America and socialism: past and present

Thoughts from the present:

http://billmoyers.com/2015/10/14/what-one-historian-wishes-bernie-sanders-said-a...

Thoughts from the past:
https://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/winthrop.htm

So any thoughts as to the future?

We've been a socialist country for 150+ years. That won't change, as the managed economy model is used throughout the First World, and has been reasonably successful. What might change is a greater allocation of State resources to the common citizen, rather than to corporate interests.

>2 BruceCoulson::
The USA has not been a socialist country for 150 years! It has not been a socialist country, ever! What you are is an eighteenth century republic, trying to cope with a serious challenge from the results of your recreational and escapist waste! You are a predatory capitalist country, preying upon the disorganized to recycle your capital through a relatively large number of people who believe they have accumulated the rewards of hard work and forethought to a very small number of people, about 85 families, who are the owners of the commercial entities they created for that channelling. From time to time, you enact a small amount of palliative legislation in order to keep your working people quiet and the goods and services actively moving.
Having reached the obvious limits of the relatively cheap natural resources of the solar system, the USA is trying to find some method of distracting your population from real answers to to some of the environmental and economic challenges that are becoming intrusive. Therefore, you seem to be allowing Sen. Saunders his 15 minutes of fame, largely for entertainment value.
For a more detailed analysis about the failure of capitalism to be an effective tool for dealing with the enviro-and economic crisis I heartily recommend a through reading of "This Changes Everything" by Naomi Klein.

#3 We started building socialized hospitals about 1800 to encourage men to work transporting goods on our rivers and coasts. That is 200 years of socialism. Before the word was invented unless I am wrong. Every road a city, county, state or the federal government builds in a socialist road, money collected from the citizens and spent to benefit all the citizens. The Federal government built the National Road in the 1810s. New York state built the Erie Canal in the 1820s. Either you don't understand the definition of socialism or you are lacking quite a bit of historical knowledge.

One socialist act does not make a socialist state or frame of mind. It is a case of "the least we could do" rather than "we are all in this together" which is the socialist frame of mind. The history of your country is a history of toll roads, toll bridges, and shipping out cash cops instead of feeding local populations. You would have done far better to use the "Barn raising" trend in frontier communities, as an arguing point.
If you want to encourage me to do your research for you, try "The War on Powder RiverÈ or the Johnson County War about the efforts toward collective action on the frontier. :-)

To go on, roads and bridges and grade schools are examples of the doctrine of "Eminent Domain", actions for the maintenance of work force training, and movement of goods and services for commercial life, not socialist actions undertaken for the enrichment of life for those lacking in the currency of the time. Public Libraries are socialistic actions, free information services like public broadcasting, hand-out newspapers, advanced health care, education that is not technical training for employees, provision of utilities like electricity, water and garbage collection and police services. These are obviously the "Socialist" functions of your communities and the USA is working hard to charge directly for all of the above.
Try the trilogy on the American Frontier by Richard Slotkin, if you are looking for knowledge of USA.
A society is not defined by its conscious goals, it is defined by its unstated assumptions and the USA has very little standing as a socialist country to any outside observer.
On the point that I lack quite a bit of historical knowledge, I believe that my recorded book lists show a reasonable number of books about the USA... and in the larger sense one should I think, notice the number of books about other countries, undertaken to establish at least in my own mind, the idea that objectivity, not parochialism, is my goal, historically :-)

Barn raising is community cooperation. Building a chain of hospitals in port cities using taxpayer funds to promote benefits for the entire nation is socialism. Why are you restricting "socialism" to programs that are "undertaken for the enrichment of life for those lacking in the currency of the time"? Every citizen in Canada can take advantage of their medical system. Same for the UK and Germany and I imagine most of Europe. Providing clean water and collecting garbage and sewage protects the health of everyone, rich or poor.

Is the US government or has it ever been 100% Socialist? No. Have we undertaken Socialist programs through our history? Yes. We also have a long history of our financial elite rewriting and selectively remembering our history to their own glory.

Personally I will stick with parochialism, US history and our current society is complicated enough to understand. I don't have delusions that I can understand every society and their history.

I date U.S. socialism to the birth of the railroads; public lands (i.e. public assets) were provided to private enterprises for (allegedly) public interests. Whether this was a good idea or not is moot at this point; businesses large and small benefit from government largess and will fight tooth and nail to retain it. Many of the industries supplying public services and goods are private enterprises dependent upon government involvement for their existence.

