ch33zw1z
Lifer
- Nov 4, 2004
- 39,750
- 20,323
- 146
DrMrLordX
Lifer
- Apr 27, 2000
- 22,934
- 13,020
- 136
Lovely topic actually. Incoming wall of text!
That is definitely not true. If you are an American, perhaps you say this because you see other countries with poor(er) people willing to do the same work as you for less money. If outsourcing didn't exist and immigration slowed to a trickle, you would fully understand how limited is the supply of labor in "first world" countries. There would be significant upheaval in American society. Eventually it would turn out very well for our society (I think), but it would come with some ugly side-effects.
Automation is the long-term problem . . . assuming you want everyone to define their life and continued existence through being someone else's employee. Certainly there other ways for humans to spend their lives. Then automation becomes more of a boon. However, automation and globalism (or what we often define as globalism) don't necessarily have anything to do with one another. Exporting production to an undeveloped country often prevents automation of tasks (by temporarily reducing labor costs to make human labor more competitive with machine labor). Eventually machine labor will wipe out even those jobs. If the factories return to developed countries, they won't be bringing back the old jobs that were lost in years past.
A few points:
1). Except in cases of prison/slave labor, "some poor fuck" doesn't have to do anything. Usually they jump at the chance to work if it means earning more money.
2). Gains are distributed according to equity. If workers held equity in their company, they would realize the gains as well as the opportunity to purchase cheaper products. Sadly, few American workers ever hold much (or any) meaningful equity in their employer . . . or anyone else's employer for that matter.
Imagine if the middle class had prioritized acquiring partial ownership of American corporations, instead of . . . whatever else it was they spent money on. Vacations, nicer cars, better clothes, tastier food, and what have you. Consumer spending would suffer, but . . .
Bingo! Even non-union employees could, once upon a time, negotiate pay. Today you are paid according to scale set for all employees. Even if you demonstrate a particular skillset that makes you more valuable to your employer, you can't ever negotiate a pay increase based on that skillset (or anything else). You follow the same wage scale as everyone else. Typically.
Credit allows the finance industry to slowly bleed away everything you've ever earned, or will earn.
It's a problem, but it's also a possible solution. Overall, you want increased production of goods and services, even if it requires only a few highly-skilled workers to facilitate that increased production. Dumping more goods/services on the market reduces prices and increases availability . . . at least in a market that is not manipulated. The question is, how does anyone buy those cheap goods/services when their income is $0? And what's the economic incentive to produce those goods when nobody can afford to buy anything? Do you produce anything you like and give it away for free? That doesn't seem realistic.
That's a sticky problem. We currently live in a society where organized corporations are best able to produce products and sell them to a wider market. Equity defines who shares in the profits. So if someone legally founds (or buys) a corporation and captures some significant percentage of all income for themselves, did they steal anything? What, in general, has Amazon stolen from anyone? It was a bookstore started in a garage. It was not founded by a plutocratic cabal hell-bent on spreading poverty for the sake of spreading poverty. Amazon got rich because a bunch of customers rejected other businesses and instead chose to do business with Jeff Bezos. A great many people who are potentially harmed by globalization willingly yielded a significant amount of wealth to Amazon without necessarily considering the ramifications of what they were doing. We continue to do this every day. Apple, Google, Microsoft, Nike, General Motors, Levi's . . . when you buy their products, you fuel globalization. People have been voting with their wallets for globalization for years.
The light that burns twice as bright, burns half as long.
Not necessarily, no. In fact, wages vs. inflation trends would show that (overall) you're wrong. Certain sectors, such as housing; food; and medical care show price inflation above median wage growth in the United States. Since 2000:
Median American income has grown by ~49.8%
Food prices have increased by 53.6%
Housing prices have increased by ~56.2%
Medical prices have increased by ~89.4%
Not if the products are sold at the same prices. The only thing that happens is an increase in profit margin for the company selling said products.
