one of the ways in which the class system is perpetuated in capitalism.

Whereas...
I want to choose which if any health services I patronise and I don't expect someone else to be forced to pay for me.
I am happy with the air, water and earth as it is.
I want to choose which educational services I use and don't expect someone else to be forced to pay for me.
Trade and industry have already solved that problem in the country I live in, through profit seeking enterprises like farms and supermarkets. I do hope those poor people in socialist countries starving to death because of ideological imbeciles trashing the economy for their own stupid lulz can one day be free from the cancer of socialism that causes their increasing poverty and consequent starvation. To help those people I would support military intervention as it may be the only way to save them.

As long as we agree that your weird communism idea was just a strawman.

You also know very little about socialism.

You also would support Pinochet, supposedly.

I don't want the government to make people poor, they should stick to what they are good at which is running a military and providing the force to make a civil society possible. I would be happy with a total tax take amounting to 5% or so of GDP, to go to funding the military and police. Us civilians can do the rest better.

If you are a cpaitalist, then you do support a gov't that makes people poor. All capitalist countries have poor people.

Seems we are enemies then. You want a totalitarian dystopia, I want a return to rational governance. Neither of us can have much impact on which transpires for the lands we live in, but I think time will prove my hopes the more likely to happen as I already explained to you earlier, totalitarianism had utility for governments only on the back of the rifle, now they don't need masses of warm bodies for cannon fodder to win their wars so they don't need us dependant, controlled and indoctrinated for our military potential. We can be civilians and they can leave us be providing we still pay them enough to keep their cruise missiles and AI piloted attack drones running.

Actually, you have no idea what my position is and instead you make up some weird socialist dystopia and then incorrectly assume I support it.

[Truth To Power]

There is no class system in commerce; in academia yes, in the military yes there are class systems, in commerce no.

Welllll... it depends what you mean by "commerce." If you just mean the exchange of ordinary goods and services, then no, there is no class system. But commerce normally requires use of money, and there is definitely a class system in money: greedy, privileged private banksters are entitled to create money in order to charge interest on it. Commerce also usually involves some kind of intellectual property monopoly. There is a class system in IP, too: some are privileged to own what would otherwise be in the public domain -- and the term of privilege shows every sign of extending from decades into centuries. And of course, any form of commerce involving land -- and every form of commerce involves land -- automatically has a class system, in which landowners own the opportunities government, the community and nature provide, and for access to which others must pay them.

[SolarCross]

Non-sequitur, that relatively rich people tend to begat relatively rich people and relatively poor people tend to begat relatively poor people in general does not indicate a class system in commerce.

Yes, it does indicate that. That is pretty much the defintion of a class system.

"Class" maybe, for those with a fetish for categorising, pretty much anything can be split up into classes so indeed why not earning ability? However "system" implies some design which I don't see as being relevant to commerce. Academia yes, that is a class system, the military yes that is a class system, because both are class systems by design. Commerce however is too big, too variable, too massively multi-polar, too anarchistic to be a class system by design... the world of commerce has more in common with an eco-"system" than the stuffy and rigid artificial constructs of academia or the military. Ironically enough if you were to get all of human economic activity booted under one global totalitarian communist thing then the world of commerce would then acquire an actual class system where before it had not, is that not so?

More than money is inherited by children from their parents: talents, knowledge, habits, social connections, expectations and aspirations are also passed on, so it is and that is just fine. All rich people had a poor ancestor if you go back far enough.. Not everyone wants to be rich, at least not seriously enough to make it happen but they can make it happen if they want. Moreover as TtP already explained to you, becoming rich comes from well paid work NOT from "owning the means of production". Working as a CEO of a big business, best selling novelist, star athlete, specialist surgeon, or top lawyer will make you rich, owning shares in a factory will not by itself. Returns on capital for passive investors are not that much it is like 5% pa after currency depreciation on average and that is for working assets like factories or shops, it can be more but it can also be less than zero! Passive assets on average lose value over time, because of entropy. The path to riches is in smart choices in work and resource deployment (and some luck) not from owning stuff. Owning stuff is the pay off for working, as a way of preserving value accrued from work (often vainly) and as a cost to enable working most effectively. Who earns the surgeon's pay, the surgeon or his scalpel? Who earns the novelists pay, the novelist or his word processor? Who earns the toilet tissue factory's pay, the employees from the CEO down to the floor sweeper or the tools they use?