Now, it certainly can be argued that managed economies are usually managed for the benefit of business more than the average citizen; but public pressure (and the threat or actuality of legislation) means that those enterprises are subject to some form of public control (a fact they work very hard at trying to make everyone else forget). And every First World nation works under a managed economy.

In fact, a recent example of public pressure motivating private enterprise to act in the public interest (albeit in self-defense) is the recent flap caused by Shkrelli (sp?)'s greed. Other pharma companies, seeing that public outrage could push a movement to regulate that kind of price gouging, are moving to undercut shkrelli.

>8 BruceCoulson: it's already happened: Skirelli has a competitor now, willing to sell the $5000 pill for $1:

http://arstechnica.com/science/2015/10/drug-with-rage-inducing-5000-price-hike-n...

>9 stellarexplorer:: Yes, and they're not doing it to be nice, or even make a profit; they're doing it to head off a threat of regulation. "See? The 'market' can regulate itself, we don't need government regulation to protect the consumers..." A great many prescription drugs are vastly overpriced, from the perspective of how much it costs to manufacture them; but the companies restrained themselves from outrageous acts of greed, confining themselves to small grabs that wouldn't be noticed. Shkrelli exposed the practice with a blatant, outrageous, (but legal) price jump, threatening the entire market.

Yes, it's possible they are all be opportunists waiting to grab their money in what ever way they can. But I'm fairly certain this guy Skirelli is not a nice person ;)

Skirelli is pure capitalist. Profit is the bottom line, literally the only thing that matters. Workers are commodities that the government should train for whenever they are needed and they should be disposable when they are not needed. Customers are to be milked for their last dime. If the customer is dying, get it quick but get it all.

Capitalism is the worst economic system, except for all the rest. Strong government regulations are necessary to prevent workers and customers from being exploited so badly the economy folds up or so badly that they revolt.

Regulation also keeps the currency flowing. Minimum wages that allow a worker to support at least himself lowers the tax burden on everyone else and puts more cash in circulation. Disposable income creates demand, demand creates jobs, expanding business creates profits. When done right everyone benefits even if they have to be dragged to the party kicking and screaming.

>7 TLCrawford::
Okay, this is getting to be fun!
Barn raising is a very obvious example of Socialism, acting in the community's interest to raise the local standard of living without the intervention of capital accumulation to pay for the acts or goods. Now the hospital program was good socialism as well, and a way to do it using money. I admit that I did produce a definition of Socialism that was too narrow. Behold the amended version! "Socialism is actions undertaken for the enrichment of life for all, but especially for those lacking in the currency of the time!"

As for the attractions for this historian of pursuing "Parochialism" vs "Cosmopolitanism" I will helpfully direct you to those parts of Arnold Toynbee's "A Study of History" dealing with "Contacts between civilizations in Space" and "Contacts between Civilizations in Time" which have motivated my emphasis on cultivating "delusions that I can understand every society and their history." I will admit, that I simply haven't had the time or resources to investigate India, China and Japan to the same depth as I have looked at the North American, Mediterranean and European Worlds. But I don't think that any study of an historical question can wisely be made by only "Parochial" sources and analyses. Herodotus couldn't do it without bringing in the Persians I'd like to note.

Upon reflection I should have used Thucydides as the classical example, sorry.

Alright, let's look at your new definition, "Socialism is actions undertaken for the enrichment of life for all, but especially for those lacking in the currency of the time!" Your barn raising example fails the first part for the obvious reason that the barn is not raised to the benefit of all, it is a gift given to benefit one family, the owners of the new barn.

The second part of your definition is simple logic. Those that have the least will always benefit the most from any improvement. Provide 100 calories more food a day to everyone and the starving benefit the most. Give 10.000$ to everyone and you nearly double some peoples income but others hardly notice.

Since "socialism" is used both to describe an economic system and a political system trying to talk about it outside of either realm, for example as a barn raising, is silly.

Actually when you have a barn raising, you are increasing the ability of a community to provide and store food, which does benefit the community. It helps your neighbor become a productive part of the community, which raises the standard for the whole community. When you have something like the tradition of barn-raising, you are providing an infrastructure for the whole community to flourish. If each person had to build their own barn by themselves, development would be slow and sporadic. But when the community raises barns for the members of the community, development is stable and quicker.

A barn raising is kind of like having schools in a community when you don't have children. You don't benefit directly, but there are indirect benefits.

