Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Koreadays]

poll

[chellovek]

Was telling some old guy I was a Communist last night and he thumped me on the arm and said I had a black heart.

[blade]

Only two choices? Both options are ultimately unworkable and doomed to failure.

[Big_Bird]

[The Happy Warrior]

A limited gov't and free-market system means significantly less corporate and special interest capture, at least until someone convinces everyone that gov't is the only answer, again.

But, I would say a progressive income tax must accompany that, balanced out with some consumption and carbon taxes. The middle-class is ultimately a political creation, but a robust phenomenon that just needs to be lightly taxed (the rich should be moderately taxed).

I actually favor European democracies over Keynesian democracies (US, Japan), though. A social safety net is a more reliable, if expensive, cushion than what we see here in the States. In the States, we employ Keynesian stimulus in recessions, but we don't ever save during healthy times. The result is a debt trap. Of course, Europe has a problem with demographics, but given that France has a healthy birthrate, I do not attribute the cause to its social safety net but rather something else. Anyway, social safety nets rely on a steady, stable increase in population to keep the worker/retired ratio high, so they're imperfect as well.

[caniff]

[Big_Bird]

[Koreadays]

well the majority of the world follows similar governments
it seems capitalism is the way we live. but frankly I think it's not working anymore. sure it use to work in our fathers generations. but not now.
now greed is going to far and no one is stopping them.
winner takes all, means literally the man at the top is taking it all and living nothing for the small guy.
why would anyone want to hold onto a dream where one day you might be in the take top 1%? you have a better chance at winning the lottery!
this is not a fair system.

[Wai Mian]

There isn't a single free market government on earth. risk is socialized, profit privatized.

[Sergio Stefanuto]

As others have said, the question of the thread is based on the flawed assumption that our only options are laissez faire and socialism. Neither of these things exist in the developed world. But also, state management or intervention is not synonymous with socialism. Take a classic economic intervention - import tarrifs (say, the state imposes a tax on imported apples to protect domestic apple producers). Is that socialist? No, it isn't. What characterizes socialism is public ownership and paying every citizen a dividend. So the state nationalizing apple production would be socialism; the state merely imposing a price floor, yet apple production, operation and profit remaining private, isn't. Just because a policy is anti-free trade, it doesn't intrinsically qualify it as socialist. This is a false dichotomy.

Concepts clearly defined are conflicts half-solved!

All developed world economies are "state-managed", yet all practise a form of capitalism. There isn't a single developed world state that's nationalized production, but nor does any practise complete free trade, as governments impose all sorts of price floors, which are anathema to free trade. Developed world economies, then, are mixed though broadly capitalist, because the essential feature of capitalism - making a profit from owning and investing private capital - is what broadly characterizes and funds them, whether it be 'socialist' Germany or 'capitalist' Switzerland.

The economic policies I personally favor are privatization where ever feasible. I'm very opposed to government-run healthcare and education. Income tax would be abolished, if it were up to me, and replaced with more ethical, more efficient taxes. But government-lovers needn't worry, because the state still needs to fund many things which are desirable to us yet don't attract private capital. Countless scientific, medical and other achievements are funded by the state that otherwise wouldn't exist because investors weren't interested.

If we were to do this, I feel certain that hitherto unimaginable economic blessings would be brought about across the whole of society, probably resulting in a second Age of Enlightenment.

[AsiaESLbound]

Socialism is between communism and capitalism, but doesn't usually mean a loss of freedom. In a social system, you have capitalist elements like business, but your country's tax dollars are being used for domestic purposes; not maintaining an imperial global rule using bases all over the world. In a social system, taxes are used for health care, infrastructure, small business programs, unemployment programs, and other needy programs to ensure everyone are taken care of. In a system like Germany, it used to be that the trains and main suppliers were ran by the state, but they privatized in the late 1990's. I would still consider them to be socialist in the line of domestic programs, but very much a highly competitive lean mean business machine. I think Germany, Denmark, and Sweden give us fine examples on learning how to do a country system.

America has also had social systems for quiet some time, but not as much so today as back in the 1980's and 90's. They no longer give out to those in need the huge blocks of cheese, butter, silver cans of peanut butter, and big bags of rice that say, "From the people of the USA." These are probably shipped overseas. Now food pantries only give out stale donuts and maybe 1 pound of meat with pantries running dry in these times. Medicaid and SSI are very much the stuff the American social system is made of which poor and elderly disabled people live on. Meals on wheels lunch programs for the poor and elderly disabled are also another example of a social program.

A social system is simply something that benefits the majority. It can be a city mass transit system, public schools, and cheap bottled drinking water. I can't understand why so many are against socialism, because having decent social systems and infrastructure for all to benefit from means having a healthy middle class without 3rd world country level of poverty. When the economy itself fails to take care of people, socialism is the answer. To keep a social system sustainable, the government has to either tax everyone or it has to be producing value that makes it the needed money. Many governments around the world operate in the black instead in the red borrowing trillions of dollars. America continues to reduce it's social programs due to budget hardships. It's obvious America is only nailing another nail in the casket by killing socialism as if it's evil. Remember, in socialism, you can still be an entrepreneur and there's small business programs, but you may not make $100,000,000 a year to be CEO. Isn't $250,000 a year enough to do that job while taking care of people and producing long term value for your company, your economy, your people, and your country? The only loss of freedom socialism presents us is you can't greedily take $100,000,000 a year from the economy.

[caniff]