You only buy a washer/dryer set once every so many years. Typically they last 11 years. You pay for housing every month. You buy food every day. What good are those consumer products going down in price, if you are having problems buying food and paying for housing?
Rant
The real problem isn't so much globalization, or global trade: it lies in our equity model, and how that equity can be handled. Example: you found a widget company in the United States in 1951. You invent the widget, you create your own automation process for producing the widget with marginally-skilled labor to operate the machines, and you organize the sale of widgets in the United States and abroad. Great! You have created your own business. But it goes nowhere until you have staff. Without staff, it dies completely. So you get some investors, offer them shares in your company, use the money to hire workers, and off you go.
The workers earn a wage. You and your investors have equity in your company. Shares of stock. You go public, and you issue more shares, which you distribute to more investors. The workers continue earning wages. Foreign competition pops up in Japan. The Japanese have invented their own widgets (early models are likely retrofitted from your design, but 1-2 years in the models are obviously novel) and developed their own automation process. Their workers are cheaper than yours. They enter the global widget market, and you initially take a beating. You have to lay off some workers, but you update your models, fight back, and stabilize. You weather another assault from Taiwanese and German widget manufacturers who come online shortly thereafter. The Germans normalize their designs for the international market (they were operating in local European markets, not in competition with you except in limited areas) while the Taiwanese crib from the Japanese by knocking off their designs for a bit before attempting original designs. The Taiwanese and Germans both produce their own automation processes and hire their own talent. Just like you did decades ago. You continue to compete, and though you've lost majority control over the worldwide market, you're still a force in the United States. Sales are stable. Ish. Your workers are still employed, though wages aren't rising as much as they were in the 50s when you were new.
Then your board gets a bright idea: let's try using some of that cheap labor like the Japanese used to have and the Taiwanese had just a few years ago. In 1988, they vote to explore expanding production into new industrial parks opening up in China and Mexico. Nobody is able to produce a widget factory in either country. Nobody is able to design a competitive widget in either country. Left alone, they will likely never compete with anyone in the global widget market. But your board knows that they can build factories using your engineering talent and produce widgets from your designs in those countries at a much lower cost. Those factories will not just compete with the German, Taiwanese, and Japanese factories; they will also compete with your own widget factories in the United States (albeit in a slightly different way). So despite the fact that the Mexicans and Chinese do not have the talent or the technical skill to produce their own widget manufacturing sector, by the mid 1990s, they become dominant in widget production thanks to the export of all of your talent and skill. The shareholders realize significant increases in profits (since your prices don't drop as much relative to inflation as does your cost basis), but your workers face mass layoffs and factory closures. Eventually, due to IP theft, knock-off widgets start creeping into markets. Your board agrees to a merger/sale with a manufacturing concern in Guangzhou, and you join the sale, retiring with great wealth. Your Mexican facilities are spun off to a German AG. The last of your American factories close. Your brand is now a foreign one.
Despite the fact that your widget business had zero value until American labor (and the stable American society that made such labor available in the first place) made it possible, said labor reaps no reward when you move the majority of your business into impoverished and underdeveloped/uneducated labor markets. How does that make sense? If we want to compete with countries that can develop their own industries with their own talents using their own human resources, then great! I welcome the competition. Let's see who can innovate best. But why are we taking entire industries and transplanting them into countries that can't (or won't) develop local resources and businesses on their own? Why did we have to drop ready-made factories with modern designs into China, Mexico, Bangledesh, Malaysia, Vietnam, and other countries when we could have encouraged them somehow to develop their own industries instead?
Why can't we encourage our corporations to stay in the country where they started or restrict expansion of production into countries that have the necessary stability to produce their own domestic competition?
That is definitely not true. If you are an American, perhaps you say this because you see other countries with poor(er) people willing to do the same work as you for less money. If outsourcing didn't exist and immigration slowed to a trickle, you would fully understand how limited is the supply of labor in "first world" countries. There would be significant upheaval in American society. Eventually it would turn out very well for our society (I think), but it would come with some ugly side-effects.
