Monsieur RedPhoenixxx wrote:
See, this is why it's very hard to have a normal discussion with you gbaji. You change the meaning of words to suit your argumentation.
That's misleading by itself. Words can have different meanings depending on how they are used for example.
I'm also not the person who responded to a statement about the degree of "socialism" in Europe with a long rant repeatedly stating that Europe is not "communist". You can quibble over my use of a word, but at least I don't ignore the word used, replace it with a completely different one, and then argue based on that instead...
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Socialism is not "an inbetween state. In between capitalism and commmunism in this case." This is YOUR definition, and to be honest I couldn't give a rat's *** about how YOU define socialism. The definition I quoted was the correct one, so don't come here and tell me that it's something else.
You missed the second part of the
definition then Quote:
so·cial·ism (sÅ'shÉ™-lÄz'É™m) pronunciation
n.
1. Any of various theories or systems of social organization in which the means of producing and distributing goods is owned collectively or by a centralized government that often plans and controls the economy.
2. The stage in Marxist-Leninist theory intermediate between capitalism and communism, in which collective ownership of the economy under the dictatorship of the proletariat has not yet been successfully achieved.
Wow. You'd think I looked that up or something. I didn't. Not until you barged in with your own definition, that is. Some of us start out knowing what we're talking about... ;)
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What you are referring to is called a "social market economy". That's the expression you're looking for. And that's what we have in Europe, and that you have in the US too, albeit to a lesser extent.
Who'e quibbling over words now? Is that really what it's called? Is that really "different"? Or did someone just come up with some different words so they could convince people like you that what your government(s) doing isn't really the same thing as real socialism...? Cause you don't believe that your governments, given enough control over the means of production, might just become defacto "dictatorships"?
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having said all that, you're whole theory about the free market in Europe not being "free" is both misleading and circumstatial.
The European Union is founded on the principle of free movement of workers, capital, goods and services. These four Freedoms are the cornerstone of the EU. Competition is "free", and while government does impose standards and regulations, not much more so than in the US. 95% of all the private sector is the same as in the US, and if it wasn't, we wouldn't be competing on the same marketplace.
Free movement, and "free trade" are not the same thing. Capitalism also is *not* the same thing. "Free Trade" has to do with governments reducing tarriffs between eachother. It has to do with trade, but not specifically to do with capitalism. China trades goods. The USSR traded goods. The mere act of trade occuring between two nations does not imply the use of capitalism. Free trade and free market are not the same thing.
Capitalism is something different as well:
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cap·i·tal·ism (kăp'Ä-tl-Äz'É™m) pronunciation
n.
An economic system in which the means of production and distribution are privately or corporately owned and development is proportionate to the accumulation and reinvestment of profits gained in a free market.
There's a few key points there. Means of production and distribution are privately owned. That's one we can debate. I'm positive there's a lot more "means of production" under state ownership or at least heavy state regulation/control in Europe then in the US. You are correct that this is just a matter of degrees though. The more important bit is the second part: "proportionate to the accumulation and reinvestment of profits gained in a free market". In the US we allow our businesses to reinvest their profits into new ventures. In the EU profits are taxed to provide benefits to the people instead. That, far more then any other thing, is the key difference here.
The re-proportioning of wealth from the top end of the economy to the bottom via government (taxation and entitlement) is what makes a nation socialist. The degree to which this occurs can vary of course. We do this to a small degree in the US. It's far more prevalent in Europe. It's not just about how much direct control the nation has over it's industry, but also the degree to which the government of that nation controls the
wealth generated by that industry. If we're to contrast capitalism and socialism, we must look at both of those aspects.
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What is left is that *in general*, the EU is a tiny bit more regulatory than the US. But not much more so. And, once again, this is making huge generalisations. In many countries in Europe, especially in Eastern Europe, the economic system is less regulated and more "free-market" than in the US. Take the flat tax, for exemple. Even in the US, Republicans are slightly scared of talking about it.
Viable points. I still think you're using the wrong litmus test when you declare them "less regulated", but we could literally wander around debating that all week long and never come to an agreement as to what "more regulated" really means. I'm not sure what you're getting at with the flat tax statement. However, that's also a gross simplification. When we talk about flat taxes, we're talking just about income taxes. That's only one piece of the taxation puzzle. That's not touching corporate taxes, VATs, sales taxes, tarrifs and numerous other forms of taxes that affect businesses differently then people (usually), and the wealthy differently then the poor.
How you structure your tax system says a lot about the viewpoint a given nation has about wealth and how it should be used. And that's much more core to any discussio contrasting capitalism and socialism IMO.
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There are differences in the economic systems of the EU and the US. But implying that these tiny differences are enough to produce some sort of giant conspiracy, such as the one on global warming, is quite simply laughable.
