An important, but short, point to make.
Given how Europe's economy is failing and our economy is failing, it is important to highlight not just how far these economies have deviated from capitalism, but have essentially embraced full blow socialism. Not just so when these economies DO inevitably collapse we can point out,
"Hey, look, see here? Nationalized healthcare, 40% corporate taxes, progressive tax system, bailing out failing companies? Yeah, that's not capitalism."
it's so when the idiotic children (and by "children" I mean people of all ages who are too lazy to study budgets and look up the occasional statistic on the internet because they're infected with ego investment) in a fully anticipated move blame it on "capitalism maaaaaan!"
So two little tidbits:
1. No economy where government spending accounts for 40% of GDP can be considered "captialist."
2. When 70% of said spending is spent on social programs (social pensions, health care, education, salaries for worthless non-profits who never solve anything), again, that economy cannot be considered "capitalist."
I now await for a socialist to explain how the US is capitalist.
7 comments:
Hey Cappy, was wondering if you could comment on this piece:
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/blogs/taibblog/from-an-unlikely-source-a-serious-challenge-to-wall-street-20120720
"From an unlikely source, a serious challenge to wall street"
Hey Cap,
Saw this on Facebook, had to see it
http://imgur.com/YYe0p
Some comparisons that might be of use,
Mexico had a revolution about the same time as Russia; and Mexico all throughout the last century was itching to follow the communist dream. So as not to have our southern border a worse problem than it is, we tacitly supported the PRI( partido revolucionario institucional; imagine that, the revolution being institutionalized by a party!). The PRI more or less had it´s way for 70 years and we didn´t have to worry so much about our soft underbelly. They provided for a certain stability in Mexico, but of course every once in a while they had to throw a bone to those communist dreamers. Well, on the eve of De la Madrid´s presidency( 1982, after the disastrous Lopez Portillo) Mexico´s economy was about 2/3 state controlled. And with the equally deteriorated state of all other rights( not just economic rights) in Mexico at the time, I like to think that Mexico was about 2/3 communist. De la Madrid began the long journey to turn things around which has vastly helped Mexico, but we can still see how our southern neighbor struggles.
Now, you say Captain that we have an economy(40% state) that is not capitalism, and if we can speculate that 40% of our other rights have been lost; can we look to Mexico for more comparisons of our future, even our present?
Well of course it isn't capitalism, we all know that.
But when you've come to believe that everything is relative, then the US is probably the most "capitalist" nation in the West.
It's pretty damn hilarious reading papers from "philosophers" who cite Einstein's theory of relativity as a basis for relative morals/laws. Barack Obama himself wrote a paper discussing that.
I believe 40% to 50% of the American economy is government.
There are 3 million federal employees between the civil and military. Think of the local and state employees.
Don't forget all the government contractors at the federal level which is probably another million. And consider the hundreds of consulting engineering firms that do local, state, and federal work.
We have quasi Soviet economy without the material shortages.
I saw an interview with some woman who said, "thank goodness for the public sector, it's the only thing keeping the private sector afloat"
that's some armour plated studity right there
It would be interesting to chart countries by Government Spending as a % of GDP AND % used on "social programs" and look for a trend...
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