Automation is the long-term problem . . . assuming you want everyone to define their life and continued existence through being someone else's employee. Certainly there other ways for humans to spend their lives. Then automation becomes more of a boon. However, automation and globalism (or what we often define as globalism) don't necessarily have anything to do with one another. Exporting production to an undeveloped country often prevents automation of tasks (by temporarily reducing labor costs to make human labor more competitive with machine labor). Eventually machine labor will wipe out even those jobs. If the factories return to developed countries, they won't be bringing back the old jobs that were lost in years past.
A few points:
1). Except in cases of prison/slave labor, "some poor fuck" doesn't have to do anything. Usually they jump at the chance to work if it means earning more money.
2). Gains are distributed according to equity. If workers held equity in their company, they would realize the gains as well as the opportunity to purchase cheaper products. Sadly, few American workers ever hold much (or any) meaningful equity in their employer . . . or anyone else's employer for that matter.
Imagine if the middle class had prioritized acquiring partial ownership of American corporations, instead of . . . whatever else it was they spent money on. Vacations, nicer cars, better clothes, tastier food, and what have you. Consumer spending would suffer, but . . .
Bingo! Even non-union employees could, once upon a time, negotiate pay. Today you are paid according to scale set for all employees. Even if you demonstrate a particular skillset that makes you more valuable to your employer, you can't ever negotiate a pay increase based on that skillset (or anything else). You follow the same wage scale as everyone else. Typically.
Credit allows the finance industry to slowly bleed away everything you've ever earned, or will earn.
It's a problem, but it's also a possible solution. Overall, you want increased production of goods and services, even if it requires only a few highly-skilled workers to facilitate that increased production. Dumping more goods/services on the market reduces prices and increases availability . . . at least in a market that is not manipulated. The question is, how does anyone buy those cheap goods/services when their income is $0? And what's the economic incentive to produce those goods when nobody can afford to buy anything? Do you produce anything you like and give it away for free? That doesn't seem realistic.
That's a sticky problem. We currently live in a society where organized corporations are best able to produce products and sell them to a wider market. Equity defines who shares in the profits. So if someone legally founds (or buys) a corporation and captures some significant percentage of all income for themselves, did they steal anything? What, in general, has Amazon stolen from anyone? It was a bookstore started in a garage. It was not founded by a plutocratic cabal hell-bent on spreading poverty for the sake of spreading poverty. Amazon got rich because a bunch of customers rejected other businesses and instead chose to do business with Jeff Bezos. A great many people who are potentially harmed by globalization willingly yielded a significant amount of wealth to Amazon without necessarily considering the ramifications of what they were doing. We continue to do this every day. Apple, Google, Microsoft, Nike, General Motors, Levi's . . . when you buy their products, you fuel globalization. People have been voting with their wallets for globalization for years.
The light that burns twice as bright, burns half as long.
Not necessarily, no. In fact, wages vs. inflation trends would show that (overall) you're wrong. Certain sectors, such as housing; food; and medical care show price inflation above median wage growth in the United States. Since 2000:
Median American income has grown by ~49.8%
Food prices have increased by 53.6%
Housing prices have increased by ~56.2%
Medical prices have increased by ~89.4%
Not if the products are sold at the same prices. The only thing that happens is an increase in profit margin for the company selling said products.
You only buy a washer/dryer set once every so many years. Typically they last 11 years. You pay for housing every month. You buy food every day. What good are those consumer products going down in price, if you are having problems buying food and paying for housing?
Rant
The real problem isn't so much globalization, or global trade: it lies in our equity model, and how that equity can be handled. Example: you found a widget company in the United States in 1951. You invent the widget, you create your own automation process for producing the widget with marginally-skilled labor to operate the machines, and you organize the sale of widgets in the United States and abroad. Great! You have created your own business. But it goes nowhere until you have staff. Without staff, it dies completely. So you get some investors, offer them shares in your company, use the money to hire workers, and off you go.
