commies

[Cannavore]

the workers should own their own labor and control what they produce through democratic mechanisms doesn't mean everyone must be a worker lol. you wanna try running a traditional capitalist business model in a socialist economy go for it, nobody is stopping you. good luck staying in business and hiring people to work for you though lol.

the capitalist ruling class will never allow the economy to be reformed in a more ethical and moral direction (we just saw it two president cycles in a row with Bernie Sanders... not even milquetoast social democratic policy is allowed in our hypercapitalist hell hole).

 

[h.h.]

Does capitalism have to be traditional? Does it have to be corrupted? Is socialism automatically corruption free? Or do corrupt individuals simply exist and we have to deal with them?
The answer to the baby formula dilemma is more producers, not a single state sponsored unity. An increase in the number of capitalists. More small business.

 

[St. Phatty]

The US Military is the WORLDs largest Climate 'polluter'!

Also ANWR oil is not sequestered forever.

It's Money in the Bank - for the US government, or maybe it will be farmed in 2045 or something.

 

[Cannavore]

Does capitalism have to be traditional?

You happened to focus on the one word that I said that's basically irrelevant. Why would workers want to work in an autocratic work environment where they have no say in anything including their wage when worker owned democratic workplaces is the goal of socialism?

Does it have to be corrupted?

Capitalism will always be corrupt. Yes. Name a time in American history where the economy wasn't dictated by a few elite.

Is socialism automatically corruption free? Or do corrupt individuals simply exist and we have to deal with them?

Its a lot harder for corrupt individuals to get away with it when the decision making is done democratically.

The answer to the baby formula dilemma is more producers, not a single state sponsored unity. An increase in the number of capitalists. More small business.

You acknowledge the potential corruption within a system of unelected individual business owners and your fix for this is yo create more of them lol.
Then you falsely state socialists prefer a state monopoly? Lol no.

 

[HempKat]

It's almost as if Capitalism was designed to consume itself...

Well only if Capitalism gets so greedy that they make it difficult for the worker to continue to be a consumer or have any chance of ever being anything but a worker.

 

[HempKat]

Why do we all have to be workers?
The 1950’s were great. For some.

Nobody said we all have to be workers, in fact if we were all workers we would be unemployed because there would be no business owners/employers. Unfortunately unless one is born into a wealthy family or has some sort of amazing talent we all have to work for some period of time.

 

[HempKat]

the workers should own their own labor and control what they produce through democratic mechanisms doesn't mean everyone must be a worker lol. you wanna try running a traditional capitalist business model in a socialist economy go for it, nobody is stopping you. good luck staying in business and hiring people to work for you though lol.

the capitalist ruling class will never allow the economy to be reformed in a more ethical and moral direction (we just saw it two president cycles in a row with Bernie Sanders... not even milquetoast social democratic policy is allowed in our hypercapitalist hell hole).

Well as nice as some of his policies might sound he asks for too much for one thing. Sure student loan debt is a huge problem but it's like any other loan you know what you're getting into when you accept the loan and you're gambling on being able to pay off the loan within the agreed upon time limit. The problem with student loans is that when everyone is a college graduate having a college degree is not the path to instantly being in a high paying job like it used to be. Too many people who took those loans made the assumption they would get a high paying job right out the gate. Also a large percentage treated it like just having a college degree was a guaranteed high paying job and didn't put enough realistic thought and planning into the career they were studying for. You can get a degree in practically anything but some curriculum is about as useful as tits on a bull in the real workforce. Also there is limited openings for certain jobs, the world only needs a certain amount of doctors and lawyers and in most jobs you start out small and work at it for years before you get to where you're making big bucks. Plus not everyone is cut out for the life of a degreed professional. High school should have done more to steer some people into good paying trade jobs. Still all that aside when you sign on for a loan you're getting what was agreed upon, if you can't quickly turn your education into a good paying job that's on you, it's not a fair excuse to have your debt just forgiven. If I buy a house based on the income I'm making when I buy the house and then a few years later I lose that job and can't afford my house payment because the job I replaced it with didn't pay enough should I be forgiven my mortgage?

