Marxists Thread

[everywhere116]

Yes, it's true. I love capitalism because I believe it has helped me get out of poverty.

Communism wont do this.

[unriggable]

My problem with capitalism is simple. If you have ever bought a cartridge of ink from staples or wherever you'll know the price tag is immense. However I know the vice president of Xerox and she tells me that it costs between four and six dollars to make one. In a communism, that type of cheating would not happen since the government owns the companies and supplies the goods to the people. But that is only a pro in a sea of cons when it comes to socialism.

[everywhere116]

My problem with capitalism is simple. If you have ever bought a cartridge of ink from staples or wherever you'll know the price tag is immense. However I know the vice president of Xerox and she tells me that it costs between four and six dollars to make one. In a communism, that type of cheating would not happen since the government owns the companies and supplies the goods to the people. But that is only a pro in a sea of cons when it comes to socialism.

Its probably 4 or 6 dollars for materials. But you then have to pay people to make it, you have to pay for machines, you have to pay for electricity, and then there is something for thier effort. Do you think they should have to go through doing work all day with no profit?

[got tonkaed]

everywhere....typically when the cost of something is listed, within that cost is the amount of labor time included in the cost along with everything else. They calculate the total cost of making something, so they can get the maximum amount of profit on what they create.

[The Gunslinger]

communism is a might be a decent IDEA but in reality it just doesnt work. plain and simple

[everywhere116]

everywhere....typically when the cost of something is listed, within that cost is the amount of labor time included in the cost along with everything else. They calculate the total cost of making something, so they can get the maximum amount of profit on what they create.

Yes, but you are missing my point. If that company sold thier product at the price it took to make it, the company would make $0.00. DO you think the owners would stay if they were earning nothing? Heck no!

[unriggable]

Its probably 4 or 6 dollars for materials. But you then have to pay people to make it, you have to pay for machines, you have to pay for electricity, and then there is something for thier effort. Do you think they should have to go through doing work all day with no profit?

I'm pretty sure you need to know costs well to be the VP of an ink company.

[Neutrino]

The point of Communism is not man against man, but man for man. They were only competing against America because they knew if they didnt, they would become outdated and obsolete. They had to do it to stay in the running, even though it went against the point of their whole society.

Thank you for making my earlier point.

What? That Russia was forced into a race that it didnt want to run? Thats plain to see if you just think about the situation for a few moments! How can pointing out the plain and obvious be considered 'a point'?

The USSR wasn't forced into a race it didn't want to run. It's all very fine and well being in favour of the principles of communism, but there's no point in saying the USSR lost because the USA didn't play by its rules.

Marxist revolution was never supposed to take place in Russia or China - it was supposed to happen in already-industrialised countries, like Britain, or Marx's greatest hope, Germany, not agricultural, backward places.

Defend non-Marxist Communism all you like, but don't bother defending the USSR or China - they both perverted Marxism more or less from the beginning. It might have taken until 1956 for many people to realise, but we at least have the benefit of hindsight.

Exept for those last paragraphs, I was trying to stay away from Russia as an example of Communism. I know Russia really wasnt the right place for Communism to spring up and that is why it is probably not the best of examples.

According to the ideals of Communism, Russia really didnt want to get into a arms race with America, but, as so often happens, the people running the place were not concerned with the ideals of the society that spawned them.

[got tonkaed]

no i understand the point. And as much as i admire other forms of economic system, i defintly understand that yes the position of the capitalist in this system gives them more of a right to the profit of course. I understand capitalist theory. Still at the same time are you telling me that CEO's have earned the right to million dollar severance packages and mulit million dollar salaries. There certainly is a balance between the two that could be struck.

[unriggable]

communism is a might be a decent IDEA but in reality it just doesnt work. plain and simple

Agree. However we can take some things from it, like welfare.

[Sammy gags]

Word on the street is that marxism is bad

[got tonkaed]

which should force one to ask, why do the people on the street tell you that marxism is bad, do they have anything to gain by it?

[GoldenNaruto]

Lies all lies

[unriggable]

I like goldennaruto's avatar. Boing, boing, boing...

[everywhere116]

no i understand the point. And as much as i admire other forms of economic system, i defintly understand that yes the position of the capitalist in this system gives them more of a right to the profit of course. I understand capitalist theory. Still at the same time are you telling me that CEO's have earned the right to million dollar severance packages and mulit million dollar salaries. There certainly is a balance between the two that could be struck.

Well, do you think that the CEO could work his worker's positions just fine? I think so. Could those worker's work the CEO's position? Probably not.

[Neutrino]

no i understand the point. And as much as i admire other forms of economic system, i defintly understand that yes the position of the capitalist in this system gives them more of a right to the profit of course. I understand capitalist theory. Still at the same time are you telling me that CEO's have earned the right to million dollar severance packages and mulit million dollar salaries. There certainly is a balance between the two that could be struck.

Well, do you think that the CEO could work his worker's positions just fine? I think so. Could those worker's work the CEO's position? Probably not.

Does the CEO deseve millions for doing practically nothing? No.

A few months ago, the CEO of Telstra (I dont think you'll have heard of it if your not Australian) recieved a 14 Mill bonus for making his company loose money!

Please tell me, how exactly is that fair?

[everywhere116]

no i understand the point. And as much as i admire other forms of economic system, i defintly understand that yes the position of the capitalist in this system gives them more of a right to the profit of course. I understand capitalist theory. Still at the same time are you telling me that CEO's have earned the right to million dollar severance packages and mulit million dollar salaries. There certainly is a balance between the two that could be struck.