The workers earn a wage. You and your investors have equity in your company. Shares of stock. You go public, and you issue more shares, which you distribute to more investors. The workers continue earning wages. Foreign competition pops up in Japan. The Japanese have invented their own widgets (early models are likely retrofitted from your design, but 1-2 years in the models are obviously novel) and developed their own automation process. Their workers are cheaper than yours. They enter the global widget market, and you initially take a beating. You have to lay off some workers, but you update your models, fight back, and stabilize. You weather another assault from Taiwanese and German widget manufacturers who come online shortly thereafter. The Germans normalize their designs for the international market (they were operating in local European markets, not in competition with you except in limited areas) while the Taiwanese crib from the Japanese by knocking off their designs for a bit before attempting original designs. The Taiwanese and Germans both produce their own automation processes and hire their own talent. Just like you did decades ago. You continue to compete, and though you've lost majority control over the worldwide market, you're still a force in the United States. Sales are stable. Ish. Your workers are still employed, though wages aren't rising as much as they were in the 50s when you were new.
Then your board gets a bright idea: let's try using some of that cheap labor like the Japanese used to have and the Taiwanese had just a few years ago. In 1988, they vote to explore expanding production into new industrial parks opening up in China and Mexico. Nobody is able to produce a widget factory in either country. Nobody is able to design a competitive widget in either country. Left alone, they will likely never compete with anyone in the global widget market. But your board knows that they can build factories using your engineering talent and produce widgets from your designs in those countries at a much lower cost. Those factories will not just compete with the German, Taiwanese, and Japanese factories; they will also compete with your own widget factories in the United States (albeit in a slightly different way). So despite the fact that the Mexicans and Chinese do not have the talent or the technical skill to produce their own widget manufacturing sector, by the mid 1990s, they become dominant in widget production thanks to the export of all of your talent and skill. The shareholders realize significant increases in profits (since your prices don't drop as much relative to inflation as does your cost basis), but your workers face mass layoffs and factory closures. Eventually, due to IP theft, knock-off widgets start creeping into markets. Your board agrees to a merger/sale with a manufacturing concern in Guangzhou, and you join the sale, retiring with great wealth. Your Mexican facilities are spun off to a German AG. The last of your American factories close. Your brand is now a foreign one.
Despite the fact that your widget business had zero value until American labor (and the stable American society that made such labor available in the first place) made it possible, said labor reaps no reward when you move the majority of your business into impoverished and underdeveloped/uneducated labor markets. How does that make sense? If we want to compete with countries that can develop their own industries with their own talents using their own human resources, then great! I welcome the competition. Let's see who can innovate best. But why are we taking entire industries and transplanting them into countries that can't (or won't) develop local resources and businesses on their own? Why did we have to drop ready-made factories with modern designs into China, Mexico, Bangledesh, Malaysia, Vietnam, and other countries when we could have encouraged them somehow to develop their own industries instead?
Why can't we encourage our corporations to stay in the country where they started or restrict expansion of production into countries that have the necessary stability to produce their own domestic competition?
Homerboy
Lifer
- Mar 1, 2000
- 30,890
- 5,001
- 126
**************** attention ****************
I would just like to step in here and congratulate everyone in this thread on an insightful, well thought through and debated discussion. I'm not sure I've seen a thread like this in P&N in years. This was truly a breathe of fresh air, and I thank all the participants involved.
**************** attention ****************
Fenixgoon
Lifer
- Jun 30, 2003
- 33,286
- 12,849
- 136
so if people save or invest instead of buying goods, who is buying to keep these companies afloat? The demand has to come from somewhere, otherwise companies would have no income and investors would drop them like a bad habit. Our current economic model (to my limited knowledge) depends on consumer drmand. Giving them a larger share of the profit pie wouldn't hurt. Hell it might be better for businesses overall since people would have more income to spend. The total amount of wealth would just get distributed differently (and hopefully more evenly)
Homerboy
Lifer
- Mar 1, 2000
- 30,890
- 5,001
- 126
I agree with you. However, there's one "small" wrinkle that doesn't require people to get paid more to let them purchase more: credit.