His Medicare for all idea was flawed too, people that get Medicare have to work a certain period of time and pay into the system to get Medicare, it's not something they automatically get because they're old. He should have left Medicare as it was/is and pushed for a government backed insurance where people still had to pay in monthly premiums and Co-pays but just make it more reasonable then other insurance packages where they would get good healthcare but at a more reasonable rate. Nobody gets healthcare for free (not counting people who abuse Emergency care services) even people on Medicare have to pay a monthly premium and deal with copays and deductibles. America is too big of a country and healthcare costs are too high to just go overnight from how it is now to everyone getting Medicare coverage for nothing. Maybe one day that might be achievable but first a lot of work has to be done on driving healthcare costs down. Sure pretty much all well developed countries off government funded healthcare but most of them have smaller populations and they worked towards that goal for decades they didn't just one day switch form everyone having private insurance to a single payer system overnight. Also most of the countries with a good government run healthcare system charges their citizens a higher tax rate then we do. If instead of trying to figure a way where the rick could fund it all he proposed a government run program with $500 per month per patient premiums he could have vastly improved the ability for people to have good healthcare and might have stood a chance at selling the idea.

The problem with the far left isn't that their ideas are bad as much as they're unrealistic, they want to do too much too fast. We've been working on creating that hypercapitalist hell hole for too long to fix it as fast as most people seem to want to see it fixed. Instead of trying to figure out how the wealthy can pay for it all we need to be working on how to get everyone employed and earning a wage that can be taxed. Right now about 60% of the country makes too little to end up having to pay taxes they either get it all back or if their employment income is low enough they even get back more then they paid in. So in a sense the rich are already paying for it all. Unfortunately there are too many ways that if you're super wealthy you can also end up paying nothing and that's where the idea of making the wealthy pay for everything seems like a viable option. If most everyone was working and made a living wage the amount of revenue the government brought in would be substantially greater and then maybe the government could afford some of these more idealistic programs.

Bernie is right on some of his points though, two people own more wealth then the bottom 40% of the country combined and when you have income disparity that great things are going to become unsustainable.

 

[HempKat]

Does capitalism have to be traditional? Does it have to be corrupted? Is socialism automatically corruption free? Or do corrupt individuals simply exist and we have to deal with them?
The answer to the baby formula dilemma is more producers, not a single state sponsored unity. An increase in the number of capitalists. More small business.

The real corruption is in the government there are laws on the books that are supposed to break up the big businesses that more small businesses might be the cure for but our representatives are able to be bought off in order to avoid those types of laws being enforced

 

[h.h.]

Nobody said we all have to be workers, in fact if we were all workers we would be unemployed because there would be no business owners/employers. Unfortunately unless one is born into a wealthy family or has some sort of amazing talent we all have to work for some period of time.

But that could change. The idea that we have to give up the ship in favor of a huge bureaucracy is a tainted one. The idea that only capitalists are corrupt is incorrect.

Unlike conventional loans, the federal student loan policy was changed years ago to prevent bankruptcy.

 

[HempKat]

But that could change. The idea that we have to give up the ship in favor of a huge bureaucracy is a tainted one. The idea that only capitalists are corrupt is incorrect.

Unlike conventional loans, the federal student loan policy was changed years ago to prevent bankruptcy.

Nobody said that only capitalists are corrupt, given that they get away with the things they do by buying off politicians proves that the corruption goes further. If however you look at capitalism beyond just big business but rather people's pursuit of ever increasing wealth then you could make the argument that business, politicians, virtually anyone who benefits in a capitalistic system are all capitalists of one sort or another.

