Defend socialism on purely economic grounds.

but neither keynes nor galbraith are socialists, though! both are capitalists, although much more at ease with a strong regulatory government than the likes of milton friedman, et. al.

(See, I don't know economics! Keep in mind that I'm using a pretty broad definition of "socialism," though.)

Seems like it's easier to defend "not unfettered capitalism" on economic grounds than to defend "socialism" which is harder to define.

Some defenses would include:

1) Markets don't actually function perfectly because people don't really have perfect information (the whole Joseph Stiglitz thing)

2) Government institutions are actually needed to allow markets to function properly

3) Pooling of resources allows for benefits that cannot be achieved by market forces and ultimately benefit the market (e.g. universal healthcare takes burden off of corporations, giving them incentive to provide jobs here.)

Kind of like what Eisbaer said - those defenses would more apply to *socialized capitalism* than to socialism

sorry if i sounded snippy, sundar, i didn't mean to. part of the problem is definitional -- if by "socialism" you mean any sort of governmental intervention or involvement in the market economy without the government totally supplanting the market economy (a la the former Soviet Union), then folks like keynes and galbraith would do. (though, if i remember correctly, keynes' general theory -- his book on how to cure the Great Depression that sorta dovetailed with FDR's New Deal, et. al. -- is NOT easy reading, it's mostly mathematical.)

The purpose of an economy is not to perpetuate itself, churning out ever greater numbers of garter belts, suction pumps and artichokes. An economy has no purpose other than to serve human needs or desires.

Any arguments for or against socialism, capitalism, mercantilism, or communism that are "on purely economic grounds" would be pretty much sterile and pointless in my view. If an economic system were to destroy the health, happiness or social institutions of the humans within that system, it would be a crappy system, regardless of how efficient or productive it might be in "purely economic" terms.

respec knuckles

You didn't sound snippy, Eisbaer. And I am being pretty arbitrary and slippery about my terms. And, yes, Canadian or European social democracy would probably have to be defended on different terms than anarcho-communism or somesuch. However, I'm just looking for defences (they don't need to fit all varieties of 'socialism') of anything that could be described by the terms of the question. (i.e. Defences of anarcho-communism are as welcome as defences of the welfare state. Defences don't need to be one-size-fits-all.) My minimum requirements are quite a bit stronger than "any sort of govt intervention" though. (Quebec certainly goes quite a bit further than the New Deal and further than anywhere in the contemporary US, AFAICT. Feel free to prove me wrong on these points.) Minimum requirements include socialized and universal medical insurance, heavily socialized higher education with very affordable tuition, extensive public transportation and broadcasting, a major percentage of the population working in the public sector (I've heard a figure of 50% for Quebec, which may be way off), extensive unionization, heavy collective involvement in the cultural sector, etc. If you like, you can use France or Scandinavian countries as models for this end of the spectrum, though they go further than Quebec. Like, prove this guy wrong.

If you're going to take the approach Aimless takes, please also try to demonstrate how a less productive (assuming it will be less productive) economic system will provide for health, happiness, and social institutions in the long run. (The only convincing argument I've heard for privatized health care is that concentrated capital and profit incentives encourage innovation. Thus, Canada and Western European countries are able to provide socialized medicines because they can use technologies and treatments that have been developed in the US. If the US also had a socialized system, these things would just not be developed at all and everyone's health would be worse in the long run. I don't know at all if this is a good argument but it's the strongest I've heard.)

The best possible outcome I can imagine for decentralized, communal 'sustainable development' in the Third World (something I've tended to support at times) is something like Kerala. There is something to be said for this. Kerala is gorgeous and I can actually breathe the air, which is really hard in Mumbai or Bangalore. At the same time, educated people tend to leave to work elsewhere because there's little scope for higher-end professions in the state. (Medicine might be an exception, but even then, doctors could probably do better elsewhere.) I've heard the argument, and it seems strong, that the state is only holding on as well as it does because people who have left send money back to their families. Industry won't invest because there are statewide strikes practically every week. The power goes out on a regular basis. The state is still predominantly agrarian. (The rice plantation workers are working for themselves and not for capital but they're still rice plantation workers and will probably remain so.) This is an example of social development at the expense of economic development and I'm not sure it's a great one. (I'm not convinced that the cramped and polluted cities of the more 'developed' areas are a wonderful model either, mind you. It's a really difficult question for me.)

aimless otm - the question is meaningless - see Tony Wilson.

But 'purely economic' terms are the best indicator we have by which to judge human health and happiness. Why dismiss it as a standard to hold political systems to?

