What Would Constitute a "Meager Lifestyle"?

[Fife]

I would prefer that we transition to a better economic model that capitalizes on the technological gains we have made so that more people can spend their labors developing culture, science, philosophy, and so on. Capitalism as we know it cannot do this, much less mitigate the growing numbers of jobless members of society. A welfare state would be an awful solution.

You're right on, of course, about "welfare state" = "awful."

"Capitalism as we know it cannot do this . . ." Why not? I know that "as we know it" part is a shot from the bailey; give me the straight dope from your motte, please. Depending on what "as we know it" means, I can see exactly what you mean. Maybe we agree totally on this, but I'm not sure.

Is a state necessary for "developing culture, science, philosophy, and so on"? Or do those things exist to some continuing degree in spite of the state (and for how much longer)?

The state put us in this fucking miserable position. I'll pass on another big dose of strychnine as a cure, thanks.

[Speaker to Animals]

"Capitalism as we know it cannot do this . . ." Why not?
Is a state necessary for "developing culture, science, philosophy, and so on"? Or do those things exist to some continuing degree in spite of the state (and for how much longer)?

...

The state put us in this fucking miserable position. I'll pass on another big dose of strychnine as a cure, thanks.

1. As more than a few posters have pointed out repeatedly for years, technological advancement results in growing economic productivity and efficiency, which in turn results in a growing level of unemployment. Capitalism ties your ability to feed, clothe, and shelter yourself (and your family) to your ability to attain and hold on to a job. Yet we now play a game of musical chairs with a dwindling number of jobs. If you want to keep capitalism in this environment, then you had better embrace the welfare state, because the welfare state is the natural progression of capitalism as it fails to address the new circumstances of the human condition.

2. State is not necessary for developing culture. Nor did I say that we need the state to do those things. I stated we would be better of with an economic system that capitalizes on these economicefficiencies such that the people who do not work can instead devote their lives to something substantive and meaningful rather than living on welfare, and especially compared to living in a human kennel and digging random holes in the desert for soup.

3. You myopically look at the state without addressing how the economic system drives it right now, and vice versa. The two are one and the same now.

[Fife]

3. You myopically look at the state without addressing how the economic system drives it right now, and vice versa. The two are one and the same now.

Yeah, the fact that they are one and the same is what I've been saying in every conversation we've ever had.

Speaking of myopsy, you are taking a rather limited view of what sorts of human work will exist in the future, free of the state. Hell, free of the analog world.

There's more than post-holes over the rainbow, IMNSHO.

[Okeefenokee]

What if we transitioned to a state where we went back to a bunch of people growing food? Keep everything else the same, but we go back to feeding everyone with less efficient and more labor intensive farming.

The inefficiency eats away at the surplus labor created by too much efficiency everywhere else. The price of food would rise, and it would go directly to the small family farmers. We'd have to first be able to get rid of all large agg and such, but assuming we could.

Instead of a welfare state, we'd have a state closer to what Jefferson and Madison were arguing about, but with mechanical slaves.

[Speaker to Animals]

What if we transitioned to a state where we went back to a bunch of people growing food? Keep everything else the same, but we go back to feeding everyone with less efficient and more labor intensive farming.

The inefficiency eats away at the surplus labor created by too much efficiency everywhere else. The price of food would rise, and it would go directly to the small family farmers. We'd have to first be able to get rid of all large agg and such, but assuming we could.

Instead of a welfare state, we'd have a state closer to what Jefferson and Madison were arguing about, but with mechanical slaves.

That's essentially what I was saying. Encouraging homesteading does this. No more subsidies for Big Agra might help.

The big problem here is that the entire world has become dependent upon our food yield surplus. If we did this, a lot of people are going to starve in the developing world.

Globalism is a fucking train wreck all around. The shift has to be global back towards sustainable local economies, of I think some really bad times could result down the line when food, credit, and other economic shocks ripple across the world.

[Speaker to Animals]

And with respect to living in a human kennel and digging holes in order to survive, I'd choose becoming an outlaw over that, as I suspect most of you would if you truly were faced with the dilemma. The only way to sustain such a world is through massive state violence and coercion that makes North Korea look like a high school experiment. In reality, huge segments of society would check out. They would become tribes right under your noses and they would slowly erode your civilization from the inside out. Which, truth be told, is already happening. Tribalism is on the rise in the West. Explicit tribalism with a growing community of people who want to do just this.

We need real solutions here. Welfare states and libertarian pipe dreams of letting people starve to death with no minimum wage won't save this ship.

[Fife]

The big problem here is that the entire world has become dependent upon our food yield surplus. If we did this, a lot of people are going to starve in the developing world.

I'd rather subsidize American labor and capital going around the world to teach the world to grow its own food than subsidizing General Mills.