My thanks to Arctic-Stranger for a pertinent post :-)
Socialism is not a political system. It is a philosophic system, with a lot of economic consequences. The over riding part is the utilitarian philosophic koan, "the Greatest good for the Greatest number", attributed to John Stuart Mill. A political party may have Socialist policies, and try to use the term in its title, but if we are reduced to this kind of hair-splitting, then Socialism is not a political term. What we most often see in Europe currently are (Political term follows!) Social Democratic governments that are trying to reduce the differences between being Rich and poor, which does benefit the populace, cosmetically, if nothing else.
I doubt, in return, that those who have the least will always benefit the most from "any improvement", i.e. if a successful war is conducted, in which the children of the poor do the greatest amount of the fighting, and of the being maimed and dying, then the poor do not benefit the most.
Also, the term "Simple Logic". The fact that a part of an argument seems "Self evident" that does not preclude from its place in the argument.

Socialism is generally considered to be an economic system; political philosophies tend to run into problems when they have to deal with real people.

As for warfare, it depends on how desperate the conflict is seen by the elites. When the consequences of losing are minor, the poor get little but a paycheck and training in how to kill people. When the perception is that the survival of the society (and hence the elites) is at stake, the promises (and payoffs) to the children of the poor who do the fighting are considerably greater; cf. the GI Bill.

>16 Arctic-Stranger: That would depend on whether the farmer is willing to use his additional storage for the benefit of the community; not a sure thing. There are indirect benefits; if everyone is storing food, the demands on community resources is less, which means more effort can be spent towards other community projects. But it's very indirect, and Olson's Law may well apply. (As for education, the mantra is always the same; 'Pay now, or pay later'. Sadly, too many people overlook the long-term hidden costs of poor schools.)

>17 DinadansFriend: I can't argue with someone that sees war as an improvement. It would be easier to teach my dog to read than to reason with that attitude.

18

I was assuming a system where I help you build your barn, and you help me build mine. And we both help our neighbor build his. If that is the case, then the fact that Thee and Me and He all have barns raises the level of production in the neighborhood, which means that we have a richer neighborhood. If I have the only barn in the neighborhood, I may become richer than Thee and He, but overall the neighborhood suffers, and you cannot afford my corn.

Gordon Wood tells of a time in American History where it was assumed that we could only make money as a country through foreign trade. There was a limited amount of money in the country, and we could only have more money if we got it from, say trade with England. One could no more increase the monetary value of country through internal trade than one could increase the amount of water in buckets in a fire brigade by passing them to many other people.

But then a strange thing happened. A man in a small New York town makes gloves. He sells them overseas. Then he expands and starts hiring local people to help make the gloves. The wives who are working can now afford to buy his gloves! So he starts to sell more and more gloves at home, saving on shipping charges. One of the husbands of his workers saves the money his wife makes, and they start a new shoe business. Eventually they hire others, who can then afford to buy his shoes....
And so forth and so on.

The basic principle is behind barn raisings. If I am selling more corn, and you are selling more and he is selling more corn because we can all stockpile it, we all have more money to spend in our local village.

>19 TLCrawford::
I will alter the "Improvement" to coal mining , or logging, areas in which there's still a butcher's bill. But in the stage of capitalism we find ourselves, the persistence of brush-fire wars to provide employment in the arms trade still persists, so warfare can still be seen as an economic activity providing profits and employment.
My dog doesn't read English, but he certainly reads the clues I give him in commands and behaviour very, very well. :-)
>18 BruceCoulson::
"Sadly, the GI bills are a temporary condition in the sad story of societies and warfare. The Government of Canada, replaced last week, was guided by the principle that "We have not Written these people a blank cheque on the taxpayer" and substantially reduced the benefits to injured veterans by substituting a lump sum payment for the former plan of continuous support. Such supports for the former serviceman are not seen as carved in stone, and need to be actively defended.
Check out the lavish provision given to the soldier of your Civil war, or the Napoleonic Wars in Europe or WWI for what the lower classes can normally expect for "GI bills".
I see, upon reflection, that I have mis-defined "Socialism" and thus a further re-definition is required. The philosophy is "Utilitarianism", the method of obtaining the "greatest good for the greatest number' by trying to inspire policies based on scientific investigation of the environment, whose expression economically is "socialism", or social democracy, if the society still wishes large enterprises to be privately owned and manipulated by a workforce whose sole driving force is primarily personal financial reward, instead of a workforce whose driving force is the physical and mental improvement of the populace of the society.
I do agree that rigorous applications of philosophies have trouble when they encounter real human personalities, see the examples of Ayn Rand's philosophy of "Objectivism" or the pseudo religious structure called "Scientology", as the clearest examples of grinding mismatches..
The farmer who then refuses to use his labour and skills for further service to his community but narrowly uses his community raised barn to further only his own economic future, is liable to be the victim of a suspiciously efficient accident of an arsonist nature...and get no help with his attempts at replacement, to further use our reductionist example.
"Peer Pressure' is also form of Socialist activity. The larger the group of "Peers" the more likely the actions will benefit the society as a whole.