They've all done the math and it basically allows people easy to obtain credit so they can buy more things with less money in their pockets.
If/when they can't pay the credit back, the bank is still making enough on the lost payments via those making payments with 22+% interest tacked on. Those credit accounts that don't pay? The banks sell those (making some money back) and those credit buyers in turn make money on collecting from those overdue people (voluntarily paying or post judgment wage garnishment).
Credit keeps the current market afloat.
Fenixgoon
Lifer
- Jun 30, 2003
- 33,286
- 12,849
- 136
sounds like a system ripe for collapse, given that people who can't pay are somehow supposed to pay delinquent accounts AND maintain some level of consumer spending.
But here we are, so the bubble hasn't popped. Yet.
Homerboy
Lifer
- Mar 1, 2000
- 30,890
- 5,001
- 126
Oh it's ripe. Gets riper every day.
I was saying though there's 3 types of people with credit:
Those that pay back in full.
Those that pay back some, but not all, and pay high interest rates resulting in them just treading water and stuck in a vicious cycle.
Those that don't pay at all.
The banks have balanced the scales so that they make money on all 3 of those possibilities, with the middle ones (the largest of the bunch) being the fattest pig.
glenn1
Lifer
- Sep 6, 2000
- 25,383
- 1,013
- 126
That's one proposal for how to do UBI from a guy who is almost certainly not going to be elected. It's far less interesting to me than how UBI is structured in an actual bill that may get written and debated in Congress. And which may or may not resemble Yang's proposal.
theeedude
Lifer
- Feb 5, 2006
- 35,787
- 6,197
- 126
"Working class" voted to give up being "middle class" and instead wait for "trickle down." Let them wait.
DrMrLordX
Lifer
- Apr 27, 2000
- 22,934
- 13,020
- 136
There's a balance. Since the 1980s (if not earlier), the American economy has been bolstered by domestic consumerism. We're heavily tilted economically towards acquisition of goods, often fueld by easy credit. PSAVERT:
Personal Saving Rate
Graph and download economic data for Personal Saving Rate (PSAVERT) from Jan 1959 to Aug 2025 about savings, personal, rate, and USA.
fred.stlouisfed.org
And total debt-versus-GDP:
United States Households Debt To GDP
Households Debt in the United States decreased to 68.30 percent of GDP in the first quarter of 2025 from 69.40 percent of GDP in the fourth quarter of 2024. This page provides - United States Households Debt To Gdp- actual values, historical data, forecast, chart, statistics, economic calendar...
tradingeconomics.com
Granted, things have gotten . . . better? Perhaps I should say, "better balanced" since 2005 when there was a spike in personal debt and a lull in personal savings (2.2%? hah). In any case, when people start to save money, eventually the savings produce disposable income in the form of returns (especially liquid returns such as interest or dividends, which sadly are both looking a tad old-fashioned these days). It's possible to save a lot when you're young and reap significant rewards when you're in your 50s or 60s (pre-retirement) which can result in profligate spending on, you know, things that aren't investments. It'll tilt consumer focus away from the 18-34 crowd and towards the silver-hairs, but as you may have noticed, this is already happening anyway . . .
In any case, debt-driven consumerism creates a situation where, eventually, significant portions of income from work must be spent on interest which in-and-of-itself does not aid in production of anything (versus spending the same money on other products and services). You're relying on the finance sector to circulate the money they reap from debt collections through the economy. As the post-housing-bubble bank behavior and QE fiasco have shown us, it's possible for financial institutions to sit on large pockets of money or to invest in narrow sectors of the economy that don't necessarily create domestic job growth (or wage growth).
