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The Forum > General Discussion > The New Age of Moral Capitalism

The New Age of Moral Capitalism

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No easy task for me such a thread.
I tread a different path, avoiding, as much as I can, individuals weird thoughts, that I have just started to form opinions.
Runners contribution,not sure,truly what does his comment want to contribute.
Rache, I under stand you, disagree but under stand, our author thinks as you do.
I once did, forgive the person I was as a youth.
Not for sins, not for commitment, but for not understanding.
Few of us do not want a better world, even less would not want criminal capitalism bought to justice.
Achievable change is extremely hard to get, minority's pushing minority views are not going to get it.
No system, even the far better than Communism but tainted by it and Nazi use, wrongly, of its name Socialism worked as well Capitalism.
I can put a list of failures of Capitalism that would go around the world twice, and not end.
But the lists from other ways would be longer.
We all want better for those in need, all know of Americas street people,shameful.
Self interest, dislike it hate it, but it is the driver behind every human being.
We have to, CONFRONT this those we help the most say on welfare, too often, leave self help behind , in fact help them selves to more they do not need, vote conservative and do not care about other than self.
Dreams will not change the truth any system has faults.
Posted by Belly, Sunday, 22 January 2012 6:31:58 AM
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rache you are spot on. Pure capitalism can only operate in a totally unrestricted market. A market with absolutely no regulation or controls. In such a state there would be no place for organised labour or government legislation. Cycles of 'boom and bust' would be constant. Total exploitation of both labour and resources by the entrepreneur would be the cornerstone of society. Other than to maintain social order so exploitation could go on unhindered there would be little need for government.
The most ardent supporter of capitalism realizes such a system can not operate in the long term. That bastion of 'free enterprise' the USA still recognizers the need for organized labour and government controls while maintaining the authority of capital. Capitalism breeds inequality in society that is the nature of the beast.
I like that old protestant adage which labour has embraced for the past 130 years 'a fair day's work for a fair day's pay.' Who determines what is fair? If society was to totally embrace 'moral capitalism' you would end up with a socialist society, would you not?
Posted by Paul1405, Sunday, 22 January 2012 6:43:29 AM
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If history shows us anything it is that you cannot get a "level playing field". Even in the most egalitarian-professing of socialist administrations or the most holy of theocracies you inevitably get a preferred class.

And while it may be true that the 6% US population uses 36% of world resources. It's worth remembering the point Rhian made on another thread: "the definition of 'economic resource', or indeed 'resource', is not fixed but changes depending on demand, technology, etc. Oil was not a resource at all until the nineteenth century, when people worked out how to use it for energy on a significant scale."
It is conceivable that many of those "resources" would not be seen as resources by communities who seem to be only in the business of making babies.

And the other side of the equation is, while the US may consume 36% of resources it also does most of the research and produces most of the break-throughs that lead to medicines to treat the other 94% ailments.And it produces the bulk of emergency food that goes to feed the other 94% when they have overstocked and degraded their turf.
Posted by SPQR, Sunday, 22 January 2012 7:17:05 AM
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SPQR I agree totally with that.
Lets lift the curtain on some victims of Capitalism country's.
Education Government and Religion combined, and controlling.
To such an extent progress is impossible.
And the view God will fix every thing stopping the activism self interest drives.
Rather than push the wheel barrow of a better brand of Capitalism, real improvement can only come with TOTAL SEPARATION of Church and state,that would be promising.
Take the Capital West away and we stop progress.
Humanity has not found its end point yet, we may take many more years to find a better way but pushing against public opinion gos no place.
Posted by Belly, Sunday, 22 January 2012 10:50:41 AM
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Many on the Left like to blame all of the world's woes on the West and on the US in particular, but according to the Global Footprint Network (GFN), which has actually tried to do the math, the US is responsible for about 15% of the world's consumption, and the top billion people in the richest countries are collectively responsible for about 38% of the consumption. 62% of consumption therefore takes place in the poorer countries. The only way to completely avoid consumption is to be dead, and if there are enough people, it doesn't matter if the per capita figure is low. Here is a link to the GFN 2010 atlas. It is worth taking a look at the tables starting on p. 28 and the graphs showing the relationship between environmental footprint and rank on the UN Human Development Index starting on p. 21

http://www.footprintnetwork.org/en/index.php/GFN/page/ecological_footprint_atlas_2010

It is clear that the level of consumption required to give people what we would consider a minimally decent quality of life is quite high. Even if the US cut its consumption in half it would make relatively little difference in global terms, and global population growth (currently adding about 80 million people a year) would soon erase any benefit.

Some forms of consumption are simply senseless waste that benefit very few people while needlessly trashing the environment, and capitalism does bear some responsibility for this, but I can see no reason for forcing ordinary people to lead crowded, joyless, regimented lives just so that we can cram in more of them.
Posted by Divergence, Sunday, 22 January 2012 12:27:48 PM
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Great points, Divergence!

http://www.smh.com.au/national/prolife-push-in-labors-ranks-20120121-1qbaq.html

Mind you, I'm pretty pessimistic about our species. You'd think
that educated people could somehow separate religion from reason
and at least those with a basic understanding of biology would
have an influence.

Given that in both Australia and the USA, there seems to be a trend
back to the days of the "holy zygote", in the world of politics,
I don't think we have much hope. Nature will have to sort it all
out the hard way, the way I see it.
Posted by Yabby, Sunday, 22 January 2012 1:59:34 PM
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