>21 DinadansFriend:

Then definitely consider me against socialism, given your definitions. Allowing peer pressure and criminal activity to regulate society would lead to a tyranny no less odious for being supported by a plurality.

As for reductions to previously agreed contracts, I agree that the contracts need to be vigorously defended against criminal abuse. Government officials have no immunity to charges of fraud and breach of contract, and criminal charges ought to be filed against officials taking such actions. Saying, 'well, we're finding it too expensive to keep up our side of the contract, so we're just going to arbitrarily change the terms' wouldn't fly for any private company, and should not be permitted for public entities, either. (Which doesn't exclude re-negotiations of said contracts, of course.)

Soldiers, and other public workers considered 'non-essential' are being subject to the laws of the business world, rather than under the actual terms and conditions they accepted employment. Contrast this with extravagant protection extended to LEOs, and you can easily see who the governments feel most threatened by (hint: it's not people thousands of miles away living in primitive conditions). Again, the allocation of resources is based on what the actual threats might be, rather than what people are told those threats are.

The main point about socialism as far as I know is that everyone is supposed to be equal. Provide for the community (work, money) to the best of your abilities and in return receive what you need. The problem is of course that some can work more than others and therefore provide much more than they receive, which can feel unfair. There is also people that will take advantage of the system and do as litte as possible, because thay know they will get the benefit regardless. It is a good idea in principle but human nature have a tendeny to undermine it as the idealist and opportunist will almost certainly disagree on something, or anything really.

>22 BruceCoulson::
But Criminal activities do regulate globalist society, as the immense profits and social damage arising from "The War on Drugs" demonstrates. Capitalism by rewarding the qualities that promote monetarily profitable enterprises above all other forms of activity promotes an attitude of less social responsibility for the individual. Remember that Adam Smith found nothing wrong with the slave trade, as long as the goods offered were of high enough quality to justify the investment. Similarly prostitution and drug addiction because they have such a high return on investment. if you admit a moral element to your enterprises then you are making a socialist or social democrat statement in your society. Social Democratic behaviour lessens the crime problem as members of the society are less driven to regard their personal well being as the only consideration.

"'well, we're finding it too expensive to keep up our side of the contract, so we're just going to arbitrarily change the terms' wouldn't fly for any private company." Large manufacturing concerns always trot out that argument in any labour/management negotiation, sir..ask around. Wage reductions due to improvement in production equipment is a steady theme in labour history from the 1790's to the present...and if you understand that any skill that becomes very common leads to reduction in wages for practising that skill, the first typists got a better wage than many factory workers in 1880's...now everyone keyboards so no one is paid for it.

"Again, the allocation of resources is based on what the actual threats might be, rather than what people are told those threats are." The problem with that statement is that in globalist society the "actual Threats' are not correctly defined but instead the resources are not allocated to the "actual Threat", but to a profit generating enterprise that will generate profit whether or not it will meet the "actual threat". Buying Armoured personnel carriers will not lessen civil unrest so much as adding 30% to your police force to provide mental health workers and neighbourhood contact. Or even services like better day care and education...but it may result in less looting of business when civil unrest occurs.

>23 Ardagor::
"The main point about socialism as far as I know is that everyone is supposed to be equal." It seems that psychological research has shown that while people are not completely equal or capable of performing the work of a society, the distribution of talent is operationally so close to random that the best policy is to treat everyone as equal if you wish to encourage talent to perform. Other psychological or financial factors, such as filial ties, likeability capital availabilty and mere chance can skew an individual's career so that a great deal of talent goes unused, unpaid or underemployed.
"Pure" capitalism is as prone to these factors with even larger skewing due to financial positioning and filial obligation.