SMOGZINN
Lifer
- Jun 17, 2005
- 14,359
- 4,640
- 136
They tried this, several times in fact. Each time they lost their shirts. Scandal after scandal, Ponzi schemes and pyramid schemes taught Americans that unless you have the education to understand it, and can devote a large portion of your time to tracking the market, to learning about current trends, following the ever changing rules, then you are the sucker that the sociopaths that already have significant ownership are going to fleece. The average person can't afford to lose 40% of their life savings ever 10 years and recover. They need that money to live on now.
Rather like Thatcher's "property owning democracy" and desire to get everyone owning shares in the stock market by selling them off when things were privatised. Just didn't work. The shares mostly just ended up in the same few hands again. Only well-connected people with money and inside knowledge/contacts can really sustain making good money out of shares. Everyone else gets fleeced and gives up, lacking the resources to play that game.
Even with the council housing sell-off - which was and is popular among those directly benefiting from it - what actually happened for many (like my neighbour) was they then couldn't afford the mortgage and had to sell up to a buy-to-let landlord, who then rented out the property to the same sort of people who would once have lived there as council tenants. Only now the property is rented out at a much higher rent than the state once changed...and then the tenants claim that money from the state as housing-benefit, so the state now pays private landlords to rent back the same property the state once owned. It can end up much the same but with private landlords as a middle-man taking a large cut.
Jaskalas
Lifer
- Jun 23, 2004
- 35,763
- 10,066
- 136
Most (all?) existing proposals probably do not go as far as my own. Where as I fund children from the day they are born, resulting in (today's dollars) a $216k nest egg. Enabling every young couple to pay cash for a home. The widespread elimination of rent / mortgages means that $1,000/mo per person goes much further than you calculated.
The key is going far enough with UBI to make a difference. Instead of relying on middling policy that fails to accomplish the goal.
Now, when it comes to this "purpose in life". That is Stockholm syndrome talking. It is not real, or at least... it does not require begging for slave wages to find meaning in life. Imagine if you could stop slaving for just a moment, and enjoy life. Actually have time to pursue YOUR dreams, your goals, your interests. I understand this concept is foreign to those who haven't experienced a moment of respite from the grind of daily work, but life INHERENTLY has meaning. Being abused by an employer does not give you fulfillment, however much you feel the need to return to them as a beaten dog.
Furthermore, if people "had enough to enable a decent life" we wouldn't even be having this conversation!
The entire purpose of UBI is to give people the freedom to live a better life. To find fulfillment on their own terms. I am sorry if you discount the importance of being the author of your own life. But it sure as hell shouldn't be found at the mercy of any employer.
Job... security? I apologize, but you present a foreign concept. First, the point of UBI is to NOT NEED that job security. Enabling more freedom between both employer and employee. If a job doesn't work out, leave. We got you. And yes, "low-level subsistence" is one way to describe it. What, exactly, is wrong with that - when the alternative is... nothing?
I mean, you expect us to beg the employers not to fire us for profit? That WILL fall on deaf ears. The "owners of capital" have only one obligation, profit.
Oh, you think wages should be higher. As if they can compete with Mexico, or China, or any other nation with piss poor conditions? That's Globalization, but what about automation? Do you think higher wages compete with machines? Capitalism would be torn asunder if you attempted to control it and restrict it on the elimination of labor. I implore you to think outside the box, and realize how we can balance the system without forcing undue expenses upon them.
UBI gives employers the freedom to maximize production, to be fully efficient and effective. It is, IMO, a perfect compliment to balance Capitalism. Yours, I think, is an attempt to strangle production. To mandate inefficiency by dictating how expensive it is. How about we just let them do what they do... and roll with it? So long as we roll with them, and obtain a healthy share?
cytg111
Lifer
- Mar 17, 2008
- 26,182
- 15,597
- 136
Taxation of course. I dont see there is a way around it. The future is knocking at your door and your current method of governing isnt up to the job. What are you gonna do?
