Coming from the lounge - money
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Your system: I collect trash but want to live in a 10000 square foot mansion overlooking the ocean. I'm a doctor and want the same thing. There is only 1 house available: who get's it? Bottom line: money is a really good way to effect a fair system where you take the money you earn and use it to barter for the goods and services you need to live. The more effort you put in the more you will earn, the more things you can buy. Of course the system isn't fair: why should some dopey short ass actor earn millions and a nurse is barely able to survive? That is life: regardless of the system used there will always be inequalities. The system you propose is, essentially, communism and even with that there are the haves and have-nots. Until we have a society in which replicators can freely produce what we need and there are robots to do the heavy lifting we have the best system that money can buy.
"If you think it's expensive to hire a professional to do the job, wait until you hire an amateur." Red Adair. nils illegitimus carborundum me, me, me
mark merrens wrote:
There is only 1 house available: who get's it?
The gun owner!
Light moves faster than sound. That is why some people appear bright, until you hear them speak. List of common misconceptions
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harold aptroot wrote:
A related concept (in that it doesn't use money as an incentive for people to work) does work - slavery. People dislike it for some reason, but it does work great. From an economic perspective, slavery is a great thing.
No. That was true. It is not true in the modern world. The realities of slavery do not produce the same economic gain as other strategies.
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Quote:
Collin Jasnoch wrote: I think we should just abandon hard currency all together.
loctrice:
I'm for no money at all. People just doing what they want/like to do. Everyone has a job [or attends school (etc) to be trained for a job]. Would be nice, unfortunately people [and government] would screw it up. I put this off to a friend of mine once, and he was very abrasive about it. The notion that people would just go to work and nothing would cost any money was not something he could grasp. So people can just go to the market during the open operating hours and pick up some groceries.. stopping to check out only because it would be necessary for inventory. Things like that. He "what if'ed" me to death worried over details and explaining how it wouldn't work, and never even got the concept.
BobJanova:
In brief it wouldn't work because no-one would do the unfun things – fixing the sewers, taking your rubbish away, cleaning toilets, farming to the level that it would feed everyone – and you wouldn't be able to get people to work on large scale infrastructure projects.
I don't think that is true. First, it's hard to tell because money is a motivating factor for many people. This makes it very hard to find the actual truth. Also, I know many people who really enjoy physical labor. Some to feel honest, some to keep fit, etc. That may also be dishonest due to money being behind motivation.I also know people who feel it's a responsibility to do things (in reference to cleaning the garbage, etc.) Another thing we would have, is different solutions to problems. Who is to say, when corporations, money, etc.. don't run things that we find an entirely different solution to problems like hauling away the garbage and cleaning the sewer? Things like our electrical grids in the US would likely change by people who enjoy solving these types of problems... and probably in a way that wouldn't require the electricity to go out until the change was made. It is hard to say what would/could come about in these different circumstances because everything is engineered around the money situation. Some people really love to teach, others to research, others to work hard. There are people for everything and I believe it would work well.
If it moves, compile it
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Wow... I'm still looking for the joke icons, but it seems that most of you guys here are actually seriously discussing the pros and cons of communism. SERIOUSLY? Come on, are you 5 years old or what?
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Quote:
Collin Jasnoch wrote: I think we should just abandon hard currency all together.
loctrice:
I'm for no money at all. People just doing what they want/like to do. Everyone has a job [or attends school (etc) to be trained for a job]. Would be nice, unfortunately people [and government] would screw it up. I put this off to a friend of mine once, and he was very abrasive about it. The notion that people would just go to work and nothing would cost any money was not something he could grasp. So people can just go to the market during the open operating hours and pick up some groceries.. stopping to check out only because it would be necessary for inventory. Things like that. He "what if'ed" me to death worried over details and explaining how it wouldn't work, and never even got the concept.
BobJanova:
In brief it wouldn't work because no-one would do the unfun things – fixing the sewers, taking your rubbish away, cleaning toilets, farming to the level that it would feed everyone – and you wouldn't be able to get people to work on large scale infrastructure projects.
I don't think that is true. First, it's hard to tell because money is a motivating factor for many people. This makes it very hard to find the actual truth. Also, I know many people who really enjoy physical labor. Some to feel honest, some to keep fit, etc. That may also be dishonest due to money being behind motivation.I also know people who feel it's a responsibility to do things (in reference to cleaning the garbage, etc.) Another thing we would have, is different solutions to problems. Who is to say, when corporations, money, etc.. don't run things that we find an entirely different solution to problems like hauling away the garbage and cleaning the sewer? Things like our electrical grids in the US would likely change by people who enjoy solving these types of problems... and probably in a way that wouldn't require the electricity to go out until the change was made. It is hard to say what would/could come about in these different circumstances because everything is engineered around the money situation. Some people really love to teach, others to research, others to work hard. There are people for everything and I believe it would work well.
If it moves, compile it
There is one way that communism can work: if everyone in the commune has a real personal interest in its wellbeing. You mentioned the Amish already, and their farmsteads work because it's a family group, and everyone does best if the farm keeps running as it needs to (though I imagine you'll found there is an authority figure, probably the man of the house, and much of the unfun work is done under threat of force or sanction, even there). Hippy communes work pretty well too, because all the people that are attracted to such things have a big self-interest in showing that the system works, so they pull their weight, and they also tend not to be selfish people. Most families work as a commune, when you study it with an objective eye: no-one is paid for cooking dinner, taking the bins out, painting the windowframes, etc, but they still do it because they have a personal investment in keeping the household in order. However, once you extend it beyond one person's immediate circle of close friends/family, people don't have that personal attachment and it's better for them personally in the short term to not do the work that helps the rest of the community. In a typical town, me repairing the fence of that guy three houses down does me no good, and it takes time and effort that I'd like to be spending doing something else.