>23 Ardagor: The idea behind socialism is not that everyone is equal, that is the idea behind the United States of America, "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal" and "We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America." Socialism takes the first premise, that we are all created equal, and says that we should all have equal opportunity. The farmer's kids should be able to get as good an education as the lawyer's kids. Every citizen is entitled not to die of a blood infection because they could not have dental work done. Every citizen should be able to shop for groceries without fear of death. Anybody interested should read The "S" Word: A Short History of an American Tradition...Socialism.

Capitalism has only one goal, to enrich the capitalist. The "bottom line" is literally the bottom line of the accounting sheets. The owners, those that provided the capital for the enterprise, are all that matters, everyone else is a commodity. Labor and markets to be exploited as efficiently as possible.

>26 TLCrawford:

That definition of capitalism is based on the concept of "He has it only because he got the breaks". If everyone in his own way is a capitalist ... investing his time and energy in the things that interest him ... the definition of selfishness falls away. As someone once said ... "I'm all for capitalism. One day we'll have to try it."

>27 Rood: No, I think that is a very fair explanation of "free Market" capitalism. Many places that I have worked took the position that a customer would not come back so it was imperative to get every cent possible from them while they are in front of you. Personally I take the approach that I can get more money out of them if I treat them so they do come back, over and over.

I paraphrase Churchill, capitalism is the worst possible economic system, except for all the rest. Capitalism needs rules, regulations, as much as poker does.

"The main point about socialism as far as I know is that everyone is supposed to be equal."

Equality is when everyone has shoes. Equity is when everyone has shoes that fit.

This may be of interest to the folks following this discussion.

Teaser quote: "Nobody is actually proposing to import Soviet-style communism to the United States. In fact, for a term so freighted with the capacity to inspire its supporters and terrorize everybody else, “socialism” is oddly bereft of any specific meaning."

>30 March-Hare::
What is interesting about the attempt to define "Socialism" here is that it has led to a groping towards a specific meaning. The quote you added does certainly transmit the term in depressingly ordinary discourse.
>29 Arctic-Stranger::
"Equity" seems a term in commercial law terminology and I agree that it certainly does differ from "Equality".

To quote Gordon Gekko , " greed is good". Great line and scene and it did encapsulate the roaring 80's in a way that is touchingly archaic in 2015. The distinction between capitalism and socialism as a mode of organizing society is outmoded and irrelevant to human life, wants and desires. Gekko had it right in his own small, narrow way, humans are greedy, for freedom, opportunity, safety, progress, love and all the other desires that drive our daily lives. However you want to define it, socialism , democratic or otherwise has proven a non starter in the US. It does not meet the greed test, as people always want more, and none should make a value judgement about people wanting more of anything.
My own limited reading and understanding of Marx suggests he did not quite get human motivations. Capitalism is not the worst economic system except for the alternatives to paraphrase as someone did in this thread; it has been proven to be the only way to harness humanity's unique genius to provide for its basest and most luxurious wants.

>1 Urquhart:

FYI, a full and more accurate text of Winthrop's 1630 sermon is here: http://history.hanover.edu/texts/winthmod.html

The page given above has errors such as "whether" for "whither."

>32 chagonz:

In other words, Socrates and Jesus were chumps.

>32 chagonz::
"it Capitalism has been proven to be the only way to harness humanity's unique genius to provide for its basest and most luxurious wants."
The basest (are you sure you didn't mean "basic"?) and most luxurious needs are supplied by any economic system. That's why the rulers strive to be in the position of power. The bulk of humanity however, doesn't believe that "capitalism" is the way to provide less luxurious and the more basic needs of their societies. Jesus was a carpenter, who made things of wood, and Socrates, a potter, used even more basic material to gain a living with his hands.
Gordon Gecko was a fictional character, but those resemble and identify with him, are not persons who produce actual products, but manipulate a financial system in order to make a marginal profit from the fears and hopes of an emotionally driven artificial market place. The Geckos live in a market driven system that is elaborated past the point of being useful to creation and movement of goods and services.
Remember that Adam Smith had a list of enterprises that he, as a professor of Ethics (Yes, he wasn't an economist, but was a keen observer), stated should NOT be run as joint stock companies (Google it!). We now have a lot of them, these artificial entities who control almost all the activities of life associated with our economic lives. They also manipulate our emotional lives by trying to get us to believe that possession of objects and services constitute enjoyment of lives. Middle aged white men are committing suicide in very large numbers...I think it is because they find their lives are lacking in valuable emotional rewards, there's no sources of pride in their existences...capitalism has failed them, and wasted their lives...that's how some of my friends have died.