Use paragraph breaks when switching ideas. I am not going to parse this monstrosity into an argument.

Meh it wasn't that big a paragraph, what is your reading level classification?

Okay I'll split it up for the high school drop out class, as so:

More than money is inherited by children from their parents: talents, knowledge, habits, social connections, expectations and aspirations are also passed on, so it is and that is just fine.

All rich people had a poor ancestor if you go back far enough..

Not everyone wants to be rich, at least not seriously enough to make it happen but they can make it happen if they want.

Moreover as TtP already explained to you, becoming rich comes from well paid work NOT from "owning the means of production". Working as a CEO of a big business, best selling novelist, star athlete, specialist surgeon, or top lawyer will make you rich, owning shares in a factory will not by itself.

Returns on capital for passive investors are not that much it is like 5% pa after currency depreciation on average and that is for working assets like factories or shops, it can be more but it can also be less than zero! Passive assets on average lose value over time, because of entropy.

The path to riches is in smart choices in work and resource deployment (and some luck) not from owning stuff. Owning stuff is the pay off for working, as a way of preserving value accrued from work (often vainly) and as a cost to enable working most effectively.

Who earns the surgeon's pay, the surgeon or his scalpel? Who earns the novelists pay, the novelist or his word processor? Who earns the toilet tissue factory's pay, the employees from the CEO down to the floor sweeper or the tools they use?

Was that easier for you to read?

It does. Also hard work is not the winning ticket, working smart is the winning ticket. I can bust a gut working hard by digging random holes out in the desert with my bare hands that no one wanted but it won't and SHOULDN'T make me anything but tired. Making the slightest of cuts with a laser to an arterial blockage in someone's brain is not hard work at all but if it saves that person's life it should result in a very, very good pay off. Work is a cost, the value of the product of that work is the pay off, the difference between the two is the profit or loss depending on which is the greater.

None of this contradicts what I said. Please note that the guy digging holes is almost certainly not going to make enough money to send his kids to medical school.

So you acknowledge what I said as true? Please note that the guy digging random holes in the desert for no reason is probably be too dumb to interest any woman into allowing him to impregnate her, thus is unlikely to produce, except by rape, any offspring to want any kind of education, let alone an expensive one. Also note medical degrees are not the only way to get on in life. Guess what the educational certification level you need to start your own business? That is right, there is none! How is that for literally classless...?

There is nothing wrong with parents making gifts to their children in life or on their death. There is nothing wrong with that. It is at least half the reason for trying to be successful in life in the first place. If you are mad you didn't get a fat inheritance you should blame your own parents before you blame those that did pass on a rich estate. Or better get over it, quit whining for hand outs and make your own fortune. I dare say Bill Gates children will have a fantastic good start in life, while I am practically an orphan with nothing to get from my parents even if they would give it, do I care? No, not all. I am neither jealous, envious nor angry. I am totally indifferent. You should be too.

My feelings have nothing to do with it, so I have no idea why brought them up.

You brought up inheritance with an implication that there is something wrong with it. You did that.. So yeah that is your feelings motivating you to do that.

Now, the fact that people pass their riches onto their children is one of the ways in which the class system is perpetuated in capitalism.

No it is just something people do, have always done and always will do and really they should do. You will have more luck curing people of a liking for alcohol as you will of stopping people helping their children, it is practically biological.

Bill Gates' children may well be born millionaires or even billionaires but in all probability they will finish their life poorer than they started it. Same goes for the children of other top earners like the author J. K. Rowling. Her grandchildren will probably also be poorer than their parents. The estate left behind by super earners like Bill Gates or J. K. Rowling may be so epically huge that it takes many generations of bungling and fecklessness to completely fritter away but it will happen all the same, entropy spares none.

Whereas...
I want to choose which if any health services I patronise and I don't expect someone else to be forced to pay for me.
I am happy with the air, water and earth as it is.
I want to choose which educational services I use and don't expect someone else to be forced to pay for me.
Trade and industry have already solved that problem in the country I live in, through profit seeking enterprises like farms and supermarkets. I do hope those poor people in socialist countries starving to death because of ideological imbeciles trashing the economy for their own stupid lulz can one day be free from the cancer of socialism that causes their increasing poverty and consequent starvation. To help those people I would support military intervention as it may be the only way to save them.