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Nothing actually... It just scares the *** out of me that some people here - most likely intelligent people - seriously consider it as an alternative. At least that's the feeling I get after reading the posts above.
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harold aptroot wrote:
it seems to work rather well for China and India
I can only suggest that your definition of slavery differs from mine.
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Quote:
Collin Jasnoch wrote: I think we should just abandon hard currency all together.
loctrice:
I'm for no money at all. People just doing what they want/like to do. Everyone has a job [or attends school (etc) to be trained for a job]. Would be nice, unfortunately people [and government] would screw it up. I put this off to a friend of mine once, and he was very abrasive about it. The notion that people would just go to work and nothing would cost any money was not something he could grasp. So people can just go to the market during the open operating hours and pick up some groceries.. stopping to check out only because it would be necessary for inventory. Things like that. He "what if'ed" me to death worried over details and explaining how it wouldn't work, and never even got the concept.
BobJanova:
In brief it wouldn't work because no-one would do the unfun things – fixing the sewers, taking your rubbish away, cleaning toilets, farming to the level that it would feed everyone – and you wouldn't be able to get people to work on large scale infrastructure projects.
I don't think that is true. First, it's hard to tell because money is a motivating factor for many people. This makes it very hard to find the actual truth. Also, I know many people who really enjoy physical labor. Some to feel honest, some to keep fit, etc. That may also be dishonest due to money being behind motivation.I also know people who feel it's a responsibility to do things (in reference to cleaning the garbage, etc.) Another thing we would have, is different solutions to problems. Who is to say, when corporations, money, etc.. don't run things that we find an entirely different solution to problems like hauling away the garbage and cleaning the sewer? Things like our electrical grids in the US would likely change by people who enjoy solving these types of problems... and probably in a way that wouldn't require the electricity to go out until the change was made. It is hard to say what would/could come about in these different circumstances because everything is engineered around the money situation. Some people really love to teach, others to research, others to work hard. There are people for everything and I believe it would work well.
If it moves, compile it
I think others have pointed towards it but here goes: Money in itself has no intrinsic value. The value of money is the value we bring to it, so a dopey actor(as mentioned by a previous poster) earns lots of money because society 'values' what this actor does. When inflation goes out of control barter systems take over - just look at Zimbabwe and how inflation made money almost worthless... I don't know what the answer is however I have lived in communes and can assure you that exactly the same dynamics we see taking place in the business world, people assuming power over others, occurs in communes too. I think the answer is more about the ability for people to empathise and understand other people, then to act from that position without necessarily having all the answers to hand - take the US where the healthcare system is for those who can pay for it - there are still physicians and hospitals that will treat people for free out of compassion.
“That which can be asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence.”
― Christopher Hitchens
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Yea I threw that in mostly to troll. Failed attempt, apparently. Seriously though, how does slavery suddenly not work anymore? The cheap labor of India and China work, and slavery would be even cheaper wouldn't it?
harold aptroot wrote:
The cheap labor of India and China work, and slavery would be even cheaper wouldn't it?
Your analogy rather specifically demonstrates the difference. The demand for cheap labor in India has risen over time and because of that now the people doing the actual work are getting paid more.
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harold aptroot wrote:
The cheap labor of India and China work, and slavery would be even cheaper wouldn't it?
Your analogy rather specifically demonstrates the difference. The demand for cheap labor in India has risen over time and because of that now the people doing the actual work are getting paid more.
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Right, so imagine you could whip them and pay them nothing. They'd still work, so you'd have more profit.
harold aptroot wrote:
Right, so imagine you could whip them and pay them nothing. They'd still work, so you'd have more profit.
You are still missing the point. You are equating slavery with nothing but hourly pay. You are also assuming that productivity and value could be effectively driven by physical hardship. Based on your analogy one need to nothing more than put a slave collar on an individual and then shareholders of companies would no longer need to pay a large salary for a CEO.
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harold aptroot wrote:
Right, so imagine you could whip them and pay them nothing. They'd still work, so you'd have more profit.
You are still missing the point. You are equating slavery with nothing but hourly pay. You are also assuming that productivity and value could be effectively driven by physical hardship. Based on your analogy one need to nothing more than put a slave collar on an individual and then shareholders of companies would no longer need to pay a large salary for a CEO.
I am still missing the point. Why don't you just explain to point instead of messing around with silly analogies? And well yes you don't want to have a slave as CEO. But then why can't you still produce more cheaply if you don't have to pay any wages to the workforce?
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I am still missing the point. Why don't you just explain to point instead of messing around with silly analogies? And well yes you don't want to have a slave as CEO. But then why can't you still produce more cheaply if you don't have to pay any wages to the workforce?
harold aptroot wrote:
I am still missing the point. Why don't you just explain to point instead of messing around with silly analogies?
First because the analogies demonstrate that the slavery model is not just a matter of wages. Second for a full analysis you need to find some economic studies based on the decline of slavery in the US.
harold aptroot wrote:
But then why can't you still produce more cheaply if you don't have to pay any wages to the workforce?
I would suggest reading some economic studies. But a simplisitic answer is because free people won't do that. And slaves won't produce a competitive product.