As for student loans the problem isn't whether people can go bankrupt or not the problem is that the costs of education have gotten way out of hand to where it's unrealistic for the average person to get a college education without a student loan. When I went to college it was completely doable for a person to get a college education with the assistance of Pell Grants and then working a part time job. Sure it was tough and one would have to maybe give up things like an active social life or doing a lot of partying but hey there is nothing wrong with making some short term sacrifices while pursuing a goal of self improvement. Unfortunately the colleges and the professors that teach at them began to recognize how much value a college education represents and just like food that is better for you and therefore sold at premium prices to similar foods that are a bit less healthy colleges started jacking up their tuitions and professors started demanding much more compensation. In a capitalist society one of the worst things that can happen to a product or service is for it to be deemed is important and beneficial, it's a sure path to outsized prices for said products or services even if the cost to produce of provide for them isn't that much different then less beneficial services or products.

Another problem with student loans is that the majority of people who use them do so banking on a perceived financial benefit the education will provide. That's all fine and dandy if that benefit is realized but as soon as people have trouble getting those higher paying jobs they start wanting to be forgiven their obligation to repay that debt.

 

[Three Berries]

The reason education cost rose so much was because the government was making student loans. They had a guaranteed clientele. Salaries and positions went up. It's the colleges that benefited and are sitting on huge Billion Dollar endowments that should be refunding the loans. Not the taxpayer.

An excellent example of government driven inflation.

And will those who did pay off loans get a rebate?

 

[HempKat]

Nah the student loans were a reaction to the skyrocketing prices of College tuition. For decades college tuition remained relatively flat and it was during that period one could get a college education with the use of Pell Grants, Scholarships, working during the summer and saving up then working part time while studying or for those fortunate enough, thru parents saving up a college fund. What really changed things was somewhere in the 80's the widespread belief began to take hold that the only way to a successful well paid job, that didn't require hard work like the trades, was if one got a college education. People started believing that if they just got a degree, any degree they would get offered a nice comfortable office job that paid them well enough that they would be set for life. People believed this because virtually everyone before who got a college degree were ending up with all the best paying jobs. It used to be enough that all one needed to become gainfully employed was a High School Diploma and that's what parents would tell their kids "If you want to get anywhere in life you have to get your High School Diploma" That was back when the American Dream was alive and well and graduating from High School was all one needed to go out in the world and be successful. Pretty much only doctors and lawyers need to go to College which is why the Ivy League Schools were most famous for producing Doctors and Lawyers. Then the country went thru some rough times and you had people serving in the Military because as an incentive you could get a large chunk of government money to go to college after you completed your service. This added a bunch of new college graduates that weren't doctors and lawyers plus the rough times saw college graduates lose jobs and become willing to take most any job to become gainfully employed again and this began the time of employers realizing they didn't have to settle for High School graduates and train them up from the ground floor, they could get college graduates for the same price, some of which needed little to no training to move quickly up the ladder. Now having a High School diploma was no longer the sure path to a good job, the High School kids were now competing with College Graduates for the same jobs and this ushered in the belief that you had to have a college degree to get anywhere in life. Interest in going to college rose and with that Universities started to recognize they had greater value and demand higher tuitions. That then brought on the need for student loans because it was no longer possible for a person to do college on their own thru a mix of Pell Grants and hard work when not studying. Also tuitions were now becoming High enough that fewer families could cover the cost for their kids by saving up a college fund, something additional was needed and that something were student loans. From there it just kept snowballing to where we are today and now that the student loan path has become problematic we are also now seeing the rise of online Universities that can offer a college degree at a discount by eliminating the physical classrooms and replacing them with virtual ones. There was another contributing factor along the way that probably happened as the government started contributing less money to public education. Which was the decline of school counselling. It used to be the school counselors did more then try to figure out ways to keep kids from fighting or acting up in school. They used to do much more in spotting what each childing fixing to graduate soon had an aptitude for. In this way they separated those that were not college material away from the ones that were college material and the ones that weren't they would try to sell them on considering a career in the trades. Back then schools all pretty much had shop and auto shop classes to help the kids going into the trades begin to develop the skills they would need. Unfortunately all of those began to disappear as well with cuts to government funding for education.

 

[Three Berries]

I'm sure the pensions and exploding salaries and staff at the colleges have nothing to do the cost of tuition with the availability of ready government (now handouts) cash for loans there too. And many colleges are state funded. But full of foreign students. It's the colleges that push the degree is what you need thinking.