As long as we agree that your weird communism idea was just a strawman.

You also know very little about socialism.

You also would support Pinochet, supposedly.

Yes Pinochet was good. The only fault I can find in him is that he didn't kill enough socialists.

I don't want the government to make people poor, they should stick to what they are good at which is running a military and providing the force to make a civil society possible. I would be happy with a total tax take amounting to 5% or so of GDP, to go to funding the military and police. Us civilians can do the rest better.

If you are a cpaitalist, then you do support a gov't that makes people poor. All capitalist countries have poor people.

No, I support people making their own choices and living with the consequences. My government probably does make some people poor, anyone caught and convicted by them for committing a crime, such as theft, rape, murder or trading in narcotics will very likely go to prison and take a massive hit to their earning ability and future prospects... that happens... is it something that shouldn't happen? I don't know, honestly. What do you think?

Seems we are enemies then. You want a totalitarian dystopia, I want a return to rational governance. Neither of us can have much impact on which transpires for the lands we live in, but I think time will prove my hopes the more likely to happen as I already explained to you earlier, totalitarianism had utility for governments only on the back of the rifle, now they don't need masses of warm bodies for cannon fodder to win their wars so they don't need us dependant, controlled and indoctrinated for our military potential. We can be civilians and they can leave us be providing we still pay them enough to keep their cruise missiles and AI piloted attack drones running.

Actually, you have no idea what my position is and instead you make up some weird socialist dystopia and then incorrectly assume I support it.

Well maybe you should straighten me out on that?

[Truth To Power]

Actually it is. Studies that look at social mobility show that the best indicator of which tax bracket you will end up in is your parent's tax bracket.

Income is not the measure of wealth. Wealth is. Try to remember that.

For every person who has struck it rich through hard work, there are hundreds who have worked just as hard and were not successful.

True. Or thousands.

For every person who made their own fortune, there are hundreds who inherited it.

Dozens, sure. Not hundreds. And more to the point, for every person who made their own fortune through commensurate contributions to production, there are hundreds who have made it by dint of privilege.

And put the economy to rhe service of the people instead of having all of us serve the economy.

We are forced to serve the privileged, not the economy, and the economy would actually be a lot better if we were not forced to serve the privileged.

"Somewhere in Africa little Omgavou Pofouatomo lives in a village that has not seen water in 37 years. He walks to school everyday where he has to use charcoal from the drone struck cafeteria of his school because his father lost his pencil money playing dice in a neighboring village. But for only $14.00 a month, less than 50 cents a day, you can change OP's world. He can have a pencil, some loaner shoes and an chance to be on our next infomercial. Please help. Sally Struthers, who is now working as a telemarketer in Compton is standing by".

"Thousands hack at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root." -- Henry David Thoreau

[Hong Wu]

Inshallah, the government should donate 2.5% of other people's money to charity, then be like "DONE".

[Pants-of-dog]

"Class" maybe, for those with a fetish for categorising, pretty much anything can be split up into classes so indeed why not earning ability? However "system" implies some design which I don't see as being relevant to commerce. Academia yes, that is a class system, the military yes that is a class system, because both are class systems by design. Commerce however is too big, too variable, too massively multi-polar, too anarchistic to be a class system by design... the world of commerce has more in common with an eco-"system" than the stuffy and rigid artificial constructs of academia or the military. Ironically enough if you were to get all of human economic activity booted under one global totalitarian communist thing then the world of commerce would then acquire an actual class system where before it had not, is that not so?

Class is relevant to capitalism even though you may not see its relevance.

While the market is an organic system that is too complex to be considered a class system, society is not the market or commerce. And society is not so complex as to have no class system. People who own businesses that employ a lot of other people are almost certainly not going to be the same class as the people who are employed by this individual.

Meh it wasn't that big a paragraph, what is your reading level classification?

I read it. I just did not bother trying to filter out an argument.