But 'purely economic' terms are the best indicator we have by which to judge human health and happiness.

What?

I'm not arguing for unfettered capitalism here, but name a better measure against which we can judge political systems.

...in achieving human health and happiness or whatever it is you want to measure by proxy.

why do we want to measure them 'by proxy'?

wasn't marx's work a critique of the category 'economic' y/n?

but not even all economists agree with that, aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa

I guess you could use "unsustainability" as a "purely economic" criticism of pure capitalism - capitalism requires endless growth and endlessly increasing growth, and it results in a boom-and-bust pattern. There's the whole E.F. Schumacher thing about capitalism treating limited resources as unlimited "inputs" - but that's as much a flaw with "pure economic" thinking as it is with capitalism.

The only convincing argument I've heard for privatized health care is that concentrated capital and profit incentives encourage innovation. Thus, Canada and Western European countries are able to provide socialized medicines because they can use technologies and treatments that have been developed in the US. If the US also had a socialized system, these things would just not be developed at all and everyone's health would be worse in the long run. I don't know at all if this is a good argument but it's the strongest I've heard

One counter-argument to this is that new technology is not really the most important factor in improving health at this point, as there are already so many people who don't even get access to basic healthcare that improved technical capability is moot. Another would be that government money could still be used as an incentive to innovate.

One of the best arguments for socialized anything, is insurance - even in a hardcore capitalist society, people seem to intuitively recognize that they are better off by pooling resources and spreading risk.

Of course private insurers actually have incentive to work against the whole principle of insurance.

"Canada and Western European countries are able to provide socialized medicines because they can use technologies and treatments that have been developed in the US."

haha, oh yeah sure, british research has been minimal in this field.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Glaxo

also we've had socialized heathcare (not medicines) since the 1940s when i don't think this argument could have applied.

"One counter-argument to this is that government money could still be used as an incentive to innovate."

exactly. how are pharmaceutical companies *not* competing here? they want all that sweet cash. doesn't matter if it's from governments or from insurance companies or whatever.

Canada and Western European countries are able to provide socialized medicines because they can use technologies and treatments that have been developed in the US

Ha ha, yes, classic

Also it's a misconception that capitalism provides incentive to "innovate." I mean it does indirectly, but the primary incentive is to increase profits. This is just as often done by creating some new more expensive thing that does basically the same thing as the old one but looks snazzier and has a power marketing campaign behind it.

Often it even results creating something shittier that doesn't last as long.

Canada and Western European countries are able to provide socialized medicines because they can use technologies and treatments that have been developed in the US

We owe them so much...

Anyway how, accepting the implicit premise of the question (that economic growth is generally a good thing for people) I'm not sure the example given upstream was really a valid one: presumably its not the health care companies in America who are innovating to provide new equipement, but technology companies. Perhaps there are some innovative health care practices going on over there, but health care is such an imperfect market I doubt there's much real desire to innovate anyhow.

this is a minor point in the discussion, but that issue of medical innovation is such a red herring. lots of breakthrough medical research in the united states has come from public funding (at universities and hospitals); there is the economic incentive that researchers can take their publicly-funded discoveries and privatize them, but i've never seen any evidence that the prospect of wealth is the primary motivator for that kind of scientific research. i know some medical scientists and they are motivated more by the thrill of the chase than anything else -- and maybe by competition with their peers, and the idea of recognition within the field, but the actual riches are not their main goal. (and when riches are the main goal, what you get is drug companies endlessly tweaking their already-perfectly-good medicines to try to come up with a new patent.)

the profit motive is great for producing profit; whether it's good at producing anything else depends entirely on context and circumstance.

Well, sure, but someone has to fund those researchers and laboratories.

fwiw, profit is rarely ever the goal of the actual medical scientists doing the actual research. no one sets out to pick apart some biochemical mechanism with the thought of dollar bills floating around in their brain.

however, generally, the only reason they're "allowed" to pursue a particular type of research is because someone ELSE has dollar bills on the brain.

also: if a university makes some kind of breakthrough, they are entirely within their rights to seek the patent and make money from it. moreover, there is competition for NIH grants and the like, and that competition is determined by whatever the gov't has deemed is "important." so, if a particular type of research (let's say HIV or something) becomes politically unfashionable, it's possible for a research group to lose funding in the next go-round.

Well, sure, but someone has to fund those researchers and laboratories.

-- Casuistry, Tuesday, October 2, 2007 4:46 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Link

why is it bad if the state does this, rather than insurance companies?

i'm sure you can think of examples of state-funded excellence in technology and industry in the US.

if you can't: it's the fucking arms industry.