It's not the on paper differences, but the direction they're leading that makes all the difference in this case. Socialisms have a desire to increase the amount of the economy that is controlled by the government. It's not just about direct control (as I've already pointed out). Economic control is just as good (and is, in fact, a more common methodology). The way in which European socialisms gain this power (the ability to take wealth from the top and redistribute it to the bottom) is by convincing "the people" that if they don't, some horrible thing will result. Common tactics are to focus on the plight of the poor, the hungry, the homeless. But those in the government don't really care about those things. They care that by getting the people to ok programs that redistrubute wealth from the top to the bottom (to fix those problems), they are the ones who get to handle that money. They gain more control over the industries they are taxing. The government is the one now deciding who makes money and where that money goes. That's not a "free market" at all.
Global warming is just another tool. Remember. In this particular case, we're talking about "democratic socialisms". They can only gain control over the industry if they can convince the voting public to give them that control. Thus, there's a definate desire to highlight problems so as to convince the voters to shift that power and control to the government's hands. Every little bit matters in this case. If global warming concerns allow a bill to pass that requires oil companies to pay X amount of extra money to pay for some fund the government will control (presumably to deal with global warming), then that's more power for the government. Same deal with research. Right now, no one's really pushed any "solutions" to the problem of global warming. As I pointed out much earlier in this thread, I have yet to see any scientist publish a peer reviewed paper that lays out a set of specific actions we can take to reverse the rise in temperatures.
So what are we doing with the whole global warming thing? Well. Pretty much all of the effort goes into more research to investigate it. Hmmmm... I don't know about you, but that certainly implies a vested interest on the part of the scientists. The government wins because they get to control more of the economy. The scientists win because they get more funding from that extra money. The people think they're winning because they've got a government that is "taking global warming seriously".
It doesn't take a conspiracy. Just people don't what they naturally do. I'd explain the whole "red/green game" reasoning for why building a structure that requires people act in ways counter to their nature doesn't work, but that would be a whole nother post. Suffice to say that IMO, the biggest flaw of socialized systems is that they assume that no one ever gets greedy for power or money. So while everyone is patting themselves on the back for how "mature" their society is, they don't notice that they're creating a system rife for corruption. Again. It doesn't take a big conspiracy to cause this to happen. Just individuals acting in their own best interests in a system in which their best interests wont result in a best result for everyone else.
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Now, read what I quoted again. See how different it is? It wasn't "the president", it wasn't "rioting", it wasn't about "underperforming", and it has nothing to do with the relationship between the governemnt and the private sector, but everything to do with changes in teh labour laws, which exist in every civilised country in the world.
Not going to dispute most of your points there. I did get a couple facts wrong there (it was presented in the US as Chirac doing this, so sue me).
However, it has *everything* to do with the relationship between the government and the private sector. If you hadn't grown up in an environment where the relationship is already so screwy, you'd see this. In a "normal" economy, it's normal for employers to be able to fire people if they don't perform. In fact, the very idea that there's some status of "permanent employment" (is that a government regulated status btw?) is antithical to the basic priciples of a free market.
I don't care what "class" the people demonstrating were. The very fact that they demonstrated and the government basically backed down on the position shows the degree to which the government controls the market (and the people control the government). In the US, it would be unthinkable for the government to pass some sort of law requiring an employer to hire someone permanantly, without the ability to fire them if they didn't work out, much less having people demonstrating that it was unfair if they couldn't get that status in the first place.
That highlights the absolutely *huge* differences both legally and socialy between the US and Europe. You think that's normal. We think it's insanely stupid.
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Now, please explain again how you link changes in French labour laws to a European-wide conspiracy on gloabl warming?
It's not the labor laws themselves. It's the social approach to the relationship between "people->government->industry" that I was getting at. The demonstrations show the degree to which government controls industry. I mentioned earlier that one of the indicators that you're in a socialism is that "the people" exercise control over industry by applying pressure through government rather then directly to the industries themselves. In the US, if a business is using practices we deem unfair, people will organize boycotts. Aside from the liberals who seem to try to get the government to step in, most of "the people" use their pocketbooks to put pressure on the industry. This works in a free market, because the biggest threat to a business is their customers. The more government controlled your economy is, the more this shifts to government. Industry fears actions, regulations, and whatnot from the government more then it fears consumers withdrawing their funds. The people know this, and act to force government to impose changes (or lack of changes in this case) on industry if they don't like the result.
How does this relate to global warming? It's not the specifics but the process. If the methodology by which changes are applied to industry is to get "the people" to march and protest, forcing the government to apply those changes, then the same argument applies to global warming. The way you get the government the power to apply extra controls or restrictions on industry is through the people. Same deal. Convince them that global warming is a huge threat, get them to march and protest. Make them demand their government take more control...
That's how they're related. Surely you can see that if you live in a system where people marching in the street over an issue is what leads their government to make changes with regards to industry, that if you want to make a change with regard to industry, you do it by convincing "the people" of the need first. After all, they're much easier to convince of something then a smaller group of experts who might know something about the subject.