Can't trust anyone- another thread about what capitalism does to us.

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There are a few conditions to how we live that have the result that you can't trust anyone.

First, we are all in debt. There will always be more debt than money, since every bill or coin that is created is done so by loan, and loans come with intrest. That means that if you want to pay back what you loaned with the intrest, the only place to get the money to pay the intrest is from someone else's pocket. Then it is inevitable that if you make your payments, someone else won't.
Under these circumstances, how can you trust anyone to not do anything in their power to get to your money?

Another fact is that while shortage of anything, fuel for example, is not a beneficial condition to consumers, it is a very beneficial condition to those who produce and sell fuel.
Any person who is looking at only at the market, with the single intrest of financial gain, will try to induce scarcity to get better prices, if he has the means to do so. The crown example is the diamond industry, where diamonds are locked away or destroyed to maintain scarcity so prices remain high.
So how can we expect honesty, when the condition that is least favorable to any community is the most beneficial condition for financial gain?

If we create a world where it is counterproductive to try and live by the moral responsibility we teach to children, aren't we creating nervous wrecks? We are taught that it is good to help people whenever we can, it is not nice to mislead people, and it is plain wrong to tell lies.
But anyone who makes it a priority to help people, who does not mislead people, and who tells no lies, could never successfully run a shop without betraying those ideals.

It simply doesn't pay to be a good guy. So why should we expect it of anyone?

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[+3] - snood - 11/18/2010I think it's an excellent question; and a lucid snapshot of the times we live in. I spend a lot of time around adolescents, and I often think about how these kids are going to fare in this...

@Cyracuz,

Cyracuz wrote:

There are a few conditions to how we live that have the result that you can't trust anyone.

First, we are all in debt. There will always be more debt than money, since every bill or coin that is created is done so by loan, and loans come with intrest. That means that if you want to pay back what you loaned with the intrest, the only place to get the money to pay the intrest is from someone else's pocket. Then it is inevitable that if you make your payments, someone else won't.
Under these circumstances, how can you trust anyone to not do anything in their power to get to your money?

Another fact is that while shortage of anything, fuel for example, is not a beneficial condition to consumers, it is a very beneficial condition to those who produce and sell fuel.
Any person who is looking at only at the market, with the single intrest of financial gain, will try to induce scarcity to get better prices, if he has the means to do so. The crown example is the diamond industry, where diamonds are locked away or destroyed to maintain scarcity so prices remain high.
So how can we expect honesty, when the condition that is least favorable to any community is the most beneficial condition for financial gain?

If we create a world where it is counterproductive to try and live by the moral responsibility we teach to children, aren't we creating nervous wrecks? We are taught that it is good to help people whenever we can, it is not nice to mislead people, and it is plain wrong to tell lies.
But anyone who makes it a priority to help people, who does not mislead people, and who tells no lies, could never successfully run a shop without betraying those ideals.

It simply doesn't pay to be a good guy. So why should we expect it of anyone?

what of to yourself though ?

1 Reply

@north,

Mate, you are the first poster. There couldn't possibly be any doubt as to who you are speaking to, so the

Quote:

quote

is a bit superfluous, wouldn't you say? Wink

But, do you mean what of being a good guy to yourself?

1 Reply

@Cyracuz,

Cyracuz wrote:

Mate, you are the first poster. There couldn't possibly be any doubt as to who you are speaking to, so the
Quote:
quote
is a bit superfluous, wouldn't you say?

always I try to be clear to the newer people

Quote:

But, do you mean what of being a good guy to yourself?

yes

1 Reply

@north,

Quote:

always I try to be clear to the newer people

I've been here since 2004...

Being a good guy to yourself is just another way of saying being a selfish, inconsiderate bastard, no?

1 Reply

@Cyracuz,

Cyracuz wrote:

Quote:
always I try to be clear to the newer people

I've been here since 2004...

Being a good guy to yourself is just another way of saying being a selfish, inconsiderate bastard, no?

1 Reply

Cyracuz, sure there are assholes in business, but you've drawn the boundaries around the systems you describe too tightly. People don't tend to be outright bastards because it costs. They don't gouge us too much because if we decide if we buy a product or not. Sure oil is what runs our society and you'd think OPEC could hold us to ransom, the trouble for them is that if they gouge too much they make alternatives more affordable, or worse yet, cause the economies they rely on for payment to crumble.