Uhm, I don't think that was his point.

Has anyone read the full version of this?: http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000AF3D5-6DC9-152E-A9F183414B7F0000

I found the magazine itself but that only contain as much as can be seen at the link. You'd need to buy the article online. It seems like it could be the sort of thing I'm looking for but the condensed version is pretty cursory. Is it worth buying the whole article?

#

"He is so right! The anarchic capitalilsts so much mispeak! They mislead about history. They just gloat over selfishness."
Posted 12/24/07 by skeptic griggsy

Has anyone read the full version of this?: http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?articleID=000AF3D5-6DC9-152E-A9F183414B7F0000

I found the magazine itself but that only contain as much as can be seen at the link. You'd need to buy the article online. It seems like it could be the sort of thing I'm looking for but the condensed version is pretty cursory. Is it worth buying the whole article?

-- Sundar, Saturday, 23 February 2008 21:18

That article looks interesting re: Nordic vs Anglo-Saxon economies.

But why has social democracy been so successful in the Nordic states and less so in say, France or the UK pre-Thatcher? Is it just a case of better economic management, or are cultural factors an important part of this? Did a country like Sweden have the right "mindset" to allow these policies to work in the first place?

but why has social democracy been so successful in the Nordic states and less so in say, France or the UK pre-Thatcher? Is it just a case of better economic management, or are cultural factors an important part of this? Did a country like Sweden have the right "mindset" to allow these policies to work in the first place?

very good point and always something ive wondered about. also why has an achingly middle class socialist paradise like sweden got the highest of suicide? those 3 weeks of constant darkness?

Think the suicide thing a fallacy anyway. It's 32 out of 95, according to these figures:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_suicide_rate

One way of looking at high suicide rates is that if people aren't dying from causes like poor health, murder, road accidents, etc then they're likely to hang around longer to commit suicide.

So I'm slowly working my way through the scholarly version: http://www.countercurrents.org/gindin300908.htm

but I find myself intuitively wanting to generally agree with Leo Panitch and Sam Gindin in the more populist versions:
http://www.countercurrents.org/gindin300908.htm
http://www.socialistproject.ca/bullet/bullet200.html

(Some of this is specific to Canada or Ontario but the basic principles travel, I think.) But this stuff is totally crazy and radical, right? Can someone explain why they're wrong?

Or at least why this perspective is so far out of the mainstream?

which parts?

Any of it?

‎(Weirdly, I'm more interested in the arguments about nationalization than in the debate re the actual wage freeze.)

I'm kind of curious where the $2million ceiling originated, because that seemed to be the same number Jello Biafra was proposing when he ran for mayor...

Oh crap, this was the first 'populist' article I meant to link:

http://www.thestar.com/opinion/editorialopinion/article/837616--public-sector-austerity-unreasonable-and-irrational

I read an article somewhere about public-interest (but not nonprofit) companies applying for special tax breaks because their charter prohibits amoral douchebaggery. My guess is that companies like these might go down easier than ones directly chartered by the govt.

(i mean they would go down easier in the throats of the public, not that they would fail more, but they might, not having the larger resources of a govt backing them)

Do you mean "go down" as in "go under" or as it "be easier for the public to swallow"? (Banks are directly chartered by the govt in any case, right?)

Ha xpost!

TBH, I'm not at all clear on what a private-sector for-profit public-interest company even is. Whatever it is, it doesn't seem like it could do the sort of large-scale planning and reorganization of sectors of the economy that Panitch and Gindin are advocating.

(I've kind of intuitively quietly believed in bringing back nationalized control over Canadian oil for a while too tbh.)

I do sort of get why at least the Canadian public has not been clamouring for direct nationalization of the banks, given how highly they've been ranked.

there's a new US bank startup that's based on "don't be evil" but I think they are consumer banking rather than lending much. i'm reading that a bunch of these microfinance outfits which you typically associate with 3rd world are picking up some of the slack on the lending front domestically.

does anyone really have a problem with state-run industry except for those who might profit from privatisation?

Going by the comments following the Toronto Star article (and the platforms of major political parties), I'm guessing yes?

Oh btw that "2m cap" quote was a quote from Dean Baker that the authors are criticizing. It's clearer in the print version than in that online reprint.

there's a new US bank startup that's based on "don't be evil" but I think they are consumer banking rather than lending much. i'm reading that a bunch of these microfinance outfits which you typically associate with 3rd world are picking up some of the slack on the lending front domestically.

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