Its these exchanges that keep me plugged into LT. Thanks to all! No Socrates and Jesus were not chumps, though they were seeking and promoting an ideal for human behavior. The latter promised or at least offered salvation in return. Alas, his message got sidetracked for a long time by the very church that his inheritors created to spread his gospel.
Yes Gekko is a fictional character.i used him as a metaphor , perhaps poorly, but none the less he articulates the very passions that Socrates and Jesus tried to blunt. I am not a biologist or anthropologist, and therefore cannot intelligently comment on Homo sapiens wiring, all I know humankind has been driven to obtain its most important needs, want and desires for millennia. Various economic systems and theories have been developed, advanced and implemented to achieve them and organize human society on a macro scale. None has achieved anywhere the success and achievements that capitalism with all its faults and limitations has created. Can it be better? Well , that's a question with an obvious answer.

> 36

Define capitalism.

My own definition based on 40 years of trying to be one and advising them is the pursuit of wealth and success by investing scarce resources (capital) combined with hard work, sacrifice, time to perhaps , maybe make a buck or two. Along for the ride are jobs created, investments made, improvements in quality of life for all and rising incomes. In addition capitalism is about creating mobility and opportunity and creating long term advancement. An inelegant definition I know, but one derived from real life experience.

Here is what my old Webster's had to say:

Capitalism: 1. An economic system, marked by open competition in the free market, in which the means of production and distribution are privately or corporately owned and development is proportionate to increasing accumulation and reinvestment of profits. 2. A political or social system considered to be based on capitalism.

Socialism: 1. a. A social system in which the producers possess political power and the means of producing and distributing goods. b. The theory or practice of those who support such a social system. 2. Construction of the material base for Marxist-Leninist communism under the dictatorship of the proletariat.

And by those definitions, the only truly capitalist economy in the United States is the black market.

Now we are getting somewhere.

Socialism 1a sounds like the USA..

If you look at definition 1.a then you should understand that "Producers" are defined very narrowly...in the grain trade the "producers are the farmers...not the Cargill Grain Company. The actual line workers in the factory employ the management, and can fire them for incompetence...not multi-national manufacturing concerns. The retail trade would see enterprises where the customers buying shares in the retail enterprise, and voting on its actions and employment and purchasing decisions ...like the Co-op retail stores in Calgary Alberta Canada. (the world's largest and very prosperous Co-operative) I'm willing to go with that definition.

I'm sorry , that's not capitalism. Growing a product is not delivery of said product to end consumer. Line workers perform very specific duties in support of the ultimate objective, a salable product. The argument that the individual produced is the origin and ultimate owner of the value produced is a bad distortion of reality. Th architecture of capitalism is where max value is created, because value is only created in the eyes of the consumer. This is the inherent conflict between Jefferson's vision vs. Hamilton's. Scale is the key differentiating factor that determines who ultimately creates the most value. The history of this country's success and development is all about building continental scale , creating enterprises that could satisfy a national demand for everything from steel rail to washing machines to light bulbs and PCs. Building scale requires investment, dollars at risk to use a term. With no guarantee that said dollars will return the investment let alone a return on said investment, capitalism is ultimately a system that rewards risk taking maybe. Unfortunately today we have corrupt offshoots , eg. Crony capitalism and state capitalism a la China, Saudi Arabia and so many others. But no one is banging on the door in those places to start businesses and risk capital. You all know where they go.

From Wikipedia:

"Crony capitalism is a term describing an economy in which success in business depends on close relationships between business people and government officials. It may be exhibited by favoritism in the distribution of legal permits, government grants, special tax breaks, or other forms of state interventionism."

I found a very readable critique of capitalism as it currently stands, with its high level of cronyism. Raj Patel's "the Value of Nothing", ISBN 978-1-554-68622-3. It has several good zingers!

Touchstone: The value of nothing

I offer up Steve Jobs and Apple as the symbol of modern robber baron capitalism, exploiting the masses and charging us all a premium for the pleasure. On the other hand maybe that anti IBM commercial in 1984 was right on, they did change the world. To paraphrase Churchill, capitalism is a terrible way to organize the world, except for all the alternatives.