I disagree with your initial statement about debt, mainly because you aren't considering how wealth is created, it's not solely from debt. Sure we have massively complex financial system that creates fake wealth from it's complexity, but much longer runningeconomic systems are still pumping; agriculture, and manufacturing for example. Fix a rock to a stick and you have an axe worth more than a stick and rock.

I can't say I'm a fan of unbridled capitalism, but to blame it for creating un-nice people is cart before horse. Economic systems might encourage certain behaviours, but humans will always try to work any system. Basic game theory.

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@north,

Well, who can argue against such exquisite rhetoric? Smile

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sorry, your evil plan of presenting some twisted opinion to convince others to be like you is doomed to failure.

nice try though.

1 Reply

I think it's an excellent question; and a lucid snapshot of the times we live in.

I spend a lot of time around adolescents, and I often think about how these kids are going to fare in this corrupt world where being upwardly mobile trumps the golden rule nearly every time.

There's a "gospel of prosperity" taught in a lot of big churches, and kids are taught at school through words and actions that becoming successful is more important than everything, and that success means having more and better 'stuff' than others.

Been doing a lot of anti-bullying work lately, and the concepts about helping the victims of bullying seem almost quaint sometimes, when I'm telling them to these kids who are too often too jaded, too early.

2 Replies

@hingehead,

Quote:

I disagree with your initial statement about debt, mainly because you aren't considering how wealth is created, it's not solely from debt.

Money is what satisfies debts, not agriculture or manufacturing. And all money is always created at a debt. There is no disagreeing with this; it is presented as fact, so it's either true or false. In this case, to the best of my knowledge, it's true.

Quote:

I can't say I'm a fan of unbridled capitalism, but to blame it for creating un-nice people is cart before horse. Economic systems might encourage certain behaviours, but humans will always try to work any system. Basic game theory.

I disagree, it's not putting the cart before the horse. In this system, someone has to fail is someone else makes it. It is not about playing the system, because any amount of good will and selfless action could not change this as long as you were working with the current system.

Even in the unlikely event that all humans decided at once that it was time to end poverty, it couldn't be done without scrapping capitalism as we know it today.

2 Replies

@chai2,

Not entirely sure who you are referring to here, but in case it's the OP....

It's not a matter of opinion. If it's your opinion that none of it is true, I dare suggest that you don't know the facts.

1 Reply

@Cyracuz,

Quote:

Money is what satisfies debts, not agriculture or manufacturing. And all money is always created at a debt. There is no disagreeing with this; it is presented as fact, so it's either true or false. In this case, to the best of my knowledge, it's true

Maybe I'm not grasping your point, but money is simply a convenient way of exchanging goods and services. Agriculture and manufacturing create products that are exchanged for money (usually for less money than they cost) creating wealth. We could get rid of money and debt, and just barter, but I sincerely doubt there would be fewer assholes.

0 Replies

@Cyracuz,

Actually, debt is a good thing... The money is green paper... The only thing that makes it any good is that it legal tender for all debts, public and private... If everything goes to hell, where it is headed, you may not be able to get anyone to take a million dollars for a loaf of bread, but if you owe money on a house, they may not refuse it... In every other sense, debt is bad... The need we have been forced into, of borrowing for everything, personally, and publicly, drains the wealth right out of the nation and into private hands... The government could fix the situation, but they are part of the situation, not only collecting debt, but adding to it...

0 Replies

@snood,

That's cool snood. You're a good guy.

A
R
T

0 Replies

@Cyracuz,

Quote:

I disagree, it's not putting the cart before the horse. In this system, someone has to fail is someone else makes it. It is not about playing the system, because any amount of good will and selfless action could not change this as long as you were working with the current system.

You're wrong no-one 'has' to fail for someone to make it. People do fail, but if your assertion were true we would have a fixed number of succeeders, who become a smaller percentage of a growing population. You sound bitter about something - am I missing some subtext, I've seen your handle a few times over the years, but I don't think we've annoyed each other enough for me to have any recollection of where you're coming from.

Quote:

Even in the unlikely event that all humans decided at once that it was time to end poverty, it couldn't be done without scrapping capitalism as we know it today.