[Speaker to Animals]

The big problem here is that the entire world has become dependent upon our food yield surplus. If we did this, a lot of people are going to starve in the developing world.

I'd rather subsidize American labor and capital going around the world to teach the world to grow its own food than subsidizing General Mills.

It's not that simple. Libertarians have a tendency to look at humans as interchangeable, when that's simply not the case. Look around you. Only two groups of people managed to develop complex, technological societies.

None of the excuses pan out. We have dumped billions upon billions of dollars into Africa over the past fifty years in the form of government aid, charity, and subsidized goods and services, to little effect. They are a tribal people. It's not like you can just go there, show them how to form corporations and innovate, and then walk away from a prosperous western nation.

Nigeria is one of the most resource-rich nations in the world, and among the poorest per capita. Iceland is one of the most resource-poor nations in the world, and among the richest per capita.

Whatever the solution is for them, either it needs to be based on tribalism, or we need to actually impose circumstances on their people that will select for high-trust, low-violence society over time as happened to us in the middle ages and to the Chinese over two thousand years ago.

And you can't really impose those things. We could, for example, demand social reforms that would turn Africa's extractive social and economic institutions into productive institutions, but the ruling class will never allow it to happen. They'd rather their people not receive the aid in that case because such reform would take away their power and wealth extraction. In a tribal system, the ruler runs the society to his benefit and the benefit of his clan. There exists no fealty to a wider group of people. You care about your closest kin first, and your care diminishes as people become further removed in relations to you.

If you think that's just some unique circumstance common in Africa, then I'd invite you to take a gander at every major population of African-descent people in the world outside of Africa as well.

I feel like whatever we do only makes it worse. We advanced first and we harm the rest of humanity by pretending as if all they have to do is "believe" in the miracle of the free market or whatever to do the same thing. What we did, and what the East Asians did, was a major evolutionary step that others have to make in their own way. And, just as the European and East Asian peoples do it completely differently, I suspect a future African people would do it differently. The advanced civilization they someday will form will be their own thing, not a copy of our own.

[Fife]

We need real solutions here. Welfare states and libertarian pipe dreams of letting people starve to death with no minimum wage won't save this ship.

I agree we need solutions. Speaking of pipe dreams, the fantasy of $15 employment for making garments in California is a rather cynical one. Too bad for the people who can't escape. They are the ones who will huffing paint in that shit-box, or out killing old ladies.

[Fife]

The big problem here is that the entire world has become dependent upon our food yield surplus. If we did this, a lot of people are going to starve in the developing world.

I'd rather subsidize American labor and capital going around the world to teach the world to grow its own food than subsidizing General Mills.

It's not that simple. Libertarians have a tendency to look at humans as interchangeable, when that's simply not the case. Look around you. Only two groups of people managed to develop complex, technological societies.

None of the excuses pan out. We have dumped billions upon billions of dollars into Africa over the past fifty years in the form of government aid, charity, and subsidized goods and services, to little effect. They are a tribal people. It's not like you can just go there, show them how to form corporations and innovate, and then walk away from a prosperous western nation.

Nigeria is one of the most resource-rich nations in the world, and among the poorest per capita. Iceland is one of the most resource-poor nations in the world, and among the richest per capita.

Whatever the solution is for them, either it needs to be based on tribalism, or we need to actually impose circumstances on their people that will select for high-trust, low-violence society over time as happened to us in the middle ages and to the Chinese over two thousand years ago.

And you can't really impose those things. We could, for example, demand social reforms that would turn Africa's extractive social and economic institutions into productive institutions, but the ruling class will never allow it to happen. They'd rather their people not receive the aid in that case because such reform would take away their power and wealth extraction. In a tribal system, the ruler runs the society to his benefit and the benefit of his clan. There exists no fealty to a wider group of people. You care about your closest kin first, and your care diminishes as people become further removed in relations to you.

If you think that's just some unique circumstance common in Africa, then I'd invite you to take a gander at every major population of African-descent people in the world outside of Africa as well.

I feel like whatever we do only makes it worse. We advanced first and we harm the rest of humanity by pretending as if all they have to do is "believe" in the miracle of the free market or whatever to do the same thing. What we did, and what the East Asians did, was a major evolutionary step that others have to make in their own way. And, just as the European and East Asian peoples do it completely differently, I suspect a future African people would do it differently. The advanced civilization they someday will form will be their own thing, not a copy of our own.

All I was offering was a preference for a suggestion that might alleviate global hunger and unemployment; that being a subsidy. It was an academic point however, because I don't support subsidies generally.

I'm not a globalist; if the Sudan doesn't want to allow our citizens to come in and make commerce with them internally, too bad so sad. I think you also know that I would end 100% of foreign aid tonight if I had the power.