Top problems affecting the world.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Drogue

I never claimed that communism didn't pay you, you're misunderstanding my argument completely. However you are paid according to your labour, when it comes to wage rate, as I said. If you're only paid on capital, why does my brother, someone with very little capital but a good job, get paid more than my father, someone who has far more assets, but is retired, and thus get's far less income?

You get income from capital by investing it, and you get income from labour by working. I made no comment about communism not paying. Please show me where my argument is wrong. However saying that you are paid solely for capital, and not at all paid for labour is ridiculous.

I misunderstood you. You said that capitalism pays you for the value of what you do. You meant things like saving and investing, not just working. I thought you meant just working. Communism pays you only for working, not saving or investing. Of course, both of them pay for work, but assuming that the same amount of work is done in both system communism pays more for work.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
BTW, communism is not equal wage rate.

Oh yes it is. If you don't have equal wages you have a bastardized form of communism.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Drogue
However your comment that the free market results in greater inequality is not an "in practice" comment, as it's never been tried. The free market, a perfect free market, allocates income based on how good you are at your job - how much you're worth to your employer. So it's distributed by abilit, perfectly, with nothing to do with need. Thus while it would be unequal, it would be fair and unequal. I don't think it's a good idea for a country to have a totally free market at all, but that is what a free market is, and since it hasn't ever been tried, we can't say it's effect "in practice", just in theory.

If you wish to make comments about economics ignoring reality, please study some economics first so you know what it is that is ignoring reality.

You're assuming that a free market would be perfect. There's a reason it isn't tried, because know one really believes that it would work. His comment is true. Free markets, as they are in practice, result in inequality. In theory they should result in equality since the theory claims that producers and workers will move into profitable and high wage industries. But of course it doesn't work that way. He's talking about reality and you aren't. And btw, he's studied economics plenty, I'm sure.

[Kontiki]

Wow - another cap/com threadjack! Keep up the good work!

But in order to really keep this thread flying, someone should bring up abortion and/or religion.

[Arrian]

I considered taking a shot at religion, but in a very broad sense (kinda what General Ludd is talking about in teaching intelligent design thread). This is something that appears to be a general failing of humanity - we often just accept what we're told by people we assume know better, whether that be priests, scientists, economists, psychics and other assorted quacks... and thereby avoid thinking about issues for ourselves. To an extent, it's necessary (otherwise you would get nothing done), but it's rather more widespread than is healthy, I think.

But that's not the worst problem.

-Arrian

[Kidlicious]

I think it is actually. The worst problem is the inability to solve our problems.

[Arrian]

Brilliant, Kid. Simply brilliant.

-Arrian

[Az]

You can't argue with that logic.

[Patroklos]

Biggest Problem?

Everyone needs to get laid more.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Whaleboy
None more so than the likes of an election. 9/11 would only probably be remembered for it's uniqueness and the fact that it stood as a kick-up-the-backside. As for the numbers of people that died, in the historical sense, it is trivial, and the post-9/11 hysteria would not be well understood by history, except in the Orwellian sense.

It's perfectly understandable. People react to the fact that other people are actively gunning for them differently than to the fact that some people died as a result of an impersonal force of nature.

[Kuciwalker]

Originally posted by Chemical Ollie
So does war and genocide. Each of them have been at least 100 times worse than terrorism in the last 10 years.

And I wasn't comparing it to war or genocide, but to natural disasters and disease.

[Sava]

Originally posted by Patroklos
Biggest Problem?

Everyone needs to get laid more.

[Az]

Biggest Problem?

Everyone needs to get laid more.

If a Patroklos, Sava, and Azazel agree on something, it must be true.

[Sava]

If a Patroklos, Sava, and Azazel agree on something, it must be true.

[Drogue]

Originally posted by Kidicious
You're assuming that a free market would be perfect.

By definition, a totally free market is a perfectly free market.

Originally posted by Kidicious
There's a reason it isn't tried, because know one really believes that it would work.

Nope, it hasn't been tried because it's impossible. You cannot have perfect knowledge of a market.

Originally posted by Kidicious
His comment is true. Free markets, as they are in practice, result in inequality. In theory they should result in equality since the theory claims that producers and workers will move into profitable and high wage industries. But of course it doesn't work that way. He's talking about reality and you aren't. And btw, he's studied economics plenty, I'm sure.

No, free markets haven't been tried. Free markets in a nation do result in inequality. Between nations, they equalize, when compared to other models. And as a philosophy tutor, I wouldn't be sure he's studied economics.