This I don't really disagree with. But I still don't think capitalism is the sole culprit. We have a very imperfect version of capitalism - there is no free market in access to knowledge so there is no level playing field. That said the real culprit is human aspiration. Our desire to consume and acquire. No economic system has yet held that in check.

2 Replies

@hingehead,

Quote:

You're wrong no-one 'has' to fail for someone to make it. People do fail, but if your assertion were true we would have a fixed number of succeeders, who become a smaller percentage of a growing population.

And isn't this precicely what's happening? You could check for yourself how money is created.

There is a fixed amount of money at any given time. Say you are one of ten people who get 10% of that money, and it comes with 1% intrest.
So when it's all payed back, there is the 100% that was given out in the first place, but there is also the 10% from intrest. But where does that come from? Nowhere. At least one person out of the ten has to lose all of his 10% so that the nine others can get the 1% extra they need.

But this wouldn't work, obviously. So we have something that is called fractional reserve banking. In this practice, any lender is only required to keep a small percentage of the total sum that is lent out as a reserve. Let's say it's 10%, which is pretty realistic.
If someone borrows 10 million, the bank only needs reserves to cover one million. So if someone deposits 10 million into a bank, the bank can grant loans based on that money for the total sum of 90 millions. This money doesn't exist, and is created upon the signing of the loan agreement.

And that is how the snowball keeps rolling. And that is what creates inflation. Introduction of new money to pay for the already existing money.

This is a hard issue to get people to see straight, because it is not only critisizing the life of the wealthy, but the dream of the poor. The wealthy don't want to let go of their wealth, and the poor do not want to let go of their dream of becoming wealthy.

But I wouldn't say I am bitter about anything. I've just begun to realize that the whole monetary system we have today is based on a scam that has one inevitable outcome. It will transfer money and power to a minority while enslaving the majority of people with debts. This is not opinion.

1 Reply

@Cyracuz,

Quote:

There is a fixed amount of money at any given time.

Sure, but you don't pay back the interest at that given time. The next day there is more money which represents the wealth (added value) that's been created.

Quote:

Say you are one of ten people who get 10% of that money, and it comes with 1% intrest. So when it's all payed back, there is the 100% that was given out in the first place, but there is also the 10% from intrest. But where does that come from?
Nowhere.

Well that's not true. You keep treating money like it's the end game - it isn't, it is an abstract representation of wealth/added value, and that is not a fixed amount - it can be, and is, increased by human endeavour.

Quote:

At least one person out of the ten has to lose all of his 10% so that the nine others can get the 1% extra they need.

Or they could go gold panning, or wash cars, or shine shoes, or trade on the stock market. Wealth/value can be created. It's not zero sum.

1 Reply

@hingehead,

Quote:

Well that's not true.

It is actually. Moneysupply is increased irrespective to the demand of goods and services. If it was as you say there would not be anything called inflation.

Quote:

Or they could go gold panning, or wash cars, or shine shoes, or trade on the stock market. Wealth/value can be created. It's not zero sum.

Wash who's cars? Shine who's shoes? Everyone is paying with the same money, every share of money comes from the same 100% pool, and as it is lent back and forth intrest comes on top of it. Sure you can make more bread, but the extra money to buy the bread isn't created. Sooner or later someone has to cash in to make his payments, and when that happens it sets off a chain reaction.

Quote:

You keep treating money like it's the end game - it isn't, it is an abstract representation of wealth/added value, and that is not a fixed amount - it can be, and is, increased by human endeavour.

I think this is an inacurate description of what is actually going on.

1 Reply

@Cyracuz,

Cyracuz, it may be me but I don't understand how you can say:

Quote:

Moneysupply is increased irrespective to the demand of goods and services.

and

Quote:

Sure you can make more bread, but the extra money to buy the bread isn't created

So money supply is increased, but extra money isn't created? What?

So wealth creation is 'inacurate'? So the net worth of the world has never changed? There's the same amount as there was when the Egyptians built the pyramids, and the Roman invaded Gaul, and the Portuguese located the Spice Islands, and when the English raised the tea tax in their colonies? Sorry I just can't accept that premise. It's clearly fallacious.

1 Reply

Can't trust anyone- another thread about what capitalism does to us.

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