And the books are another (or was ) monopoly with exorbitant cost. I think they outlawed the exclusive sales of books at the colleges in Illinois. Or at least have to give you the info on them so you can get them somewhere else.

All the while many colleges sit on endowment funds worth $100s of Millions, reap $100s of Millions in grants and funding. US education system is as broke and corrupt as is it's medical industry. All for the dollar, all for the power and influence.

 

['Boogieman']

just out of curiosity, exactly what do you think they are? it sure as hell is not a democracy.. autocracy maybe? kleptocracy?

Dictatorship, it's always the end result of Communism.

 

[HempKat]

I'm sure the pensions and exploding salaries and staff at the colleges have nothing to do the cost of tuition with the availability of ready government (now handouts) cash for loans there too. And many colleges are state funded. But full of foreign students. It's the colleges that push the degree is what you need thinking.

And the books are another (or was ) monopoly with exorbitant cost. I think they outlawed the exclusive sales of books at the colleges in Illinois. Or at least have to give you the info on them so you can get them somewhere else.

All the while many colleges sit on endowment funds worth $100s of Millions, reap $100s of Millions in grants and funding. US education system is as broke and corrupt as is it's medical industry. All for the dollar, all for the power and influence.

I didn't say that the pensions, exploding salaries and staff have nothing to do with the cost of tuition and/or are related to the availability of government money in the form of Student loans it's all connected, I'm just saying the driver for the government to start making student loans available was a reaction to the rising costs of education rather then the notion that costs rose because of the availability of student loans. The costs rose because of the widespread perception of value the college education had. It's just like anything else in Capitalism it's all ruled by supply and demand. Sometime demand is based on there being a limited amount of goods but more people wanting those goods then there are goods available. Demand can also be a factor of perceived value. it's kind of like how it is with medicine or food that is healthy there can be plenty of medicine to meet the demand but if the medicine is in the brand name phase (no generic options available) if that medicine is recognized as having life saving/changing benefits the price will go up. There can be enough food to cover the demand but if that food becomes seen as better for you then other similar options the cost of the healthy one will go up. Not because there isn't enough supply to go around but because that supply now has a perception of being better for you, more desirable.

 

[Three Berries]

I didn't say that the pensions, exploding salaries and staff have nothing to do with the cost of tuition and/or are related to the availability of government money in the form of Student loans it's all connected, I'm just saying the driver for the government to start making student loans available was a reaction to the rising costs of education rather then the notion that costs rose because of the availability of student loans. The costs rose because of the widespread perception of value the college education had. It's just like anything else in Capitalism it's all ruled by supply and demand. Sometime demand is based on there being a limited amount of goods but more people wanting those goods then there are goods available. Demand can also be a factor of perceived value. it's kind of like how it is with medicine or food that is healthy there can be plenty of medicine to meet the demand but if the medicine is in the brand name phase (no generic options available) if that medicine is recognized as having life saving/changing benefits the price will go up. There can be enough food to cover the demand but if that food becomes seen as better for you then other similar options the cost of the healthy one will go up. Not because there isn't enough supply to go around but because that supply now has a perception of being better for you, more desirable.

The old chicken before the egg discussion.

Bottom line is Federal Government should not be in the banking OR education business.

And in the case of Illinois government and public unions are incestuously related.

 

[Cannavore]

Private banking and private schools should be abolished

 

[h.h.]

We shouldn’t teach our children. It should be left to the state to decide what they learn.

 

[h.h.]

And yes the state should be in total charge of how you invest the rewards of your labor. Those politicians that you love so much will turn over a new leaf when they’re in total charge of the country.

 

[HempKat]

The old chicken before the egg discussion.

Bottom line is Federal Government should not be in the banking OR education business.

And in the case of Illinois government and public unions are incestuously related.

Well to be fair they aren't really in the banking or education business they only pass laws that either facilitate or hinder those in those businesses.