Knock down the future? Halt innovation, get the good old factories back, cancel all trade, isolate the country?
Or reinvent your way of governing yourselves.
If its not 1 or 2, then 3 comes knocking:
Knock knock.
Who is there.
Trump.
Last edited:
Jaskalas
Lifer
- Jun 23, 2004
- 35,763
- 10,066
- 136
Agreed on the scope. This is a world wide problem as Capitalism has evolved. No western nation escapes the issues we face. No Capitalist society does. We can, however, be the first to find a robust solution that'll help us tackle not only today's problems but tomorrow's as well. Then we can share our solution with the world, to help lead the way into a more secure future.
sandorski
No Lifer
- Oct 10, 1999
- 70,783
- 6,341
- 126
This is somewhat fallacious. What if someone else as already discovered the solution, but you(plural) have been actively suppressing it. I'm not really disagreeing with your post, just disagreeing with the implied notion that the solution has to come from a certain Source, which I assume to be the USA. It's the arrogant American Exceptionalism run amok that I object to, although I concede this may have not been your intent and that my reaction has to do with my own personal hangups. Never the less, many do think that way and have chosen to ignore ideas simply because of where they originated either geographically or ideologically.
ivwshane
Lifer
- May 15, 2000
- 33,520
- 17,024
- 136
So you thought it was a better idea to argue against a proposal no one is making? Ok guy.
That's nonsense. There are not enough homes for every young couple to have one, period. Increasing the cash in everyone's pocket just means that the price for every home goes up by exactly $216k. I'm a proponent of UBI too, but you can't pitch a seriously flawed scenario like that to get people on board with the idea. That's counter-productive.
this thread is based on a pointless question, globalization is reality and will be even more so as time goes on. instead of fighting globalization, we should be working to use it to our advantage.
Fanatical Meat
Lifer
- Feb 4, 2009
- 35,862
- 17,403
- 136
Jaskalas
Lifer
- Jun 23, 2004
- 35,763
- 10,066
- 136
I spoke positively regarding how we could find and share the solution. Nowhere did I say we MUST be, or that ONLY we could. Your imagination ran wild?
I'll note that America is exceptionally bad at letting Capitalism (d?)evolve into a broken husk, but other nations employ controls that I do not believe will be sufficient in handling the great challenge of automation. Or... of our dire need to establish sustainability. AKA, zero growth. I do not believe any nation today is setup in a way to let their people fully prosper, or to overcome the challenges of tomorrow. It is certainly possible that any nation could change and adapt to meet said challenge, but given human nature and our penchant for rampant stupidity to achieve short term gains, I fear for us all.
If any nation on this planet will challenge Capitalist societies at being a large scale industrial nation, successfully moving forward towards the 22nd century, it will be China. And their model of slavery is not something that should go unchallenged in the world. Other nations need a role model, a path to success to follow. It could be us, it could be someone else. I don't care who wins, so long as it isn't a one party slave society.
It is our responsibility to improve our system so that it can survive, so that in our perseverance we can teach others how to enjoy the freedom that we might first bring to ourselves. The idea that we'd be worthy of teaching anyone, inherently means that we would have first solved our current crises. It means we'd be worthy of such a role, unrecognizable from the United States you see today. Again, someone else could beat us to it and we might learn from them. However, I am a United States citizen. My speech is inherently as an advocate for change within our own nation. Whatever change I want, starts here.
You are free to name a nation, I am unaware of, that has implemented "free" housing, UBI and cost effective healthcare, the whole shebang. I would be happy to study their policies and argue for implementing theirs here. Though I already support copying other nation's healthcare model(s). I feel housing and UBI are even more critical.
glenn1
Lifer
- Sep 6, 2000
- 25,383
- 1,013
- 126
This is a tech forum so I figured you understand Boolean operators.
if (solution === "replaces current social welfare programs and other transfer payments") {
println("Go for it!");
} else {
println("Not interested!");
}
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