Okay I'll split it up for the high school drop out class, as so:

More than money is inherited by children from their parents: talents, knowledge, habits, social connections, expectations and aspirations are also passed on, so it is and that is just fine.

All rich people had a poor ancestor if you go back far enough..

Not everyone wants to be rich, at least not seriously enough to make it happen but they can make it happen if they want.

And I already commented on all of this.

Moreover as TtP already explained to you, becoming rich comes from well paid work NOT from "owning the means of production". Working as a CEO of a big business, best selling novelist, star athlete, specialist surgeon, or top lawyer will make you rich, owning shares in a factory will not by itself.

I am not discussing the very small percentage people who becme rich. I am discussing the vast majority of people who do not become rich despite working hard and being as talented as rich people.

Returns on capital for passive investors are not that much it is like 5% pa after currency depreciation on average and that is for working assets like factories or shops, it can be more but it can also be less than zero! Passive assets on average lose value over time, because of entropy.

Since businesses are not passive assets, this does not contradict my point.

The path to riches is in smart choices in work and resource deployment (and some luck) not from owning stuff. Owning stuff is the pay off for working, as a way of preserving value accrued from work (often vainly) and as a cost to enable working most effectively.

And people who inherit money do not have to work, as I already said.

Who earns the surgeon's pay, the surgeon or his scalpel? Who earns the novelists pay, the novelist or his word processor? Who earns the toilet tissue factory's pay, the employees from the CEO down to the floor sweeper or the tools they use?

And this seems like random words tossed onto the end.

Was that easier for you to read?

Well, it made no more sense, but at least we could see that the ideas did not actually refute my claim.

So you acknowledge what I said as true? Please note that the guy digging random holes in the desert for no reason is probably be too dumb to interest any woman into allowing him to impregnate her, thus is unlikely to produce, except by rape, any offspring to want any kind of education, let alone an expensive one. Also note medical degrees are not the only way to get on in life. Guess what the educational certification level you need to start your own business? That is right, there is none! How is that for literally classless...?

You seem to have ignored my point that the opportuniy to become a neurosurgeom requires someone willing to pay for medical school. A manual labourer will almost certainly not be able to pay for his child to become one.

Thus, to get these opportunities for well paying jobs, it almost certainly requires well to do parents.

You brought up inheritance with an implication that there is something wrong with it. You did that.. So yeah that is your feelings motivating you to do that.

I brought up inheritance as a way for the upper classes to maintain their economic leverage. You brought up my supposed feelings. I would rather you stopped incorrectly guessing my feelings and addressed my point.

No it is just something people do, have always done and always will do and really they should do. You will have more luck curing people of a liking for alcohol as you will of stopping people helping their children, it is practically biological.

Bill Gates' children may well be born millionaires or even billionaires but in all probability they will finish their life poorer than they started it. Same goes for the children of other top earners like the author J. K. Rowling. Her grandchildren will probably also be poorer than their parents. The estate left behind by super earners like Bill Gates or J. K. Rowling may be so epically huge that it takes many generations of bungling and fecklessness to completely fritter away but it will happen all the same, entropy spares none.

Probably not. This goes against the findings of people who study social mobility. Gates' kids may not be intelligent money makers, but they do not need to be. They can hire someone to do that for them.

But as long as we agree that inheritance is one of the ways that class systems perpetuate themselves, the rest is a tangent,.

Yes Pinochet was good. The only fault I can find in him is that he didn't kill enough socialists.

So when you talk about freedom and choice, you do not actually mean it. Good to know.

No, I support people making their own choices and living with the consequences.

No, you do not. If you did not, you would not support authoritarian military dictatorships imposed by foreign gov'ts against the will of the people. You seem to be using this word "choice" as a slogan, rather than as part of a logically consistent or moral position.

My government probably does make some people poor, anyone caught and convicted by them for committing a crime, such as theft, rape, murder or trading in narcotics will very likely go to prison and take a massive hit to their earning ability and future prospects... that happens... is it something that shouldn't happen? I don't know, honestly. What do you think?

In every capitalist country, there are poor who have not committed crimes.

Well maybe you should straighten me out on that?

I suggest you read my posts and answer my actual points instead of assuming I am a college kid who worships Marx and has never read him.

--------------

@Truth To Power,

Please see my last post to you. Thank you.