Well, do you think that the CEO could work his worker's positions just fine? I think so. Could those worker's work the CEO's position? Probably not.

Does the CEO deseve millions for doing practically nothing? No.

A few months ago, the CEO of Telstra (I dont think you'll have heard of it if your not Australian) recieved a 14 Mill bonus for making his company loose money!

Please tell me, how exactly is that fair?

I am sure you do not know the exact story. Tell me what you know.

And the CEO does not do pratically nothing! Have you ever tried running your own company, let alone how big thier companies are!

[got tonkaed]

to perhaps clear some of the air....im not saying in the current system CEO's dont deserve to earn more. However i dont think ill ever be able to justify in my mind the work of one person being more than 100 times more important than someone else. However, i dont really control market value, so within the system if someone is willing to pay that salary, that individual might as well take it. But that doesnt make the system right, and if you can intellecutally justify the notion, assuming that we both believe that any individual with the right socialization, being born affluent, attending high level schools, networking with the proper circles, can rise up to that level, then you are just a different thinker than I.

[everywhere116]

to perhaps clear some of the air....im not saying in the current system CEO's dont deserve to earn more. However i dont think ill ever be able to justify in my mind the work of one person being more than 100 times more important than someone else. However, i dont really control market value, so within the system if someone is willing to pay that salary, that individual might as well take it. But that doesnt make the system right, and if you can intellecutally justify the notion, assuming that we both believe that any individual with the right socialization, being born affluent, attending high level schools, networking with the proper circles, can rise up to that level, then you are just a different thinker than I.

I can justify it because a CEO is so much more important. Take GM. There have been thousands if not millions of workers, but 14 CEO's in thier history to bring GM to where it is today.

I believe that anyone can have those positions if they work hard enough.

[unriggable]

CEO's have too much power. Look at Enron. They were able to do that under the radar.

[got tonkaed]

i think the hard work thing is to some degree a myth. Yes those who have the proper oppertunity, they have to compete against others with similar oppertunities.

Lets take an area like East St. Louis, im not from there, but ive read a fair number of articles about it (its a popular place for comparsion in my discipline). Frankly the education that i recieved is just simply lightyears better than the educational oppertunities there, part of the reason is because my basic needs are met, whereas in many cases life is just that much more difficult there. Teachers dont have the luxury of being able to develop more abstract thinking in students because frankly when your material needs arent met (which has been used as an argument against communist socities) then there simply is not the potential to do more abstract lines of thinking. Now if we take me, and take me out of my social location and instead i was brought up in that scenario, i simply never would have matured in the same fashion. Now i dont have a superhuman work ethic, but ive been able to be put through an education system, and now a higher education system that will probably lead me into academia. Its quite possible in East St. Louis i never would have made it out of high school, the drop out rate is staggeringly high. Now i ask you, if as the same person, in one situation i will have multiple degrees vs another situation where i likely would not have graduated high school (as a simple probability with the drop out rate), how is it that working hard has anything to do with it?

[everywhere116]

i think the hard work thing is to some degree a myth. Yes those who have the proper oppertunity, they have to compete against others with similar oppertunities.

Lets take an area like East St. Louis, im not from there, but ive read a fair number of articles about it (its a popular place for comparsion in my discipline). Frankly the education that i recieved is just simply lightyears better than the educational oppertunities there, part of the reason is because my basic needs are met, whereas in many cases life is just that much more difficult there. Teachers dont have the luxury of being able to develop more abstract thinking in students because frankly when your material needs arent met (which has been used as an argument against communist socities) then there simply is not the potential to do more abstract lines of thinking. Now if we take me, and take me out of my social location and instead i was brought up in that scenario, i simply never would have matured in the same fashion. Now i dont have a superhuman work ethic, but ive been able to be put through an education system, and now a higher education system that will probably lead me into academia. Its quite possible in East St. Louis i never would have made it out of high school, the drop out rate is staggeringly high. Now i ask you, if as the same person, in one situation i will have multiple degrees vs another situation where i likely would not have graduated high school (as a simple probability with the drop out rate), how is it that working hard has anything to do with it?

I dont get you here. What does poverty have to do with how hard yuou work? How does it affect your "abstract thinking"? It doesnt.

[got tonkaed]

well the idea is that when you are severly impoverished, you are forced to struggle with meeting your basic needs. Its a simple theory, you cant build your way up to abstraction, if you are forced to focus on how ill get enough money to eat.

I ask you who do you think has worked harder, The individual who is forced to work for minimum wage everday with low benefits in order to feed his family or the true highest of the upperclass such as the filmaker of the Johnson family, who was born into such incredible wealth, without ever having to work a day in his life, something possible in a capitalist system?

[everywhere116]

well the idea is that when you are severly impoverished, you are forced to struggle with meeting your basic needs. Its a simple theory, you cant build your way up to abstraction, if you are forced to focus on how ill get enough money to eat.

I ask you who do you think has worked harder, The individual who is forced to work for minimum wage everday with low benefits in order to feed his family or the true highest of the upperclass such as the filmaker of the Johnson family, who was born into such incredible wealth, without ever having to work a day in his life, something possible in a capitalist system?

I dont know who Johnson is.

[got tonkaed]

i would have to look him his name, but hes the from the family of Howard Johnson, who own the company johnson&johnson. Essentially he is worth hundred of millions of dollars, which was released to him upon his 18th birthday simply for being born a Johnson. Id recommend his documentary, Born Rich, where he struggles with whether or not the system which he was born into truly is fair.