>48 chagonz: "To paraphrase Churchill, capitalism is a terrible way to organize the world, except for all the alternatives." Amen. Well regulated capitalism, something we are moving farther way from, is the fairest and fastest way to grow the economy.

Well-regulated capitalism is an oxymoron.

>50 Phlegethon99: I would argue that "free market capitalism" is the oxymoron' as it quickly devolves into monopolistic multinational cabals that treat the public as feudal property.

Edited to correct my reference.

I would argue against that line of thought. If anything, today's global business environment is as challenging, difficult and unforgiving as it has ever been. The names of the some of the biggest and greatest companies on earth are but skeletons of their former glory, virtual ghosts of their former selves, pushed aside by companies that did not exist even 10 years ago. The beat goes on with the thermonuclear destruction of industries from taxis , hotels , travel, energy to tech. And now there are the Chinese, Indian, Brazilian even Mexican companies to deal with. Global cabals went out with the Trilateral Commission. Even the former king of cabals, OPEC is as effective as HP is trying to compete with Apple.
Unfortunately for the US, you have too many firms run by executives trained in the 20th century for a 21st century business landscape. No wonder activist shareholders , even old grizzled raider from the 80's are chomping at the bit to challenge the old corporate guard.
Financial regulation sure, those institutions are the Achilles heel of the global system, but for the rest, well , what have you done for us lately is the tale of the day.

The idea that one's economic life, the gaining of basic needs, and a little surplus to allow for leisure should be the primary concern of the entire population, which is the environment of capitalism, is its most damaging effect on the growth of the human spirit, and has severely limited a lot of human activity in the last three hundred years. Capitalism has been the bedfellow of many totalitarian regimes, has kept the world tied to environmentally damaging policies, and has limited education by treating knowledge as property rather than a utility.
Some people have concentrated stored wealth to the stage that they play games with it and then expend it in massive speculations, instead of using the stored wealth they have the talent to accumulate to raise the standard of living of the species. When these accumulators give a small proportion of their stored wealth in charitable activities they expect to lauded for it to the skies. (Try raising money for PBS from the rich!)
But given the personality defects or traits that psychologists find in the wealth accumulating community, such altruistic moments are rare. Some of the backgrounds of the self-made make salacious, but chilling, reading. And it is not a community exhibiting much originality in thought or artistic expression, they are more likely to assemble the original work done by their organizations rather than do it. Steve Jobs organized Apple, and drove it administrationally, Wozniack and others did the real design and work. Ford achieved a simple design for a transport vehicle, but ceased quickly to lead any kind of design team, when the public taste left his two cars in the dust...but he did pontificate a lot, once someone did his follow-up work...Out of proportion rewards for the lucky few.
Remember Adam Smith said that a reasonable profit and spreading reasonable wages for the less driven or imaginative wasthe best goal for the ethical capitalist....

>53 DinadansFriend: The Gates Foundation underwrites the PBS Newshour ... for one.

https://theintercept.com/2015/11/25/how-the-gates-foundation-reflects-the-good-a...

54RoodToday,
>53 DinadansFriend: DinadansFriend: The Gates Foundation underwrites the PBS Newshour ... for one.

A very minor, minor footnote here. I was watching PBS Newshour this evening and the credits of who supported it. They went by very quickly but my guesstimate is that there were many major donors listed for the program in addition to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

See:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/about/funders/

With contributions to anything it is important to remember proportions. Someone making near minimum wage who donates $10 a month could miss that money much more than someone able to give a million dollars.

This is really meaty stuff. What is our purpose on earth is what I think you are asking. If we are not economic beings then what are we? Communism supposed we were not, that man was content to be part of the greater society and play their own small role in it for the benefit of all, and of course the state. Since we cannot regress to our hunter gatherer state, which was in fact a proto-economic being, then where do we find our bliss so to speak. Your position on capitalists is simplistic at best, and suggests you don't quite get it if you are suggesting that Woz created and Jobs benefited. I am no Randian to be sure, but she had a point in describing the unique and essential role of the risk taking capitalist. While we may not all want to play economic roles, play them we must to a certain degree. My brother the creative artist had to make a living to provide for his family. So in spite of himself he became, in pursuit of his craft, a wage earner, in fact a creator of value in the form of property, aghast ! Intellectual property at that.
The emergence of the pricing mechanism a thousand years ago cemented our doom and curved the arc of our cultures. Its a dog eat dog world out there goes the cliche, and Chinese dogs are even hungrier than ours are.